News archive

This spring Asa Research Station has installed new water pressure sensors at the SITES water monitoring locations and the streams in the surrounding catchment areas. By measuring the pressure in the water it is possible to calculate the water level and the discharge. This type of data has already been collected for many years in Asa, but these new sensors are capable of sending the data directly to an online server which gives researchers immediate access to data from the office.

In March, the Skogaryd Research Catchment (SRC) welcomed about 50 high school students and their teachers from the Erasmus project “Global heat”. This project is an international exchange between Birger Sjöberggymnasiet Vänersborg (Sweden), Heilig Hartinstituut Heverlee (Belgium), Liceo Scientifico Cannizzaro Palermo (Italy) and the Bundesrealgymnasium Schwaz (Austria).

On April 11th, the vice chancellor of SLU and her leading council visited the field station at Röbäcksdalen. The purpose of the visit was to learn more about the infrastructure, but also to sign a collaboration agreement between SLU and Umeå municipality. Röbäcksdalen SITES manager Johanna Wallsten talked about the SITES activities in the region, and Charlotta Erefur from Svartberget presented some of their activities, and talked about collaborations between the two SITES stations.  In addition, researchers at SLU in Umeå demonstrated some of the spectral equipment at the station.

The central data coordination team has scheduled several data-focused meetings with individual stations to facilitate uploads to the SITES Data Portal during the off-season when field sampling is less time demanding for the station staff. 

Currently, the SITES secretariat and staff from Erken Laboratory are processing data from complex lake profile measurements collected using YSI sonde technology which will be uploaded soon. Follow-up data meetings are scheduled with Svartberget and Skogaryd, so more data will be available for download in the coming weeks. 

The snow cover around Tarfala Research Station has changed dramatically as a result of a period with a high rate of cyclonic activity. About a meter of snow has accumulated in the area around the station recently, and while this accumulation is good news for the glaciers it makes travel and measurements more difficult. After a storm, it takes several days for the snow to settle, making ground transportation possible and reducing the threat of avalanches. Late snowstorms also make mass balance studies difficult to perform properly.

In fall 2021 a temporary technical workshop was established at Grimsö Wildlife Research Station to develop technology for decreasing the number of traffic accidents involving wildlife. Research and development projects are conducted with project leaders from Grimsö in collaboration with several national and international stakeholders, including, the Swedish Transport Administration, Interreg Sweden-Norway, the Norwegian Institute of Bioeconomy Research (NIMBO), and the Norwegian railway infrastructure BaneNOR.

We are excited to welcome Emily Pickering Pedersen, to the Swedish Polar Research Secretariat at Abisko Scientific Research Station.

The short spring season at TRS is of extreme contrast to the extended summer season. Instead of hiking the 24 km from Nikkaluokta one must use a snow scooter, instead of worrying about mosquitos one must be aware of avalanches and one must be even more prepared for the unpredictable infamous Tarfala weather. Yet spring is an essential time in the Tarfala calendar, representing the beginning of the station’s glacier mass balance programme.
 

A restoration case study called “Beaver re-introduction” is the Swedish contribution to the new EU Green Deal project MERLIN*. The case study will have a before-after design, which means experimental construction as well as removal of 60 beaver dams in Sweden, of which 10 will be located in the Vindeln Catchment including Krycklan (Svartberget Research Station). It is a four-year project and aims to sample two years before the measures (dam construction/removal) and two years of sampling after the measures.

Ongoing work by SITES spectral uses satellites to give researchers a broad spatial view of vegetation conditions at SITES stations. This work generates data layers describing vegetation productivity and phenology for 20 x 20 km areas. Layer data ready for inclusion in GIS databases will be distributed in analysis-ready format, in the Swedish reference system. The data show the seasonal development of green vegetation and can be useful for monitoring vegetation’s response to variations in weather, human influence, and other factors.