One of the basic principles underlying the ABMI is that one cannot know if species abundances are changing, if one does not know what they were to start with. For example, many readers of this blog may have heard of the worldwide decline of the Honey Bee (Apis mellifera), our agricultural pollinator mainstay. We have [...]
After months of hard work, the ABMI Remote Sensing Group is very pleased to announce the completion and release of the ABMI Wall-to-wall Land Cover Map version 2.1! A long-awaited data product, the spatially exhaustive polygon vector layer represents land cover across Alberta circa 2000, uses 11 land cover classes, and contains roughly one million, [...]
We’re wrapping up this year’s fieldwork on our Rare Plants project! It’s been a great summer – 150 plots were sampled (50m x 50m each) in July and August across the Lower Athabasca region. The project is a partnership between the ABMI, the EMCLA (Ecological Monitoring Committee for the Lower Athabasca), and the Neilsen Lab [...]
The ABMI’s camera-trapping project led by Ecologist Cole Burton continues to run well with masses of photos coming in. Check out the new gallery dedicated to some lovely shots taken with the camera traps. The project will continue until early fall. Watch this space for updates and more photos. Remember to cast your vote on [...]
A huge congratulations to everyone at the Monitoring Centre for successfully completing wetland and terrestrial monitoring for the summer season 2012! Field season wrapped up on Friday July 27th, and despite a wide variety of challenges throughout the season, field staff were able to complete inventories at over 150 sites from across the province. They [...]
What is it like to monitor a wetland in southern Alberta? What do wetland monitoring crews actually do? What do the different protocols look like in action? In an attempt to answer these and other burning questions, our Information Coordinator, Jill Smith and our Communications Coordinator, Sonya Poller visited Ciara Sharpe and Emily Jansen, one [...]
Aquatic Invertebrate Protocol Update An updated protocol for processing aquatic invertebrates has been posted on the ABMI website thanks to Rob Hinchliffe, Lab Coordinator, Aquatic Invertebrate Taxonomist. The document also includes valuable information for aquatic invertebrate identification. Is a picture worth a thousand species? The Science Centre’s Dr. Erin Bayne peer-reviewed article “Is a picture [...]
Over the past two years, the ABMI has been working closely with representatives from Canadian Forces Base Suffield on the development of a License Agreement which would allow for long term access for the ABMI to complete our field surveys on the military base. On June 1, 2012, the agreement was fully executed after being [...]