What being a field scientist is really about.

Canines have always been a passion for me.  I loved dogs ever since I can remember and I got more and more interested in wolves in my late teens. It was since then that I decided I would like to specialize on wolves in the future, study them and help in their conservation.  I am currently on my way towards trying to achieve that by becoming a researcher. When I am done with my undergraduate, I will apply for a Masters and a PhD, get a Dr. slapped in front of my name and begin a life of wolf studying. The main reason why I am writing this article is because people tend to have a skewed notion of what this will entail. Not just wolves but other animals as well. The media have exposed the public to people who love animals(either through documentaries, reality shows or viral videos) and people either expect you to end up that way or expect themselves to end up that way.

Case and point is Steve Irwin. For those who don’t know Steve Irwin was a brilliant naturalist, a man with a passion in conserving the Australian wildlife and he had a strong love for crocodiles. He is often seen jumping around, being really energetic, picking up animals, wrestling crocodiles and the sort.  Now Steve Irwin was a brilliant passionate person and a great conservationist but he was never a scientist. Not in the conventional sense at least.  Any scientist passionate about crocodiles would not do what he did. It’s not to say that what he did was wrong.  By all means Steve educated generation upon generation (including me) about the Australian wildlife and he was a brilliant TV persona. He was not however a scientist. As much as we all would like  to have a life similar to Steve’s, a scientist’s research is either done in the lab or in the field for a while, then data analysis and then writing. If any biologist is intrigued by crocodiles, then they will either monitor them from afar, breed them in lab conditions or take data from somewhere else.  It all depends on what you would like to investigate on a particular animal.

When I tell people I want to study wolves I often get send videos of Shaun Ellis, usually with comments along the lines of “this will be you in a few years”and so forth. I hope it is not.  The closest I can hope to be is any videos you see from field biologists conducting wolf research such as Doug Smith. Although they handle wolves, most of the science done is either through observation or non-invasive behavior. And at times where humans actually get involved with wolves it is under controlled situations. Allow me to explain why. If you were to bond with a pack of wolves, a pride of lions etc you skew animal behavior, you mess with the data. This sort of data would not be accepted by the scientific community due to biased nature in which they were gathered. Hence if I ever were to become a TV persona  then it will probably mean I am not a scientist.

There needs to be a clear distinction. The people you see on TV handling animals are rarely scientists and what they are doing most of the times is not science. While some documentaries feature recordings of the methods that are used in scientific research, they do not show the painstaking statistical analysis or the paper analysis. I am not saying don’t be a scientist. Just be wary of what the media pass on as science and just take everything with a pinch of salt.

Finally, Steve Irwin was a great influence in my life. This article is by no means meant to be a disrespectful to him what so ever. I just thought I could clear the lines for people who don’t get the differences.

Species of the Week: Goosander

Species of the Week:
Goosander(Mergus merganser)

1. It is found in Europe, North America and central and northern Asia.
2. It's wingspan is 78-98cm long and weigh about 0.8-2.1 kg.
3. Males during breeding season have a greenish hue on their head while females and juvenile males have a brownish hue.
4. These ducks have sawbills. Sawbills are bills that have serrated edges to help them hold their prey and grab their prey easily.
5. They are diving birds, which means that they dive into the water to acquire their food. 
6. Goosander lay about 6-17  white to yellowish eggs that usually incubate in tree cavities.
7. When they are disturbed they will disgorge their food before running away.
8. Goosander have been known to stumble and fall frequently when they are on land.
9. They can be found in both salt-water and fresh-water areas
10. Although not threatened, some conservation work has been undertaken to make sure they aren't victims of shooting or poisoning.

Let's meet halfway

Today’s article is because of some recent events that I observed.  As I already said, I have been accepted into a center to study wolf behavior over the summer as part of my dissertation. Naturally worried family and friends are all anxious about my health. What if the wolves turn on me? Won’t they rip me to shreds? Will the insurance policy cover it?

Joking aside I was still shocked by the misinformation and lack of proper scientific knowledge the general public has. I am not expecting a person to know the latin names of each wolf subspecies or all of their behavior. I do however expect at least a common understanding. Wolves won’t attack humans. This isn’t about wolves though. It’s about science and communication.  Science and the general public rarely mix.

It is only recently that scientists acknowledged that the general public should understand the weight that some papers and experiments have on the way the world is shaped. Will the general public ever know though? Highly doubt it. For this scientists are to blame. By publishing papers that are too specialized, by underestimating the general public and not believing them able to grasp the concepts of science, we are alienating the public.

Now I am in no means a proper scientist yet. Even if I was I am more versed in Biology and mostly Zoological matters. This means that although I can read a scientific paper, it doesn’t always mean I can understand it.  This is particularly annoying when the subject is one that I am familiar with. If it was a physics paper then I understand why I failed to grasp it. But I am third year into my Zoology degree and there are papers that are still hard for me to read.

Imagine then a person interesting in animals. Let’s say they are interesting in physiology. Let’s say that they got a textbook and got a general grasp of the subject but they are rather inquisitive and want to know more. Now someone recommends a more advanced textbook or an academic paper. The frustration of not understanding what you are reading may be enough to make this person abandon their curiosity because they can’t understand the subject.  Wouldn’t that be frustrating for the scientist? It’s not a lie that research grants are hard to come by. If however the general public knew exactly what your research was about then maybe scientists would have an easier time trying to sort out grants, approvals etc.  Also if the public were slightly more aware about certain scientific issues then some policies can be removed or prevented. Policies that are not supported by scientific evidence but are instead pushed forward by mass public hysteria.

Now it’s not just the scientists fault though. Dear general public. Sometimes you can be so gullible or so pre-occupied that you refuse to question what you read or hear.  In one of the social media I am part of, a picture of a small pink elephant appeared under the caption “Newborn baby elephant”. The comments were regarding how cute it is, and how they have never seen elephants so tiny before. It didn’t take more than a few second to realize that what people were commenting on was in fact a dead elephant fetus. I mean come on guys. A lot of the general public may have never been around elephants before but most of you must have watched at least one documentary with them. Since when are elephants born that way? It’s not the picture that angers me. It’s the fact that people refuse to so much as double check the facts.  Search engines and encyclopedias are right in our fingertips and yet I still hear that a shark cull is a good thing.

By believing in pretty much everything they read sometimes the general public can bring scientists to a point where decide that they won’t actually bother anymore because no matter what they try and do, they feel the general opinion won’t change.

And this is what I propose. Let’s meet half way huh? What if scientists decided to try and make their publications easier to read but also the general public decided to try and keep up with science news and question everything that they are being told. If that were to happen then perhaps science wouldn’t be under a public media barrage and perhaps scientists wouldn’t be angry when legislations are passed that defy scientific work. It’s a simple solution that is really hard to implement and perhaps that is one of the sad things. But slowly we are getting there. The more educated the public and the less specialists the scientists become then the more science can be embraced as a tool to discovering the world.

Updates

Hello there everyone,
First of all allow me to apologize for missing the last couple of  the "species of the week"series. Ill try not to miss them from now on.
I just wanted to share some news with you and some ideas for the blog.

First things first. Over the summer I will be in Austria at a science center to do my Bachelor's research on wolf behavior. I am not sure how accessible the internet will be but I will try my best to add least queue a few articles for you. If I get internet access then I will provide my experiences for you read while I am there. So expect a lot of wolf talk over the summer.

Secondly I find that if I have set series it keeps me motivated to write so I decided to review documentaries along with species of the week. I will start with a documentary a month and then see from their own.

Thirdly, I will be writing more articles with one coming soon.

Thanks for understanding
Pete