Picture from front left to right: Kristine Birkeli, Viljar Storvik, Vendula Spackova, Elias Skaslien
Hi! I’m Elias Eide Skaslien, and I am a master’s student in Between the Fjords. For my master’s project I have been travelling with Kristine Birkeli and Durin around Norway to investigate diurnal fluxes in different macro- and microclimates in Norwegian heathlands. This has led me to Kautokeino, Senja, Sogndal and Lygra.
Throughout my fieldwork, I got to know many new and lovely people. We had plenty of interns to help us out with projects, where some of them went to university and some to high school. There were also other master’s students linked to Durin there as well as other researchers. We ended up being quite an international group of people with people from all over the world. This group helped massively in making the trip (even with some tiring fieldwork) a great one, and I wouldn’t mind going on another one.
The fieldwork itself consisted of preparing my plots, doing my measurements and helping the others with theirs. This could be both tedious and entertaining, but it was always educational. I feel like this fieldwork has helped me understand how fieldwork might look later in my work life. Although the protocols and locations will be different, I feel like this has given me an insight into the fieldwork mindset and how to adapt on the spot.
One of the parts I found interesting was the difference in measurements between the northern and southern sites at night. Of course, I expected a difference, but it was still cool to see the difference when it was pretty much all dark in the South and quite bright in the North. The nature in the North was formidable, both in terms of sights and insects. Especially with the Kautokeino killer mosquitoes.
I want to extend a heartfelt thank you to Between the Fjords and the Durin project, with a special shoutout to Kristine Birkeli for making it possible for me to do my fieldwork. I’m also grateful to Klima og energiomstilling at UiB for funding the trip.
In the picture from front left to front right: Sam King, Ross Brown, Viljar Storvik, Diana, Teresa Pissermayr, Elias Skaslien, Marine, Vendula Spackova, Bente Sagabraaten, Sonya Geange.