User: | Open Learning Faculty Member:
Doing a field research was a great experience for me, not only as a student fascinated by Biological processes, but also as an individual who did not always pay much attention to the ecosystems around her. Some words that I could use to describe the overall experience include eye opening, intellectually challenging, and inquisitive.
During the process of designing the field experiment, I decided to use the systemic sampling strategy to help me avoid experimenter bias while choosing the samples. Initially, I thought I could randomly select the first bean plant, and then systemically select the next samples. However, later in the experiment I realised that the garden beds were not large enough for the samples to be spread out perfectly in fives (the random number generated using excel). Thus, I decided to use the same approach, but this time recording every third plant instead of the fifth.
Another change that I made while implementing the experiment was that I only collected data from 2 garden beds (locations) instead of 3, which were from the original plan. This was due to the inaccessibility of the garden bed because of the long fence around it, unfortunately I could not reach individual beans without making damage.
Finally, I can confidently say that engaging in the practice of ecology increased my appreciation for how ecological theory is developed. I learned that it starts as a simple process from observation, which grows over time as the experimenter finds certain patterns and organizations that sometimes represents significant processes in the surrounding communities, and even ecosystems.
