The campus has been relatively uninhabited by humans over the last few months which has left nature alone to do its thing! This is going to make fieldwork even more rewarding, now that Covid rules have relaxed to allow students with practical work as part of their study, back on campus.
New Covid regulations have allowed some precious in-person teaching over the last couple of weeks. These undergrad students are doing interesting fieldwork around campus at the moment, as part of the Survey and Monitoring for Biodiversity module (DI303) here with Prof Richard Griffiths.
The broad aim of this module is to provide students with practical field experience in biodiversity monitoring and assessment methods. Specific aims are to introduce students to a range of basic field techniques and develop their skills in the collection, analysis and presentation of field data. The module provides an essential practical element of the Wildlife Conservation programme.
This week they have been examining newts and small mammals.The newts are part of a long term study on campus. You can see the mammal traps being set up and a wee vole too! This week we’ll be looking at birds.
Of course, all the animals get released after!
Thanks to Dr Jake Bicknell for the photographs!