I'm sorry for the lacking updates recently. To tell you the truth, not much has happened. It's getting colder and the hoverflies are fewer. There are still some out, today I even saw some marmalade flies. Unfortunately they don't necessary behave well for our project. The flowers are also looking kind of shabby by now. I fear this may be the final week for field studies. But then again, so did I think about last week and today I did collect some data =)
Following approximately 20 mm of rain yesterday it was, to say the least, wet outside today. Malin and I went to the Botanical Garden where we found a plenty of soaking wet bumblebees. They happily crawled onto our fingers, hoping to get some warmth. After a while they were able to stretch their wings, trimming bangs and legs and fly away.
We also saw a fly that is as yet unknown to us. Unfortunately, I did not get a particularly good picture, but this will have to do. We have also been contacted by Katten & Björninen who filmed us at Botan's day during the weekend. Here is their nice repotage: https://vimeo.com/137823508 Last Saturday Malin and I were in the Botanical Garden that celebrated Botan’s day with exhibitions of geraniums, sale of flowers, honey and much more. Pretty soon Erik showed up and stood with us all day. A good ending to his time with us in my opinion.
The weather was generally with us even though both our decorative vases fell over several times and threatened to soak all our technical equipment, which was saved at the last second. There were lots of people and we were even filmed by Katten & Björnen. Today I first found a good spot with several flies. Then i looked for negatives and got a rerun from yesterday. "Hm, there are no flies but some bees there. Maybe I should take that as a negative...? No there is a drone fly." Followed by "well there are no flies at all here, even though they look like they may be yummy for hoverflies. I'll do some negatives there". After 2 minutes there was a fly in the area tasting several flowers. So i moved on only to find a new place without hoverflies, or any other insects for that matter. When I had started with the measurements a Helophilus showed up and I'm absolutely sure he/she saw me and landed on a flower for just one second only to mess with me. I could no longer use them as negatives, but they weren't strong enough positives either. And then the wind got stronger.
Hoping for better luck on Monday. Tomorrow I hope I see you in Uppsala botanical garden! Me and Malin will be outside the Café. I have now worked for two days without Erik. His last day is actually on Monday, but he is on vacation these last days to continue with his education. Being alone has been tricky in several ways. First, the weather suddenly got worse again. Second, it is now so much equipment that I had to put it on a bike to manage to bring everything. And today the flies have been very difficult with me. First, I ended up in a place with marmaladeflies, drone flies and syrphus. Then I saw a drone fly that was not quite a drone fly. Malin said it was a Helophilus. Then I found a good spot to make negatives and made half of the measurements when it was cloudy. Then all clouds disappeared and drone flies appeared. Of the roughly 200 flowers they could choose from they, of course, sat on the ones I had marked as "free of flies". And I could not use them as positive either because I made measurements of light and temperature while it was cloudy. So today's data only consists of two flowers :(
This week we have been to the botanical gardens but also in BMC's courtyards. Yesterday we got a nice visit by a cat that meowed happily when we greeted it. Then it stroked itself against my legs and went on, as only cats can do, and ignored us.
There are a lot of hoverflies. Lots of Marmalade flies and drone flies are increasing too. It is good for Malin who is watching the territorial behavior of the drone flies. Next week is Erik's last. Very sad to lose him. Also cumbersome to implement all measurements on my own. So if you are a bit bored and curious about what research means, you can contact us :) If you do not have time for that, me and Malin will show what we do outside the cafe in the Botanical Garden next weekend. Come and see what we're doing! Last week was busy. There were a lot of flies, which of course meant nice work. Unfortunately though, we had some hick-ups with the equipment, which of course was less pleasant work. We have now replaced three cords so everything should work again.
Suhrid was traveling to Denmark and Germany last week, but today he will return and accompany us in the field. On Wednesday, he travels back to India where he and Shannon may soon start looking for hoverflies in Bangalore. Here in Uppsala we expect to have about a month before the flies disappear for the winter. Hopefully the high density of hoverflies continues so that we can gather lots of data during that time. At the end of last week there were so many hoverflies! Mostly Marmalade flies, which made me very happy, as that’s one of the flies we’re very interested in. Funny thing was that they weren’t at all afraid of us. Instead they were almost “ruining” our measurements as they returned to flowers they had left where we had started to do measurements. One day they sat down on a flower we were supposed to take pictures of, another day Amadeus was doing some sampling of abotic data and the flies gathered around and were very curious about both the equipment and his hand. Today they also had some interest in the abiotic sensor. Funny little creatures, those flies :)
Hello again!
Today is my last day here in Uppsala and It's been two super lovely weeks. There has been much field work and very instructive. During the field work we looked for hoverflies that pollenated different flowers. We marked them as positive and took some tests in the form of reflected light and more. After that we gather scents from flower with the help of various materials. Now when I quit today I go home and pack for the trip to India with experience and more knowledge from the university here. I am really happy and grateful for the time here and that I was given this special opportunity. Thanks for me! Kind regards Amadeus The last week has finally had better fly-weather. Sunshine and white clouds with a bit of heat. Today we just went in BMC's courtyard and just outside. More than that was not needed. One of the flowers we looked at was so popular that we could hardly make our measurements because a marmalade fly came back all the time and wanted to munch on the flower goodies. But it was great company and an appreciated problem instead of lack of flies and tangles with the spectrophotometer.
Yesterday was a good day for photos on the hovering insects. Among other things, I got some pictures of a marmalade fly that showed itself from all angles. |