By Faith Bishock, September 28, 2008
This is my final entry to the blog– Christie, Carl, and Steve are in Palau while I am headed back home via Guam and Hawaii.
On our last field day in Pohnpei, Steve and Carl decided to take some longer hikes in search of palms in new areas. Christie agreed to stay with me for the day, introducing me to snorkeling for the first time.
We rode to an island where the Japanese had built a seaplane base during World War II. The concrete platforms, a hangar, and pillboxes remain.
For a first time snorkeler and true scaredy cat, Pohnpei was a great place to start. The reefs are beautiful– the fish are colorful and small. The corals range from pastels to white with sparkly blue tips. Our guide took good care of me and steered me away from where the big fish might be. This was our only non-palm activity of the entire trip.
For those of you who assume we’re on an exotic Pacific vacation, think again. There are no resort hotels on Pohnpei or Kosrae. This type of fieldwork is grueling, exhausting, and sometimes dangerous. When we return from the field to our hotel, wet, filthy, and exhausted, we are often up late doing our field assessments, pressing and cataloging herbarium specimens, sorting and cleaning seeds, writing our blog, uploading and sorting our field photographs, and keeping the budget records.
I have a new appreciation and understanding of what Carl does in the lab and in the field. Christie is my new mentor, as she has gotten me to finally be on time. She blows me away with the extremely organized way she has handled everything. From Steve, I come away with an appreciation of what a truly dedicated field botanist does. This is extremely important work we’re doing. We are spreading the name and legacy of David Fairchild and Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden everywhere we go.
