Forests and Frisbee

My last week of spring break I actually spent in class for four days, but it was one of those classes that confirms any doubts (not that I have any) about me being an environmental studies major because the entire day is spent learning outside (besides the time being carted around in 17-seater vans). It was very interesting to visit a forest from the perspective of a forester -different from the conservationist and biological perspectives of other field courses. The topic of conversation would be about managing a forest, but the reason was for producing harvestable timber, not for the ecosystem in sake of itself.
Growing up in a forest state I was naturally curious to see how Scotland's forests compared to Minnesota's. I checked online and found out that Minnesota's percentage of forested land is about 32% and Scotlands is about 8%. Minnesota's total area of land, excluding inland waters, is 206,208 sq km. Scotland's total land area excluding inland waters is 77,097 sq km which is one of those fascinating things about Europe and America -there is just more of America.
Also, there are no charismatic megafauna in Scotlands forests. The biggest animals there are deer -no bears, wolves, or mountain lions. Don't misunderstand me, because certainly the megafauna are not the only thing important about a forest, but when I looked out at the great expanse of sleepy, misty pines and spruce, I felt that there was something missing when I knew that there were no wolves out there padding softly along on the trail of a deer.
I have many more thoughts on the field trip but you will just have to ask me when I am home because I should probably get around to writing the report since I can't turn in my blog.

Saturday and Sunday I spent all day at CUBE playing in my first beach ultimate tournament. It was so much fun and was so great to play frisbee again, after having gone probably a month without it! There were a few people I overheard saying that beach ultimate is "the way ultimate was meant to be played" which I disagree with very much but I would love to hit up more beach ultimate tournaments (especially Paganello) sometime in my life. It was super hard to run on sand but really easy to lay out (yes, I did, and caught things too!). The weather was nice and sunny but a bit windy the second day and therefore a little chilly. We only had enough space for two pitches so the games were really short and I always wanted more when they were over! The frisbee party that night was a ceilidh, so now I have been to two ceilidhs (this one was much more fun than the last -helps to dance with people you know and people who are Scottish and are good dancers). If I could bring anything back to America from Scotland it would be my very own ceilidh band.

Today was my first day back at uni and I haven't started much of my work, so I must get on that now-
Cheers!
Karen