And now for something completely different….

My work has taken a detour away from bats, to horses and dunes! I have been so fortunate to be working as a Research Manager for the Sable Island Institute. They have partnered with Parks Canada to launch a large study to better understand the very unique, every-changing ecosystem on this beautiful, majestic, remote island: Fences in the Sand

With upwards of 500 horses grazing on the island, a frequent question that gets asked is “how do the horses influence the island’s ecosystems and organisms”? To answer this, we will keep horses out of 9 plots (1ha or less) on the island and monitor how things change, and we will compare these changes to where horses continue to have access.

Before excluding the horses, I spent 2 months during summer 2021 collecting data on the island’s geomorphology, soil quality, soil communities, plant communities, and invertebrate communities. I had a lot of help from an amazing field technician, Erica Geldart, as well as the awesome Parks Canada Summer Intern, Almeera Ahmed.

Erica (L) & Krista (R) using quadrat to sample plant community. Photo credit: Almeera Ahmed

L – R: Krista, Erica Geldart, Almeera Ahmed, Dan Kehler ,

The data we collected will be used to monitor changes over the next 4 years to examine what happens when horses are excluded from the 9 areas. To exclude horses, myself, Parks Canada staff, and a hard-working group of volunteers spent 2 weeks in the fall building electric fences.

Now we wait…and collect data over the next 4 summers to track any changes! Stay tuned to see what we find out!