Who am I and what am I doing??

My name is Chelsea Miller and I am an undergraduate student at the University of Central Arkansas with one year to go before I obtain my BS in Biology.  I have been doing research, both volunteering and as a paid worker, at UCA since my Freshman year and have participated in many graduate student-level projects through the Biology department.  The studies I have been involved in include migration behaviors of minnows in intermittent streams in northwestern AR, a follow-up study of an invasive snakehead eradication in southeastern AR, and the effects of gas wells in central AR on the health and biodiversity of small headwater streams.  For almost 2 years now I have been a member of Dr. Entrekin's aquatic invertebrate lab and have been identifying macroinvertebrates for graduate student projects.  All of this work on other peoples' projects has taught me so much, and it has finally paid off--I am now getting a chance to conduct my own research project, and the setting is very different than what I am used to here in Arkansas.  I am travelling to northeastern Madagascar this summer to aid Zach Farris, a UCA alumnusi, on his PhD work regarding population dynamics and life history characteristics of the Fosa, an endemic carnivore.  While there, I will also be collecting data for my own undergraduate Honors thesis.  I will be looking at population ratios of feral cats and domesticated animals to endemic and invasive rodent populations in both disturbed and pristine sites in Masoala park, a protected rainforest region in Madagascar.  This is important work because there are many threats that face biodiversity in this region--in which 80% of the flora and fauna are found nowhere else in the world--and domesticated animals brought into the country by people is one of these threats.  Domesticated animals have the potential to disturb natural ecosystems as they did not evolve to be a part of certain systems--their presence in northeastern Madagascar (especially that of feral cats living and hunting in the rainforests) has the potential to harm endemic populations of rodents, birds, insects, other carnivores, etc. through predation and/or competition.  We will be using cameras to take pictures of several sites every hour of every day for 6 weeks.  The cameras will record which animals have been present in sites, and what their prevalence within those sites is.  In this way, Zach can determine population dynamics of the Fosa, and I can determine correlations between feral cat/domesticated animal populations and endemic/invasive rodent populations.  I have primarily chosen to look at feral cats and rodents because there is a lot of preexisting data regarding feral cat eradication programs and endemic/invasive rodent populations.  I am so excited to be able to have this amazing opportunity to study population ecology in a country that is arguably one of the richest natural environments in the world.  I hope my data will be telling, and that my thesis, small as it may be in the grand scheme of things, can at least tell an interesting story about life on the other side of the world.  I would like to thank the UCA Honors College for giving me a $3,000 grant to purchase plane tickets, and Zach Farris through Virginia Tech University for allowing me to accompany him on one of his research expeditions.  I would also like to thank my parents for helping me out financially, mentally, and emotionally through the tough weeks leading up to this trip, as well as the Larson-Gettinger family for their support and help. On that same note, I would like to thank Dr. KC Larson, my adviser for my thesis, for her help and support this semester.  Finally, I would like to thank my friends for their support as well.  I could not have gotten to this point without all of the people who have helped me get here!  I hope to not let any of you down!