我是半路出家的生态学家。这是我首次就大自然这个话题跟大家分享。这篇文章是作为我个人在野外科研和理论学习的经验给愿意了解大自然的小伙伴们的一点浅薄建议。

先鼓励一下大家：首先无论你是对大自然微感兴趣，还是你想成为专业的生物学家，不管你多大年龄，现在开始都不晚。而唯一能够驱动你的只有一个，那就是因兴趣所带来的好奇心。我们中间只会有生态“学”家，永远不会产生生态或生物“专”家。到目前为止人类甚至不知道我们这个星球上有多少物种，就连大概的数目也是个谜，当前有各种估值，估算最多的有1亿种。所以其实人人都可以对大自然进行研究，人人都可以成为生态学家。虽然要做到像David Attenborough那样很难，但即使是Attenborough,距离了解大自然也还是太远，一个人就算是付诸一生去学习研究，也最多是对一个特定地域的生态系统和物种有非常浅显的了解。

想对大自然进行研究，首先应了解生态系统大概的运作方式，再慢慢对单个物种进行深入了解和研究是相对比较符合逻辑且能培养兴趣的方式。在学习的时候大家能拿到的可能最容易且声色并茂的就是纪录片了。最为推荐的就是BBC的纪录片。英国人很擅长将大自然客观地讲出来，所以BBC关于大自然的纪录片可以让大家作为重点来学习，有时间的话我也许会将这些纪录片分类方便大家观看学习。在BBC的关于自然的纪录片中，How Nature Works这个系列可以作为你对生态系统了解的初步也是很重要的第一课。

在学习的过程中我强烈建议大家做笔记，信息量大的纪录片（如How Nature Works这个系列）可以多看两遍，把听到的连贯总结起来，确保自己真的都明白了，这样可以避免走马观花听完就忘了的问题，也能排除一些一笔带过没有仔细听而错过或没听懂的知识点。不做笔记的话有些纪录片看完之后过段时间可能会忘得只剩当初印象最深刻的一个知识点甚至完全忘记，这样反而是浪费时间，而多出一点时间做笔记就可以加强记忆也能在回忆的时候产生更浓厚的兴趣和思考。

如果可以，就把生活或旅行中逛街的部分匀出来一部分给大自然吧，就算不为学习，身体也会更喜欢养分充足的地方。如果允许，可以多些时间来观察细节，看到物种可以思考他们在生态系统中的角色，用图片的形式记录下来，然后回家去翻阅资料或者上网找他们的科学名和生物特性。在实践的最初阶段其实是最难的，因为你会发现如果不是兴趣，你是不会去翻十几本书去确定一个物种，同样如果不是兴趣，你不会明白这个地球上有那么多在我们看来长得如此相似的物种。但如果能够靠着兴趣慢慢坚持下来，时间久了，你会越来越快地辨别不同物种之间的差异。

下面是我关于Seasonal Forest 这一集的笔记。笔记在记录的时候是直接用英文总结下来的，尤其是有些物种名也并不是很清楚中文名所以没有转换成中文，所以有兴趣的可以随便看看。当然不是必须，但个人建议如果想了解全世界的生态系统懂得英文是相当必要的。原因有三：一是因为全世界通用的物种拉丁名，二是生态研究的科学报告大都是以英文发表（包括在国际科学杂志上发表自己研究报告的国内研究人员）。三是中国在生态研究方面还处在非常落后的阶段（抱歉，这是事实）。

祝大家热爱大自然。

Seasonal Forest 的笔记如下：
Summary:
1. The whole forest needs fungi to breath by the process of decomposition, trees need the network of hypha to develop underground. Fungi needs flying squirrels to travel their spores.
2. Caterpillars and herbivores give control on the distribution and the development of the trees, in which the hares are fed on the fallen trees, the lynx is fed on hares.
3. The whole forest is nourished by nitrogens from migrating salmons during the wet season with the help of other animals and the whole forest. where there are limited nutrients from the plants caused by the blushing of the rain. The salmons travel at the high water level season for laying their eggs at nutrient and oxygen rich section of the stream, which also makes a safe place from the forest shades for their eggs.

Fungi as the ultimate decomposers connects the whole ecosystem in forests, autumn is the best season for fungi sporocarps to germinate as the falls of the leaves. Flying squirrel as a night mammal, forge on fungus, carrying spores in their guts, gliding from tree to tree, defecates the spores to a new place, which makes a network of up to 10 square meters of a single fungus underground system with the help of the tree roots, in return the hypha helps the tree to grow and expand their own species, which is the reason of the domination of certain tree species.

Grizzly bear ecosystem:
Grizzly plays a key role bring nitrogen to the forest. They feed on salmons during autumns (rain season) for accumulating calories for 5 months of survival of the coming winter (60,000 calories = 550 chocolate bars per day). They catch salmons and eat in the woods as it is safer there for protecting their cubs from other adult males. They eat only the fattest parts such as brains etc. and leave the rest on the forest ground. Other animals like banana slugs (the biggest slug in the world) eat the rest of the fish. The remains make good incubators for flies to lay their eggs on, the nutrients of the tree can be provided by the decomposition of the remains. And in the next spring, the bears are fed on the plants, which the nitrogen is composed by the fish parts that were abandoned by them the last winter. The DNA examination of the bear hair has proved that the bear has been fed on 80% of oceanic nitrogens which is mainly from the salmon. And according to the DNA examination of the tree, 85% of the nitrogen was also from the ocean. Salmon fuels are utilised and carried by all animals in the forests.

Temperature plummets by winter,
Wood frogs and newly hatched painted turtles freeze solid, antifreeze in their blood keeps them alive until spring.

Moose, white-tailed deer, wolverines, birds, squirrels do not hibernate. Not easy for some animals to survive the winter as it is too cold for them, their death brings food to small scavengers animals.

The lynx feeds on snowshoe hares during winters. The population of hares and lynx are correlated. And the population of the hares is correlated with the budworms which bring the falls of the trees.