Archive for February, 2014

Meg Wika wins AAG-GTU travel award

Congratulations to Meg Wika, senior geography major, who has been awarded an Association of American Geographer‘s (AAG) and Gamma Theta Upsilon (GTU) student travel award. This award will allow Meg to present her senior honors thesis at the national meeting of the AAG in Tampa, FL, in April 2014. Meg’s presentation is titled “Family, Patriotism, […]

Water and Climate Change Talk at Gustavus: Feb 27

Dr. Jason Smerdon, Professor at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University, will present a talk titled “Drip, Drip, Drip: Water, Climate Change, and Tales of Want and Excess in the 21st Century” on Thursday, February 27, at 7:30 pm in Olin 103, Gustavus Adolphus College.

Frost depths in Minnesota recorded at up to nearly 8 feet deep

Anyone living in Minnesota right now knows just how cold this winter has been. The Minnesota DNR writes, “The winter of 2013-14 has been the coldest in years. So far the average temperature of Meteorological Winter (December-February 9) is 9.4 degrees. If similar extreme cold continues for the rest of February, the winter of 2013-14 […]

Release of Google Earth-viewable historical global temperature data

Here’s a new data resource that looks great for student research projects, classroom instruction, or simply to play with. The University of East Anglia has released a Google Earth-compatible data set of global temperatures based on 6000 weather stations and reaching as far back as 1850. Find the data here.

Arb Soup and Sandwich Seminar – Dr. Anna Versluis, Geography Department: Geo-engineering: Can we engineer our way out of climate change?

In the search for solutions to climate change concerns, Geo-engineering (also called “climate engineering”) has recently emerged as a potential solution (seeding the oceans with iron, for example).  Following a brief background on earth systems and climate change, we’ll talk about various proposals for geo-engineered solutions to climate change challenges, and look at what modern […]

John McLean Named Athlete of the Month

Congratulations to junior Geography major and hockey goalie John McLean who was named Male Gustavus Athlete of the Month for January 2014. “Thanks in part to a red-hot goaltender who is seeing the puck now better than anytime this season, the Gustavus men’s hockey team is in first place in the conference standings with 32 […]

Internship at dairy spurs interest in agriculture

During January, Junior Geography major Carlie Hedlund conducted an internship at the New Sweden Dairy, one of three Davis Family Dairies in Nicollet County, MN. Together, the dairies manage over 20,000 cows and calves and daily produce 570,000 gallons of milk that is made into 70,000 pounds of cheese. “I think a lot of people […]

Super Bowl LXVIII and the Geography of Fans

If you live in Seattle you’ll likely be cheering for the Seahawks, and if you live in Denver you’ll likely be rooting for the Broncos. But what if you live in Arco, Idaho, equidistant between Denver and Seattle? This New York Times journalist travels to Arco to find out Super Bowl loyalties.