Week Four

This week we did our observations across two days, at two primary locations. I plan on splitting them up accordingly.

Date: Saturday April 27th, 2013
Weather: Cloudy, slightly rainy
Temperature: ~52 degrees F
Time: ~2:00 PM to 6:00 PM
Location: Lake Crescent (Olympic National Park): Barnes Point

One of the most striking things that I noticed as we began to walk on the trails was the fact that we were in old growth forest. There was large coarse woody debris strewn all across the forest floor, ancient looking trees with widths that would challenge even the most experienced tree-huggers, vertical and horizontal diversity among trees, and a good amount of species richness. It seemed that due to the heterogeneity of the forest, a number of ecological niches were available. This is a bit of a side tangent, but something I studied in my Wildlife Conservation class was how individuals within a single population can often fill different niches. For example, dolphins in Australia often have very different foraging behaviors that are passed down to their children. Some might use "sponging", where a dolphin uses a sponge to scrub the seafloor, looking for food, while others might chase their pray towards the shore to trap them. The loss of an individual in this population would result in the loss of a tradition/foraging behavior, and reduce the overall niche diversity within a population. This forest made me think about this because of all the huge, dead trees that met their end due to logging. The loss of individuals prematurely might have very significant genetic consequences and niche effects; these trees were the ones that survived to become big and thus filled specific niches. With the onset of climate change, the reduced genetic and niche diversity among certain populations might make them more susceptible to certain negative effects since the population has become less flexible in their survival strategy. However, short of conducting experiments, there is no way to be sure of this.

Moving on, we saw quite a few exciting species! Right away I noticed the large Pseudotsuga menziesii, Tsuga heterophylla, and Abies grandis. In fact, we got to see the largest living Grand Fir alive! Looking at the floor, we saw the Fairyslipper Orchid (Calpyso bulbosa), which was exciting because I feel like you so rarely get to see any of our terrestrial orchids. Apparently, they are an indicator of dense forest near beaches; I'd have to agree considering where we were! With such dense forests, there must be a lot of competition going on, primarily for light and space. It seems that unless you're a shade tolerant species like Tsuga heterophylla, there is a lot of pressure to grow quickly and out-compete your neighbors or you face getting shaded out. However, disturbances like fire and wind will often get a chance to individuals that would otherwise be suppressed by more competitive individuals. Anyways, it seems like the Latin name for the Fairyslipper Orchid, Calpyso bulbosa, hints at its root structure; they have an underground corm that they sprout from. This made me a little tempted to dig some up for my garden, but I'm pretty sure collecting on National Park grounds without a permit is illegal...

Hard to tell without anything for scale, but this is the biggest Abies grandis around. 

Calypso bulbosa

As we moved through the forest, we came to several clearings, or breaks in the canopy cover. I imagine this was probably due to wind action, as fire has probably been suppressed in this area due to the proximity human settlement. A different variety of species dominated this area. There were a number of grasses but none of them were in flower, and I'm not good at identifying grasses anyways. Beyond the grasses, there were also a few species in the Boraginaceae! This made me super stoked, because I work with the Boraginaceae in my lab; I do genetic analyses of the genus Hackelia, also known as Stickseed or Wild Forget-Me-Not. My current project is to try and figure out how species within the genus are related because this has never actually been determined, and only speculated upon. However, my project aside, the Boraginaceae we saw looked a lot like the plants I work with, so that was really exciting! The biggest way they differ is the fruit structure; the fruits of Myosotis are smooth while those of Hackelia have spikes (mammal dispersal). Unfortunately, I didn't get a chance to identify the species of Myosotis, although I suspect it is Myosotis sylvatica, which is the escaped cultivated Forget-Me-Not.

Myosotis spp. Look at how the petals turn from purple to blue!

White phenotype of the same Myosotis species. Perhaps it is a recessive trait?

To give you an idea of how similar Hackelia and Myosotis are,
here is Hackelia floribunda, one of my species that I am sampling

Moving back into the forest, I was amazed by the crazy diversity of fungi! This made me realize that a large portion of the diversity in the forest is tied up in fungi, and is often invisible to the eye. We saw things like Orange Peel Fungus, Elephant Saddle Mushroom, Artist's Conk, and a bunch of others we had no idea what they were! Gahhhhh, I need to take mycology! Fruiting bodies aside, there are a number of mycorrhizal fungi in the soil, creating a symbiotic relationship with some of the trees like Douglas-Fir by providing water and nutrients in exchange for sugars from the photosynthetic tree. This network of fungi often connect trees and might be the cause of how some trees try to recover from being cut down; the fungi is shunting resources from other nearby trees to help the stressed tree recover. The forest truly is alive! Other fungi facilitate other plant species by breaking down dead plants and trees, and thereby releasing important nutrients back into the soil. For example, Lettuce Leaf Lichen grows in the tops of trees, living off of pure organic matter accumulated through time in tree tops (especially those that developed decadence), and when wind blows it out of the tree, it acts as a Nitrogen rich fertilizer for other plants. Other types of epiphytic moss create interesting relationships with their hosts, like Bigleaf Maple; the moss takes out sugars from the tree, but retains moisture during the summer, which allows the maple to send small roots into the moss to collect water during stressful times.

Elephant's Saddle Mushroom

Orange Peel Fungus

Artist's Conk

Unknown Fungi

Yet another Unknown!

Besides the amazing amount of mushrooms we saw, there were quite a few other cool plants I'd never seen before! We saw Palmate Coltsfoot (Petasites palmatus), Stream Violet (Viola glabella), Trailing Yellow Violet (Viola sempervirens), Devil's Club (Oplopanax horridus), Vanilla Leaf (Achlys triphylla), Western trillium (Trillium ovatum), False Soloman's Seal (Maianthemum racemosum), False Lily-of-the-Valley (Maianthemum dilatatum), Twinflower (Linnaea borealis), Vine Maple (Acer circinatum), Trailing Blackberry (Rubus ursina), Black Gooseberry (Ribes lacustre) and an unknown Brassicaceae. Whew! Despite all the time we took to identify plants, it was super fun! I don't really get a whole lot of opportunities to try to identify new plants, so it was refreshing to test my identification skills again. Once we got back from our trip, I tried keying out the unknown Brassicaceae that we saw, but it was rather difficult for a couple reasons. First, I didn't have a specimen in front of me and I realized I didn't get that good of a look at it (for example, I didn't look at the basal leaves). Second, keying out things in the Brassicaceae is heavily dependent on the fruits, and none of the plants I saw were fruiting yet. However, my limited description is as follows: 4 parted, 6 stamens (4 long and 2 short), petals about 1 cm long, pale pink. Leaves are compound with 3 leaflets. Leaflets are entire and linear in shape. With this knowledge I tentatively identified it as something in the Cardamine genus, although my confidence level on this is pretty low since my observations were limited.

Vanilla Leaf. Smells like vanilla when dried. 

False Lily-of-the-Valley

Trailing Yellow Violet

Western Trillium

Black Gooseberry

Our unknown Brassicaceae. Couldn't find it in Pojar!

In terms of avian diversity, we saw quite a few things! Although initially all we saw was an American Raven and a Winter Wren, we soon saw others. One of the more fascinating things we saw was a pair of American Dippers; we saw this bird jump into the river, surface near a rock in the middle of the creek, jump onto the rock, and then fly into a hole in the bottom of a huge dead log that spanned the creek. I presume that it was the location of its nest, since it had food going in, and left empty-beaked on the way out. The way it exited was quite amusing; rather than fly out, it simply plopped back into the river and popped out somewhere downstream. This is a great example of how the great trees of the PNW act as facilitators even after their death; they can provide essential habitat to birds. They can also alter the flow of rivers and streams to make them more suitable for salmon. Yet another example is when we saw a Pilated Woodpecker which was pecking away at a snag tree, either looking for insects or some prime real estate. Closer to the Naturebridge campus we saw birds that were more edge specialists: Dark-eyed Juncos, White-crowned Sparrows, and Stellar's Jays. This might be another example of facilitation, albeit by humans. By creating more edge and laying down grass, we create more foraging habitat for these specific species. In fact, we saw the Stellar's Jay picking up sandwich crumbs left by one of the Naturebridge workers. In a similar manner, we saw Black-tailed Deer taking advantage of all the grass around the campus. I imagine that being in proximity to the campus also afforded these deer limited protection for predators. We didn't see much predation, although we did see the remains of a deer skull. Perhaps a cougar got it?

Stellar's Jay taking advantage of some scraps...

Black-tailed Deer

Dark-eyed Junco

We also saw other examples of some interesting interactions. For example, we saw the mutualistic interaction of a Bumblebee pollinating some Salmonberry flowers. We also saw a Douglas Squirrel eating some sort of fruit. It is likely that it was assisting dispersing the seeds of that plant, either through messy eating or by storing it for later and forgetting where they stored it!

Overall, the forest was quite amazing and magical, and left me with a lot to think about. But there is another part to this!

Date: Sunday April 28th, 2013
Weather: Cloudy, intermittent sun, windy
Temperature: ~48 degrees F
Time: 10:00 PM to 12:00 PM
Location: Salt Creek Tide Flats (Olympic Peninsula)

Overall, I found that species identification in this area was rather difficult. I haven't really taken any classes that cover marine ecology or species identification, outside of Fundamental of Ecology, so I felt like I didn't know what to look for. But after following other people around, I kind of figured out how to look at things, even if I wasn't sure what I was looking at. That being said, we saw a lot of really amazing things that I didn't think we'd see!

Before we even got to the shore, I saw some Broad-leafed Stonecrop chilling against the side of a cliff face. I was hoping to see some earlier in the trip, but here they were!

I love these guys. 

As we approached the shore, we first saw a lot of Edible Mussels which covered rocks extensively, and were hidden in their calcareous structures. Moving just a little farther inland, we saw Dall's Acorn Barnicles heavily competing with the mussels. I was surprised to find that I could often walk on the mussels without crushing them. Fairly early on we saw a Purple Shore Crab; one of the students was silly enough to put their finger directly in their pincer to see if it'd pinch her. As it turns out, it does pinch quite readily, and she gave out a little scream as it gave her a short squeeze. Maybe it just wanted to hold hands?

Mussels galore. 

Purple Shore Crab, raring to go. 

Moving along, we began to come across a number of anemones, like these Giant Green Anemones. However, there seemed to be quite a few different coloration schemes among different sets of anemones. It seemed like they were similar species, so maybe it was result of air exposure? Or perhaps just a trait passed down to offspring (especially since they are clonal)? For some reason, I imagine that competition between the progeny of an anemone would be extreme because they are exact replicates, and there is no variation in how they take advantage of resources. Although, I suppose that would be based on the assumption that the progeny remains in proximity to the parent, which I don't think is the case. 

Giant Green Anemone

Another Anomone!

Also in close proximity to these creatures was some species of Chiton, which looked like a giant slug, except that it had a hard shell. Apparently they are grazers of the Green Algae and Brown Algae that was growing all around, as are the variety of Limpets that we saw.

Chiton!

In fact, I was amazed at the simple amount of biodiversity that was around. You could just turn over a rock and there would be all sorts of species. It was a little funny because the moment you turned the rock over, all the creatures would start migrating towards the bottom side of the rock again.

All I can recognize is the limpet... everything else is some sort of invertebrate! 

Towards what looked like a major flow channel during high tide, we saw some Giant Feather Dusters, which seemed like worms in long tubes that displayed giant feathers that would catch debris for it to eat. In this way, it is probably facilitating the entire ecosystem by cleaning it up and recycling energy. As we approached a large tide pool, we came across some Red Algae, and hiding among it was a Hairy Crab! While I'm not sure if the crab holds so still sometimes that algae grows on it, or that it produces these structures itself, it certainly blends in super well!

Can you spot the crab?

There it is if you couldn't find it before!

In the tide pool, we saw quite a few Hermit Crabs, but coaxing them out from their shells proved to be quite difficult. Another student was tenacious enough to actually capture a Tidepool Sculpin. Honestly, I have no idea how she did it because we watched the others in the tide pool swim around and they moved around like bullets.

Aw, come on, don't be such a Hermit. Oh wait...

The Tidepool Sculpin

Heading towards the shoreline, we came across not one, but two Octopus carcasses. I imagine that they must have died somewhere near the shore and washed up during high tide, as I believe they can survive outside of the water long enough for them to crawl back into the water should they get stranded during low tide. The basis for this belief stems from when I used to volunteer at the Seattle Aquarium; at some point fish began to disappear from some of the tanks. None of the fish in those tanks would eat each other, so we were left wondering what was going on. After a while, the aquarium set up cameras to see what was happening when everyone wasn't around. As it turned out, since the tank for the Octopus was open-air, it would crawl out at night, scuttle across the floor, crawl into another tank, eat to its heart's content, then crawl back. Crazy! That being said, we later saw Seagulls picking away at their splayed bodies. While it is not predation, it is definitely an example of savaging.

Poor guy...

Finally, we made it to the actual waterline, and there was a noticeable difference in the species here. No longer were there mussels or barnicles, but the rocks were primarily dominated by Eelgrass and brown algae like Dead Man's Fingers and some species of Coraline Algae. To eat all this primary productivity were various sea urchins like the Purple Sea Urchin. However, this much productivity often produces trophic cascades, and in this case, it does. Sea stars like the Blood Sea Star and the Sun Star roamed through the algae and grasses to track their favorite prey of sea urchins.

Purple Sea Urchin

Equal Sea Star 

Pacific Blood Star

Unknown Sea Star

Looking back over the landscape, we could see that there were a number of disturbances which had removed a large number of mussels, algae, or barnicles. As Bob Paine mentioned in our guest lecture, these disturbances are typically due to strong wave action, and leaves a patchy matrix much like how fire can effect a forest. The disturbed patches often were of a different color and had a different composition of species, as per succession. However, I didn't manage to see the edge effect of grazers coming in from older, more sheltered matrix to create the bull's eye effect in newly disturbed areas. Perhaps this is because none of the areas I surveyed were recently disturbed enough?

All in all, I was fascinated by the biodiversity we could find at the beach; I didn't think we'd find so much!

Well, that's all for this week. Next week I shall look for some arthropods at my original site!

Week Three

Date: Sunday April 21st, 2013

Weather: Initially cloudy, sunny with some clouds later on

Temperature: ~53 degrees F

Time: 3:00 PM - 4:20 PM

Location: Discovery Park

As we got to our site, it was a little chilly and began to drizzle. "Is it ever going to be nice when we visit our site?" we pondered as we zipped up our jackets all the way and stuffed our hands into our pockets. Nevertheless, we soon got into the observational spirit as we began to notice new and changing things around us! One of the first things we noticed is that the Red-flowering currant had began to fruit, even though some of the inflorescence was still flowering. 

Look at how it fruits from the base of the inflorescence towards the apex!

We also noticed that the cones on the Alaskan Yellow Cedar was beginning to mature. The female cones looked a little farther along than the male cones. Perhaps it is to avoid the males wasting their pollen before the females are receptive? I'd be interested to see if there is alternating variation in the timing of the emergence of reproductive structures between individuals; it seems like that would be a good way to ensure outcrossing and avoid self-pollination. 

Knoby little cones the Alaskan Yellow Cedar

While we were looking at the cedar, we noticed a Fly of some sort. Normally, I ignore most insects simply because I have no idea how to identify them, but we managed to get a pretty good picture of it. Hopefully we find more soon! Maybe I should take an entomology class...

WHOA. 

Resuming our search, we found yet another species at our original small-scale location! And I thought we had been so thorough in our search last time. Turns out we had missed a Dovefoot Geranium hiding at our feet. However, it is yet another invasive weed. They are quite pretty though...

The palmate leaves typical of something in the Geraniaceae

Also, the species we tentitively identified as Spiraea spp. seems to be mostly done flowering, as most of the petals have fallen off of the plant. 

No real sign of fruit yet though.

The Bigleaf Maple continues to mature; it looks more like a bigleaf maple every time we come back. The leaves are certainly a lot bigger. 

Check out how the stigma on the bigleaf maple is exposing its receptive surfaces! 

Also, the flowers on the Elderberry are looking a lot more prickly, since the stamens have completely unfurled and seem to be active. 

Pointy stamens... now fully erect. 

Moving on, we found the fruiting body of some sort of fungus, and from the looks of it, it is probably from last year, or at least a couple months ago. 

Almost looks like a flower... minus leaves and no reproductive structures

We found yet another plant in the Rosaceae! It looks like a Prunus or perhaps something else? It is so hard to tell without flowers. Fortunately, we won't have to wait too long to see what it is because the flower buds are looking pretty ready to burst. 

Yet another Rosaceae. Seems like everything is in the Rosaceae. 

A while back we observed how the flowers of the Indian Plum were already drying up. Now they aren't so dry...

Fruits of the Indian Plum are about...

It might have been because it was rather cold and wet last time we were looking at Douglas-Firs last week, but the male cones looked a lot more open and mature this week. 

What a bright orange!

Despite all the amazing phenological changes we were seeing, we managed to tear ourselves away from our familiar area and delved deeper into the park in search of new and exciting lifeforms. Almost right away, we started to see new things, like Snowberry, Pacific Madrone, Black Hawthorne, Red Alder, Nootka Rose, a grass in the Barley tribe, some sort of true moss, Oceanspray, a potentially invasive Strawberry, Sticky Currant, Stinging Nettle, Grand Fir, Western Hemlock, maybe Lamb's Ear, Quaking Aspen, yet another unknown Rosaceae that is probably some introduced Cherry Blossom, Salmonberry, Sitka Spruce, Vinca Vine, Herb Robert, Lodgepole Pine, Ponderosa Pine, Salal, Fringecup, Licorice Fern, Pacific Flowering Dogwood, and a species of Butterfly Bush. WHEW!! So many species!!! This was actually really overwhelming, because I felt like we stayed in a very similar ecological niche the whole time, and simply expanded our search area. Although, I believe there is some sort of ecological principle that states that the wider the area you search for species, the more species you will find. Seems like common sense, but there is sure to be some sort of name for this concept. Oh well! 

The Ericaceae flowers of the Pacific Madrone

For some reason I thought identifying species of grasses would be somewhat easy, but as it turns out I've forgotten most of the terminology for describing grass flowers, so I can't do a quick identification. Next time I visit my site, and have the time, I hope to key out some grass species to force me to relearn the lingo. Being able to identify grasses, rushes, and sedges down to genera levels is a very helpful skill in habitat quality/type evaluations. I hope to develop and use these skills in my future career!

Blogger is weird and won't let me rotate the picture...
But here is a grass in what I think is the Barley tribe!

White-flowering Currant really means Sticky Currant.
 I should have grabbed some to make sure it wasn't just an escaped cultivar of Red-flowering Currant. 

Don't mess with this bad boy. 

Fringecup; the first species we've found in the Saxifragaceae!

We actually came across quite a few species that I had no idea what they were. There were a few deciduous trees that had yet to leaf out, let alone flower, so we were left guessing on that front. I heard that UW used offer a twigs class, but due to budget cuts it was discontinued. Sadness :(   However, there were a few other more herbaceous plants that seemed a little easier to potentially identify.

First unknown. Looks reminiscent of something I've seen in someone's garden

Close-up on the flowers of the first unknown. Wish I took some with me. 

Second unknown. Also has a whorled leaf arrangement. 

We managed to find another insect on our first unknown though! It looks like it might just be a Common Housefly though...

Believe it or not, this fly is not actually defying gravity; this picture is simply sideways. 

So many plants!!! All this made us rather planted out, so we searched for some diversity of the avian variety. Unfortunately, the only bird that was photogenic enough to let us take a picture was an American Robin, once again.

Oh hey, long time no see.... not. 

 Despite this, we did manage to see a Chestnut-back Chickadee and a Bushtit, even if it was just fleeting glances. I'm always impressed by the aerial acrobatics that they manage to pull off; they fly to the edge of a shrub from the interior, flip so they are upside down, then quickly grab a twig as they pick a bug off of new shoots, leaving them hanging upside down momentarily, until they fly off. I wish I could do that! We managed to hear some of the other birds around the park though, like the Stellar's Jay, American Crow, Anna's Hummingbird, and Pine Siskin, among others.

This week, we were supposed to describe eight different plant species as well as we could, so here goes nothing!
Fringecup (Tellima grandiflora): Herbaceous plant. Most leaves basal, although some are on the stalk of the inflorescence. The leaves are generally heart-shaped and shallowly/broadly lobed, and has the palmate venation that is characteristic for Saxifragaceae. Flowers appear to have a fused calyx, and many (5-10?) tattered looking petals that are reddish in color. 10 stamens. I did not get a chance to closely look at the pistol. Many flowers along the raceme. Appears to like filtered light and moist conditions.

Heart-shaped Leaves of Fringecup

Can you count the number of stamens?

Vinca Vine (Vinca minor): Low growing herbaceous vine, opposite leaves. Forms small thickets along the ground. A soft purple color to their flowers. The petals have a propeller shape to them, which is characteristic for their family (Apocynaceae). The 5 sepals are unified into a tube, with just little lobes to distinguish them. The 5 petals also do the same, although to a lesser extent. The 5 stamens are actually attached to the corolla tube, rather than the receptacle. They are frequently used in gardening.

Vinca Vine

Ponderosa Pine (Pinus ponderosa): Large conifer tree in the Pine family (Pinus genus). 3 longish needles per fascicle. Bark appears almost armored; with bark-like spikes coming out at a 90 degree angle from the branch for just a bit, then running parallel to the branch. Younger branches appear more knobby than spiked. Immature female cones are a bright purple, and the male counterparts are borne on the same structure, just at the terminal point. Some female cones are developing along the branch. Cones are about 6 inches long, with spikes at the end of each scale. Although our site was fairly mesic, they prefer slightly xeric sites, and are typically found on the east side of the cascades. Apparently, when it is hot and sunny outside, the bark will give off a vanilla-like scent.

Purple immature female cones

Armored to the teeth

Alaskan Yellow Cedar (Xanthocyparis nootkatensis): Large, somewhat squat conifer tree. Scales instead of needles, the scale tips are pointy and jut outward before coming inwards to connect to the next scale. Foliage is a yellow-green, and bark is stringy like most cedars, with a slight yellow tinge. Cones are knobby little globes (~1 cm in diameter) with about 6 scales.

Distinctive cones of the Alaskan Yellow Cedar

Pacific Madrone (Arbutus menziesii): Tall evergreen broadleaf tree. Distinctive red pealing bark. Leaves are a dark-green and are thick, sometimes older leaves are spotted. Flowers are white and urn-shaped, characteristic for its family (Ericaceae) and are many, borne upon a typically terminal raceme. The tree is cold, giving it the nickname "the refrigerator tree".

Ericaceae flowers

Reddish pealing bark

Salmonberry (Rubus spectabilis): Medium-sized shrub, younger branches are coated with many small thorns, while older branches are unarmored and smooth. Leaves are alternate, and are doubly-serrate with pinnate venation. Flowers are a bright pink, with 5 sepals, 5 pointed petals, and many stamens. Berries are an aggregate of drupelets, and look like orange raspberries. The sweet edible fruits are popular with all sorts of wildlife.

Salmonberry

Western Flowering Dogwood (Cornus nuttallii): Medium to large deciduous tree. Opposite leaves with characteristic dogwood pinnate venation that runs parallel to the leaf edge towards the leaf apex. Leaves are more or less entire, with an acute/acuminate apex. Flowers actually really small, and the entire inflorescence creates a white button-like structure surrounded by 4-6 white bracts. Inflorescence will later swell up to a red "berry" like fruit. Can perform the dogwood test; carefully break a leaf laterally and the leaf halves will remain attached to each other due to a spiral lining in their xylem.

Dogwood leaves with last year's fruit

Red Elderberry (Sambucus racemosa): Tall woody shrub (2-6 meters tall), opposite compound leaves, with 5-7 leaflets per leaf. Leaflets are obovate in shape, serrate margins, with an acute apex. Flowers are cream colored, with 5 stamens with bright yellow anthers, 3-5 lobed stigma, 5 petals. They are also fragrant  attracting hummingbirds and butterflies. Inflorescence is generally cone shaped, with multiple cymes coming off of a primary panicle. Fruits are a characteristic bright red drupe, which is popular with birds.

Elderberry.

That's all for now. More next week!