The 3D lab

A good omen

Posted on August 28, 2015 by lembrechtsjonas

It was a quarter past twelve. I just survived 3 countries and 4 airports on my way up north and now had to drive for another hour to finally reach my bed. The weather had been really bad up here all day – after two weeks of amazing sunshine, which I thought might be a bad omen for the rest of my week. But then it happened. The clouds opened up for a few minutes, revealing a sky that was barely dark, and a green light started dancing.

I pulled over in a parking lot and enjoyed my first northern lights. They were definitely a good omen, I thought. Then, after a while standing alone in the middle of the night on an empty road, gazing at the sky, I realised what I loved the most about it: the true, complete, breath-taking absence of sound while the light was dancing through the sky. It was as if it even sucked up lights from the environment.

I was totally not prepared for this to happen, as I was tired and just driving to my bed as fast as possible, so I could only take this crappy picture. Then the clouds closed again, leaving me to find back my breath.

If I was an inuit, the sky would definitely be my god.

— To be honest, I saw northern lights two years ago, but it was only twenty seconds, a very light shade of green, not moving nicely, and my camera was broken. So I thought it was allowed to start counting from zero again. —

Posted in Sweden | Tagged arctic, Aurora, Beauty, north, Northern, Northern light, Photography, Scandinavia, Science, Sky, Travel, Winter | 5 Comments

Just checking up on my dandelions

Posted on August 26, 2015 by lembrechtsjonas

Tomorrow I will go back to Sweden to check on my dandelions (and their colleagues).

They got two whole growing seasons to become as distinguished as those three in the picture, but circumstances might have been less ideal at 1000 meters in the Swedish mountains than they were back in the days of this picture…

I will keep you updated about the adventure, already excited about all the new upcoming results!

Posted in Sweden | Tagged Animals, Dandelions, Ecology, Field ecology, Fieldwork, Invasive species, PhD, Plant ecology, Plants, Scandinavia, Sweden, Travel | 2 Comments

Me after reading papers for too long…

Posted on August 23, 2015 by lembrechtsjonas

Just kidding, I love reading papers :). This is just an amazing mural I came across in one of the most famous little allies in Ghent, Belgium, where graffiti artists are free to show that graffiti indeed deserves to be called art.

Zombies, they love you for what’s on the inside.

In other news: a new family of thunderstorms has crossed our country, tomorrow morning will bring the news if my experiment survived again! Crossing fingers here!

Posted in Belgium | Tagged Art, Belgium, City, Ghent, Graffiti, Must see, Painting, Paintings, Photography, Street art, Touristic attractions, Zombies | 3 Comments

Picture gallery!

Posted on August 17, 2015 by lembrechtsjonas

I already told a lot of stories about my latest trip to Sweden, but now I grouped all pictures again in one picture gallery on the right of my site.

Reflections

Enjoy the highlights of Arctic research with these shots!

Posted in General | Tagged Abisko, Adventure, Animals, Ecology, Far, Fieldwork, Hike, Hiking, Mountains, Nature, Nature photography, outdoor, PhD, Photography, Plants, Scandinavia, Science, Summer, Sweden, Travel, Traveling, Wildlife | 3 Comments

Raging storm

Posted on August 15, 2015 by lembrechtsjonas

On thursday evening, a massive cold front rolled over Belgium, accompanied by dark and dangerous clouds and severe thunderstorms.

Of course I was worried about my greenhouse, although we had attached it as good as we could. But it had been having ‘mood swings’ its whole life already, and the design made it very easy for the wind to get trapped underneath.

A huge sailing boat to sail the storm

The worries were not undeserved, because next morning, the damage at first sight seemed huge: the plastic foil had lost the battle, only being hold in place by the net in the middle (no pictures, too worried). Bad luck.

But after a closer investigation, it turned out that only one of the replica’s got any rain, and luckily one of the control plots. Even the drought plot that seemed to be fully exposed to the elements showed no signs of water in the measurements. Maybe the largest damage only happened right after the storm?

At least the net did not move an inch!

What a relief, no damage done! Of course we put the plastic in place again, and we hope it is even stronger now. Let us just hope there are no more storms on the way!

Posted in Belgium | Tagged Cold front, Damage, Experiment, Fieldwork, Garden, Gardening, PhD, Photography, Rain, Storm, Weather | 1 Comment

Protected

Posted on August 12, 2015 by lembrechtsjonas

Achillea millefolium

During with the nice and persistent heath we were experiencing in Belgium, we started our drought experiment on the university campus.

With the help of some very welcome extra hands, we put ten by twenty meters of plastic foil over our greenhouse to keep out the rain. The lowest meter stays open to allow the wind to flow through, otherwise it will start heating up as well (like a ‘true’ greenhouse would).

It was our final chance to start the drought, as our plants were growing crazy fast and establishing very well within our experimental gaps. If we would wait much longer, they would grow too strong to experience much damage from our experimental drought.

Measuring light on the bottom of the gap

Measuring light on the soil surface

By now, half of the gaps have suffered a persistent drought of one and a half week. Plants in the gaps clearly slowed down their fast growth, compared to those that generously get precious water from us once every two days.

White clover

With the thermal camera, we closely monitor the temperature in our gaps, especially now, during the drought. On a nice day, temperatures on the soil surface easily rise above 40-45 °C.

But not all plants seem to mind the heat that much. If their roots reach deep enough to maintain access to the precious soil water, they can keep their temperatures low, often staying more than ten degrees below the environmental temperature.

Control gap, with happy dandelions

But with persistent drought and hot temperatures, the soil water will get increasingly difficult to access, making their life a lot more difficult. I’ll keep you updated!