Monday, April 20, 2009

What has Mary been up to?








We're sorry to have been absent for awhile. Our time in Ireland has been getting very busy, especially now that my research project has started. Above is a picture of some field plots that I'll be sampling very soon now...you can see some green squares within the field, which are small plots of mustard residues that contain a heavy form of carbon (13C). My colleagues at UCD will study these plots to see how Lumbricus terrestris worms (nightcrawlers) bury residue carbon into soil, and I will look at how much of the carbon goes into microbial communities living in soil and in earthworm burrows. It's a fantastic carbon tracking study that will show how earthworms affect carbon cycling within soil bacteria and fungi! 

But we have been doing some fun things on the weekends, so it's not all been work. More pictures to come...

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