let it snow

Hi everybody,
Snow is the theme for my current REU research work load. We're still doing weekly (or every other week) snow sampling in the Dungeness for the NASA forecasting model. I'm also working on the protocol for snow microbial sampling, which will be done at some of the same sites in the Dungeness. This friday the snow team is heading up to Hurricane ridge to do a snow survey with Bill Baccus of Olympic National Park for their climate and mountain lakes program. So I should be knee deep (heh heh heh) in snow for a while.
The snowpack microbial survey is probably the coolest part of what I'm doing right now. It's a fairly young field so any work is considered significant. The thing I'm learning first off is how important it is to write a thorough methods section in papers. Dr. Barry has stressed as much in the past but it didn't hit home untill I had to try and write up a methods protocol off of science papers. Nothing is more frustrating than trying to fill in the blanks when someone has neglected to include a half-step here or there. Luckily I have knowlegeable proffesors I can rely on to help me connect the dots (right Dwight?....Bill?....anyone?). I've also learned some pretty cool things about microbes and snow. Bacteria is one of the most common sorces of nuclei for snow flakes to form around and microbial blooms in surface snow can reduce albedo and increase snowmelt rates up to three times. Cool huh? Tune in later (as if you weren't anyway) to find out more as my research progresses.

2009 - the future is now!

Hi again my friends,
I hope 2008 treated you well, I know I had a blast. 2009 looks like it will be even better, especially after I graduate. Collecting snow samples has gotten a bit more exciting this year with the increased amount of early snow. I'm getting ready to head back out with Rebecca in the morning to sample from our hardest to access site. I'm hoping the recent rain we've had has melted some of the snow. I have the feeling however, that our recent rain in town was more recent snow up at elevation. It's nice to have challenges in life from which to grow, right?
I'm looking forward to going to the Puget Sound, Georgia Basin Conference in Seattle this Feb 8-11. I have to go as part of a class but I get to use water management in the Puget Sound as the subject for my paper in the class. I'll be able to apply some of my knowledge in water management gained from the NASA project in my paper research. It'll also be an opportunity to widen my focus from hydrology and decision making in the Dungeness and Elwha watersheds, to that of the greater Puget Sound region. I always enjoy overlapping projects because they help reinforce and expand my understanding of an issue. It also increases the bird kill rate per stone throw ;)