AniMOVE

Before starting to explore Europe by bicycle, I arrived in Germany with two weeks of class ahead of me at the Max Planck Institute of Ornithology, located just outside of the town of Radolfzell, on the northern shore of Lake Constance. I came to take part in AniMOVE, a summer course focused around animal movement, remote sensing, and species distribution modeling. The program is truly international in flavor: I am one of thirty participating students, who collectively represent eighteen different countries.

But why am I here? Animal movement encompasses some of the most awesome and powerful biological forces on our planet: from the annual 44,000-mile migration of the arctic tern; to the unparalleled size of a caribou herd; the stunning flocking behaviour of a starling murmuration; to the unpredictable impacts of invasive species. These phenomena and countless others have a profound impact on our environment and our lives, and scarcely any of them are currently understood. If we want to protect an endangered species, for example, how can we do so without knowing its movement patterns and habits? Crops are suffering across the globe because bees are dying, but why, and how? We're running out of fish in the ocean, but will they come back, and if so, where? These types of questions are addressed in part by learning how different animals move, from the individual to the global population, from a day-to-day basis to patterns seen across centuries.

Starlings in flight.

This branch of the Max Planck Institute of Ornithology, hereto referred to as MPI, is small, but astonishingly ambitious in its research. It promotes and emphasizes collaboration and data sharing through a fledgling but highly successful, freely accessible standardized worldwide database of movement data. (In this age of "big data", making sense of the glut of information out there is an onerous to impossible task, and the importance of standardizing information so that it can "talk" to each other cannot be overstated.) MPI collaborates with governments and NGOs such as NASA, National Geographic, the Smithsonian, and the National Science Foundation to conduct research as sophisticated as launching their own satellite. As a student, I benefit from the enormous wealth of knowledge and experience from the professors and researchers here, and get to rub elbows with some bigwigs in the science community as well.

Now, prior to my arrival in Germany, my German lexicon consisted of the following:

• bitte
• danke
• bier
• Reinheitsgebot
• schlagsahne
• kartoffelbrei

Suffice it to say, not quite enough to get by. Fortunately for me, AniMOVE is taught in English, which has severely softened any culture shock I may have otherwise experienced.  Instead, AniMOVE reminds me of a summer school I might have attended as a kid, except with a lot more work and a lot more beer. The days consist mostly of lecture and labs, but the atmosphere is relaxed and casual, with a healthy amount of time for play. I've spent most every afternoon and even some mornings (I'm not known as a morning person) swimming in a nearby lake (I'm also not known as a water person); the evenings are spent enjoying communal dinners, beer, and general camaraderie. The thirty of us students are housed in respectably luxurious guest quarters, with a spacious community building in an old renovated mill just a short field's walk away. Adjacent to the mill is an ancient castle occupied by a scarcely-seen baron, who I can't help but imagine staring down at us from behind his parapets, scowling through his monocle with a watchful, disapproving eye, but this is probably not an accurate reflection of reality.

Konstanz architecture.

This past weekend allowed time for a couple of fun forays: Saturday took us into the nearby town of Konstanz, a place filled with beautiful architecture, ancient churches, and European charm. On Sunday we took a trip to the Swiss Alps to climb Säntis, at 8209 ft (2502m) the highest peak in the region. The climb to the top featured sheer cliff faces with metal steps and hand cables hammered into the side of the mountain, and the descent was enjoyed from the luxury of a dizzyingly high cable car, that stretched more than two kilometers across jagged peaks and alpine pastures.

The view from the top of Säntis.

All in all, I can scarcely believe that I've already been here for ten days. I've been kept tremendously busy, but I'm having a wonderful time in class, and have absolutely loved the people I've met here.

Me with a classmate "in" traditional Swiss garb.

I've gotten a surprising amount of work done on my graduate research over the last week, but've still had time for frivolities like frisbee. I'll be sad to go in just a few days' time, but am just as excited for what lies ahead when I'm done here.

I hit the road on Sunday! I hope you'll stay tuned.