Finally, I have photos for your viewing pleasure!
1. Alice, Ben, Safak, and Laura walking the fields looking for burrows (the hole is where I should be).
2. Laura, Safak, Ben, and Alice with Elbeyli in the background.
3. The reservoir we visited today.
4. Alice and Ben examining plants by the reservoir.
The news for today is that I've decided that I actually like this running thing (though it’s not as fun as being on the bike)! Today I ran 3.5 miles without stopping – and when I got back to the house (I was the last one back) I ran into the courtyard, picked up the Frisbee, told everyone to follow, and then ran to the soccer field where we played a very minimized version of Ultimate. It was great!
We also had a chance to walk some fields today looking for hamster burrows. We were unsuccessful, but it felt good to be in the fields again. After that, Safak took us to a nearby reservoir to bird watch. We saw some unidentified ducks and several black kites.
Though I wasn’t supposed to go (we still don’t have the permits to go into the good fields), I went with Cumali this afternoon when he went to set traps. I wanted to use the telemetry equipment to locate our two males. So far, every time we’ve tried to locate them during the daylight hours, we’ve gotten strong signals in their burrows – suggesting that they are inside. Today, however, one was tucked away as normal, but the other was not. I got no signal what-so-ever from his burrow, but faintly pickup up his signal near the first hamster’s burrow! How confusing! I wish we really could go in there and do some solid tracking.
6 comments:
Maybe they are gay hamsters? Or maybe there was a big game on and they were drinking beer together at Hammy 1's place because he's got the big screen? No, not beer! Tea!! Duh, they are Turkish hamsters, after all.
Now THAT would be a paper in Science!
Misty,
Greetings from the Howes family! Keep the updates coming. We've started drinking tea to honor your experience in Turkey.
I hope you're drinking LOTS and LOTS of tea in our honor - otherwise it would be a sad imitation of the real thing. :->
And Eleanor - the beer would work as well. After they consume vast quantities of tea, they consume vast quantities of beer and/or Raki (the Turkish version of Ouzo).
Oh, boy. Ouzo is dangerous stuff, man. Those hamsters are loaded, with full bladders and they can't find their way out of the burrows (11 miles long? Or was it yards? And I have been sadly deprived of raki). Poor little hammies. And the American ones just run on big wheels. A sad state of hamster affairs, I tell you. What is the world coming to?
Cool photos - thanks for sharing those.
Wow - what a great image - two hamsters chilling together in front of the game :-). Hope you get to a point where you can really track these guys.
I just got back from walking into town for a haircut and took some photos of snow while I was out. Now I'm having some nice hot oatmeal and hot (Alaskan fruit) tea to warm up. Neither was nearly as good as reading your blog, though!
Oh, and we're fostering a new cat. Paco is small, jet black, and amazingly curious. She gets into everything, and is an excellent climber to boot. She's also super friendly (esp. at 3am when you thought you were sleeping), so it's nice having a cat in the house again.
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