Go with the Floe

I'm moving!

Hello all! (I know, it's been 3 years. A lot has happened. Sorry.) I'm moving platforms and evolving a little in the process. Catch up and find me on Wordpress!

Time has just flown by! Today is our last day already! With a few last-minute runs into town to snag souvenirs in between, we completed our final projects and prepared to present them to the scientists from KISS in the evening (We had a great turn-out for our presentations! Thank you to all who came to watch us!). I have learned so much from this experience. I gained a much more profound understanding and appreciation of the polar ecosystems and the cultures of the people living in them, and words cannot express how grateful I am for that. My experience in Greenland shaped me as a person and as a budding scientist, and I am looking forward to returning someday. I'm sad to leave, but I enjoyed my time in Greenland immensely, and I'll always be looking for a way to get back. I owe an enormous thank you to everyone who was involved in this program; to all the Danish, Greenlandic, and American students, teachers, scientists, and behind-the-scenes workers, who not only made this trip possible, but who made it amazing, thank you.

Tuesday, July 10, 2012

PERMAFROST!!!! (And Soil Profiling)

We went out with Julia and Ruth (from Dartmouth University) again today! They visited us in the morning to share atmospheric carbon dioxide data from our last encounter and to teach us about gelisols ("ice soils"). We traveled up to an area near Lake Fergusson and discussed remote sensing techniques (the use of satellites, cameras, or other methods of observation to perform preliminary surveys on a landscape), vegetation classification, and the purpose of soil pits. Julia and Ruth have been using soil pits (deep holes dug to reveal a soil profile) to analyze fluctuations in the depth of the active layer in relation to that of the permafrost layer. Each group was assigned an area in which we dug our own soil pit. We measured the depth of the permafrost layer at various locations and compared the results. My group dug our pit on a north-facing hill slope covered primarily in grasses and small shrubs. The top 8 centimeters of our profile was moss! That layer was followed by a 4-5 cm layer of organic soil (dark, nutrient-rich peat) beneath which was a layer of mixed sand and silty clay. Our pit was comparatively shallow - only 28 cm of active soil on top of the permafrost (other groups' pits ranged from ~40 cm deep to ~55 cm deep). We hypothesized that this is largely due to the orientation of the slope to the sun. Because the hill is north-facing, the slope is less exposed to the sun than the surrounding area, and the permafrost layer can exist at a shallower depth because the ground is cooler. This activity gave me a different perspective on the ground beneath our feet - and a chance to play with some permafrost! It was so much fun!

This doesn't have a lot to do with what we did today, but I thought it might be worth mentioning; relative to its level the day we took discharge measurements (July 3), the Watson River has risen considerably and is flowing at a seemingly greater capacity than before. It's extremely formidable!
Tomorrow will be our last day in Kangerlussuaq. I'm so sad to be leaving, but I've definitely got the Polar Bug, and I'll be looking for any chance I could possibly get to return to Greenland! For now, I'll just have to enjoy the time I have left.

Group 3 digging our pit!

PERMAFROST!!!!

The inside of our soil pit

We stuck Sydney in a soil pit...Aqqu wanted to leave her there

The rock pictured used to be completely exposed

The water of the Watson River was getting dangerously close to the main water supply for the town!

Monday, July 9, 2012

Åsa Rennermalm from Rutegers University visited us this morning and brought us up to Point 660 to assist her in taking discharge measurements. We took measurements in a small stream, found baby birds (Redpolls specifically), and "bumpy-bused" (a school bus was our mode of transportation for the day) up onto the moraine. We took a slippery hike out onto the ice to run maintenance on one of Åsa's ablation stakes and weather probes. Åsa uses 3-meter-long bamboo posts to track supraglacial (on the surface of the glacier) melting. As we drilled a new hole in the ice for the stake, Åsa told us about the previous month's measurements. A 3 meter post she placed in the ice on June 8 was completely exposed when she returned 16 days later (on June 24) to check on the weather probe associated with the ablation stake. She explained that it is typical for the ice sheet to undergo seasonal melt, but not at as drastic a rate as 3 meters in 16 days.*

On a different note, I officially caught the "Polar Bug" today. I now know that I caught the "bug" as soon as I applied for this program, but it didn't quite catch up with me until I was out on the ice sheet away from the edge of the glacier. They're really not kidding when they say that once you've been out on an ice sheet, it's guaranteed that you won't want to leave the polar regions. Standing in the sea of ice and sky, its hard to avoid being drawn in by the ice sheet's presence. It truly is a powerful feeling, and it's what draws many scientists to return time and time again. See for yourself if you'd want to come back - check out the pictures.

*Regarding this, many of you may have heard about the sizable chunk of the ice sheet (twice the size of Manhattan!) that calved off into the Arctic Ocean early in July. Perhaps you've even heard about the major melting measured by NASA. Additionally, while in Kangerlussuaq, we experienced the massive flooding of the already fast-flowing Watson River. These matters are definitely worth further investigation especially regarding the potential influence human activities may have had over these normally natural occurrences. Here's a link to NPR's story on the iceberg and the melting: http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2012/07/25/157343661/heat-dome-linked-to-greenlands-biggest-melt-in-30-years

Asa's device for measuring discharge.

Sunday, July 8, 2012

Rikke started us off this morning with a presentation on fossils and evolution. Afterwards, we all trucked out to the local fossil beds. Although they are now fully exposed, the beds were formerly located on the ocean floor. For this reason, we found everything from clam and mussel shells to full fish fossils while digging through the sand and silt! After a while, though, the inevitable happened, and Sydney, Dana, and Fie started an all-out mud fight. Amid much squealing, mud-slinging, and shouting, Agnes, Sasha, and I took cover and did our best to avoid being hit while we continued digging for fossils. Aggu simply sat back and laughed while all those who weren't involved in the fight took pictures and video.

Things settled down after a little while, and all the crazies left to get cleaned up. Those of us who weren't completely coated in mud settled back into digging for fossils, which turned out to be quite fruitful. I found half a fish, an interestingly shaped piece of what I think was something's jaw, a full fish, and a ton of clam shells. I'm excited to clean all the gunk off of these things and uncover what they actually are! (Hopefully I'll have some better pictures of these to share later, but right now they just look like lumps of dirt.) So exciting!

We had a fun little movie night this evening. We watched The Proposal, which was actually pretty popular with the Greenlandic students. Another great day in Greenland!

Saturday, July 7, 2012

We had a day to recover from yesterday's intense hiking. After finishing yesterday's video editing, we had the rest of the day to ourselves - I napped. :) In the evening, we enjoyed a spectacular Greenlandic feast! The Greenlandic students served up smoked salmon, boiled shrimp, Matak (whale skin and blubber), Danish Rugbrød (rye bread), and scrumtious hardtack-like crackers. I tried everything, including the whale, which had a mild flavor, but was like chewing on rubber. We also enjoyed some herbal tea made from a native Greenlandic plant. We played some Inuit games and had a little friendly competition before bed. What a fabulous day off!