Cascades

If you wonder what keeps me so quiet all these months, I have an answer for you. I'm thinking. Thinking of how to catch the world and transform it into easy understandable formulas. However, the world is slippery, global and moving at a speed of 107278.87 km/h* around the Sun. So that's why the thinking part takes so long.

 

Our daytrip to Brackendale on Dec 30th was breath-taking

Nevertheless, I have some ideas. They are more concentrated around two kinds of flying objects: eagels and geese. I added a more sessile being to the equation, to make it more interesting. It has to do with my origin too. It's called: eelgrass.

Short eared owl at Boundary Bay

What if we can find that the returning eagle does not only disturb waterfowl in his shadow, but also increases grass growth? What if eagles increase their own foraging opportunities by chasing geese? It may not be its intention, but it happens all the same.

Summer goose, Stanley Park, July 2012

 I see eagles chasing geese all the time, but catching them hardly happens. Can you follow my train of thoughts? Eagles disturb geese from their feeding grounds, enabling eelgrass to restore from constant grazing damage. Denser eelgrass beds will appear, which will offer more hiding places for newborn fish. These fish grow to become large eagle prey, enriching prey availability for eagles.

Eagle taking a break from tourists, Brackendale, December 30th

What is needed to test these thoughts? A model, a tree of chances, or a rake? Can we analyse footsteps by following the tide, and fly over waves with microsatellites? If helicopters disturb feeding geese, can we use these as tools to simulate eagle wings? Disturbance is just a branch on the tree. We need collections of faeces, snails and fish, we gather data of eelgrass and feathers. But all these facts on a pile cannot make our vision clear. We need statistics and algebra, maybe a marinde shifting stable states from biologist to mathematician. Do I hear you laugh? I laugh with you.

Try to analyze the landscape of fear. Estonia, April 2012

Does the same occur on the other side of the Atlantic? I shift through continents in my mind, but going there in a physical state is less economic. Can we reproduce what happens on the other side of the world, without going there? That only makes sense in the mind of a desk-biologist, but I push away that idea completely. We need real observations of life.

These salmon eating eagles don't need to perform a wild goose chase. Brackendale, December 30th

So what’s the effect of eagles on eelgrass?

It sounds like a poem if I am honest. And it makes total sense for a Volendammer to focus on eels, if not on grass.

Snowy owls are back at Boundary Bay. November 2012

*source: http://geography.about.com/od/learnabouttheearth/a/earthspeed.htm