It's been a week of ups-and-downs, highs and lows. Successes and failures. But that's basically a PhD in a nutshell, right?
We started the week with the unhappy sight of our malaise trap on the Fleurieu Peninsula having been destroyed by storms. It was irreparable, so we packed it up and will attempt to make two ripped malaise traps into one with some questionable sewing skills on the weekend.
The week was improved dramatically by following the hashtag #actuallivingscientist on Twitter. The idea apparently stems from the fact that many people can name scientists now in their grave (e.g. Einstein, Marie Curie, Darwin) but can't name living scientists. So the scientists of Twitter took to the internet to introduce themselves - if you have five minutes to spare, look it up and check out some of the amazing people doing science around the world!
I'm an #actuallivingscientist studying parasitoid wasps that munch on caterpillars! #stemselfie pic.twitter.com/Vj78wnGNxV
— Erinn Fagan-Jeffries (@ErinnFJ) February 7, 2017
The week then got even better with a delivery from the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery of vials of wasps from recent Bush Blitz expeditions. Bush Blitz is when a team of scientists hit a a small area hard to document the biodiversity there - recording insects, plants, birds, mammals, reptiles - everything! These samples are the first wasps we've had from Tasmania, so it's pretty exciting.
Then we got some not-so-good results back from our recent DNA sequencing, where we can't really work out what went wrong. Science doesn't always work first time though, so the trick is to try not to think of the grant money you just accidentally spilled down the drain on sequencing that didn't work, and move forward, trying something different and hoping for better results.
We then got some good results to balance that out, with a new DNA extraction method trial working pretty well!
We then got some good results to balance that out, with a new DNA extraction method trial working pretty well!
What better gift on #Valentines Day then receiving a package full of malaise trap samples from QLD? #insectsoup pic.twitter.com/JprzGB7NYP
— Erinn Fagan-Jeffries (@ErinnFJ) February 14, 2017
To finish of the emotional highs, we got a parcel from a scientist in Cairns who is running a malaise trap for us - and we found lots of our wasps! Yay! We also found this super cool wasp in the picture below - it's a wasp in the family Eucharitidae, which are know to parasitise ants! Insects are so crazy looking sometimes!
Science is emotional, particularly when results come back as basically unintelligible rubbish. But just like with the rest of life, you need to focus on the positives and just keep swimming. Or crawling, if you're a wasp larvae looking for an ant to attach yourself to, so that you can be carried back to the ant brood in the colony and slowly gorge yourself on baby ants. Each to their own!
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