Straight on to field work!

 We finally made it to Base Escudero, our home in Antarctica for the next couple of weeks!

I haven't posted until now because we have been very busy! Because we were delayed by 3 days, we had to make up for lost time. The same day we landed on King George Island in Antarctica, we unpacked the lab and got organized to start our work. We did that until we couldn't stay awake any longer, and then went straight to bed! The next morning, we headed right out to check on our experimental plots!

We left the research station in the morning and walked to our main field site. We spent the day collecting the plant and soil samples. We only stopped briefly to eat a quick lunch... though it was a very cold lunch!

Dr. Becky, Hannah, and Dr. Angelica eating lunch with the Collins Glacier in the background.

We collected samples from our transplant experiment. In this project, we have planted some of the 'pioneer' species that first colonize the soil after a glacier recedes. We want to understand how the arrival of these plants alters the soil. The best way to do that is to add them to the soil and see what happens! 

Our hypothesis is that the presence of the plants will change the soil habitat that paves the way for organisms to move in. These organisms can then change the soil to make it possible for more plants to grow. So, we added the plants two years ago, and now we are measuring the changes in the organisms and soil habitat! We collected some of the plants and the soil underneath them to measure the bacteria, fungi, and invertebrates that now live there. We will also measure soil chemistry to see how the plants changed the habitat experienced by those organisms. We needed to collect the samples immediately and get them on the extractors in the lab, or else we wouldn't have time to get everything done in our remaining time here! 

Today, we have been busy in the lab processing these samples. We have to extract and preserve the organisms, and preserve the soil for the chemical analyses that we'll do back at Arizona State. It has been a busy couple of days! I will post more details when we have some down time. In the meantime, we will keep working to catch up!