The Crow’s Nest Research Center seeks 2-3 interns interested in environmental sciences and geography to install, monitor, and manage a multi-month project using micro-climate weather stations.
The project location will be on the 132 acres of the Crow’s Nest Research Center (CNRC), a private non-profit located in Stafford, VA that is dedicated to conservation and environmental research and education.
Project duration is anticipated to be the spring semester of 2023. Written deliverables must be completed by April 28, 2023.
Project Goals:
- Determine the feasibility of using small, micro-climate weather stations in measuring weather and soil conditions in natural habitats including meadows, forest, and riparian areas at the CNRC by setting up and collecting data from such stations, and analyzing the data produced.
- If the use of the weather stations is determined to be feasible during the project, then a next step will be to develop techniques and methodology for citizen scientists to use the weather stations in Sabah, Malaysia under the auspices of a sister non-profit there called HUTAN.
Role of interns:
- Assist in determining locations for the weather stations at the CNRC, considering proximity to one another and writing a site description for each (soil, slope, aspect, vegetation, etc.)
- Assemble and install the weather stations at the CNRC, choosing data collection intervals
- Assist in developing the software used for data collection (optional)
- Maintain and monitor (download data) the weather stations
- Assist in analyzing data
- Present the data in a concisely written report, including graphs and maps where practical and describing any persistent errors and trends
- Assist in developing a User Manual for the weather stations
How to apply:
- Email your resume and a short cover letter telling why you are interested in the project to Dr. George Meadows, gmeadows@umw.edu and Ms. Sophia Lynn, sxlynn@gmail.com
- Please apply by 5pm Thursday, 1/12/23, if you want to earn 1 academic internship credit for this experience
Materials:
- SparkFun micro:climate kit for micro:bit – v3.0, described here: https://www.sparkfun.com/products/16274
The kit includes sensors for:
Air Temperature, Relative Humidity, Barometric Pressure, Wind Speed, Wind Direction, Rain Fall, Soil Moisture, Soil Temperature
- Micro:bit pocket-sized computer, described here: https://www.sparkfun.com/products/17288
Sample code for the weather stations can be found here: https://makecode.microbit.org/pkg/sparkfun/pxtweather-bit#startrainmonitoring
WHY is the CNRC partnering with a non-profit in Malaysia?
HUTAN is a French NGO located in Sabah, Malaysia that works with local people to study and protect native wildlife including orangutan, pygmy elephants, and hornbills. HUTAN also is involved in research, education, and re-forestation. https://www.hutan.org.my/
Palm oil plantations take up most of the agricultural land in Sabah, which often results in conflicts with local wildlife populations. HUTAN has been working with palm oil planters to address these issues by developing protected forest areas, especially along rivers and streams. One recent approach by HUTAN is to encourage palm oil planters to plant small islands of forest trees in the middle of the rows of palm oil to increase biodiversity on the plantations. Greater plant biodiversity tends to invite greater wildlife movement through the plantations which, in combination with the added benefit of some shade, contributes to palm oil plants being more productive due to improved soil conditions.
To demonstrate this approach, HUTAN would like to set up several micro-climate weather stations in one of these trial plots of mixed palm oil/natural plants to gather supporting data weather and soil conditions that would be presented to the palm oil plantation owners. HUTAN would like to involve local Malaysian people in the installation and maintenance of these stations.
A CNRC board director and volunteer, George Meadows, leads the research effort in Stafford, VA to test thoroughly the micro-climate weather stations – albeit in a different climate zone than Malaysia – and to create an easy-to-use guide for how citizen scientists can perform this kind of research in temperate habitats. The SparkFun microclimate stations are inexpensive, durable, easy to operate and repair, and therefore an efficient match for building this model of citizen science. If the micro-climate weather stations work well at the CNRC, then HUTAN would use the CNRC-developed technology and methodology in its mixed oil palm/native tree plots in Sabah.
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