Nina here! To start off the third week of our externship, Trevor and I got back to work in R. We started making our own scripts to try to visualize our data and understand our results. I found a strong correlation between seed-set and fecundity and a correlation between seed-set and achene count (although the R squared value was small). I downloaded a database of plants of Minnesota from the USDA database that included information on whether or not the plants were native, threatened, or endangered as well as their fire tolerance and growth habit. I merged this database with the diversity data collected in the field in order to provide more data about each species. Next, I tried to calculate the percent of invasive and nonnative species for each plot. Meanwhile, Trevor calculated the means for the numbers of achenes in the top, middle, and bottom samples and determined whether or not there was statistical significance between pairwise comparisons of the findings. Next, he looked at confidence intervals for his findings. We both continued our work on our papers, writing up our methods sections specifically. As Trevor meant to say, there’s nowhere to go from here but up!

Trevor here! Today, Nina and I finished our work in “R” and diverged paths. I recounted Solidago to ensure that my initial counts were accurate. Nina began aggregating her data in “R” and created five extremely beautiful and effective graphs to display her data efficiently. Then, we progressed to the lab meeting, stuffing our faces with salami, cheese, and crackers as we learned about different management methods used with western prairie fringe orchids in Northwest Minnesota. Whilst attempting to answer questions, it seems as if these meetings yield more questions then answers as the intense discussion amongst fellow researchers brings up perspectives not previously contemplated, providing opportunities for future research. Stuffing our faces at lab meeting progressed into stuffing our faces at the holiday party as we joined everyone in the festivities. Highlights include chocolate covered strawberries, mac and cheese, and meatballs. Nina and I, on the recommendation of Leslie and Marty, then proceeded to walk off our meal with a stroll through the garden, visiting the amazing green houses in the Regenstein center. It’s super surreal to be inside a tropical-esque greenhouse in the middle of December! Ending our Friday, we began researching and writing the background information for our future research papers and are excited to continue our writing next week.

Nina here! Today, Trevor and I downloaded R and RStudio and started familiarizing ourselves with R by using the tutorial package ‘swirl’ and completing several of the lessons about the basic building blocks, vectors, matrices, data frames, logic, functions, and much more! Thanks in part to Trevor’s donut holes and Tracy and Lea’s support, we powered through and completed the swirl tutorials. Next, I got started with looking at my own data by reading in some of the csv data files into R and trying to get started on viewing them and writing a script to determine species richness. Also, just for fun, here’s a counting timelapse from a couple days ago of an evaluating empty, partially empty, and full achenes!

Trevor here and reporting that me and Nina are very “hatisfied” with our progress from the day. As we sat alongside each other, working on our various tasks, we invented a new word in the english dictionary: “hatisfied.” It translates to, roughly, being satisfied with being at or around halfway done. I am around halfway done cleaning my solidago samples and will most likely finish tomorrow. After that, I will move on to arranging my baggies on x-ray sheets and then x-raying them to discern if there is an actual embryo in the achene. How exciting!

On the other hand, Nina moved on to randomizing today to prepare her samples for x-raying, which she admits was a more tedious task than she had initially anticipated. But she is very enamored with her randomization wheel that she has so much that it makes up for the meticulous task it is (see exhibit A to the left). She finished about half of her bags and reports feeling “hatisfied” with her progress. She hopes to be done by tomorrow so she can prepare het sheets for x-raying for Wednesday. She also reports that she is looking forward to counting because it is a beautiful, non thought-provoking task.

It seems as if we are nearing the end of phase one for both of our projects and both Nina and I are so excited to see what comes next! See you soon—and remember to stay “hatisfied!”