Sheri Myler, our student who is doing a series of placements with us over the next year or so is back for her second stint. Once again, I am putting her to work and she will be blogging each day about her time here...Day 1 – Saturday
My first official day
of work back at the CFZ began with the realisation that I had forgotten the
cable for my netbook and, so, could only get a couple of hours use out of it.
As it transpired, this was more than necessary.
After I had written up
an introductory blog about arriving back in Woolfardisworthy, Max and I set
about the animal routine. During this, there was some discussion on viviparous
fish and the benefits of having algae in their tanks. The main downside is the
lack of aesthetic appeal.
We then discovered
that, during the night, tragedy had struck. It was something of a conundrum at
first, when we found one hen dead and couldn’t find the other at all. However,
some of the wire was seen to be loose and it was concluded that a fox had taken
the missing hen and the other had died from the shock of it. It was then
discovered that one of the amphiumas had also perished. The hen was buried and
the amphiuma is to be preserved.
Live feed was procured
from the nearest pet store, before Max and I filmed taking fin samples from
some preserved fish and one live one (to act as a control), to analyse their
DNA and genetically determine their species. This task allowed me to increase
my knowledge on preserving DNA. We then cracked on with the two volume George Eberhart encyclopaedia until about
nine, when we had tea.
The final task of the
day was the cat hunt. It was only a relatively short one, but was the most
dramatic so far. Only a few minutes into the drive, our hearts all stopped as
we saw a large, sleek black animal walking down the road, its big eyes aglow in
the headlights. I pressed record on the video camera but have no idea what I
pointed it at as I was too busy staring out of the window at this creature
elegantly strolling towards us. A second passed. It was a dog. Its colour, its
shape, even its gait were so cat-like. These kinds of dogs will be the culprit
behind many big cat sightings, both locally and in wider Britain . When I
look back on this incident, I remember it as a cat. This is quite an important discovery
in alien big cat research.
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