When I decided to start a blog nobody told me how hard it is to actually start writing and to come up with something good to start with, and since I've already started this will just have to do!
So now that I've avoided the incredibly uncreative "Hi I'm John" as a first line I might as well introduce myself and what I do and what this blog is going to be about so as previously mentioned my name's John Abernethy, I'm currently a PhD student at Liverpool John Moores University having just started back in September 2014. My research is on the influence of forest structure on Orang-utan distribution, densities, behaviours and locomotion in Sumatra. This is going to involve completing two 8 month long field seasons at my field site in Sikundur in Gunung Leuser National Park in Sumatra the first of which I'm just starting now.
To determine the influence of forest structure on these aspects of orang-utan ecology I'm going to be using a combination of ground based methods like transects, day follows recording their behaviour and movements and canopy photography along with data from airborne drones. The goal of this will be to develop a model that predicts how Sumatran orang-utans adapt to the changes in their forest environment which is mostly due to human actions such as logging and deforestation for development. This will allow for land managers and conservationists to be able to develop better management strategies for orang-utan conservation and reduce the impact of utilising the forest resources.
One of the most common questions I've had since I started this project is "Aren't orang-utans everywhere? Why do they need help?". In answer to this, no there actually limited to only two islands in South-East Asia which are Sumatra and Borneo, with each island having it's own species. The Bornean orang-utan (Pongo pygmaeus) is by far the more common, but that's not saying much as it is still listed as endangered by the IUCN with only 55,000 left in the wild! The Sumatran orang-utan (Pongo abelii) which is the species I'm working with is critically endangered with only 5000 or so left in the wild! With numbers like this you can see they're definitely not everywhere and with the rate their forests are being lost to deforestation for palm oil and coffee plantations they definitely need our help.
So what is the point of this blog? Well what I'm hoping is it will both help to raise awareness about orang-utan conservation, let people to see what modern science is like and that not all scientists are sat in ivory towers and that some of us are in our huts covered in mosquito bites, mud and leeches and in general I want people to get involved in my research. With this blog I'm hoping to be able to update at least one a month though at times it may be way more frequently especially at the start. For now though I hope you read this and that you weren't too bored, future posts should have plenty of photos once I'm in the forests, but I hope you stay for the journey and I look forward to sharing it with you.
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