Welcome to the Mara, James!

This summer we have two undergraduate students joining us in the Mara for the first time. They are part of a Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) program through our National Science Foundation grant. The first student, James Landefeld, joined us in the Mara this week. James will be conducting research on the influence of hippo and wildebeest inputs on the Mara River food web, using both field sampling and artificial streams. Karibu James!

Bush baby

This summer we have a new field assistant joining us in the Mara... Lily will be coming along on her first field expedition! It will be a whole new adventure to have her in the Mara with us. I'm a little nervous (wildlife, malaria, equatorial sun, oh my!), but mostly excited! I hope she loves it as much as we do.

Invited lecture at the University of Antwerp

On our way to Kenya for our 2016 field season, we stopped by to visit our colleagues, Jonas Schoelynck and Eric Struyf, at the University of Antwerp. Jonas invited me to give a lecture at the Institute of Environment and Sustainable Development's Water in the World Series on the influence of large wildlife in the Mara River. It was a great honor and a lot of fun. 

Jonas and Eric visited us in the Mara in 2014 to study the influence of hippos on silica cycling in the system, and we're now working together on a paper on this topic. It was a short stay (and a little unnerving to leave 7 bags of research gear in a coin operated locker at the airport), but we covered a lot of ground and had a great time!

Jonas and Eric sampling silica in the Mara River