Supporting Casey's first Madagascar research trip

Dear friends and family,

 

As most of you know, in 2019 I'd planned to go to Madagascar to go on my first field research trip for Summer 2020. I had tickets, most of my needed field gear, and plans all lined up for this first experience and then the pandemic happened. Now, I'M FINALLY GETTING TO GO DO RESEARCH ON SIFAKA! Anyone who knows me even a little knows exactly how much this experience means to me.

 

Now I'm in a Master's program under the mentorship of Dr. Mitchell Irwin at Northern Illinois University, studying nutritional ecology and energetics of diademed sifaka. We'll be headed to Tsinjoarivo around this June for two months of field research with the SADABE team! I'm more prepared for the field having had training at Duke Lemur Center for two summers, 2020 and 2021 respectively. My advisor and his Malagasy colleagues are well-versed in hosting and teaching students in the field.

 

While living on a graduate student stipend, the expenses for a first-time field expedition are more than for a seasoned traveler. I've applied so far to two grants to help cover costs and have already heard back that I will be receiving $5,000 from Re:Wild and $3,250 from Primate Conservation Inc for my research project! Many other grant options are for Ph.D. students only, rather than for M.A. students like me. However, grant budgeting tends to not account for necessary international travel vaccinations (I've spent ~600 so far getting up to date on all of those) and necessary rainforest field gear prep (while I had much already covered from prior trip planning, there is still some to buy. Rain gear is expensive!). Additionally, while my grants cover most of the field costs, I need to help cover food and wet lab gear.

 

Thank you for helping get me out to Madagascar to finally pursue my dreams! I'm featured here on the SADABE website as a student of Dr. Irwin ( https://www.sadabe.org/Irwin/Lab_Members.html ) and my scicomm Instagram account is @Propithecase (this is a play on "Propithecus"). I plan to document my first field journey on my Instagram!