Field work isn’t just hiking around and playing with puppies. There is a little talked about dark side to field work that many researchers love to hate—organization and paperwork!

Field work requires lots of help, equipment, permits, budgets, logistics and inventory. My Sunday “funday” is usually spent catching up on this week’s receipts and cash stash, restocking sample collection bags, cleaning and checking equipment, and quite literally “recharging” all the hundreds of batteries we use for our GPSs, camera traps and microchip scanner.

Though it might not necessarily be as fun as puppies, this is a necessary evil as it helps us prepare for the next week as well as plan for our next season of data collection. Actually, it’s not so bad as long as you have plenty of coffee and you’re blasting your favorite tunes☺

By the way, this is only a quarter of the batteries we use!

Anna Czupryna

A research associate in the zoo’s Alexander Center for Applied Population Biology, Anna Czupryna studies domestic dog population dynamics near Tanzania’s Serengeti National Park. Her work is one part of a zoo-led vaccination campaign that protects the region’s people, pets and predators.

Follow Anna’s field updates on Twitter.