West Coast

Hello;
Last week I went to the WEsT coast for three days to look for field sites for a project we are doing this summer in collaboration with people from Landcare (a crown corporation akin to the ministry of environment). We are looking at the development of pollination networks (imagine a food web for pollination interactions) along a glacially created chronosequence. In other words, as the glacier retreats it created new habitiat for plants and animals to colonise. So we will have young sites near the toe of the glacier with a young plant and animal community, and old (~120000 years) sites higher up on moraines with a well-established but nutrient-limited community. From these types of chronosequences we can not only look at the effects of dwindling soil nutrients (as they are washed away and used by vegetation), but also the build-up and dwindle of communities. In general, the communities get increasingly diverse up to about ~50k years, then diversity drops off. I will have sites near to the Franz Josef glacier itself, as well as closer to Okarito (a nice sea-side town mostly with 'bachs' (i.e. cabins). It should be interesting, as the area gets 3 to 11 METERS of rain per year (in contrast, Vancouver gets a mere 1 m). My current logistical difficulties are figuring out how to get pollen off bird heads and how to get traps 30 m up into a Rata tree (curse bird pollinated trees!).
Here are some photos of the west coast - Okarito to Franz Josef.