Yesterday, we had a new member joining the team! It was a virtual first day at work, but we are very happy nonetheless to have her on board now: Camille will be managing our citizen science project on garden microclimates, and will ensure we roll smoothly through the test phase this summer while building towards the full project for next year.
We are tremenduously happy to have her strengthen our team while we are frantically working backstage on getting everything ready for this ambitious plan.
In the meantime, our first batch of TMS4 ‘garden daggers’ for the season – introduced here– is happily logging microclimate data from crispy frozen April mornings and sunny afternoons. Keep an eye out on this place for some first data on the microclimate variability in my own backyard soon!
Our TMS-logger catching the first sun of the morning with their feet in a crispy frozen lawn
As we are all locked up now anyway, we decided to spread the love for garden sciencing across the world, and launched a call on Twitter for our fellow scientists with idle microclimate loggers to start measuring their own gardens as well.
There was a lucky few for which the loggers were not inaccessible in the office, just enough to give our trial project the global flare that it deserves.
1/n Okay #microclimate #SoilTemp people! We got a plan (thanks to @RagnhildGya!) As many of our experiments are delayed, there might be spare loggers lying around. Put them to good use, and put them in your gardens!https://t.co/RM7AFbWA9R pic.twitter.com/VajyxIGwVv
— Jonas Lembrechts (@JLembrechts) March 23, 2020
Cat and TMS-logger bathing in the April sun
That said, we really hope to see all in person again soon in the future! Luckily, the 3D Lab has already gained quite some experience with ‘virtual labbing’, so we are not going to let this homeworking get us down!
