Štěpán and Antigone identifying flowering herbs.
As a conclusion to the busy month, a large part of our team (Rob, Stepan, Kobe, Antigone, Dominik and Sailee) spent the last week of June in the Krkonose mountains. We hiked along the ridge of the mountain range, looking for suitable areas to study pollination networks with the Czech Science Foundation (GAČR) project PI-ed by Rob. As opposed to our spring sampling in the semi-natural forests, we were scouting for natural grasslands above the timberline. All throughout (minus a foggy day), we hiked through beautiful landscapes and fair weather.With Stepan and Antigone proceeding at “botanical” pace, we spotted numerous interesting plant species, some of them endemic! Not surprisingly, there were plenty of insects too. Our trip has been highly successful, and we now have a few potential sites to choose from for our longer sampling sessions next summers!