Hard work, not in vain...

So we're starting a new week of research work, having concluded our research at the East Port Medway site. In our studies of abundance and distribution, early findings for this team are as follows:

- Red-backed vole: average of 10 per 2 hectares
- Deer mice: at least 3 in 2 hectares

- Chipmunks: 2 found on a 2 hectare plot

Overall density of small mammals = 10.5 per hectare (this is at the low end of the scale but we are early in the year – Chris Newman (lead scientist) would however have expected the numbers to be higher than this at this time of year, but weather has been harsh and food supplies will be low right now. The next couple of weeks are going to prove critical for these creatures otherwise we could have a potential population crash in Nova Scotia relatively soon which could have all sorts of knock-on effects for the foodchains within this fragile forest ecosystem.

Surveys of snowshoe hare droppings have so far indicated that population numbers are healthy in the East Port Medway area; and deer dropping sightings have been significantly down on 2008 so far.

We laid out new small mammal trapping grids in both forest and meadow locations at another, long-term study site today - Cooks Lake. Let the fun commence once more!