Heading home soon

This is likely to be my last update for a while because I'm heading home for a few months. I'm leaving South Africa on the 2 December and arriving back in Missouri late on the 3rd. My plans are mostly open but will revolve around a few commitments. I will be traveling to a conference in Salt Lake City from 1-10 January and I'll be in Winnipeg for a couple of weeks in the middle of February. I also hope to see some friends that are scattered across the southeastern US, but that depends completely on whether or not I get any job interviews. I've got applications in at universities across most of the US and Canada, so I might be in your part of the country at some point as well. Right now, my plan is to come back to South Africa for a few months next year before I (hopefully) start a real job.

I would love to hear from everyone while I'm back, so send me an email or a note on Facebook and I'll give you a call.

A quick update

The last month and half has been absolutely packed with work, largely because I've spent so much time traveling this year that a ton of work has piled up. We recently finished the elephant shrew project that we started shortly after I arrived last year and I've been busy writing the manuscript. I've also managed to get a couple of other manuscripts finished and submitted in the last month, so I'm finally starting to dig out a bit.

To add to the stress, it's job application time and I've been submitting applications left and right to universities all over North America. To that end, I'm going to be heading back to the States for about 3 months this winter. The tentative plan is to arrive in Missouri about the 9th or 10th of December and fly back to South Africa sometime around the end of February. I'll be at a meeting in Salt Lake City the first week of January and I'm going to spend a couple of weeks in Winnipeg working on a project. With any luck, I'll actually have a job interview or two as well. Otherwise, I have no real plans and will probably be looking for something to do during that time and would like to see some of my friends.

Brazil was a blast!

I'm back in Pretoria after three weeks in Brazil. I traveled with Andrew, Ben, and Berry and Hana Pinshow from Israel and have to say the company was definitely a memorable part of the trip. The first week was at a conference in Campos do Jordao. Not much to say about that week...a very average conference in an obscenely expensive resort town.

The second week was spent at the Pantanal Wildlife Center, and wow, was it worth it. The Pantanal is a birdwatcher's paradise, and while I'm not much of a birder, it was still amazing to see. Far cooler than the birds were the giant river otters, giant anteaters, and crab-eating foxes. The entire three week trip was made very worthwhile by a very up close sighting of a large male jaguar while by myself in the bush (sorry about the crappy picture, it was almost dark). That was an experience I won't soon forget.

The third week was at Igauzu Falls. It was an amazing sight, but it was exceedingly touristy and we made the mistake of visiting during the long weekend associated with Brazilian Independence Day, so it was even worse. 

All in all, it was an amazing trip and I would suggest you visit Brazil if you get the chance.

Just a quick roundup

I've been back in Pretoria for a couple of weeks now and have spent the mornings driving back and forth to Ezemvelo to trap elephant shrews and the afternoons and evenings working on digging out from all the manuscripts that have piled up over last few months. The Ezemvelo project went relatively smoothly, and when combined with last year, our sample sizes should now be sufficient to publish that project in a nice journal.

More importantly (at least for me), Andrew, Ben, and I leave for Brazil in 10 days. Our trip will start with 5 days at the International Ornithological Conference in Campos do Jordão near São Paulo. We'll then head to the Pantanal in western Brazil for about a week of bird watching for the ornithologists among us and for me, possible sightings of jaguars, tapirs, giant otters, giant anteaters, and a list of other ridiculously cool creatures. After that, we'll be off to Iguazu Falls on the Brazil/Argentina border for a few days before heading back to South Africa.

No more Namaqualand

I just returned from seven weeks of absolute relaxation in the Namaqualand and I'm trying to readjust to city life. Namaqua was, as always, unbelievable. Ben and I completed the nightjar project and finished a second project on elephant shrews, so hopefully two good publications will come out of all the work. A definite highlight of the trip was stopping by a graduate student's field site to play with a pangolin on the way back to Pretoria (that's her in the picture).

It is now less than one month until I leave for Brazil, which I am very excited about, but I have a ton of work to finish between now and then (I guess that's what seven weeks of slacking off in the Namaqualand gets me). I have several manuscripts that need to be completed and submitted and Ben and I will be going back and forth to Ezemvelo next week to do the second year of the elephant shrew project we started last August.

Otherwise, everything is going to be relatively dull for me for the next few weeks and I'll be easy to contact.

Namaqualand Again

It's been awhile since I got an update posted, so here we go. I got back from Poland at the end of April, and have to say that trip was a complete success. I then had two days in Pretoria before I headed out to the Namaqualand to catch freckled nightjars and elephant shrews. Our original plan was to be there for two weeks, but we had so much trouble catching animals that we added a third week and still ended up with less than half the animals we were hoping for...sometimes biology is hard. I've been back in Pretoria for a few days now trying to dig out from under all the work that piled up while I was gone. We turn around and go back to the Namaqualand around the first of June to spend two months doing research. I can't wait, I love that place a little more each time I visit! Once I get to the Namaqualand, I will have very little email access, so contact will be limited.

Just a few more days in Poland

My time in Poland is quickly coming to an end and I'll be heading back to South Africa early next week. My time here has been interesting--definitely a very different culture than the one in which I grew up. Michal has been a great host and we accomplished quite a bit with the experiment, let's just hope the data tell a good story. We went to the Old Town today, which is the original part of Torun. Absolutely amazing architecture and a very cool feel to the place, along with some neat history (it's the birthplace of Nicolaus Copernicus, which is the statue in the foreground of the picture). I took a bunch of pictures, but can't upload most of them until I get back to SA.

I will only be back in Pretoria for 2 days before I turn around and head to the Namaqualand for 12 days. I am unbelievably excited about that because it's still my favorite place in southern Africa. Unfortunately, during that time, contact will be a bit limited.