Please scroll down for the English version-UNNC graduate’s regional research on barn swallows wins high praise.

春末夏初的夜晚，黑龍江姑娘張巋然像往常一樣背上書包，挎起相機，掛著副八倍鏡，便出門上街看燕子。

這位寧波諾丁漢大學環(huán)境科學系2020屆的畢業(yè)生，去年頂著寒暑尋訪甬城內(nèi)的燕巢，以家燕為研究對象，畢業(yè)論文拿下90分的高分。（按照寧諾的評分體系——70分以上即優(yōu)秀。）指導(dǎo)老師Odette Paramor直言：“這是畢業(yè)季看到的最真摯可愛的論文！”

剛剛結(jié)束在密歇根大學第一學年碩士課程的她，希望利用暑假將這篇論文整理發(fā)表。同時，她計劃與北京大學的候鳥研究團隊溝通協(xié)作，將畢業(yè)論文中的研究區(qū)域擴大，繼續(xù)以親歷生態(tài)現(xiàn)場的方式揭秘家燕的“快樂老家”。

一次外出看病帶來的靈感

張巋然和鳥的緣分始于大二。圖書館舉辦的一場鳥類展覽，張巋然報名成為了志愿者，就此和這些小生命結(jié)緣，掉進了觀鳥的“坑”。后來她還擔任學生社團Nottingreen的社長。

大三下，她就決定選擇鳥類作為自己的畢業(yè)論文研究對象，希望研究棲息地以及人類活動對城市鳥類多樣性及豐富度的影響。但辛苦耕耘一學期后，她遇到了瓶頸：觀測位點眾多，需要頻繁造訪，還有“因為被迫觀鳥而對鳥產(chǎn)生的厭惡心情”，都讓她十分泄氣。在持續(xù)的焦慮下，張巋然生了一場病，而正是這次看病的外出，帶給了她全新的靈感。

從醫(yī)院出來，她漫步在鼓樓街頭，意外發(fā)現(xiàn)老巷子里成群結(jié)隊地居住著許多燕子。已是夜晚時分，街巷仍被熙熙攘攘的人群和生意紅火的小飯店映照得如同白晝，按照自然規(guī)律本該休息的家燕仍在捉蟲哺雛。

喧鬧的鼓樓步行街里也有燕子集體筑窩

觀察著這一切，她忍不住想：為什么燕子們會在這里集群筑窩，而不是其他位置？它們挑選巢址會考慮哪些因素？那么，在城市或鄉(xiāng)村中生活的家燕會有不同的考量嗎？

回學校后，這些疑問一直縈繞在她的心頭。她查閱了大量文獻，發(fā)現(xiàn)這樣的研究正是現(xiàn)存科研的空白。并且燕巢位置固定，方便調(diào)查。于是在得到導(dǎo)師的支持后，她興高采烈地敲定了新的研究方向。

她計劃在城市與鄉(xiāng)村的輻射帶上，研究影響家燕選擇巢址的環(huán)境因素。調(diào)查區(qū)域被鎖定在鼓樓與寧諾兩點間的延長線上，她解釋說：“鄞州區(qū)近年來一直在搞建設(shè)，這條調(diào)查樣帶既包含了豐富的城市肌理，又能體現(xiàn)城市向外擴張的動態(tài)變化�！�

張巋然的田園調(diào)查研究區(qū)域圖

她把自己代入了燕子家長的角色

“4時39分家燕夫婦醒來，先在建筑物廊道里飛了幾圈，似乎在熱身，然后飛到外面，也許是去進食了一些飛蟲。4時44分成鳥開始喂食雛鳥，平均3分鐘/次，一小時內(nèi)共喂食21次……”

——摘自張巋然的觀測記錄

根據(jù)生態(tài)學理論，想理解動物的生活，就要用“動物的眼睛”去看世界。于是張巋然選擇鼓樓與寧諾校內(nèi)的兩戶燕子作為“模范家庭”，設(shè)身處地地觀察它們的日常生活，將自己代入燕子家長的角色，理解它們選址的考量。

同時，為了盡可能全面地采集到調(diào)查區(qū)域內(nèi)的燕巢，她每天輾轉(zhuǎn)于鼓樓與寧諾兩點間的采樣帶上。調(diào)查區(qū)域內(nèi)的每一條街道、每一個村莊，每一戶燕子的位置她都爛熟于心。

在鼓樓的街道里，經(jīng)常能找到“燕子家庭”

經(jīng)過三個月的田野調(diào)查，她一共收集到169個燕巢的數(shù)據(jù)。并且，基于經(jīng)驗判斷，她還記錄下101個本該是絕佳筑巢點，卻“詭異”地沒有燕子家庭光顧的點位。

“

這篇論文的核心問題是家燕們是如何選擇它們的棲息地的，我希望能站在動物的視角完整且有邏輯地分析一個家燕宅區(qū)的‘風水’，進而預(yù)測出有利于家燕筑巢的環(huán)境因素。

通過對變量進行合理篩選、隨機組合，她最終得到了27個模型，并通過比較得出結(jié)論：越老的小區(qū)或者村莊越容易發(fā)現(xiàn)燕子窩；在家燕約500m的覓食范圍內(nèi)如果存在吸引飛蟲聚集的要素，燕窩往往會更密集；景觀尺度的環(huán)境變量如河流、道路長度、綠地面積，在大尺度范圍內(nèi)（750m）對家燕巢密度影響更大，密集的水網(wǎng)會吸引更多家燕，而密集的道路則會導(dǎo)致家燕巢密度下降。

“這是一篇真正具有獨創(chuàng)性的研究”

交完論文之后，張巋然多少有點忐忑。畢竟她的論文屬于完全原創(chuàng)性的學術(shù)研究，沒有太多先例可循。

這篇論文最終獲得了中英雙方考官的一致好評。她的導(dǎo)師Odette Paramor博士說，

“

這顯然是她熱愛并且喜歡做的一件事情。不論是研究的廣度和深度、嚴謹性，還是她投入的原創(chuàng)的思想、細心和純粹的努力，這些都讓這篇文章閃耀。

不止是Odette Paramor，所有外部考官都被她在論文中展現(xiàn)的“真摯”所打動。一位考官在閱讀了當年度諾丁漢大學地理科學系所有本科畢業(yè)論文后，認為這篇文章“極其優(yōu)秀”——田野調(diào)查和研究方法令人印象深刻，并表示這是他最喜歡的一篇論文。

本只想全力以赴做好畢業(yè)論文的張巋然沒想到收獲了如此之多的好評。目前在美國密歇根大學的環(huán)境生態(tài)學系讀研的她保持著和本科導(dǎo)師的聯(lián)絡(luò)，籌備近期將這篇文章投稿發(fā)表至學術(shù)期刊。

與此同時，她打算這個暑期與北大的候鳥團隊溝通協(xié)作，繼續(xù)探索家燕繁殖相關(guān)的課題。這一次，她計劃運用公民科學的力量，招募“尋燕志愿者”擴大研究范圍，對論文結(jié)果進行進一步的分析和論證。

為了拍攝，經(jīng)常全副武裝的張巋然

回顧這段崎嶇而充滿挑戰(zhàn)的經(jīng)歷，張巋然覺得，最大的意義就是鍛煉了自己堅毅的心性。由于經(jīng)驗不足她踩了很多坑，但是她始終沒有放棄，而是“死磕到底”。這也使她切身體會到科研的完整過程，也被科研的魅力深深俘獲。

“

做著自己喜歡的事情，再累都是幸福的。每次找到一個窩，看到可愛的小燕子的時候，我就覺得：值了。

UNNC graduate’s regional research on barn swallows wins high praise

Kuiran Zhang, a 2020 Environmental Sciences graduate from University of Nottingham Ningbo China (UNNC), took one year to find and observe almost every barn swallow nest within her study area, a 18km * 5km rectangle across the Yinzhou district of Ningbo for her thesis research, and obtained the highest dissertation score in the School of Geographical Sciences of the year.

Now moving on to pursuing an MSc at the University of Michigan, Kuiran plans to work with the Bird Migratory Research Team at Peking University to expand her research scope during her break.

Kuiran’s interest in birds developed from her volunteer experience for the “Birds in UNNC” exhibition on campus in 2018, which aimed to raise students’ awareness on bird and environmental protection. She chose birds as the theme of her graduation thesis in year three, hoping to study the impact of habitat and human activities on the diversity and population of urban birds.

Kuiran made little progress in her dissertation at the beginning, because the very first topic she chose involves huge amount of observation sites, high observe frequency. Anxiety caused by approaching deadlines frustrated her and made her ill. However, it was a trip to hospital that gave her new inspiration - the unusual behavior of barn swallows in the downtown area made her rethink the factors that influence nest site.

After conducting background research, Kuiran found a research gap and changed her research direction.Her new research focuses on barn swallow nest distribution patterns along a suburban-to-urban core landscape gradient. “I chose Yinzhou district because it has developed rapidly since its establishment, starting within Ningbo’s urban core and extending out into agricultural areas,” she explained.

To fully understand barn swallows’ decision and obtain first-hand data, Kuiran visited every street and tried to find every nest in her study area. She also picked two nests to carefully observe the inhabitants’ lives, trying to interpret factors influencing swallow parents’ choices from their perspective.

Despite the inconvenient transportation and dialect barriers, she successfully collected the data of 169 nests. After thorough data analysis, she discovered that barn swallows favour older building blocks, and insect traps within radii of 500m will attract denser nests. Landscape variables “l(fā)ength of road” and “l(fā)ength of river” predict colony size more accurately in large scales than in smaller scales, and Length of road within radii of 750m explains the most variance in colony size.

As her research was completely original without many precedent cases to refer to, Kuiran was a little nervous at first. However, she was happily surprised by the high praise from the entire supervisor board.

“The loveliest thing about Kuiran’s dissertation was that it was obviously a piece of work which she had loved and enjoyed doing. The breadth of the research, the range of methodological approaches used, and the level of original thought, really made her dissertation shine. It was a total joy to read,” said Dr Odette Paramor, her supervisor.

An external examiner called it “truly excellent” after reading all the first-class dissertations from School of Geography across the three campuses, and said that it had been his favourite dissertation of the year.

Currently studying in the US, Kuiran still keeps close contact with Dr Paramor, and is preparing to send this dissertation to academic journals.

Looking back on the whole research process, Kuiran was glad that she persevered to the end, overcoming various obstacles that arose and accumulating experience step by step. “Doing things I love makes every effort meaningful,” she recalled.

文字來源 | 毛思逸，Lily Su

圖片來源 | 張巋然

English | Elena Yang，ETT

Copyright

轉(zhuǎn)載或進一步了解

寧波諾丁漢大學品牌與傳媒辦公室

commsandmarketing@nottingham.edu.cn

寧波諾丁漢大學

中國第一所中外合作大學

卓越學術(shù) 精彩未來