
I collected a few marine amphipods, and showed them to my companions. Perhaps not surprisingly, most soil scientists are relatively unfamiliar with intertidal crustaceans, so there followed some entertaining discussion about the relative ugliness of our chosen study systems. Amphipods are basically ugly creatures, apparently. A nice, rectangular pit or a long, straight transect are more elegant, according to some opinions.


My companions continued on their tour of the landscape while I busied myself with marine collecting. Almost the only macroinvertebrates present in the intertidal here are amphipods. At a guess based only on gross morphology, I’d say there are 3 or 4 species here, all in quite high abundance. I’m not sure what they eat, or why they are so active, but they’re gratifyingly easy to collect, and they certainly count as a core taxon of interest for my project.
I moved in a wandering path inland, gradually making my way back to camp. My companions were expecting me back for lunch, so I needed to check in at least. Polar bears generally approach this area from the sea, so among all of us I am probably at greatest risk of an encounter. Fortunately, no bears were seen today.

After lunch, I went out again for a bit to find some more critters. Today is probably the last day I’ll have to devote entirely to my own work, rather than helping my companions, so I tried to take advantage of the situation and cover lots of ground. The biodiversity here is much higher than around Resolute, but still very limited compared to more Southern locations – this is tundra, just as surrounds Churchill, but it’s as clearly different from Churchill as Churchill is from Northern Ontario.
Tomorrow I plan to collect from more ponds and streams, and I’ll help with the work my soil scientist companions will be doing.
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