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52 NEBRASKAland • MAY 2017 off faces and slipping up noses. Lake Ogallala is the culprit; this is where they breed. "It's a weird balance of working and just not letting it get to you," Drabik said. "It's a mindset. My second year was easier." Phone service is spotty. "You have to walk to the top of a hill to get service," said Drabik. "My taller friends seem to have an advantage. I found that standing on a log helps, or sometimes I'll take a bucket to stand on." Student cabins purposefully lack Wi-Fi, and that lack of social media creates a fascinating throwback: groups of students hanging out together talking. "It keeps students from dispersing," added Garbisch. "They are happy without internet access. It's about personal connection. They're getting dirty and having adventures, then sitting around in the evening and talking about it. It's real. Quite a few students have met their future spouse here." Cedar Point students earn four credit hours in three intense weeks. Initial panic often grips first-time students as they realize how quickly the material must be learned. "These students are all high achievers," said Scott Gardner, professor and curator of parasitology at the University of Nebraska State Museum. "But they're still not used to working so hard. They need to collect data for 12 days straight, synthesize it all and then present it in a paper." "It was kind of scary at first," said Drabik. "The long hours seemed insane. The hardest thing is keeping a strong work ethic going, but as days go by you just accept the demands and throw yourself into it. If you don't do the work the data won't be there." As it is in all science, data is everything here, though sleep is a close second. "Exhaustion is hard," Drabik said, "Sleep is beautiful." Many spend months more working on their project in Gardner's Lincoln parasitology lab, and some projects are published in scientific journals. "This is an opportunity for students to discover something completely new," Gardner said. "It's an experience they can receive in no other way." Because parasites are highly prevalent in the wild, their place in the larger puzzle of the ecosystem is still being worked out. Gardner can tell what has been eating what by tracing parasites' paths in the food chain. "You can determine a lot about animal distribution over a geographic space," Gardner said. "Parasites often respond more quickly to environmental changes than their hosts. They provide an early warning signal for ecological disturbances." Finding parasites means catching the animal, dissecting it and then carefully examining what's inside. "Most students have never dissected an animal and are often reluctant at first," Gardner said. "But after seeing so many parasites right before their eyes, it becomes a fascination." All parasites and their hosts examined here end up in the University of Nebraska State Museum's collections for future DNA analysis. Rodents, rabbits, fish, amphibians, bats and non-migratory birds from the Cedar Point area represent snapshots in time providing readily available reference points Situated next to Lake Ogallala, Cedar Point Biological Station will soon bustle with activity this hazy August morning.