ESC-ESO 2013 Conference, Guelph (Oct 20 to 23)

I just returned from a four-day ESC-ESO conference at Guelph, and it was a great conference with excellent presentations and posters.  This conference also attracted a large number of CANPOLIN students showcasing their research on pollination, and it was great to see fellow peers whom I had met the past two years, but it was also bittersweet because this was the last official meeting for CANPOLIN members as the initiative comes to an end.

The conference also promoted the use of social media: Twitter: (#ESCJAM2013), YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIn22KYNkQI), and blogs (e.g., The Bug Geek, Ibycter, and The Boreal Beetle).  The conference also invited the well known insect photographer, Alex Wild, to teach a photography workshop and to speak to everyone at the banquet dinner about insect photography techniques - keep image simple (i.e., avoid messy background), light (know where your light sources are), tell a story, avoid centering the subject (i.e., follow rule of thirds), and patience.

My trip began with a six-hour Greyhound trip from Peterborough to Guelph (via Toronto) on Sunday morning.  I was unable to make the proper connection at Toronto so I ended up waiting in Toronto for two hours (which I used the time to check out cameras at BestBuy and had lunch at McDonald's).

Harvest Moon & Baby Snapping Turtle

I was at school last night trying to print off five copies of my thesis so that I can submit them this morning to the graduate office.

I had been watching the moon for the past few nights, and it was finally full!  It is also this year's Harvest Moon because it is closest to the autumnal equinox (September 22).  It is called the Harvest Moon because fruits and vegetables ripen near this time of the month (in the Northern Hemisphere), and back when there was no electricity, farmers would use the moonlight to harvest their crops.

Today, after photocopying a few more pages at school to have everything complete and ready, I saw this baby Common snapping turtle (Chelydra serpentina) on the path next to the river.  I quickly dropped everything and snapped many photos of it.

Walks to school & Woodcock video

Came to school during the weekend to do some work.  The weather was so nice today that I decided to walk to school instead (as well as take some photos along the way).

 

Lots of American Robins are back.  Here is one watching the road.

Last few days of the course

The second half of the course (Feb 26 to Mar 1) was dedicated to bees. We learned and received a lot of resources, although the identification keys for bees are either too old or too complicated for us to identify the bees as easily as we'd liked. Nonetheless, the instructors from the Packer Lab are extremely helpful and knowledgeable, and are in the process of making bee identification much precise and accurate, e.g. for the genus Megachile.

I didn't take too many photos for the remainder of the course, but here are some:

A list of the most common genus in the family Apidae.


Went outside during lunch break on the second last day. This is the Central Experimental Farm.


Snowy weather for the majority of times here in Ottawa.


Where the course was held.

This afternoon, on our last day, we had the opportunity to tour the Hymenoptera collections in the building.

A collection of bumble bee nests. The nest in the bottom left corner was from Ellesmere Island high up in the Arctic Circle. Amazing!


More collections.

On the desk was a map of Canada, and in front of me was Yukon, the place I will be in less than 3 months.


History of CNC.

My first time videotaping using the Nikon S4100. The leader briefly mentioned one of the first collections from the Arctic, the Arctic Expedition.

It was snowing pretty hard today. Hope it gets better tomorrow for us to drive back to Peterborough.

Murmuration

Not something I usually post, but I recently came across this video that I thought was pretty spectacular. Nature never ceases to impress me.

Plus, murmuration is a cool word.

Murmuration from Sophie Windsor Clive on Vimeo.

[Video] LCBO Enviro Report - Shrike Recovery Project

This video was done a few years ago, but this was my job/home this summer and I miss it very much.

Same species, same care, but still endangered.

The video is from this website: http://www.lcbo.com/socialresponsibility/enviroreport/
More information about the efforts trying to save the Eastern Loggerhead Shrike: http://www.wildlifepreservation.ca/wildlife/shrike.php
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Thank you, Digital Photography

Another dark and gloomy day here in western Canada. I came across this video while blog-reading, and I wish one day I could take photos like these. Amazing.



Watch the video in larger version here.

366 days ago (2008-11-13) ...
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