Blog Assignment #2

I wrote a paper last semester for my plant ecology class. We had to write it on any article or research related to plant ecology. In this type of writing, I had to analyze and summarize the scientific research the author(s) had conducted. The research paper that I summarized was called “The Effects of Timber Harvest, Forest Fire, and Herbivores on Regeneration of Deciduous Trees in Boreal Pine-Dominated Forests”. I chose this research because I am interested in trees and the factors that affect tree growth and survival. This research was conducted and written by three people, Michael Herder, Jari Kouki, and Vesa Ruusila. These writers are very credible sources of this topic. Michael Herder and Jari Kouki are both faculty of forest sciences at the University of Joensuu in Finland. Jari Kouki is a researcher at the Finnish Game and Fisheries Research Institute in Finland. This research was published in the Canadian Journal of Forest Research which is a very credible source of forest research. This a prestigious scientific journal. This journal publishes many scientific research experiments. It is a very rigorous task to get research to be published by this journal. The audiences that this publisher targets is mainly the scientific community.

            This research was conducted and written in Finland. These authors attempt to describe the many factors affecting the boreal forests known as the “taiga”. This is important because these forests span a large area of the world’s landmass. The main point of this paper is that the species composition of these forests are changing and it is important for us to understand potential causes for the changes. Some major issues that these authors bring to attention is the fact that species diversity will continue to decrease if we neglect the effects that these factors have on some of the pioneer species these forests contain. By understanding these factors, better conservation practices can be enforced and thus protecting these ecosystems. The call for these authors to write is for research and to share what they have found in their research. Each of these authors are experts on forest research. Since they all live in Finland, it would seem logical to conduct their research there, which also contains the largest forests in the world. They seem to have a concern for the current state that these forests are undergoing, and are also concerned for what the future may hold for these boreal forests. The actual research took 6 years to conduct. So the authors were not concerned with urgency, but more on quality. They realize that the topic at hand is slow process. However it is important, and by doing more long-term research will potentially aid in finding long-term answers.

I think the audience targeted is the scientific community, but in particular those who interact with these forests and who are working on conservation research. Maybe the authors would hope to spark interest and concern with those who work in these forests to come up with better conservation mechanisms. The tone of this paper is very scholarly. This adds to the credibility of the authors. I think the tone is important because it would be easy to say, “We need to conserve the boreal-pine forests”. However, by giving scientific data to support this thesis it gives this topic a more justifiable reason for conservation efforts. The authors use scientific wording, assuming that the readers are approaching this topic also from a scholarly viewpoint.

I believe the authors presented this research in a very clear manner. This research was scientifically written, but it was also easy to follow. In the past I have read research papers that were really hard to understand, but the authors in this paper did a great job of keeping my attention. I would have liked to read about more facts in general about the forests that they conducted their research on. I made an A on the summary that I wrote. But if I could have done it over, I would have also presented more generalized facts to grab the reader/audience attention in order to relate the topic more.

Blog Assignment #1

  My name is Erika Selman. I am 25 years old, and I am an Environmental Biology major here at Southern Miss. I currently work for the biology department as the gardener for the Biological Sciences Teaching Garden. I love plants and gardening, and I hope to one day work for a botanical garden or nature center. I enjoy the outdoors. I like to hike, go camping, and travel in my free time.

  To be honest, I have never really enjoyed writing. English has never been a favorite subject of mine. Although I do not particularly enjoy writing, it does play an important role in my field. Science is all about research. In doing research, writing is crucial. One academic document that I frequently do have to write is research papers. I take someone else’s research experiment that they have conducted, and I interpret and summarize into a paper. In my present employment circumstances, writing in my workplace is very rare. I basically just work with plants all day, and they can’t read! However I do sometimes make lists of what needs to be done. I also email my professor frequently, as well as text on the phone. Email is the most frequent way writing is incorporated into my workplace. I have engaged in writing in the public sphere. I have done this is a variety of ways. I recently posted an ad to sale some items. I work with children at my church, and I have made posters for their room. There are numerous other examples, each seem to have a different audience.  

   

  One type of writing I really find myself enjoying is writing music. I recently wrote my first song. I loved that experience. It was very liberating. One the contrary I do not like to write long research papers. I often find that when I am forced to write something that requires a set number of pages, I have trouble coming up with things to say. Sometimes I think writing “fails” as a way to communicate because you can’t tell just by words sometimes the true emotions that are behind the words. For instance, I have gotten into an argument with a friend over a text message and took what she wrote out of the context that she meant to send it. Sometimes it is hard to put feeling into words. This semester I hope to get my resume together and become better at writing workplace documents. That is really my ultimate goal.