Tuesday, June 12, 2012

On meeting with the folks funding my research

I'm always nervous.  Always.  Before each of these meetings, I convince myself that they're going to withdraw my funding and I'm going to have no more money and all my paychecks will have to go to PVC and grass herbicides and I'll have to eat ramen and stale bread for the next year and a half.

So I'm having one of these meetings tomorrow afternoon.

Here's the thing:  I actually really like the Syngenta turfgrass representative that oversees my Operation Pollinator project.  He's consistently super-pleasant, and everyone he brings with him to check up on my work has always been helpful and engaging.  This time he's bringing the manager of their Lawn & Garden Research Development staff with him.  They're interested in setting up their own OP plots in Wisconsin based on the work/methodology that I've already developed.

So I'm nervous.

Big day tomorrow.  Plus, I'm putting out my first round of bee bowls tomorrow morning, which I'm super excited about, even if it does add an extra dose of time-crunchy stress to tomorrow.


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2 comments:

  1. the Native Plant NeophyteJune 12, 2012 at 4:24 PM

    Hey EntolomoloGal,

    Very interesting. If I had my life to do over again, I'd sure love to study Entomology. Nonetheless, Curious though, given my former attempts at golf, How do you keep the wayward golfers from beating the hell out of the OP plots? By the time I tried to get my ball out of there, it'd look like a sand dune?

    And love your writing style. Reminds me I've got to loosen mine up. Keep up the great work.

    Hal

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  2. EntomoloGalJune 12, 2012 at 4:49 PM

    Thanks for your feedback!

    I actually haven't run into any problems with golfers. I specifically chose each of my sites along with the golf course superintendents so that they would be in very out-of-play, but still visible, areas. This mostly means that they're either waaaay far away from the fairways or right on top the tees. The plots are also relatively small--the total area they take up is about 45m x 5m, and there are 1m Roundup-ed buffers between each of the four treatments, which allow folks to walk through the sites without damaging the wildflowers too much.

    I have another project which focuses on pre-existing naturalized roughs on golf courses, and MAN do the golfers destroy those sites. It's always a rodeo with my naturalized roughs.

    If you have any other questions, lay 'em on me! Really enjoy your writing and hearing about all the natives in your backyard.

    Em

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