Many young children love exploring nature and have the inquisitorial minds that make the best scientists. Few, however, get to have their name on a peer-reviewed paper, and it seems likely Grace Fulton has set a record by doing so at the age of six. Although her father is her co-author, he is keen to stress Grace’s authorship is not simply for show, she’s played an important part at several stages of the research. Graham Fulton is an ornithologist at the University of Queensland. His research includes how well owls adapt to urban environments. “Grace absolutely adores owls,” Graham said in a statement . “She was only four when she started spending nights with me in the rainforest searching for them, and now she knows all of their calls." For his most recent research, Graham compared the presence of owls at a Brisbane park with the nearby Mount Glorious rainforest. He told IFLScience that “[Grace] attended fieldwork on all occasions and always [attended] school the next day. She was in Prep at that stage. She could read the data and tell which owl was most common both on the data (excel sheet) and from being at the fieldwork. She […]
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