Jess-Viborg

This Monday starts my last week of work at Foulum. Time has really flown by here! I feel like I am just getting into the usual momentum of work, if there is such a thing, and I think it will be very hard for me to leave it all behind. I am still very interested in what the analyzers will tell us about the diets that the pigs were on and how that information can help people too. Peter has promised to keep me informed, so that makes me feel a little bit better!

I must admit that before I came here I knew that I just wanted to work with animals. I was perfectly happy with the idea that I would do something with some species of animal each day at Foulum and that would be sufficient. But, I am really happy that Peter and everyone else here has taken the time and made a huge effort to include me in every single aspect of their project. And most importantly, they have made the effort to allow me to choose what role I would like to play in their work. I think that takes a lot of trust and true dedication to science on their part.

I will surely miss catching the bus each morning and seeing the same faces saying, "Gut morn" regardless of the weather, the time, or their general mood!! Denmark is a wonderful place that I will be sure to visit again!

This week I will be working as usually, but on Wednesday Peter will be treating me to a special 4th of July! He is planning on taking me to his farm and meeting his family to celebrate the 4th of July with a strong Danish influence! I do not know exactly what he has planned for the day, but it will surely be memorable!

Another event that I am looking forward to this week is attending the National Show here in Denmark. Helle, from work, has very generously offered to include me with her family for a trip to what would be our version of a state fair! She showed me a show bill or sort of itinerary for the day which includes horse shows, rabbit races, tractors, cattle, and anything else having to do with agriculture in Denmark. I am really excited to see how this may compare to our county or state fairs in the U.S. and to just get back to seeing people being proud of their agricultural background!

Next Monday I plan to travel to Copenhagen for about three days. I have a good friend who lives in Malmo, Sweden who plans to meet me in Copenhagen and show me around. I may stay with her in Malmo after visiting Copenhagen, but at this point that is all dependent on her work schedule. Some things are always universal among college students! She said we can visit the beach and see the Little Mermaid!! I can't wait!

I plan to return to Viborg on or before Monday before we leave to fly home Thursday.
I don't know that I will be able to see Peter or Helle after this week. I think they are both taking holiday, so this week will really be strange because I will be thinking I won't be seeing either of them for a long time. Winnie plans on driving us to the airport when we leave so I am grateful that I will get to see her one more time before jumping on the big, white, bird.

It is amazing to me that this trip is already coming to a close. I have to say that one of the most important lessons I have learned is to be true to yourself even if others around you are changing. I know that I have changed while I have been here, but I know that it has only been for the better. I feel much more confident in my basic daily activities and I really know now that friendship and family are truly important to me no matter what else is going on in my life.

Of course I have learned invaluable lessons about science. I would say that I have learned more about how science works as whole than minute scientific details though. I was always under the impression that I loved science because there is always a right and wrong answer to everything! But I have learned that I could not have been more wrong. I still love science, but I have become so much more aware of the variables that are still present in science no matter how much you calculate, aniticipate, and repeat your experiments.

I think this has been a wonderful trip and I consider myself extremely lucky to have been able to take part in such an amazing life ride. I will be sure to write again before I leave, but I am sure that my overall feelings will not change a bit!

Viborg Week 6 Alanna

This has been a very fulfilling week academically and socially. This past weekend Jess and I attended Viborg's summer solstice festival. The Danes celebrate the longest day of the year by lighting a witch on fire. I thought that was the funniest thing when I first heard about it. Every year a witch made out of cloth and wood is put on a raft and sent into the middle of north lake in Viborg. The raft is then lit on fire and the people of the town celebrate. A long march through town opens the celebration and concerts and the witch burning end the celebration. This event comes from a pagan tradition that was celebrated hundreds of years ago. It has modified itself and has turned into a celebration that hundreds of people partake in. It's like Halloween in the middle of summer.

Work has been challenging this week. I am in the final stages of writing my research paper and gathering my thoughts for the final two weeks to come. It seems that one can never be truly satisfied with their own writing. After weeks of working on and editing my paper I still have much to revise. Although this process is very grueling I have learned a few things. This paper has given me the chance to learn how to write like a scientist. After years of writing essays and papers for my humanity classes I found it very hard to transition over to scientific writing. According to Jens writing a research paper is like a "march." You have to write in precise steps which are to the point and methodical. I'm still struggling to write like a scientist and I would love to learn how to integrate the science mentality with the smoothness of humanity writing. Some scientists have done it but it's an art. Hopefully I can bring back the skills of scientific writing back to school with me.

As the weeks come closer to an end Jess and I have been anticipating our travels to Copenhagen. After hearing such wonderful things about the capital I am excited to see what it has to offer. Hopefully we won't run into any troubles purchasing tickets and getting around. If all our plans come through I hope to share what we've seen when we come back!

Wageningen Week 6 Sam

Time here in Wageningen is flying by, as we are already almost finished with our course that I feel like we just began. I guess 4 weeks really isn't long for a course at all, yet putting in 40 hours/week is a lot of time. Allison's blog generally reflects most news I would've covered in a general update about Wageningen, not much else has been new.

I did however, find Jess's blog about borders, visas and discussing the U.S. situation with several people very interesting. In response, I cannot say I was nearly as surprised about what she found out. It is truly unfortunate that our borders are becoming so tight, however it is happening all over the world. For instance, I know getting 2-week Visas for our study tour in Brasil this past Spring is becoming more and more difficult. People are often surprised when they hear this, yet as we make it more difficult for people to enter our country, it becomes increasingly difficult for us to enter theirs. I have also been fortunate to speak with many people around the world so far that have trouble traveling, namely to the States, but to other countries as well.

Through my time here, I have to say that discussing politics has been one of my most enjoyable experiences. In the aquaculture hatchery I worked mainly with PhD and post doc students, therefore I was much younger than everybody there. Also, being an American, they had several pre-conceived notions about how much I knew or whether I even cared. Yet each day at lunch or well we were working, I have had extensive conversations with people from all around the world, for example, Zambia, Italy, Greece, the Netherlands, Portugal, etc. about our current politics. After I few days I had successfully proved myself to many of the men I work with in this discussion and we were from that point able to talk freely about politics. I understand why many people have these notions about people from the U.S., because unfortunately the apathy of a good percentage of our country gives us the reputation. However, I know they were pleasantly surprised and impressed to find such a 'young' person so aware of the rest of the world and their politics as well.

I find it very sad that I have been able to have more extensive discussions here about the next election, the debates, the issues, the war, etc. than I can find when chatting with friends from home. It's odd to find that it seems like everyone from all around is so interested in what is going to happen with our government, yet many people actually involved in voting for these changes seem hardly phased. That says a lot about our country and mainly, our generation. I really hope to see my generation step up from the apathy and begin to care, just as the rest of the world does.

Wageningen Day 37-40 Allison

We have been working on analyzing our data gathered from our observations at the zoo. It has been a bit troublesome for us because we seem to be behind everyone in this area. It seems as though we are expected to know quite a lot about this already, but unfortunately we have never had a class on it. The professors actually seem to be a little annoyed when you ask for extra help. I think we will be fine though.

Our observations went fine until the last day, when a dominant female took the infant for nearly the entire day, so we are hoping this will not become habitual. It would be nice if we could stop by and check on the apes before we leave, but I doubt the zoo will let us do that, and it is not worth 17 euros to us just to pop in.

We had a seminar on Friday at a company called Noldus where they make and distribute technologies used to enhance behavior studies. It was interesting to see what products are being developed, and after trying to use pencil and paper for everything, I can see how digitalizing things would make recording easier. Sam said that she uses a computer always when she does her behavior work at Shedd.

We had some unfortunate excitement this week in town. One of the student dorms was struck by lightening and caught fire because the gas tanks on the roof exploded. They made an announcement in our class about it, and one poor girl told us she lived near the top floor and left to go see if everything was okay. I can tell my family is paying attention to any news from here though, because not half a day later I was getting messages from them asking if I was okay. The explosion was pretty big, and we could see black smoke from across town, but when we passed it yesterday, there didn't seem to be that much damage to the building, so that is a good sign. Here is a link to a picture someone took of it.

http://rijnsteeg.bit.nl/hoevestein/img_1946.jpg

Yesterday we made a day trip to a national park in the area called De Hoge Veluwe. I thought it was wonderful. They have a lot of land, including grasslands, forests, and sand dunes. Also they have several wildlife preserves and a phenomenal art museum and sculpture garden. It would have been a bit nicer if the rain had held off, but other than that, I would highly recommend this park. They even have bicycles for everyone that you just take whereever you want and then leave for someone else to use when you get to your destination.

Today I will be working on some class work so that we don't have to worry about it in the next couple days. We already present our final reports on Wednesday. This trip is really flying by for me.

Jess-Viborg

Yesterday I had the unique opportunity to travel to some local farms with a Veterinarian from Orum. Torben, graduated from the Danish vet school located in Copenhagen about ten years ago. Since then he has been a veterarian at an ever growing clinic along with two other doctors.

I was able to make the contact with Torben through Peter and Helle. They were both nice enough to offer to help me on my task to finding some veterinary work before I leave here. I was very curious to learn how vet med compares between the two countries.

To my suprise veterinary medicine here is a lot different that veterinary medicine at home...and almost exactly the same at the same time. What I learned yesterday is that here in Denmark all forms of antibiotic and medical treatment on any animal are only jobs for veterinarians. For example, in the United States if a beef producer sees that he has a cow that is starting to have a small mastitis problem, he can strip her udder really good, clean her up, give her a shot of Penicillin and be on his way. That would not happen in Denmark! Everything here is regulated. No antibiotics can be purchased by a farmer at a Farm and Home or Big R store. A veterinarian has to supply, and in some cases, actually inject the antibiotics.

Torben showed me the paper work that is necessary every single time he visits a farm. He has to write down each cow's given number (this number has to be in every cow's ear, or else the farmer is breaking the law), he has to write down what he did the for the cow, what he gave her, how much he gave her, the date, time, his clinic information, the farmer's information, what he left the farmer to continue treating the cow, how long the cow can receive that medicine, how much she can be given each day, when her milk can be sold again, and when she can go to slaughter. And, on top of all of that, at the bottom of each of the tickets with all of this information, there are stickers with numbers on them that match up to the ticket number. Any medication that is left at the farm must have one of these stickers on it with the number that matches up to the receipt! Then, all of the information must be kept on file for a minimum of five years by both the veterinarian and the producer. The veterinarian is then responsible for reporting all of the information from each farm into a national database so that the government always has a running record of what is going on at each farm!!

Beyond these tasks, veterinary medicine here is exactly the same as home. Here though there area lot more dairy farms to visit than beef farms!

Jess-Viborg

Work is still going great here! We drew blood from three pigs today, which made the day fly goodbye! At some times during the day we have only fifteen minutes in between times for drawing blood. This may seem like a lot, but when you have to measure glucose, hematocrit, spin down the blood in a centrifuge and pipette plasma into appropriate tubes for analysis, fifteen minutes can seem like two!

I am beginning to learn more and more about the scientific community here and in the United States from the people here and I will have to admit that it is something that I could not rule out as a potential life long career. I do not know that I could give up vet school for a research job, but I might be able to combine the two and find a happy medium. After vet school is completed of course!

We are planning to travel to Copenhagen and Germany during out last week here! I cannot believe that we only have two more weeks of work left! Time has really gone fast as Alanna said. But, before we take off to another big city, I am checking out the world news...just so that I am aware.

I watched a video on MSNBC that was about Iraqis fleeing their country to seek asylum in Sweden. I found this very interesting because the video explained that the country of Sweden has always opened its door to refugees and tried to help them. Sweden offers a place to stay, a daily stipend, and language classes while families get their feet under them again. I think that is wonderful, but I am feeling a little bit unsure about where the future of the world as we know it is going.

The next article that I saw under the title for Iraqis fleeing to Sweden was an article about how hard it is to get into the United States. I found this very contradictory. I was always under the impression that the United States was the free land that welcomed people of all races. But, now all of the sudden we have closed our doors to those who we are inflicting problems on.

The story about Iraqi refugees featured a family who had to leave their country because their son and father were working for the United States military as construction workers. The family received threats of beheading because of their association with the United States.

Last Friday when we traveled to Skagen, we met a man who is studying at Foulum who is from Iran. The tour group was walking to the beautiful northern tip of Jutland on a gorgeous, white beach, when this man came over to me and introduced himself. Of course I introduced myself and asked him where he is from. He jovially replied, "Iran, the country that is giving ‘The Bush’ all of the problems." Immediately I felt terrible. I know the war is a very heated topic, but if you just step back and think about what it must be doing to all of the innocent people who had generations of happy, healthy, wonderful families that were established there, it is a terrible thing. I have always struggled with the concept of war, but now I have a face to place with the concept.

The man told me later in the day that he originally wished to complete his PhD in the Food Science Department at the University of Illinois, but he was not granted a Visa in order to do so because he was from Iran. Once again, I did not know what to say to this man. How do I explain to him the raw feelings in the U.S. about the Middle East? How do I tell him that some people in the U.S. fear the people who are trying to flee his country for their own safety, when my country is the one disrupting it?

Until this evening when I really started thinking about this issue, I always took the stand point that the United States is denying people Visas in order to protect us. I understand that there are very dangerous people who would like to cause more pain and suffering in the United States, but I wish that there was a better way to decide who is allowed to come to the U.S. and who is not!

I am glad that I came here if only so that I could make this realization. I am very proud of my country and my friends and family who have served and are still serving in the military, but I am beginning to think more as a neutral person who does not really belong to one country or another...and it is really making me think.

I guess this is just some "food for thought" but I know that I will not forget the man from Iran, or the family from Iraq.

Viborg Week 5 Alanna

I can't believe we have been here for a month already. It seems like the more work you have the faster the time flies. After a long week of analyzing and preparing data for our project I can finally sit down and look at it all. In all honesty, this week has been one of the most stressful weeks here. I had to pick up lab skills quickly and prepare myself for sorting out all the data I gathered.

One of the things that is very frustrating about this research is the program SAS. SAS is a statistical program that allows you to enter in data and create graphs and sets using a series of commands. This program uses similar programing styles to that of DOS. I wish I had learned this program before coming here because I realized it's an essential program in our project. When I told Jens I had never used SAS before he looked shocked. Gladly I knew what the program was and its purpose from working with graduate students at school. It takes years to master this program so you must realize how I felt just learning the basics. We have 14 different parameters that we tested on 72 different dairy cows. That amounts to alot of data and alot of time spent graphing results.

Jens and I recently attended a meeting with one of the statisticians here at Foulum to see if we could improve our data and back up our research. I must say, that was one of the hardest meetings to sit through. Although I understood the basics such as normal curves, t-testing, variables, and standard deviations, I could not grasp the concepts of more complex topics. I think this is normal seeing as that I haven't had too much statistics, but it is a bit discouraging. Although all these things have been tough to over come, everyone here has been really great at teaching me the basics.

The one thing that stands out this week for me is realizing science is never as straight forward as one might think. You have to consider all the variables before starting and ending your experiment. When we first started analyzing blood samples I thought it was pretty straight forward. Pipette the plasma, put it in ADVIA (the analyzer), graph it, and there you go...results. Oh no, that's not how it works. There is the "plasma matrix" (all the stuff in the plasma that can effect the sample), the different feeds, time, date, temperature and all sorts of other variables that make it difficult to just read a graph and analyze it. Standard curves have to be placed on all samples in order to ensure its accuracy. I am learning so much about biological statistics and it seems to be making sense. Let's hope I can keep up with the world of biochemistry and statistics as the weeks comes to an end.

Wageningen Day 30-36 Allison

So, we have been here over a month now, and I am a little sad to see it go by so fast. We just finished our observations of the apes today. We have really been having up and down weather, but luckily it has been fairly nice the last two days.

Our infant survived, and is back under the close watch of the zookeepers. We were very pleased with what we were seeing, up until today. The mother had been keeping the baby with her most of the time, which allowed the baby to get enough to eat and be able to sleep some. However, today a higher ranking female in the troop decided that she wanted the baby, and kept her for nearly the whole day. When we were finishing up, we were relieved to see the mom with the baby until the same female tried to take her back again. We are now worried that this may become a problem because the mother feels that she cannot take the baby back because she is lower in rank.

It was amazing to be able to watch the baby grow up for even just a short time because she developed so much. She has started trying to imitate the adults in eating and communicating, and she has been roaming around and exploring more on her own. We even saw her ride on a male's back today. They are so much like humans sometimes, and it we really got to know each personality. We have even been concerned lately with the health of a couple animals because they both had unusual injuries. I think that we have almost been a help to the keepers, notifying them when there is a problem. It seems that this zoo has a very "let them be" attitude though, and a lot of the care is just monitoring. I thought it odd that they did not know the pregnancy status of this particularly fat monkey, but they just explained to me that it would be stressful to the animals to be handled.

I think we could recognize the animals as well as the zookeepers can. I will miss them now that we have gotten to know them, and I will be curious about the fate of the infant for a long time.

We begin analyzing our data starting tomorrow and then we will go back into the labs again after the class is over. I enjoyed that we are able to see so many different things while we are here, and I think it will allow for a good perspective at the end in 199.

Other than that, we have been having fun chatting with our classmates, posing for our professors camera (they make a DVD at the end for the whole class), and relaxing with our neighbors. This is a quiet little town, but I feel like we have been having a good time with it.

Jess-Viborg-Week 5

Today was an interesting day at work, but not because there was a lot to do. I had a good day to sit back and reflect on the last few weeks here and some of the conversations that I have been able to share with many different people.

Sometime last week I had a conversion with Peter about the work force here in Denmark. He informed me that the unemployment rate in Denmark is extremely high and that many people simply do not want to work. This same subject was brought to my attention again only a few days later when I spoke to a dairy farmer.

From what I understand, Polish people are willing to move to Denmark and seek employment doing jobs that the Danish people would rather not do. Polish people are supposed to be paid the same amount of money as the Danish people, but that is not always the case.

I find this very interesting because it seems to me that it almost mirrors what is happening in the United States. Many Hispanic people move to the United States and do jobs that Americans choose not to do. For example, jobs working with livestock are often filled by those who are not from the United States. The same is true in Denmark. The people who are uprooting their families and moving to Denmark or the United States are taking on jobs that have to do with agriculture.

So my question is, why do I hear from farmers, both in the U.S. and Denmark, that they have the greatest jobs in the world...but nobody wants to work for them? Is it the way society views farmers? Is it the way farm work is portrayed? Or are farmers just so cheap (or rather so poor) that they cannot offer salaries, vacation time, health insurance, and other benefits that maybe another employer can?

I want to know how people view farm work. I know that it is extremely hard work, you never have a week or even sometimes a day to take off. I know that the work is often dirty, very dangerous, and time consuming. But, I know that I have loved growing up on a farm. My parents love what they do and the farmers that I have spoken to here also love what they do.

I am wondering if the idea that farming is the greatest job in the world is simply because it is "in the eye of the beholder". If someone had asked me as a freshman or sophomore in high school if I loved living on a farm, I would have laughed at them and asked for them to tell me a specific task on the farm. I would then answer accordingly. There are really good days and really, really, bad days, but as a whole I think that farming is one of the greatest professions in the world. So, in that case, I get back to my original question as to why no one wants to work on a farm?

I think this is a question that could come back to haunt our country as well as other countries around the world, because if there are no farmers to make the world food, there will be no food in the world.

Wageningen Week 5 Sam

Things here in Wageningen have been going very well. After finishing with the second week of the Animal Behaviour and Environment course, I have discovered a lot over the two week span. We presented the research material that we had been preparing over a week period of time in front of the class and then there was a short discussion immediately following. I really tried to speak slowly through my presentation, however it still was not slow enough, so that is something I will need to work harder on for the next time around with our final presentation. The critique mainly came from the professor and teacher of the course, concerning topics that we had been unable to find exact research on at that point. After a week of research, we learned that there was an infant Barbary macaque that the zoo requested we specifically observe. Therefore, we unfortunately discovered there was not much background research information available on the young concerning this exact species of monkey. Yet, in meetings the following day with our group (which consists of about 5 other pairs of students), our supervisor, the teacher and professor, we talked through any misunderstandings that arose the day before within our presentation. After only receiving positive feedback to this point, we finally received critique on this Wednesday, which is what we had been looking for, yet not to come the day before we began observing. We worked with the professor and teacher separately, only to discover they each had suggestions of different sampling methods, therefore we ultimately attempted to compromise between the two. We made everything work and it was one of the first days that we had to stay a bit longer than we usually have needed to, to make appropriate changes.

An advantage that we have noticed we have over the other students in the class, is that English is our first language, we think in English, we speak it, we write it. We have found that many students need much more time to write out the reports and presentations, as they have told us they sit there and talk about how to write it correctly in English. They speak much slower and use simple language, understandably so. We discovered exactly what they meant when we had to complete peer reviews of their background research introductions. The English in the paper I was reviewing was very poor and Allison and I barely knew where to begin, because we were unsure of how far we were supposed to critique. We were told to watch for sentence structure, not just content and becoming so brain washed and trained over the years caused this review to be much harder for us than intended.

However, our observations at the zoo have been great! We finally met the zoo keeper for our monkeys on Thursday morning before we began observing and she helped us to identify almost all 10 monkeys of the troop. We can finally pair names with key features and people probably think that we are crazy as they walk by and hear us speaking to the monkeys using their names. We are primarily interested in the infant who was born on May 16 and who she (we think it's a girl, as does the zoo) spends the most time with. So far we have found that there are 2 older males in the troop that spend a decent amount of time with her, her young mother spends the most and then there was quite a bit of drama in the troop Thursday when the youngest, very interested female of the troop stole the infant for over an hour. This was very nerve racking for us because she is very inexperienced, she has never had a young of her own and she was running around the habitat carrying our screaming subject by the neck. This went on for the longest time, zoo keepers kept coming by debating whether to get their manager, however there was not much to be done, as the zoo barely ever handles these monkeys. The head keeper came by later after the mom had her baby back finally and to our surprise we learned that this very female, named Kim, was the monkey who killed the infant that was born earlier this year, because she took it from the mother for too long. So now, you can only imagine how nervous we get any time Kim gets near our baby, as we feel the pressure is slightly resting on our shoulders for this infant to survive at least while it's under our watch. The funny part about it all however, is that from the start, Kim was our favorite monkey. She is the most energetic monkey in the troop because she is so young and she is definitely an instigator. Therefore, she's absolutely hilarious to watch, except when she goes after our baby. She is always near the mom and baby, or male + baby, trying to help groom or cuddle, which we thought was beyond adorable until she made her get-away when one of the males let the baby wander within a foot of him during their lunch. Friday's observation was much calmer, we were more familiar with the personality of each monkey and Kim fortunately did not get her little hands on the baby. We will observe at the zoo for 3 more days and then come back and analyze all of the data we have collected. Our sampling methods mainly focus on the specific behaviors of the infant, recording which adult she is with during each sample we take. We take proximity samples to see who is near her the most and then finally, a time budget scan of the entire troop throughout the day so we can ultimately give the zoo an idea of how they spend their time each day.

It has been a pleasure to observe at Ouwehand Zoo, the staff is great and I have really enjoyed watching these monkeys. I am excited for 3 more days with them and I have a feeling I will miss it as the end is approaching so quickly. Other than class work, we relxed in Wageningen for the weekend, gave our wallets a break and I enjoyed the town market on Saturday. However, we finally booked our trip to Berlin which I am quite excited for! I will likely post more pictures on photobucket of our darling baby and the other monkeys later on this evening. For now, I hope all is well with everyone back in the states and whoever is traveling anywhere and everywhere! We are jealous of the hot weather we keep hearing about, it has been overcast with bouts of rain for most of this week and we are missing 'summer weather.' However, I know I will regret saying that if it does get warm eventually with the lack of air conditioning! So far, so good!

Jess-Viborg-Day 23

I was lucky enough to be able to take time off work at Foulum and travel to two working dairy farms in Northern Denmark today. One of the girls who is studying at Foulum and living at the Kollegium asked me to help her with a behavior study that she has to complete by July 7th.

We left the Kollegium early Wednesday morning and traveled to a very small dairy farm in Suldrup, Denmark. It is about one and a half hours away from Viborg. There I was introduced to Finn, the farmer who manages the 90 or so cattle that are there. The operation was small and Finn was not very talkative so I was not able to gather very much information from him or his operation.

After a four hour observation of one cow in a special social group that is designed to help cows re-enter the herd after calving, we packed up and took off to move farther north in Denmark.

We went to a farm in Tanum, Denmark. There the farmer was much more social and his operation was very efficient and up to date with modern dairy technologies. The farm was composed of over 200 dairy cattle of all ages. They milk about 185 cows each day and the rest are either babies they have chosen to keep back or dry cows.

Because the cow I was observing was very happy she did not need to interact with the other cows around her and therefore she was very easy to observe. Neils, the farmer and half co-owner of the farm with his father, saw that I was not very busy and he began to discuss differences between the U.S. dairy industry and the industry in Denmark.

A few years ago Neils traveled across the U.S. with a group of dairy farmers from Denmark. They visited multiple dairy farms and were given a very good idea of the range of farming practices in the U.S.

After my time speaking with Neils (it was actually over three hours of speaking and mostly listening to Neils) I found that I had learned a great deal about dairy farming in Denmark. However the great deal that I had learned mostly consisted of what the great similarities are between farmers in the U.S. and their concerns and the farmers here.

Growing up on a farm I was always given ample opportunity to speak to farmers, or rather just listen to farmers about their trials and tribulations. Speaking to Neils made me feel right at home again.

Neils told me about the frustration that is met with speaking to people in Denmark from larger villages and cities. He said that it is very discouraging to listen to their perception of what a farmer does and how he handles his animals. Similar to wha the farmers have told me at home Neils commented saying, "People from the village think we are old farmers out here, wearing bibs, walking our cows to the barn with a piece of hay in our teeth, and doing nothing for the rest of the day." I hate to say it but I have experienced this same perception from non-farm related people from the U.S.

Neils said that ignorance and perceptions such as the one described above are the reasons why it is so hard to be a farmer in Denmark. He said you either have to keep up with the new legislation, even if it means borrowing more money from the bank to adjust your operation to follow legislation, or go out of business completely. He said one of the most disturbing instances in which he has seen consumers react to farmers was when a local news station aired a report that said that dairy farmers, particularly those who raise Jerseys, are shooting their bull calves just as soon as they hit the ground. Neils explained that while this is a common practice it is a necessary one in order to stay in business. He said Jersey producers must do this because it costs too much to raise a Jersey bull calf, or even steer, and lose money on it when you send it to the meat market. So everyone, including the calf, is better off if the animals are euthanized when they are born. He said he knows that it is a very hard issue to people to understand, and even the farmers do not like the practice, but with the way that the market is designed right now, there is no better way to be able to stay in business.

I found this to be very true to the way that consumers and producers in the U.S. view farming practices. For example, here is a joke that I have heard told so many times at farm auctions. "Why do farmers have 4X4 written on the side of their trucks?...so that they remember to work for days in the spring and four days in the fall!" Yes, yes it is a cute joke, but sadly that is how most of the people from non-agriculture backgrounds view the people who put food on their plates every single day.

I think that there has to be more education and awareness between farmers and consumers in both Denmark and the U.S. and I think that it will have to be up to the farmers once again to make this communication possible. I know that Farm Bureau and other agriculture organizations often try to organize educational farm tours, but I do not think that is enough to make people really understand what it means to be a farmer. That is in issue that I predict I will continue to struggle with for the rest of my life.

Jess-Viborg-Day 19

Three problems that I have had since coming to Viborg have been transportation, obtaining money, and communicating with people at home.

When we arrived in Viborg, we were under the impression that we would be traveling to Foulum each day by bicycle. We knew it was a long trip to get there, however we were not aware of the lack of roadside bicycle paths and how the people drive in Denmark. We ventured out the on the first Sunday we were here to see for ourselves how the bike to Foulum would be each day.

Shortly after beginning our trip we learned that the bike paths simply dwindle into shoulders along the road. You simply have to balance yourself down hills, across bridges and up hills again in such a manner that you do no cross the white line on the side of the road. Drivers of vehicles here do assume all responsibility for cyclists if they happen to hit one, but they do not drive as though they will be held responsible to the harm done to a person on a bicycle. I was lucky enough to experience the rush of a car traveling toward me, in the opposite lane, passing a large semi truck and coming so close to may hand on my handle bar that I could feel the wind and the whooosh of the car's rear view mirror!!

After that trip we decided to remedy this problem by spending money on a bus pass. Our parents were happy to hear that we had decided to be lazy Americans and travel by bus each money if only for their sound of mind. Each bus pass that is good for ten trips is 140 Dkk. There is a monthly pass, which I would suggest for people next year to buys as soon as they get here. With the month pass you can travel as much as you want on the bus in that period of time and it is only about 400 Dkk. We decided not to get this pass because by the time we learned of it, it was already going to be less than a month before we left.

We also were lucky enough to be given rides to and from work on occasion by the nice students who live at the Kollegium with us. This helps reduce some of the weekly travel costs. But, students in the future should not rely on this as a cheap source of travel because the students who live here are graduate students. So, a lot of them do not travel to Foulum at 8am every morning and back to Viborg at 4pm every night.

The second difficulty I experience since being here has been obtaining money. When I traveled over here, I had a large sum of cash (which I would not say to do in the future as it is very nerve wrecking to carry that much cash across the globe) and I had a credit card that I thought could be used as a credit card or atm. However, most of the shops in Viborg (basically all of the shops in Viborg) do no accept credit cards from outside of the country. There is a girl here just from Germany and she cannot even use her credit card that is only from one country away!

I knew that if I used my credit card to purchase anything here there would be a three percent additional fee added on to whatever I charged, but I did not know that to take money out of an atm machine using the card, there is the addition three percent interest, then a fee of about $10 to just use the card that one time, and then there is a 24% interest fee tacked on to the end of the monthly bill of whatever you charged while you were in Europe.

This missunderstanding was partially my fault and partially my credit card companies fault because when I contacted them before I left to let them know that I will be in Europe for a certain period of time (just like Dean Bohn suggested) they only spoke of a 3% interest fee for every transaction. So, being the naive traveler I did not think to ask about what it costs to remove money from an atm using the card.

I also checked into simply paying Inge (the woman who owns the Kollegium) my rent by transferring money from my parent's U.S. bank account to her bank account in Denmark. My mother checked with our bank and was told that it would only a $15 fee to send the money to Denmark. Inge said this would be fine to do, but that I would also be charged on the Denmark side at her bank. Inge promised me to check with her bank about this transaction and get back to me. While Inge did get back to me, she really did not provide me wiht any answers. She simply told me that I must pay in cash the remainder of my rent for June and July (I had already paid for May in cash) and that her bank only told her it would be very expensive to transfer money from the U.S. to her bank and they did not even give her a dollar amount!! This was a huge source of stress and frustration for me!

Luckily, Alanna's atm card does not have extraordinary charges to use it outside of the U.S. We are now planning on my parents sending Alanna's parents money to deposit in her bank account and then Alanna and I can withdraw the money we both need from her account from an atm here in Viborg.

The entire money situation here has absolutely been the bane of my existence in Denmark. I feel like I cannot enjoy my trip because I am constantly trying to figure out how much money I need to feed myself and get to work each week and still have enough left over to pay Inge and buy a few things to take home with. I suggest for future travelers that they open a bank account here and transfer money into it before even arriving, so that there is a surplus of money to spend and a lack of headache to spend it. And, that travelers truly understand the cost of spending just one week living here in Viborg. I am keeping all of my receipts from absolutely everything I have purchased here and I will have an exact dollar amount when I return home to offer to future students who would like to study in Denmark.

The last problem that I have run into in Denmark has been communicating with home. We were told prior to coming to the Kollegium that there is internet access. However, we were not informed that the internet access is not wireless, but rather you have to have an internet cable in order to use the internet.

This was stressful the first night we were here because we needed to email home to let our parents know that we have arrived safely. But, because we did not have internet cables here we could not do so. Luckily, one of the girls who lives here was nice enough to loan us a cable. The next day though we had to go into the shopping center in Viborg and send about $10 on a cable to use. We were told that we would be able to possibly use cables from Foulum, but there was a five day period during which we would not be traveling to Foulum and we wanted to be able to talk to home before then.

I also use skype to speak to my family at home. It has been a very reliable source of communication and I would recommend it to anyone who comes here in the future. The telephones here are not a good way of communicating. They rarely work and you cannot dial out to call home. They are basically useless. Nobody here ever uses them.

Beyond these three major difficulties, we have not had any problems in Viborg. I think the key for those who plan to travel and study here next year is that they have an atm with a good exchange rate (you should have this no matter what, even if you do not use one at home), have money to purchase either a monthly bus pass or multiple ten trip bus passes, and to have skype set up and ready to use on your computer when you arrive!

Jess-Viborg-Day 16

I learned today that the consumers here want to know where their food is coming from, just like in the U.S. However, the Danish are going about accomplishing this task in a much different manner than the U.S. Legislation has already been passed here that forces producers of everthing from tomatoes to dairy products to have identification numbers and labels on their animals and the products they produce. For example, all dairy cattle must have a yellow, plastic, tag in each ear that reads the identification number of that animal. If the government travels to a dairy farm (the government only allows the producer a 24 hour heads-up before arriving) and that farmer does not have proper identification on each animal he can be fined more than 2000 Dkk.

I found this to be very different from the U.S. Yes, people in the United States say that they want to know where their consumer goods come from and our Departments of Agriculture (at least in Illinois) want to be able to trace back to the origin of any animal within a 24 hour period. However, at this point there is no legislation forcing a producer to register the animals that he has on his farm with the IL Dept. of Ag. for example.

When I have spoken with consumers and producers here there is a very mixed opinion about how these issues should be handled. The farmers feel like they have no choice but to follow the governments laws or else they will simply have to go out of business. Farmers also believe that consumers can force legislation to pass to law in a very short period of time without any research or scientific evidence to support their reasons for change. This leads to stipulations being put on farmers that are not necessarily in the best interest of the animals, but rather make people "feel" better about what they perceive as better for the animals that are producing goods.

This issue forms quite a tangled web of emotions, fines, and legislation for a producer to follow. I have a hard time trying to wrap my brain around the thought of U.S. producers being regulated as the producers in Denmark are, and I cannot help but to think that there would be even fewer farmers in the U.S. if they were treated as they are in Denmark. I cannot decide whether this is a good approach or not. I will be sure to write more later about what other consumers, producers, and even researchers think about these issues.

From Dr. Hurley

Your posts are great! Keep them coming. Also, keep adding to your photobucket site as appropriate. Both of those approaches to communicating your experiences seem to be working quite well. You will be able to get great value from the blog and images later on.

I leave soon for my next trip. I will get Nancy to send you more prompts for your next reflections.

Also, about the working in teams - looks like I need to see all of you in my Lactation biology course in the Spring. Probably 80% of the work in that course is done by group work. Now that you are experts you can show others in that class how to do it.

Also, this image was from Sitou Park in Taiwan. Dr. White is expanding on broad issues about careers, etc to our ANSC students. Recognize anyone?

Good luck.

Dr. Hurley

To Allison From Alanna

Hey Allison! I read your last post and I just wanted to say that I can completely relate to your problem number 3. I had such a problem riding a bike the first week I was here. The first bike I got was a bit rickety so that didn't help my situation. I too was embarassed about not being able to ride a bike. I fell almost everytime I got on it and trust me...people saw it. I have battle wounds to prove it. There were times during the week that I would go and practice alone so I could get the hang of it. It's nice to know that someone else had the same feelings towards the bike as I did. I'm glad you are enjoying the bike rides now too. I've discovered that once you get the hang of it you really start to enjoy it. :)

Denmark: Pictures From Alanna and Jess

We have finally uploaded some of our many pictures. Sorry about the delay! You will find pictures of surrounding areas and scenery of Viborg, the Kollegium, Foulum, the Danish Cattle Research Centre and the Swine Research Lab on photobucket. Enjoy the pictures...there will be more to come!

Wageningen Day 24-29 Allison

This week Sam and I ate lunch with Dr. Grossman. In our discussions, we talked about the independence that is expected of students here as has been brought up by several of us on this blog. He had also noticed that students we expected to handle many things on their own, where we would get detailed instruction in the U.S. I find that it is an important element of learning that we may be lacking in the U.S. We also discussed working in teams, which seems to be very common here. At first for our class, it was difficult for Sam and I to work together. We each had our own idea of how things should be, and putting that together in one project became difficult. It took some discussion before we found a way to compromise and divide up the work. It is really helpful to learn how to work in a team, and I think this could be a great improvement in the classroom activities at U of I. We are not forced to work in teams often back home, and even assignments where you are asked to work together, I have found that each member does it on his or her own, and then the pair compares answers. Competition, we have noticed, is not as heated here. I think it is a good thing that less focus is put on the individual here. These are just a few new ideas that we have been discussing lately that I wanted to mention.

The new question is: Identify 3 problems that you have had since leaving home. For each, describe in detail how you went about solving those problems or coming to a personal accommodation about the problem (for example, how did you use communication, creativity, persistence, dialog, negotiation, etc to resolve the problem?). Also, how has solving each problem impacted you since that time?

Problem 1: Traveling
We have had a hard time getting from point A to point B without some confusion nearly every time we have traveled. The first day, we got on the wrong train to get to Wageningen, we spent a whole morning trying to find our meeting point with Rene, and we spent one afternoon on the exact opposite side of town looking for a building. To solve this problem, our map did come in handy, but it turned out to lead us astray in one instance. We have found now that the best solution is to always ask someone. At first we were hesitant because we didn't want to look lost, but since we were actually lost, what did it matter. Luckily, people are always happy to help here. On the train here, people were willing to watch for our stop and two gentlemen even offered to walk us to the next platform. Also, we have used determination to find what we need. It isn't helpful to get frustrated or anxious about being lost. In the end, it is best to just keep looking. It may have taken us a long time to find that meeting place, but we did find it. I now am more familiar with what to do and what type of person to ask when this problem arises, and I am glad that we struggled a bit in the beginning because now I feel that we have more resources and knowledge to use in the future.

Problem 2: Meeting people
I have found it very difficult to meet students our own age here. Part of it is because we live with graduate students, and part of it is because we were not taking classes and did not know where to find other bachelors students. I am not trying to say that the people in our hallway or labs haven't been wonderful, because they have been good friends to us and I believe we have both made good contacts here, but it is just nice to be able to socialize with students at your same level. To solve this problem, I have had to get very creative, and I have learned that you find friends in the most unusual places. I was able to sit in on a lab course just a while back, and as I was observing, I slowly began to mingle in with the students and just started asking questions about how courses were run and such, and by the end of the class I had an invitation for dinner. It was really just a matter of opening up a conversation, and people here seem very curious as to why we are here, so doing this isn't hard. We have now been trying to put ourselves in situations where it is easy to start a conversation and have met several new people doing so. Solving this problem has opened up a new gateway into learning about Dutch culture. Before, we were able to observe, but now we are more involved in what is going on here, and I feel that I can understand better now how our cultures differ.

Problem 3: Biking
This has been a problem for me alone. I must admit that I had not been on a bicycle since I was six years old until two weeks before we left. I had never learned to ride a bike, and never thought it would ever be an issue. When I found out that this would be my main form of transportation, I panicked. I had two days of learning before I came, but I was still quite uncomfortable with riding. When we arrived, I thought that maybe I would be able to walk everywhere, and I nearly gave up on the idea that I would use a bike even if it was available, but I soon found out how spread out the campus was. Once we rented bikes, I was embarassed that I was bad at it, and I avoided riding as much as I could. To solve my problem, it was pure persistence. I really needed to forget my fear in order to get any better. I began to take the bike out by myself and ride in the country for an hour at a time. After just a few days of pushing myself to do it, I really started enjoying it. Now I can ride all over town. I have few problems left, sometimes I have trouble starting, but really, I feel pretty good about it. It was all just a matter of forcing myself to do it and ignoring everyone elses reactions.

The class is going well, and we begin observations tomorrow. I posted pictures last week of Wageningen and the physiology work I had been doing. I am sure there will be many more pictures to come after spending the next few days in the zoo.

some thoughts from afar

Hi team!

Alanna's blog really got me thinking of how very fortunate the four of you are. Honestly, I doubt you would be given so much responsibility and independence at your age working in many places in the US. I sense that this independence (call it lack of direction) is uncomfortable at times because that is a type of growing pain :-) You are all learning to deal with a lot of issues - research, organizational, personal, financial and finding ways to solve the problems. That is so valuable! And very importantly I sense that you are getting through the issues with a good attitude and not being shy to ask for help/answers. Way to go!

Dean Bohn

Viborg Thoughts About Work: Alanna

This week has been extra exciting. I am finally seeing results in my project and learning how they contribute to liver function and metabolism. There is a lot going on inside my head at this point in the game. I’m not in over my head at work but there are times where I feel I am just not qualified enough to do what I do. The best way to learn though is truly by asking someone who knows what they are doing. I kind of felt really stupid at work today asking questions every second, but I realized that’s the only way to learn. My coworkers understand that I am young and I am trying to get a grasp on things so they don’t mind explaining things to me. There have only been a few problematic encounters over the week. The first problem I encountered was the language barrier. When typing up data on Excel I am expected to do it in the lab. The lab computers, however, are in Danish and every time I have to enter in data the files need to be transferred to my computer in my office which is set in English. My laptop is also experiencing some problems. I don’t know if it is my browser or settings but often times links don’t work or they automatically switch into Danish. It’s a bit frustrating and I’ve been trying to deal with it. The second problem I have encountered is the cost of living. Things at the store just seem so expensive and I can’t get over that fact. I’m tempted to buy things but when I calculate the prices I stop myself from buying them. I think that has half way ruined my experience here. I want to enjoy some of the finer items here but I’m trying to conserve money for traveling and exploring. The third problem I’ve encountered is thinking outside the box. I’ve always been taught very systematically with direct results. Things aren’t that simple here. You always have to have a plan for when your experiment fails or your parameters don’t match up. Even though I have been frustrated at many times I have to stop and think. The environment here has help alot with my problems. My coworkers have been so friendly and understanding and it has made things much easier for me to cope with failures and problems here. Regardless of these problems, I have so far had a very enjoyable stay in Denmark. Weather has gotten better, I have meet more people, and my experiment has finally started and is going well.

Viborg Work Week 3-4: Alanna

Things at work have been going very well over the past two weeks. I’ve had the opportunity to see and learn an array of things pertaining to the dairy field. Jens is working on dairy cattle nutrition and has been researching the effects of specific fatty acids on fat turnover in the liver with a primary focus on the prevention of fatty liver in dairy cows. For the first two weeks of work I was fortunate enough to follow him around and study his work. I’ve been reading an array of journals and publications from both Jens and those of his colleagues. Things in the lab have become less hectic over the week and I have been able to formulate a routine. Every Tuesday I label blood and biopsy tubes and make sure everything is in place for Wednesday’s blood drawing. On Wednesdays I go out to the cattle research center with two of the lab techs and we bleed cows. We try to take the blood from the tail but often times the cows are too restless to bleed. In that case we take the blood from the jugular. I’ve noticed that the Jersey cows are much more restless than the Holsteins. Sometimes it's a pain to get the cows to stay still or even to get them in their proper restraints. I love Wednesdays nonetheless! Starting last week I got to participate in tail bleeding. I’ve never taken blood from a dairy cow before and it proved to be a bit challenging. With the help of the lab technicians, however, the process went smoothly. While we are drawing blood Birthe, the liver biopsy queen as I like to call her, does her thing. She first identifies the region of the liver using just her hands. On the right side of the cow she places her hand on the cow’s hip region. From there she moves her hand forward and measures the distance between the hip and the shoulder region counting three ribs in between. It’s pretty amazing that this method works every time! After finding the liver she shaves the region and injects the cow with a local anesthetic and waits 10 minutes or so for it to set in. We take blood samples while waiting for the anesthesia to set in. Once the cows are ready Birthe takes a scalpel and makes a small incision in which the liver biopsy can be taken out. The most interesting part of this is she uses a biopsy gun that is meant for a human being. It is much smaller than the ones I have seen at UIUC. Jens takes great pride in the fact that they use human instruments because new methods are being created for the benefit of both humans and animals. The one thing that has come up over and over again with this experiment is animal welfare and quality of life. While writing my research paper Jens came over to look at it. Although I mentioned consumer and producer preference I lacked to mention the over health of the animal. I knew that was a very important factor in the trial but it never occurred to me that this study was done mostly to improve the health of the cows which would later prove to be beneficial for both the producer and consumer in the long run. After we have completed both the blood samples and the liver biopsies we take the samples back to the lab and centrifuge them to pipette the plasma layer for analyzing. The plasma is later assessed for metabolites. All this biochemistry is interesting yet very challenging.

Last Friday I got to be part of a top secret experiment. I can't share the details, but I can tell you I learned alot about fat globules in dairy milk and their interactions with enzymes. I learned how fat globules are split and reacted. Also, for the first time I was introduced to Biomek. Biomek is an automatic robot that can quickly pipette, dilute and dispense with the touch of a button. I thought this was the coolest robot ever. It does everything for you, no more pipetting by hand! I met with Torben Larsen, a scientist genius who spends time figuring out parameters for his milk project through a scheme of statistics. Some of the parameters he measures include temperature, time, pH, and catalyst reactions. He described his line of work, photometrics, and its capabilities. Recently, Torben and his group came up with a way to prescreen cows for mastitis. They can predict three days before hand when a cow will get mastitis. That is three days earlier than when ordinary veterinarians can diagnosis mastitis through clinical examination. Their over all goal is to find a way to improve the health and welfare of dairy cattle through the study of their milk. Very interesting work! I am now working with Torben on a project of my own. I am comparing the advantages of pooled sampling versus individual sampling in a herd of dairy cattle. I will be looking for 14 specific parameters to asses the over all health of the cows and their enzyme activity. Today I had a lesson on spectrometry and was taught how to use the autoanalyzer for these 14 parameters. We are testing for an array of metabolites, ions, and enzymes. I look forward this week to comparing my data and getting some results.

The content that I can most likely contribute to the community is my knowledge on pooled sampling. I am in the process of writing a research paper on the effects of pooled sampling versus individual sampling in early lactating cows. Pooled sampling is a method used to cut costs that are associated with blood sampling. This method, however, have created some concerns in the scientific world. I am trying to prove the method’s accuracy and long term cost benefit by comparing analytical data drawn from several metabolites and enzyme activities in a herd of early lactating cows. Hopefully with this knowledge I can better explain why veterinarians and scientist should used the pooled blood sampling method over individual sampling. I am excited to share my results with the group when I get back because there could be some great implications on dairy cattle health and cost management. During my research and idea phase of this project I have learned several important things which I think could benefit not only U.S. farmers but the dairy industry as a whole. I have learned how to view things in a different light while being here. Thinking outside of the box is something Jens is teaching me how to do every day. It’s frustrating at times when I don’t get the results I want. Science isn’t just that simple and I’ve had to come to the realization that it takes time for real results. My patience has been tested and I think that is a good thing. I like this work and I’m ready to see what my results tell me about these cows I am studying.

Viborg Weekends 3-4: Alanna

The weekends here in Viborg have been fairly productive and eventful. On May 31st I attended a monster truck show with some of the people living at the Kollegium. They thought it would be an “American” experience, even though I explained to them that I never attended a monster truck show in the U.S. They were convinced this show would be a great representation of American entertainment. I went along with it. We had a lot of fun that night biking into town and getting to know one another. The next morning Jess and I went into Viborg to do some shopping. While walking around it started to rain so we decided to check out the museum in town, stiftsmuseum. There was a nice exhibit on early Danish childhood that we passed through. The museum featured the many lifestyles of the Danes from the past. The museum included furniture, clothing, military interests, and an odd collection of birds. It seems that the lifestyles of the Danes did not differ greatly from those living in Britain or the U.S. during the same time period. We ended our museum tour with a nice cup of tea offered to all visitors. I like this idea of having tea at a museum. Tea time is one of the things that strikes me most about the Danes. It reflects their hospitality and warmth. After the visit to the museum the weather started to clear up so we decided to go for a walk through the park. There is a beautiful park located next to the north lake, which is home to hundreds of different flowers. Hopefully when the weather gets nicer Jess and I will be able to take a paddleboat out onto the lake, which is one of the many activities to choose from at this park. Sunday was a beautiful day so I decided to go for a bike ride beyond Viborg. The scenery outside Viborg is absolutely amazing. I started biking and didn’t realize how much I actually biked because the ride was so enjoyable. Although I have gotten into a few accidents, I have finally mastered the skills of bike riding. Denmark had a bank holiday on Tuesday so we did not have to go to work. I again took my bike out to the trails and just explored. The weather was awful but there were some positives. I saw a variety of slugs and snails, which I have never seen before in such quantities. The nature out here is breathtaking.

The following weekend (June 8) many people from Foulum went to Aarhus, the second largest city in Denmark. Recently Foulum and the University of Aarhus merged so that students from Aarhus could learn more and become part of the research being developed in Foulum. Scientists from Foulum are now being asked to travel to Aarhus once or twice a week to teach. In a celebration for this collaboration the University of Aarhus decided to put together an event called “Feel Aarhus” for those working at Foulum. The event started off with coffee, tea, and bread…of course! After this delicious snack the director of the event gave a speech along with fellow scientists from the university. It was kind of disappointing to find out that all the speeches were in Danish. After sitting there for an hour Jens told us to go and tour the campus a bit before lunch. Even thought the campus is not that old (est. 1929) it still had its own beauty. After a great lunch with the scientists from Foulum everyone split up to go on their tour. Jess and I chose to go to Moesgaard. This museum featured the body of a man who had been violently killed and thrown into a bog. This bog was like no other in that it preserved his body for hundreds of years. When farmers looking for peat dug him up they though he had recently died and called the police. It was later discovered that the body had been there for hundreds of years and that the plants in the bog had emitted preserving agents. This museum also featured a variety of weaponry that dated back to the Viking era. Although our tour was suppose to include a trip to the beach we never found it. Apparently the beach was a few miles away from the museum. Since we didn’t know where we were going we decided it would be best to stay at the museum. The night ended with a great dinner and band. The entertainment was good. There were three men from Denmark playing older southern style songs from the U.S. It reminded me of home for a short while. On Saturday we went back into town to mail some things and to look around. We meet up with another student from France and enjoyed a thorough walk through town. The weather was absolutely beautiful Saturday so we sat outside and enjoyed some ice cream. Sunday was an exciting day. Jess, Elke (a student from Germany) and I went out to Dollerup. Dollerup is home to a beautiful lake and hiking trails. We first biked out to the Hald Ruin, a fortress once used for Roman protection. Later that day we biked out to the lake in Dollerup and went for a swim. The water was perfect and the sun was beaming. It was well worth the several mile bike ride. People here are definitely not afraid to bare some skin. Their carefree attitude and relaxed lifestyle seem to influence some individuals at the lakefront.

Wageningen Week 4: Sam

Write about the thought process you are undergoing to move toward addressing the questions, where you are now in your thinking, how you think you will proceed in addressing the question, and/or what your current plan is to move forward?

My plan to move forward with developing a learning module based on the differences within animal welfare amongst different countries includes researching statistical data that might suggest and prove the theories of optimal growth that I have created. I also hope to inquire further to masters and PhD students once I am finished with this course, asking if any of their research might suggest support for my theories. Another factor I am now looking to include is the comparison of animal welfare amongst zoos, therefore I will hopefully target most areas of interest within my audience. So far, I have noticed several very favorable conditions for animals such as some of the polar bears in comparison to several zoos I have been to in the U.S. I have also visited a huge aquatic mammal facility where the sea lions and seals had a ton of space, in comparison to most aquariums I have been to in the U.S. Ultimately, I hope to conclude whether it is easier to keep animals in bigger habitats and whether there is less interference of disease and stress upon the captive animals in these conditions.

Identify 3 problems that you have had since leaving home. For each, describe in detail how you went about solving those problems or coming to a personal accommodation about the problem. Also, how has solving each problem impacted you since that time?

My first big problem was my internet connection. I began with my UIUC email as the only functional component. I tested my computer in Allison’s room and she tested hers in mine. My computer worked fine in her room, yet her computer did not work with my newly purchased cord either. Therefore, I decided the problem was likely the phone jack in the wall. I referenced the information sheet for problems concerning the internet and it said to go to the Wageningen Student Organization. On the maps we have, it had it listed way out past the bus station, we spent about an hour trying to find it in this area, only to discover after asking several people, that we were in the entirely wrong area. The map was wrong. We got directions toward where this building actually is hidden way away, only to be told by the people there that this was definitely the wrong place for the problem. They sent us on our way to the buildings that control internet service for the campus, which were again, a ways away and very hard to find as it was tucked away behind a huge series of buildings. To say the least, the campus is very spread out as we were told. We finally find the right building, I explain my internet problem at the help desk and basically all I got was a blank stare. He finally replies, well I’ve never really heard of this problem. I asked whether it might be possible that a block was placed on the room and he looks it up and says no. He took down me information, emailed me a few days later and we were able to resolve the problem after about a week, as I provided different codes for him from my computer. I never really became clear at what the exact problem was but I am happy and relieved it is fixed. Through this problem, I learned my way around town and campus to a much deeper extent than I could’ve imagined. I doubt I would’ve ever known it extended out so far or that half of those places existed. I also now know where to go and who to contact if any other computer problems arise.

My next big problem was my bank. I called each branch, for both my debit card and credit card before leaving, having notes put on my accounts that I would be completing transactions in Europe throughout the entire summer, providing exact dates. Therefore, it came to my surprise that my mom informed me that the bank called on a Sunday evening (after I had tried booking several flights throughout Europe) and said they had suspended my card due to suspected fraudulent charges. They said they would not remove the hold until they spoke with me within the next 24 hours, or else they would reject all of the charges and cancel my card. I first had to make it clear to my mom that finding a pay phone here in Wageningen is nearly impossible. Once she understood I had no way of calling, she spent about 2 hours on the phone with both branches of the bank, finally convincing them to accept her consent. I left all of my financial information at home and messaged with her online as she made the phone calls, providing any bit of information she might need. My cards were finally cleared. Although, something I did discover was that my Chase debit card works perfectly fine in ATM’s, yet I cannot book flights with it. The Chase end said for some reason there are often problems with the banks on the Europe end and they cannot do anything about it. Therefore, I was faced with 6 euros extra in fees, per charge, because I was forced to use my credit card over my debit card. Just a warning.

The last, more recent problem I have faced, concerns the Animal Behavior course that we are taking. On the second day into the course, we discovered that we need to be registered in order to have an account, to log in and use the computer. We are not technically registered due to all the extra fees, therefore that left us unable to log in. Our supervisor logged us in after awhile on the first day, to one computer to share. We later discussed the problem with Paul Koene, the director of the course and he said he would try and take care of it. He discovered that there were not any temporary accounts left to be given out. To try and make an effort from my end, I emailed Kurt and Stacey to see if they possibly remembered having a problem and how it might have been solved. I heard back from Kurt 2 days later, yet he had no idea and thinks it might have all been set up by the time they arrived. Paul said that he did not want us using Rosa’s account (as she had let us all week) and that he did not understand how we could follow the course without being able to log on. We tried stopping by to see if Rene had any ideas on how we might be able to solve this problem, yet he was not in that morning. Allison emailed Rene over our lunch break. Later on in the afternoon, Paul approached us and said he thinks that Bonne, the ‘teacher’ of the course solved the problem. However, it is now Monday and we are still without accounts, using a supervisors for the time being. We are just hoping that we do not get kicked out of the course after having done so much research already. This has taught me to try and problem solve through many different methods, since the first may not always work. It has been a matter of thinking of many different people to contact, that might have an idea on how to make it work.

Additional Handbook Advice

Two more comments that I had intended to include were:

For Wageningen, www.92920v.nl was suggested as a travel aid, however I have found that www.ns.nl is much more helpful just because it serves a very similar function but also includes switching the site language to English.

Also, as a tip of general advice. If you plan to travel at all on the weekends, it is very worthwhile to try an accomplish planning some farther trips before you even leave. As in as far in advance as possible. It may be hard if you are not entirely sure of what to expect from the program, but planning in advance can save you a lot of money.

I will try and compile an overall list of helpful websites for flights, trains and hostels by the time I am finishing up this program for the handbook.

Wageningen Week 3: Sam

What content will you be able to contribute to this community of scholars/learners?

The main topic I have in mind is the animal welfare and conditions that different countries keep. For example, while here in the Netherlands, I have noticed that the big open pastures that they keep most of their farm animal life in, which are similar to the conditions I saw in Brasil. Another factor is that in many cases, both of these countries keep a mix of the farm animals co-existing amongst one and another, in the same habitat. This differs from the U.S. a great deal, seeing as those most of our animals are kept separate, in much smaller places. I also noticed differences even in small areas where animals, such as pigs, are kept versus our own. Some of these areas had saw dust type bedding. The chickens were raised in communal fairly large cages, in some cases, the mother hen left in with the chicks as an influence. I have not experienced these conditions in the U.S., in comparison, most of our swine facilities smell much worse, seem less sanitary (you had to take a shower before entering the facility and only wear their clothing here) and our chickens are often kept in very small cages. The overall animal welfare concerns is other countries seem much higher.

How do you view yourself and your experiences contributing to this community of scholars/learners?

I see myself developing another learning module and poster with a better idea of what my overall aim and objective is. Thinking of ideas that I can incorporate into the class ANSC 199 while working on the program here in the Netherlands now has allowed me to recognize topics that I can bring back to incorporate in the class. I am already brainstorming ideas for which parts of specific courses I have taken, such as AnSc 100, this type of learning module based on animal welfare could fit into. I feel that this learning module can bring many new ideas to our farm animal systems.

How do you think your experiences will impact your own approach to or achievement of learning in ANSC courses once you return in the fall?

I believe I will be able to develop a module more thoroughly this fall, seeing as though I have already presented my past module in a class and was able to gain feedback on how my approach work, based on the extensive feedback that I received from students. I feel that there are many classes where a module based on animal welfare would work, especially production classes that I am not as familiar with yet, but may be a place where I can propose new ideas to up and coming animal producers. I plan to research whether facilities that cater to animal welfare have more efficient numbers when it comes producing these animals. I feel from the research that I have overlooked thus far, this will likely be the case, seeing as though animals growth is typically stunted or slowed when they are under the stressed conditions that we keep them in.

Contribution to the Handbook for Wageningen:

Buy a discount pass for the trains. I believe it is around 25 euros now in 2007 and I just learned about it, after already having bought many train tickets. Apparently it can save you up to 40% on purchases and I definitely feel it is worthwhile! Train prices can add up! In order to purchase this pass you need a picture of yourself to give them, I discovered this yesterday when I tried to buy one.

Other Thoughts:

As Allison has described, we began our Animal Behavior and Environment course this past Monday, June 4th. I am really enjoying it so far and I feel much of the material will be directly applied to my planned future career with training, animal husbandry and rescue for marine mammals. After researching all week, we finally got to take a trip out to the zoo yesterday and it was really exciting to finally observe our monkeys! There is a 3 ½ week old baby that the zookeeper asked we focus our research question on. Apparently there was a baby last year but the male, who helps rear the infant (unlike most macaques) took the infant for too long and did not return it to her mother in time to nurse, so she died of starvation. Therefore, they asked us to study how much time the infant spends with the mom and the father. We already noticed the father taking the infant away for short periods of time on Friday, which makes us slightly nervous, because now we almost feel as if this infant monkey’s life is on our shoulders. Hopefully all works out, Barbary macaques are really amazing animals to observe thus far.

Wageningen Day 20-23 Allison

Sam and I began our class called Behavior and Environment this week. We are taking this class to hopefully get a better grasp on what the educational experience is really like here. The class is taught by Paul Koene and focuses on ethology as a way to quantify behavior to create a better understanding of animals. In this class, we attend lectures discussing behavior and ethology theory and then we work out our own projects concerning a species assigned to us.

The past few days have been spent in a computer lab researching our animal, the Barbary macaque, writing an introductory report, and devising an experiment using our new knowledge of ethograms and sampling. As of this point, we will be observing maturation of social behavior in subadult individuals to try to see if being raised in captivity changes the way macaques mature socially.

With this class, I have noticed that things are much more open ended, and much more responsibility sits on the student's shoulders. Although our advisor holds meetings with us to answer questions and help us stay on the right track, nearly everything comes from our own thinking and there is no one around to make sure we are working when we are supposed to be. I like this method for a few reasons. This method allows for more open thinking and I believe it allows for more creative ideas to be produced. Also, it ensures that grades are not just handed to students, as I feel they sometimes are in U of I classes. All of the work belongs to the student, and there is no one to blame but the student if the work is not at the level it should be. Here, it is all what you put into it.

The downside of this method is that some students in our class were lost on where to even begin. Each group had been flooded with too much information, and were having trouble putting it into a narrow research question of their own. I also became frustrated with the lack of structure at first, but I feel like it really caused Sam and I to work as a team. Without being able to put our ideas together, I think this project would have been much harder.

The education system here from gradeschool on really focuses on individual ability and does not expect every person to be good in every subject. That is something I wish our society could see. I wish that Americans, in education and in the workforce, could see that not everyone can be on top or a leader, and that this is okay. I understand wanting to motivate people, but I feel that the expectations of perfection are too high in our country for anyone to achieve. This is something I hope to bring back with me and incorporate into 199.

Also, people are much "greener" here. It isn't that they preach being environmentally friendly, but the Dutch were just raised that way. Fewer people drive cars, the animals are kept in better conditions, and the need for new manufactured products is not as high here. Dr. Hurley mentioned that they live for quality and not quantity here, and I believe that this is very true. It makes me look at my day to day and I have already noticed significant changes I can make.

I am excited for the weeks to come when we get to go to the zoo and observe our animal. I think we will have a nice time watching our research grow into something tangible.

Wageningen Day 15-19 Allison

This week has been very nice for me. I was able to go through the process of electophoresis, tour the dairy farms, and also sit in on a bachelor's physiology lab. The dairy farms were very interesting because they use robotic milking here for small farms. These systems allow cows to chose when they want to be milked and requires very little staff to aid the milking process. A laser directed machine finds the teats and begins to milk the cow. She then stands until she is finished and is released back out into the pen. The cows know exactly what to do.

It was also nice this week to be able to sit in on a class. Although the lecture was in Dutch, I was able to see many differences in their teaching methods compared to ours. This was also the first time I had any encounters with students my age. We weren't sure that this school even had a bachelor's program.

This lab was to observe the breakdown and absorption of sugars in the intestine. The technicians removed the rat's intestines and inverted them to create a closed system where nutrients would flow inside and remain there. This way, sugars could be easily measured using a color detection system.

I also was able to sit down with one student and discuss general differences in their education system. They are on a 10 point scale here and most of the class grades are based on a single final exam. The students are responsible for themselves here and must be self motivated. They are also currently trying to make all lectures in English to encourage more international students to come to this small university. Tuition is much lower here as well; for Dutch students only 1,500 a year tuition and fees, and most students recieve financial aid from the government.

It was nice this weekend to just take a day away and go to the beach. Things will get more hectic once we start our class tomorrow. This class seems very intense considering it runs all day. I can't wait to see how it all is run here and what is expected of a student.

Wageningen Pictures Posted (Sam)

Things have been going very well here in Wageningen. Allison and I enjoyed taking a day trip out to Den Haag, the capital of the Netherlands, as known as the Hague, this weekend. We relaxed at the beach after walking a few miles through the city and realized that the North Sea is very cold as everyone had promised. We have finished up with research for the month and I excited to begin our Animal Behavior Course tomorrow. It should be interesting days, as they run 8-5, Monday through Friday.

I have finally had time to post pictures on the photobucket.com album. If you search for ANSCUSDA07, that is the name of our album and it will come up if you would like to view the pictures. I have created a sub album for our Wagenignen portion, so far containing folders of the pig and poultry research tour, robotic milking tour, my aquaculture research and picture I've taken around the town of Wageningen so far. Enjoy!