I had a lot of fun with my field research. The process of observing and reflecting on the natural world around us presented me with many interesting inquires. I really enjoyed noticing small connections in the ecosystem and trying to think of ways to study it. My first challenge presented itself in picking a topic. Most of my original questions were on a population-level (such as “how do squirrels communicate?”) which did not fit into the realm of Ecology. The woodpeckers prevalent in my study area interested me, especially how they were typically found in groups of 2-3 individuals around oak trees. I eventually settled on studying if they held any preference to oak trees, and to have a testable hypothesis, I compared this preference against spruce trees.
I originally started by using simple random sampling strategy. I would randomly generate a coordinate in my study area, and then record the nearest tree species (distance-based), and any nearby birds. However, this was an inefficient way to measure bird behaviour and preference as the birds were scarce and would regularly be in a different tree than the one recorded.
This lead to my second design, a haphazard sampling strategy where the sampling units were individual woodpeckers rather than individual trees. The plan was to locate a woodpecker and then record the length of time it spends in each species of tree. With direction from Professor Elliot, this design was also determined to be inefficient and not uniform. Recording a woodpeckers movement would’ve proven difficult as they may fly away at any time, as well as being quite time consuming. There was also a problem with each sample not being uniform, which could’ve lead to a confounding variable such as there being primarily oak trees in the sampled areas.
Finally, I settled on a randomized block design using belt transects that divided two tree lines, oak and spruce. By reducing the study to only two species of tree I was able to directly compare the two rather than having a large amount of poorly recorded species. Secondly, I recorded the number of woodpecker cavities in each site, which was a large improvement over the previous two designs as it allowed me to take a further look into their past behaviour as well as the various reasons why they may be creating these cavities. And was also much easier to record. These trees were in a planted row in an outdoor gardens so I was able to accurately set up a belt transect that would contain one tree per sample. Thirdly, my original hypothesis compared oak trees and pine trees but after finding the site I changed the hypothesis to compare oak trees and spruce trees.
My final obstacle was a large outlier in my data. I struggled to decide if I should include it in my data, and ultimately decided to remove it. There were two important reasons I did this, starting with that it lied far beyond Q3 in a statistical outliers test, ruling it a significant outlier. Additionally, this sample unit was much different than every other sample unit, containing six deep cavities (nests) while every other tree combined only had three deep cavities. Although I did leave it out of my data, it did provoke an interesting question, do populations of woodpeckers all live in the same tree? This would make for good future research.
Overall, I really enjoyed this project. It gave me a better appreciation and understanding for the way that a community is filled with various interactions. Practicing with Ecology and its multitude of research designed gave me a great appreciation for the field. I particularly enjoyed the process of redesigning my research until I found a way that worked. Being able to open my eyes to the connections of ecosystems and to think critically about how they came to be and how they exist is an invaluable skill that I appreciate being able to walk out of this course with.