Fieldtrip pros and cons

I just had my first fieldtrip of the year, and it was fairly eventful.

After two days of travel we got to this pretty cool place we were staying. It had a self composting toilet, that had absolutely no odour! There were other cool things too, but the toilet was definitely a highlight, lol. 

Photo: The toilet and some of the rest of the bathroom.

Now the actual field days maybe not so much of a highlight at times.

Day 1.

• We got the branches I needed to take back to the lab - good
• A dead branch fell on my head - bad

Day 2

• The river was above the causeways, we could still cross safely in the Landcrusier - good
• The rain continued to get heavier so we decided to head back incase the river got higher so in the end we drove out there and did no work this day - bad but we were safe so good
• Sorting through equipment back at the accommodation we found we did not have enough dendrometer bands - bad
• Not being able to do field work gave us the time we needed to the shops to try and repair some of our equipment - good

Photo: One of the causeways.

Day 3

• We were able to get two of out plots done, and finished by 3 pm - good
• We could not drive back as a big tree has fallen on the road while we were in the field - bad
• We had no reception and had to walk for an hour as the rain got heavier - bad
• one car didn't even slow down to see if we were okay as we walked in the rain - bad
• Thankfully some locals stopped and were able to drive us for about 5 minutes, they didn't have a 4WD so couldn't take us too far - good
• We have a good contact who could come and cut up the tree with two chainsaws, and an axe and log splitter that same afternoon - good
• Found a leech friend on my arm - bad

Photos: The tree blocking our road, and the two chainsaws needed to get through the tree.

Day 4

• Collected some more branches to take back to the lab, and picked up the rest of our team - good
• Found a bunch of dried blood in my hairline behind my ear, I obviously has=d another leech the day before - bad

Day 5

• We were able to get 3 plots completed with the whole team together - good
• Heaps more leeches - bad
• Extremely high humidity leading to lots of sweating and me not being able to drink enough to keep up, which lead to painful migraine symptoms - bad
• Had a very knowledgeable local person with us who knew where a clean creek was that we could drink from - good
• A jack-jumper type ant decided to sting me through my trousers - bad

Day 6

• The team headed up to our furthest sites which requited us to cross the state border, thankfully the migraine meds I took the night before reduced the severity of my symptoms and allowed me to drive up for the two hours - good
• Once we got to the sites there was A LOT of mud to drive through, on slopes too, it took us over an hour to get to the sites they would normally be only about 10 min away by car - bad
• Thankfully, the team was able to squeeze into one vehicle and our one experienced 4WDriver could get us and all of our gear up the hill - good
• We still had to get out and push at times though - bad
• Got stung for the first time ever by Dendrocnide excelsa . A small one got me in the knee through my trousers, which meant the invisible hairs were stinging me repeatably as I walked around. There was no way I was going to work with bare legs though. - bad
• Thankfully, this site also has plenty of Alocasia spp.  growing around which can be used to remove the tiny invisible stinging hairs and soothe the pain. - good
• Had an awesome dinner at a coworkers place that night - good

Photo: Muddy beginning of our journey into the National Park, also the border fence between states.

Day 7

• The river was finally low enough that we could cross safely by foot to get to our remaining plots  and finish them - good
• Still plenty of leeches around, mozzies too - bad
• Managed to cut myself deeper than usual with a razor blade whilst working with my plant samples - bad
• Burnt myself on the kettle making tea - bad
• Completed doing my vessel lengths today - good

Day 8

• Since we had completed all of our plot work, we had a little time to do a short walk to some waterfalls today - good
• Accidentally left my seedlings in the sun, and they got pretty toasted - bad
• Went to the lab and downloaded all my data, unfortunately it looks like there was some faulty equipment so I will need to collect more replicates next time - bad

Photo: Protester Falls.

So that was the fieldtrip, the next day was a full day of driving. We did it all in one day since there were three of us to drive back. Very exhausting still.

Overall we got a lot of things done, not as much as we wanted, the high priority things were achieved :)