Verity goes North: Fish are jumpin' and the cotton is high

A butterfly I found on the camp gravel pad that appears to be weighed down by a raindrop

This picture is taken at the same ice-wedge slump that I have pictures of in my previous post... the thawing has continued and now some willow plants are toppling in towards the stream bed.

Marjan in an ice cave

Will, from inside an ice cave

Eriophorum vaginatum (aka cottongrass) is flowering profusely at the site of the 2007 Anaktuvuk River Fire

The border of the burn is visible from the helicopter because of the flowing Eriophorum

Beautiful day on the tundra

Healy, Alaska

This past week I left Toolik Field Station and traveled to Healy, a small town a few hours south of Fairbanks. In August I will be enrolling in graduate school at the University of Florida and my research will be based just outside of Healy. My advisor will be Dr. Ted Schuur and I will be researching nutrient dynamics associated with permafrost thaw. The field site I will be working at is off of Stampede Rd, which you may have heard of if you've read or seen "Into the Wild."

The wood struts to the left of the boardwalk support snow fences that are installed during the winter. The snow drifts that accumulate on the leeward side of these fences acts insulates the soil and provides a 'winter warming' experimental treatment. The tall, plexiglass chambers passively warm the air during the growing season, providing a 'summer warming' experimental treatment.

The blue cables in the foreground are hooked up to a series of autochambers that periodically measure fluxes of CO2. This data is paired with other environmental observations to assess the impact of the winter and summer warming treatments on the carbon balance at this site.

The metal sheeting that is peeking out of the ground here is part of an experimental drying treatment. The sheeting goes down to the depth of the permafrost and a pump is used to lower the water table within the plot.