Gopher Gardens

Jenni Fuller monitors tortoises in restored sandhill habitat at Archbold Boilogical Station as part of her research internship. For her independent project she is studying the effects Gopher Tortoises have on the vegetation around their burrows and what happens to these gopher gardens after a burrow is abandoned.

Jenni finds gopher tortoise burrows and takes a series of measurement. She uses a quadrant tool, that she and her brother made using PVC pipes and duct tape, to help her record information about vegetation at the site.

Jenni also uses a canopy densitometer to measure vegetation taller than 1 meter.

Behind the scenes: Stray Hair Photoshop

As I was working my way through the photos in post-production, this portrait stood out to me. I don't usually do the kind of editing people would call "photoshoping," like removing objects, but in this case I decided that the hair in front of her face was too distracting. I would not do something like that on one of my photojournalist style action shots, but I see the rules as being different for a posed portrait.