aclay232's Journal

Daily Account: Golden Gardens, Final Journal
Date: June 3, 2012; Time: 3:30-5:30pm
Latitude: 47.69463200000 Longitude: -122.40410000000, and the surrounding area
Weather: About 55 degrees, partly mostly cloudy with a few sunbreaks, windy (apprx. 10mph, probably more in places on beach shore)

Today, I went to Golden Gardens to observe the natural history and the place as a natural area. This was an interesting change to the places inland in Seattle, and those more forested such as Seward Park, although there were many similarities. I should note that the park is actually quite large and I’m pretty sure it’s more forested as you move east from the beach, but my location led me to the upper part of the park, not far from the Northern tip of the beach, and I decided to stay around here as there was lots to observe, and it makes me nervous to walk around in the darker parts of the park where people are scarce. That being said, I spent most of my time observing the habitat and interactions of a fairly large pond/small lake which left me with plenty of interesting notes and observations.

I’ve been to Golden Gardens hundreds of times, as I usually play volleyball at the beach there, where there didn’t seem to be much aside from some seaweed and a few greedy seagulls. I didn’t realize how much green there is just a little further up. I noticed at least three different kinds of willows, the first, Sitka Willow (Salix sitchensis), a Scouler’s Willow (Salix scouleriana), and the Pacific Willow (Salix lucida). I noticed them in this order, but only noticed two trees of each, although I couldn’t tell for sure because they were dominant and disentangling the beginning of the plant from the end proved difficult, thus there very well could have been more there. These trees surrounded the outskirts of the pond probably every other tree. There were other signs of their abundance as well. Floating in the water I observed what a family next to me called a “fuzzy caterpillar floating in the water!” One could find several of these “caterpillars,” or the catkins floating in the water, their fuzzy qualities a result of the fine white hairs or tufts of hair bunched up around the flower. The surface of the water also had a good amount of white fluff on it in places where the wind doesn’t act so strongly. This was not the case in the middle of the lake, where the wind sent ripples across the pond. At first I thought these wisps might have come from a Black Cottonwood (Populus balsamifera), however, there were none to be found, at least nearby. Another thing that struck me as interesting about the catkins of these trees was the fact that when I picked one up, I noticed a fly tangled in the hairs. This may have been a coincidence, but it got me thinking about the life of the plant. I’m wondering first of all whether this bug catching is a strategy of the plant for pollination, or otherwise, how do they get pollenated, or spread their seeds? From what I read it sounds like they are mainly wind pollinated, so perhaps the fly was only there by chance. Apparently, many wind pollinated trees form catkins. They are typically formed in male flowers, and the wind takes the pollen in the tufts, at the end of a journey which they often make it to female flowers. Wow, that actually makes a lot of sense! Among the times I’ve seen cottonwood or willow trees, they usually tend to be in a location where wind plays a large role in the scene. They are usually on lake, river, or ocean shores, or in the open, subject to the elements, such as the Nisqually Delta, UBNA, and here at Golden Gardens. Pollination may not be the sole reason for this, however, it makes sense that these plants will grow where they pollinate and reproduce best.

Speaking of catkins, I also saw one Red Alder (Alnus rubra), adjacent to the willow. I remember learning at the beginning of the quarter that Red Alder is a nitrogen fixing tree, which can improve the soil in disturbed locations. This may be another reason why all the green I saw (more which I have yet to describe) is able to grow so close to the beach, and why the willows were so happy in this location (trust me, they were practically laughing). The point about being so close to the beach is also very interesting. It came to my attention when I noticed all the sand on the boardwalk and bridge through the pond, and reached the ocean’s finger that there is potentially a lot of salt in the soil nearby, carried in from the sea. I’d have to learn how to test the soil (I think you’d test pH), but it made me wonder how so many things are still able to grow. I think there are a few reasons, one being a result of Red Alder’s nitrogen fixing characteristics, but seeing as these weren’t especially abundant (though I don’t know how much it takes), I’m wondering if the water is any indication or is related to the soil quality in any way. I remember reading in Kruckberg’s book about lake water eutrophication, and am wondering whether the salt from the ocean is helping this effect, or keeping the water at a higher pH, as something I read mentioned. Also, I’m wondering if the pond/lake is salt water or fresh water. Since I don’t think the ducks or turtles I saw would be able to live in a saltwater environment, I have a feeling it’s a freshwater pool, though that doesn’t mean there is absolutely not salt in it. I also saw some beer bottles in the pond, and though I don’t think this has a large effect on the water quality, I’m sure it has something to do with it. Regardless, the soil around the pond must be reasonably high in nutrients, as I saw many other plants along the path. I saw Salmonberry (Rubus spectalis), with many berries about to ripen; Thimbleberry (Rubus parviflorus), with white flowers on the plant, some of them wrinkled, but no signs of berries yet. Is the wilting flower an in between stage, or does this mean the plant is not as happy as it could be? It’s interesting, now wherever I go, if there’s thimbleberry, I check the texture of the leaves. When I first touched some earlier this year at Seward Park, they were very soft and lived up to the name “nature’s charmin.” These plants were located in the midst of a moist and well developed temperate forest habitat. The ones I felt today and even at UBNA were hardly soft at all, nothing like the same plant in a different location. I have a feeling this connects back to the soil quality, as some of the other smaller plants I saw were doing so-so. For example, I saw Tall Oregon Grape (Mahonia aquifolium), whose plants were fairly abundant and growing tall (about six feet above ground), however, some of the leaves were red or brown, and had clusters of green non-ripe berries above the leaves. Perhaps the leaves brown naturally, but this seemed somewhat early given their location was not in the sun. I also saw Silverweed (Potentilla anserina), whose flowers look like a yellow version of the Nootka Rose (Rosa nutkana), another plant occupying the area, but with different leaves, these being more toothed and coming up only about a foot above the ground, their leaves alternate, and flowers on leafless stalks. Apparently, they like marshy and sandy areas, wet spots, and are usually near the sea, which explains why I haven’t seen them before. As predicted, these were very abundant and found between patches of tall grass and around the Nootka rose, very close to the shore where the soil is wet. Also, the roots, if cooked taste like sweet potatoes; it’s amazing what the Native Americans discovered about so many plants. There were also at least two Black Hawthorn trees (Crataegus douglasii) with berries on them. I mistook their leaves for red alder at first, but the berries were a giveaway. There were also a few patches of Red Clover (Trifolium pratense) with rich purple violet colored flowers, and Creeping Buttercup (Ranunculus repens) with greasy looking yellow flowers, growing in more bare areas between trees and grasses. A few plants I could not identify, one, a small shrub whose leaves were non-symmetrical and flowers were a dark purple with tiny yellow parts, that grew in the wet soil right against the water. There was also a fairly abundant grass, whose leaves and flowers felt very soft, with a purplish tinge to the ends. Actually, I think it might be Common Velvet-Grass (Holcus lanatus). Apparently this is one of several grass species that has developed populations that are resistant/tolerant to the heavy metals in mine tailings, etc. I wonder if the nearby train tracks have any ties to these types of metal and whether this is one reason it can grow here. I know the train tracks have been there at least since the early 1900s, but I don’t know whether there is a correlation.

On the subject of trains and beer bottles, I was thinking about the human impact on this area, particularly on the animal species that live here. One of the first things I noticed when I reached the pond, was an adult mallard couple and their tiny ducklings, even smaller than the ones at UBNA. I watched them for a while, and noticed for the first time the resemblance between mother and ducklings. They do look quite different, the babies having dark patches instead of the mature dark flecks the adults have. They also swam significantly differently; I’m assuming it was because their legs are a lot smaller, so they had to work to keep up with the parents. I was trying to figure out how sensitive they are to the noise from the train and people, but it was hard to tell, since only one train passed while I was there. After this group left, another family of mallards came along with seven young ones about the same age as the first group, the adult ducks seemed to avoid the center of the pond and stay close to its edges (perhaps because of predators), crossing the open water only once when I was there. After this, when the sun came out, the ducks sat preening on logs (about two to a log) in the middle of the lake. I also saw a Red Eared Slider turtle (Trachemys scripta elegans), with the small red band on the side of its head, and yellow stripes down its neck. This guy was sunning on a log when I found him, and the sun had just broken out a few minutes before. Interestingly, when the sun went away and the wind started to pick up, he crawled into the water. Are they sensitive to the changes in weather? I only saw one turtle, but I have a feeling there were more in the pond.

Also next to the pond, I found a Red Osier Dogwood (Cornus stolonifera), not blooming yet, about 15ft tall, with red branches on the upper ends but not at the base. This fits in with what I read about this species liking moist soils. There were also some Snowberry bushes (Symphoricarpos racemosa), and what I think was a very young Big Leaf Maple (Acer macrophyllum). Marsh forget me nots hid among the grass too, and there were patches of what I’d guess from the edges was a sedge, though it could have been a grass. Wow, this place isn’t even an old growth forest and there are so many species.

Next I moved closer to the beach to see how the ecology changed. It was definitely blended, but here I found more plants I’d never seen. I think however, that I found Beach Pea (lathyrus japonicas), with multicolored with purple flowers below and violet-pink flowers above/behind. This was growing underneath a maple and had stretched out in the sand, in a few different places where the sand meets the outer green edge of the pond. There was also Milk Thistle (Silybum adans), which is apparently invasive, and I don’t think it’s native to Washington either. The willows I mentioned ealier came right up to the sand’s edge, probably happy with all the wind. Here I found a Lady Beetle (Hippodamia convergens), and what I think was a beetle called the California Prionus (Prionus californicus), although it looked exactly the same aside from having a red head instead, and red under its black wings I noticed when it flew down, so it may be a slightly different species. It landed on a willow, so perhaps the larva have some kind of relationship with the willow, though I feel like this is a hasty conclusion. Towards the more dune-like part of the beach there were some pine trees, and a ton of a particular plant that is shrub like and looks a lot like Nootka Rose. The flowers on the other hand are much larger and darker pink, and I came to the conclusion they must be Rosehip (Rosa rugosa), and I was surprised at how abundant they actually were. They took up a large stretch of the inner beach. I wonder what pollinates this plant. I doubt it is wind pollinated, but surprised it likes this location so much. I think the few patches of Scotchbroom (Cytisus scoparius) hints that it might be Bumblebees, but I’m not sure. There were a number of crows and one seagull, I observed scavenging for food, but otherwise, I didn’t see too much sea life, since the tide was way in. There was Kelp (Laminariales) along the beach, which makes sense seeing as it is mostly found in the salty waters of the ocean, and apparently, kelp grows in the structure of a forest in shallow oceans and requires nutrient-rich water which might tell us something about the Puget Sound.

Overall, I saw lots of interesting things today, and discovered some new relationships I hadn’t noticed before. I’d like to spend more time there observing the course of the weather and the resulting changes, since I know the weather can change a lot by the sea.

Species List:

Sitka Willow (Salix sitchensis)
Scouler’s Willow (Salix scouleriana)
Pacific Willow (Salix lucida).

Black Cottonwood (Populus balsamifera)
Red Alder (Alnus rubra)
Salmonberry (Rubus spectalis)
Thimbleberry (Rubus parviflorus)
Black Hawthorn (Crataegus douglasii)
Tall Oregon Grape (Mahonia aquifolium)
Nootka Rose (Rosa nutkana)
Black Hawthorn (Crataegus douglasii)
Creeping Buttercup (Ranunculus repens)
Common Velvet-Grass (Holcus lanatus)
Red Eared Slider turtle (Trachemys scripta elegans),
Red Osier Dogwood (Cornus stolonifera)
Common Snowberry (Symphoricarpos racemosa
Big Leaf Maple (Acer macrophyllum)
Red Clover (Trifolium pratense)
Beach pea (lathyrus japonica)
Lady Beetle (Hippodamia convergens)
California Prionus (Prionus californicus)
Silverweed (Potentilla anserina)
Milk Thistle (Silybum adans)
Kelp (Laminariales)
Pine tree (Genus pinus)
Scotchbroom (Cytisus scoparius)

Daily Account: Birds!

Tuesday May 29, 2012

Union Bay Natural Area

Today we returned to UBNA to learn about birds and waterfowl. We saw and learned lots of interesting things, and it was interesting to observe how the place has changed since the first time we went there back in April. First, the grass and other plants have grown so much, now as tall as we are they once barely reached my knees in places. The Nootka Roses (Rose nutkana) are in full bloom, the yellow irises (Iris pseudacorus) are also abundant and growing all around the common cattails Typha latifolia) also extremely abundant, which haven’t changed noticeably since my first visit. There were still lots of dried out flowers of Queen Anne's Lace (Daucus carota) their stalks tall, I wonder when they flower. Their dried flowers look like brown snowflakes to me, all on a larger flake. I noticed lots of Black Cottonwood tree tufts (Populus balsamifera) covering the sides of the path and floating in the air, something I’ve noticed more this year than ever, though I suspect this is because I didn’t know what a cottonwood was and didn’t spend enough time outside at this time of year to realize how those little white puffs with seeds inside are everywhere! I’ve also notice this especially at Seward Park, and along the Burke Gilman trail. As for UBNA, I noticed the seeds before the trees, but looking around, the cottonwood is actually fairly abundant in this location. I also noticed lots of willows and what I think might have been Red-Osier Dogwood (Cornus stolonifera), though I’m not one hundred percent sure of this and would like to go back and check, since it wasn’t completely in bloom this time.

As far as birds go, we heard several, and didn’t manage to spot all of them, but the bird group opened my eyes as to the number of different species of birds just in that small area. We saw an American Goldfinch (Carduelis tristis), mostly bright yellow, with black and gray on its wings sitting in a tall shrub just off the road. I’m pretty sure this was the one they mentioned was making so much noise in the background in the beginning, because this was in the same location. I wonder if (s)he has a nest nearby, and was calling at us, or communicating with another bird. How far do these birds usually go from their nests? Does the distance a bird travels from its nest depend on wing size? Also, I’ve noticed that some birds don’t seem to care when someone comes near the tree they’re in, but some will make noise until you leave. Is this something that has to do with their nest site, or being used to humans?

We also saw a Cedar Waxwing (Bombycilla cedrorum), which looked somewhat like a jay with the shape of its head. It had a grayish-yellow body with a black mask over the eyes. I wonder if they developed this because it’s better for hunting if their eyes don’t stand out as much. It they usually eat insects, berries, and petals though, so perhaps this isn’t the case. In any event, this was the only one we saw, and it was somewhat nearby the lake (about 50ft away), and I think it was in a cottonwood tree. Nearby we heard, but did not see a Black-capped Chickadee (Poecile atricapillus) making the sound “chicka-dee-dee-dee,” a very common bird in the area, but smaller so not obvious among the trees. Farther down the path we saw a Red-winged Blackbird (Agelaius phoeniceus) calling “I seeeee you” sitting in a leafless tree that was about ten feet tall. They also like to perch on the cattails in the marsh. Both of these locations are open and not clustered with lots of leaves. Is this characteristic of Red-winged blackbirds because of where they live or because it is easier for them to hunt this way? They could very well be connected, but I find it interesting that these are the places where they like to perch. Same for the Anna’s hummingbird (Calypte anna), which I’m pretty sure we saw as well, sitting at the tip of a tall tree with no leaves at the top, similar to the red-winged blackbird. I think it might have been a male, because of the somewhat territorial act, but females might do this too. From far away its head looked scruffier than the female I saw at Seward Park, so this could be too. A few Savannah Sparrows (Passerculus sandwichensis) flew by us and landed on the path near the cattails and irises, and hopped along instead of hanging out in the trees or air like many of the other birds we saw.

Closer to an inner pond, we saw several mallards, and flying above were lots of Barn Swallows (Hirundo rustica), a bird I’d managed to catch sitting still a few weeks ago in the same location. Apparently they catch their prey (insects) in flight, diving down and weaving back up through the air. I think this also means they must be eating and flying at the same time. Isn’t it energetically costly for them to fly so much for food? This is exactly what we saw them doing, and there were at least ten of them zooming in and out of the air space above the pond. Other than geese and mallard ducks, I think these birds were most commonly concentrated in one place. They had blue backs and brownish-orange undersides, and their tail feathers split like a fork in the back. Also flying around in the area, (and these could have accounted for one or two of the barn swallows I thought I was seeing, it was hard to tell even with binoculars), was the Violet Green Swallow (Tachycineta thalassina), with a white belly and green back.

Apparently there are usually Bufflehead (Bucephala albeola) that spend their time here as well, however, they migrate north after winter’s over, so we didn’t see any today. We did see them up at the Nisqually Wildlife Refuge, perhaps because the weather was still wintery then. According to the person leading us, they can lift the feathers on their head, making them looking bigger, to attract mates. They are also smaller in the realm of waterfowl because they have evolved to nest in the cavities of the Northern Flickers. This is interesting, I’ve never thought about where waterfowl might nest, and I know some nest right in the marsh, but it seems odd that they would pick a cavity of a Northern Flicker, as it seems it would be far from the water. Why would they do this? They are also monogamous birds, dive for food, and have a similar strategy to meerkats when it comes to working in groups. Apparently, one bufflehead stays above the water on lookout, while the rest have their heads submerged for food.
Returning to the subject of mallards, apparently they can fly up to 60mph when migrating (I’d never realized they migrate before...to where?). They’re called dabbling ducks for the way they eat, and prefer shallow areas, like the one in which we observed them (shallow pond), and females can lay up to half their body weight in eggs, which is actually quite a bit, seeing as the eggs have to come from somewhere. The Hooded Merganser (Lophodytes cucullatus), is another interesting bird, and I have to laugh at myself now for not understanding the difference between this and the Buffleheads up at Nisqually, since they are quite different in appearance. We didn’t actually seed the mergansers here today either, but learned some interesting things. Their young usually find food for themselves almost immediately (though this is like other waterfowl), and their diets are quite diverse including fish, frogs, clams, insects and insect larvae. According to something I was reading they have “extreme muscular gizzards to help them grind down the exoskeletons of shellfish.” I wonder how this affects where one might look for them. It seems we wouldn’t expect to see them in that pond since it doesn’t seem quite as diverse, but that may not be true. Someone asked whether they close their eyes under water. Apparently, they can also change the index of refraction on their eyes turning them into a kind of goggle so they have good sight underwater. That’s amazing! I wonder how they adapt to all the mud in the water, it seems like that would make things difficult. We also saw some Canadian Geese (Branta canadensis) offshore in the lake.

I forgot to mention, in the pond we saw a lone duckling, very small and young probably about the size of my fist. I didn’t see any other ducklings or adult birds nearby, so I’m wondering if this bird was lost, or whether it was just out foraging for itself. I know someone in the group mentioned these birds and many waterfowl have young that learn to feed by themselves soon after being born. This may be the case, however, I find it odd, because in the past few days, I’ve seen three or four groups of baby ducks, slightly different ages/sizes meaning they hatched at different times, but they were all being herded by their mothers, or the mother was close by. Perhaps since this was such a small pond the mothers don’t need to stay so close, but it’s still interesting to see one by itself. We also saw a turtle sitting on a log. It was larger than the turtles I’d seen over near the arboretum, and had a smoother and more shiny shell. I think it might have been a Painted Turtle (Chrysemys picta) and the ones I saw by the arboretum were something else, maybe Western Pond Turtles (Clemmys marmorata). It was pretty far away and hard to tell its exact markings, but I think it had some dull yellow on its neck too.

One other thing I found interesting was the point about male mallard ducks. Someone pointed out that the males leftover who haven’t mated or paired with a female yet will basically gang up on her and “rape” her, something I’ve never actually seen, and it’s hard to believe since they seem so docile. On the other hand, the other night, I was walking through the arboretum and stopped to observe a large group of ducks standing and swimming around in the shallow water next to the shore. I’m not sure if this was a coincidence, but there were at least ten ducks, and all of them were male except for one female. It didn’t phase me at the time, because they were all standing together not really being too active, though two males stood like body guards especially close to the female. A friend and I stood there for awhile, and they didn’t do much, all somewhat statues with their feet submerged. They aligned themselves in somewhat of a line, and after awhile they began to swim away in groups of two or three, most of the males first. Just before this, thought I don’t know if this event is related, a Wood Duck (Aix sponsa) came swimming around the same area, nearing the ducks and then swimming away. I don’t know how these two species interact, but I thought it was interesting that the ducks began to “migrate” across the waterway after this happened.

Specieds List:

Yellow Iris (Iris pseudacorus)
Nootka Roses (Rose nutkana)
Black Cottonwood tree tufts (Populus balsamifera)
Red-Osier Dogwood (Cornus stolonifera)
American Goldfinch (Carduelis tristis)
Cedar Waxwing (Bombycilla cedrorum)
Black-capped Chickadee (Poecile atricapillus)
Red-winged Blackbird (Agelaius phoeniceus)
Anna’s hummingbird (Calypte anna)
Savannah Sparrows (Passerculus sandwichensis)
the Violet Green Swallow (Tachycineta thalassina)
Bufflehead (Bucephala albeola)
Hooded Merganser (Lophodytes cucullatus)
Canadian Geese (Branta canadensis)
Painted Turtle (Chrysemys picta)
Western Pond Turtles (Clemmys marmorata).

Wood Duck (Aix sponsa)
Barn Swallows (Hirundo rustica)
Queen Anne's Lace (Daucus carota)

Daily Account: Fungi and Forbes, a lesson:

Location: UBNA (Lat: 47.65381; Long: -122.293989)

Date & Time: Thursday May 24, 2012; 1:30-3:30pm

Temperature: 65-70 degrees Fahrenheit, mostly sunny

Today we went to the Union Bay Natural Area (UBNA) to learn about Fungi and Forbes. While I learned a lot about both, I also got a glimpse of the other plants and animals around the area. The weather was sunny and warm, and we stayed mostly on the path that winds around next to the bay, indenting into the brush in a few spots to get a closer look at things.

First, we talked about mushrooms and fungi. It’s funny how you don’t always notice the things you aren’t looking for. The fungi group pointed out mushrooms in a few places I might have missed. On a wooden fence post near the water, we saw lots of little orange dots spotting mainly the top railing. The fungi stretched a length of about 1ft-1½ft along the railing. This fungus is called Dacrymyces stillatus, and apparently is one of the first fungi to appear when rain comes, and evidently likes moisture as you can pour water on it and see it thrive. According to something I read, it is dry, but upon being soaked in water, it becomes a bit gelatinous in texture. When we saw it, at first it did look dry and kind of crusty, maybe because of the long day in the sun. I wonder why most of it grew on the top railing of the fence; I’ve noticed this with other fungi as well, but never really thought about it. I wonder if it has to do with the fact that the rain finds its way to the top more easily than underneath, or if there is some other reason, or perhaps I just haven’t spent enough time observing fungi. Either way it’s interesting to look at other fungi and how they compare.

Nearby, about 30 feet away, low to the ground, we found Little Japanese Parasols (Parasola plicatilis), a cluster of two or three of them, with ribbed tops unlike most of the mushrooms I’ve seen. According to the leader of the discussion, these mushrooms are ribbed in order to spread spores faster. Their spores are black. They are also very flimsy, and only last about twenty-four hours, a window outside of which the leader said you’d never know they were there. But this is hard for me to believe. Couldn’t you look underneath the soil and get an idea of what was recently there because of all the hyphae? Apparently these start out bright in shading and become dull as the day goes on. What causes this, and what is the purpose for getting dull and then disappearing into the ground? And how to they even disappear anyway? Does something have to eat them, or do they disintegrate?

We also saw a mushroom within feet of the Japanese Parasols with a dark purple-ish brown spore print, called Leratiomyces percevalii, which is quite similar to the Agrocybe praecox we saw on campus. This fungi is yellowish white and loves wood chips, which makes sense, as we found it growing amongst wood chips and short green grass, which interestingly does not grow naturally in this area, and affects the types of mushrooms and fungi that inhabit the area. Also, the wood chips brought into campus come from all over, so we don’t really know what will be popping up and how it will interact with the species we already have. This is something the next leader (Austin) pointed out along with some other interesting parts of the history of fungi.

He began by saying that the soft, degradable tissues of mushrooms make it difficult to know about their history, therefore their background is somewhat “shady.” This is something I hadn’t thought about before, I suppose they don’t have skeletons that have been preserved like the fossils of mammals and other creatures we know so much about. Then how do we learn about their past? How do we know, as Austin said, that they were once as tall as trees? I’m still not sold on this but I’ve heard similar things about butterflies and insects that used to be gigantic, due to higher oxygen levels. Is this pertinent to mushrooms as well? Is it just a hypothesis?

Apparently, mushrooms/fungi began as aquatic dwellers, floating around and gathering hyphae until they became structures. I began to wonder, isn’t this related to algae, since algae is aquatic? Are fungi related to algae because of this? Or is algae considered fungi?

While these are questions I have yet to answer, Austin said they do know that fungi has been here longer than the species homo, longer than humans, and began developing when flowers began developing. (Oh...perhaps this is how they know about fungi, from the fossils of flowers?) This may be when they began evolving, but fungal research didn’t begin until 1588, somewhere around the invention of the first microscope. Today, they have discovered so much they are thinking about using fungi to reduce the amounts of oil, (I think he said from oil spills), and of course people forage many of them for food.

After this we saw a Fiber Head mushroom (genus Inocybe), which was brown spored and small, less than an inch in diameter. Apparently this mushroom is highly poisonous, because it has something in it that can mimic neurotransmitters in our brain, potentially causing blurred vision, and lots of other unpleasant effects. We also saw Laccaria laccata (The Deceiver) off the trail, back under some shrubs, and Artist Conk (Ganoderma Applanatum), which is more common than I once thought.

Next, we talked to the Forbes group about a few of the flowers growing in the area. Many of these plants I knew of, but I learned some interesting things about the uses of certain plants. The first one we talked about was White Clover (Trifolium repens), a bee-loving plant we see all over the place, but which I have often taken for granted. Apparently, this plant is native to Europe, but not North America, and is often found in disturbed areas. It is a creeping species, and is sometimes used as a crop since it can grow in a wide variety of temperatures, and can be harvested as hay. It is also a nitrogen fixing crop, and is edible. On the other hand, you don’t want to eat the older flowers, as they can be poisonous. The white clover can be used in stir fry, as combined with rice it makes a full protein, and when put near a hive of bees, a result is clover honey. It is also used to make tea and was once purified and used to heal wounds after battle. This is similar to the Red Clover (Trifolium pratense) we saw growing behind and around it, one I’ve always called honeysuckle, though I think this name is true to something else. I used to pull the tips of the flower out and get the sweet nectar from it. I tried this again lately and it didn’t seem as sweet as it used to be. I wonder whether my perception has changed, or the plant has changed or varies by location. The latter is probably most likely. I wonder what makes the purple clover different from the white, and if they have different pollinators at all because of the color of their flowers. From what I’ve seen, and saw today, honeybees and bumblebees seem to like both, though I’d like to look more closely at this. It sounds like they both came from Europe and have the same tri-leaf characteristic.

Next, we took a closer look at Tall Buttercup (Ranunculus acris), another non-native species from Europe, and a very weedy plant although its flowers are a pretty bright yellow. These plants spread by seeds, which makes them easily invasive and on King County’s list of noxious weeds. Buttercup is toxic to grazing animals, but most avoid it because of its bitter taste if there is something else available. We also talked about the Common Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale), another common invasive plant. Apparently, these are part of the sunflower family, and their name means tooth of the lion. They are self pollinating and reproduce asexually, so they don’t really need bees to pollinate them, however, this brought up an interesting question. If they don’t need pollinators, why do they still have bright yellow flowers? I learned that there are a couple potential reasons for this. One is their evolutionary history. Since they are related to other plants that require pollination, they still produce these flowers and are not yet on the same page throughout (? Not sure how to put this, but I think this is what they meant). Another hypothesis is that pollination is still helpful to allowing them to spread their genes, and perhaps flower production and pollinator attraction is still necessary for their survival. This plant has a number of uses, including the leaves with which you can make salads and teas, and the flowers with which you can make wine. The white milky juice in the stem was also used to remove freckles, warts, etc. (although I don’t know about the freckles part). They were also used to cure kidney problems. All this makes me wonder how they figured this out. I suppose through a lot of trial and error, and probably some of it was believed and not necessarily truly effective.

Another plant we talked about was Skunk Cabbage (Lysichiton americanum), a plant with a more interesting account than I thought. According to the leader, Skunk Cabbage generates its own body heat in order to survive the cold forest winters and melt through the snow and frost. Its leaves are waxy, and natives used them to preserve fish and other things. Its roots interestingly look at work like earthworms. They dig into the ground and contract, bringing the plant closer to the ground. Flies and beetles pollinate this plant, and the calcium oxalate in the leaves and flowers can cause skin irritation like that of stinging nettle. It’s interesting that Skunk Cabbage developed this trait, as it seems like a really good strategy to keep herbivores away. We also saw Common Vetch (Vicia sativa), a plant in the pea family that has been cultivated since roman times. I wonder how much it has changed since then. It has purple flowers and leaflets opposite each other, and I’ve seen it growing all over the Burke Gilman trail and along the edges of the path at UBNA.

A few other interesting observations today include: Hairy Cat’s Ear (Hypochaeris radicata) and the realization that although this looks exactly like dandelion, its fuzzy leaves and other characteristics make it a distinct plant, one I’ve also seen at Seward Park. Also growing along the edges of the path was an abundant amount of Dovefoot Geranium/Cransebill (Geranium molle), with pink/purple flowers and five lobed leaves. I also noticed a bit of Morning Glory (Genus convolvulaceae), also growing on the paths edge near the Tall Buttercup. I also noticed some weird waxy red/sacks on the leaves of a willow tree. They were small, a tiny bit smaller than the size of a pencil tip eraser, and a bright red color, that reminded us of pimples on the leaves. There was usually only one per leaf, and it grew in a bulge on both sides of the leaf. I talked to Josh who said they might be Gall wasp larvae, which I confirmed (at least they are a type of fly) later on. We broke one open to find a tiny worm/larvae inside, and apparently these will grow larger and somehow break out of the dense shell, and become flies/gall wasps. I’m wondering if this has any impact on the trees, or whether it is a symbiotic relationship. I first thought it was a fungus on the tree, and didn’t realize something might be living inside. The red sacks are called galls, so I’m not sure if it’s actually a wasp that lives/grows inside, from what I’ve read it’s just a type of fly. We also saw a few ducklings swimming in the pond adjacent to the area we made the other observations.

Species List:

Dacrymyces stillatus
Little Japanese Parasols (Parasola plicatilis)
Leratiomyces percevalii
Agrocybe praecox
Fiber Head mushroom (genus Inocybe)
Laccaria laccata (The Deceiver)
Artist Conk (Ganoderma Applanatum)
White Clover (Trifolium repens),
Red Clover (Trifolium pratense)
Tall Buttercup (Ranunculus acris)
Skunk Cabbage (Lysichiton americanum
Common Vetch (Vicia sativa)
Hairy Cat’s Ear (Hypochaeris radicata)
Dovefoot Geranium/Cransebill (Geranium molle)
Morning Glory (Genus convolvulaceae)
Common Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale)

Daily Account: Seward Park Day 3: Latitude: 47.551, Longitude: -122.261
Date: May 19, 2012
Weather: Sunny, mostly blue sky, apprx. 66 degrees

Today, I spent the day at Seward Park again, doing nature/birding walks, and recording the things I saw and learned. I hadn’t been there in two weeks, so it was amazing to see the contrast from even then, but also the first time I came to the park the beginning of April this year. I noticed greener, new buds, flowers blooming from the plants which I’d learned to recognize by the leaves, and even some berries beginning to ripen.

In the morning, around 10-12am, I took two short walks near to the Audubon center, noticing the light pink flowers of the Nootka Rose (Rosa nutkana), white flowers of the thimbleberry, lots and lots of daisies, and bright yellow flowers of the Creeping Buttercup (Ranunculus repens), the plants looking much happier than when I first came. One thing in particular that struck my attention was the size of the Big Leaf Maple (Acer macrophyllum) leaves. I knew they grew to be large in size, but didn’t know when, since the beginning of last month they were shorter than the length of one of my fingers. Now, however, I measured one of the larger ones relative to my field notebook, and the leaf was about 1.5 notebooks long, which I will measure in centimeters or inches if I can find a ruler. The Big Leaf trees were covered in such leaves, even when we looked at one that had been struck by lightning a long time ago. I wonder how much it takes for lightning to kill a tree, because this one had a huge section missing in its trunk, but looking up we could see all the new leaves growing from the damaged tree. Are trees adapted to live with lightning? I mean they must be somewhat, but how much? Did lightning used to be more common in the area than it is now? Regardless, as compared to the first time I was here, it was much more noticeable that this tree is an abundant species in the park. I think this is due to the fact that it was such a big park and hard for me to take in all at once in my first visit, or whether the small to no leaved trees weren’t as noticeable with the evergreen shrubs and trees eminent in the forest before. Other plants I noticed at first were Snowberry (Symphoricarpos albus) which interestingly looked pretty much the same as when I first saw it, and Oregon grape, both pale and tall kinds with berries beginning to ripen. Near the center, I found many different plants most native, including Red Columbine (Aquilegia formosa), Spanish Lavender (Lavandula stoechas) with a Yellow-Faced Bumblebee (Bombus vosnesenskii) pollinating its flowers, Oregon Iris (Iris tenax), California Poppy (Eschscholzia californica) (flowers bright orange), and Pacific Rhododendron (Rhododendron macrophyllum) with larger purple flowers.

After these initial observations, I went on a walk at 1pm with a naturalist named Ed from the center, one who’s especially into birding. I learned a lot from him both about plants and birds, beginning at the bird feeders behind the center. He mentioned that the male in the species Northern Flicker (Colaptes auratus), a type of woodpecker who makes a sound kieck kieck kieck, will try to find a tree on which his peck sounds loudest and louder than other males to attract females. I’d like to observe these birds in closer detail sometime, apparently, they nest in tree cavities, eat beetles, ants and other insects from the ground, and migrate in the winter, which would partly support my not seeing them in the colder months; then again I’m still learning to identify their call so that could be another factor. Ed also talked about the Brown Creeper (Certhia americana), and the Red Breasted Nuthatch (Sitta canadensis), and the fact that they can both feed on the same tree because the former goes up the tree, and the latter moves down, so both get a different perspective on the food availability. We saw both birds on our walk, but only the Brown Creeper hopping up/scaling a Douglas Fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii) tree. Another thing I found fascinating was the fact that the number of “dees” you hear in a Chickadee’s song indicates their mood. If they’re happy there will be more “dees”, but if there might be a predator around or another territorial bird, the song will be short with only one or two “dees.” The research on bird calls and communication seems quite interesting, but also potentially complicated, and I’d like to learn more about other findings. Black-Capped Chickadees (Parus atricapillus) are definitely one of the more common birds found in the park, but so are Song Sparrows (Melospiza melodia, American Robins (Turdus migratorius), Dark Eyed Juncos (Junco hyemalis), and American Crows (Corvus brachyrhynchos), all of which we saw often today in the park. There are definitely other birds as well, but in the forested woods and grassy fields we walked through today, these were most conspicuous, probably because they are all diurnal, meaning they are active during the day. Crepuscular was another word he used, which means active at dawn and dusk, which is really when these birds are most lively. We also found a Bush Tit (Psaltriparus minimus) nest hanging in a tree. The nest looked like a sock, and is apparently made of materials such as spider webs, lichen, moss, fir needles; Ed mentioned that some of their predators, owls and crows, (snakes if the nest is on the ground), go for the eggs in the nest since they are high protein, but the nest of the Bust Tit is pretty well protected because of its shape, most likely adaptive, but why don’t other birds build their nests in the same fashion? This seems like a pretty good idea considering predators, but maybe other birds are too large to build a sock nest that actually works for its young. Then again, one of the birds we talked about at the Burke Museum made nests in colonies that seemed as if they would be hard to access, but maybe not in the way of the Bush Tit.

While we were talking about birds, I noticed a few things I hadn’t before. First, similar to the Big Leaf Maple situation, the Beaked Hazelnut (Corylus cornuta) was very abundant, a shrub every few yards in some places. I won’t forget what this is because of its soft leaves, strangely similar to the Thimbleberry (Rubus parviflorus) leaves. Why is this? Is there a benefit to having soft and fuzzy leaves? Few plants in the park have this, and I’m wondering what it’s for. Another question I have is about the new sprouts of needles on the fir trees, whether they have a name, and why they only extend from the tip a couple inches. I also learned that all pine cones hang down from the tree and fall, while fir cones grow upwards, something I hadn’t noticed before. Ed also pointed out another new phenomenon when we past Fringecup (Tellima grandiflora), with white flowers coming up. The thing is, although most of the flowers were white a few were slightly purple. He said this is actually a way in which a plant ensures its pollination. The change in color from a white to purple tells pollinators the pollen in that part of the flower is past its prime, and not worth pollenating. This works out for both the plant and pollinator, and apparently happens in Trillium as well. I find it amazing that this happens, especially when looking back at the purple trillium we saw last weekend on the field trip. Someone mentioned something about it being older, but didn’t make the connection with the pollen and pollinators. In changing to a purple color, what changes for it to look different to bees and butterflies? I know their vision is different than ours and wonder what effect this has.

Ed talked a bit about owls as well, and resolved my question of what is that white wash on the side of the Douglas Fir tree. There are a few different kinds of owls in Seward Park, but we talked in particular about the Barn Owl (Barn Owl (Tyto alba). Apparently owls have two stomachs, because when they catch their prey, (rodents, birds, etc.) they can’t digest the bones, feathers, or hair. After eating their meal, they act like a cat coughing up a hairball. In fact, they are very much like cats in that they don’t want to make a mess in their own home, so they go somewhere else to do their business. Therefore they pick a tall tree, such as Douglas Fir as their “vomatorium,” which is where one can collect owl pellets and see the white washed trunk of the tree. I saw two such trees today, both on the edge of a large grassy meadow, perhaps because this is closest to where the owls hunt.

Another thing he talked about is crows, and how smart they can be. I’ve seen and heard a few things about crows recently. At the zoo the other day we found a baby squirrel being attacked by a crow, and no matter how we tried to chase it away, it was determined until we took the baby squirrel away, as if it knew we’d give up eventually. Someone mentioned that in some places, crows will drop nuts in the road for the cars to run over and crack, so they don’t have to do the work. What Ed said today was just as if not more fascinating. He told us about an experiment Joe Marzluff from the UW did on crows. Apparently, he took a Dick Cheney mask and went repeatedly to a particular pair of crows’ nest, and shook them up, scaring them and then leaving. He did this until the pair laid a clutch, banding the birds and leaving for the time being. Tracking the birds later on, he went to the young of the birds in the eggs he hadn’t harassed, to see what would happen. First, he walked around the tree without the mask, and the crows ignored him. He returned again with the mask on however, and the baby crows were scared of the mask. This shows that somehow, the grandparents of these babies were able to communicate the meaning and fear of the mask across generations, an act quite sophisticated and intelligent in my opinion. This is definitely relevant and brings new light to all the crows I see in the park and elsewhere. Are crows native here? Is there intelligence indicative of their future success, or is it just another adaptation?

Wow, I guess you learn a lot when you spend a whole day somewhere. Following the discussions on birds, we went further into the woods, finding on the outskirts a Black Cottonwood tree (Populous balsamifera), with large leathery leaves that looked like ace of spades. These leaves were a fair amount larger than those we saw at Skykomish last weekend, about the length of my notebook, though I’m not sure why. Just skimming through the history of these trees, one can see they were used for a variety of purposes, for example, the rotten leaves of the tree were boiled and used for rheumatism, the cottonwood used for fuel in smoking fish, the bark used to make buckets to carry food, and the gum from the buds used to make waterproof boxes and baskets. There are many other uses of the plant but these are some I find particularly interesting, and wonder whether people still use them today, and where the materials we do use for things such as waterproofing come from. Also, on the edge of the forest was Highbush-Cranberry (Viburnum trilobum), with new white flowers and a few berries (three) hanging below the leaves. I also didn’t know that the mice on the fir cone are called bracts, although apart from the fable I still don’t know the real purpose of these differences as compared to pine cones. Maybe it has something to do with the growing up or down thing I mentioned earlier.
Farther in the forest we found, as usual, lots of Scouring Rush Horsetail, with sticky stems growing to about a foot off the ground. Located in pretty much the same place as I’ve seen them the last few times, and other than maybe being a little greener, I didn’t notice any significant changes. We past the stretch of Salmonberry (Rubus spectabilis), which a few weeks ago had only a number of pink flowers, now covered in berries, that look almost ripe enough to be eaten. More buttercup, also didn’t notice this before without the flowers, but can now make the connection between flowers and leaves, and it is actually quite abundant, growing low to the forest floor. Apparently it’s scientific name “ranunculus” means little frog, perhaps because it grows in an area frogs tend to live. We also saw Euthanage or the Piggy Back Plant (Tolmiea menziesii), and Large-leaved Avens (Geum Macrophyllum) which means I can finally distinguish them and Fringecup (Tellima grandiflora), something that’s been bugging me since the field trip. The first, the Piggy Back plant, had copper colored flowers; the Avens, yellow flowers, and the Fringecup, white flowers and all three do have a different leaf shape, although they look very similar at first. The Tolmiea was growing near thimbleberry, buttercup, and we found it for the first time going deeper towards the oldest and probably wettest part of the park/forest.

We heard a Steller’s Jay (Cyanocitta stelleri) in surrounding big leaf maples, and nearby there was a large ‘field’ of sword ferns. Uninterrupted, this field was interesting to see; there were hundreds of ferns probably the most I’ve seen in one place. Apparently, the mountain beaver, who likes to eat the fronds of these ferns, lives nearby underground. This is also an ideal hunting ground for larger owls who prey on the beaver. We past a Western Hemlock tree (Tsuga heterophylla), with missing needles on its lower branches closer to the ground. This is the first one I’ve seen in the park; I’m sure there are more, but they don’t seem especially common.

Moving closer to the lake again we saw Gadwall ducks (Anas strepera), and Western Trumpet Honeysuckle (Lonicera ciliosa), with orange flowers in bloom from space between leaves, the plant about 20yds from shore, the ducks, in the water, less than 10 feet from us, the female looking similar to the mallard, but the male with different markings.

Species List:
Nootka Rose (Rosa nutkana)
Creeping Buttercup (Ranunculus repens)
Big Leaf Maple (Acer macrophyllum)
Common Snowberry (Symphoricarpos albus)
Red Columbine (Aquilegia formosa)
Spanish Lavender (Lavandula stoechas)
Yellow-Faced Bumblebee (Bombus vosnesenskii)
Oregon Iris (Iris tenax)
California Poppy (Eschscholzia californica)
Pacific Rhododendron (Rhododendron macrophyllum)
Northern Flicker (Colaptes auratus)
Barn Owl (Tyto alba)
Black-Capped Chickadee (Parus atricapillus)
Brown Creeper (Certhia americana)
Red Breasted Nuthatch (Sitta canadensis),
Douglas Fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii)
Song Sparrows (Melospiza melodia)
American Robin (Turdus migratorius)
Dark-Eyed Junco (Junco hyemalis)
American Crow (Corvus brachyrhynchos)
Bush Tit (Psaltriparus minimus)
Beaked Hazelnut (Corylus cornuta)
Thimbleberry (Rubus parviflorus)
Fringecup (Tellima grandiflora)
Black Cottonwood tree (Populous balsamifera)
Highbush-Cranberry (Viburnum trilobum)
Scouring Rush Horsetail (Equisetum hyemale)
Common Horsetail (Equisetum arvense)
Salmonberry (Rubus spectabilis),
Piggy Back Plant (Tolmiea menziesii),
Large-leaved Avens (Geum Macrophyllum)
Steller’s Jay (Cyanocitta stelleri)
Western Hemlock tree (Tsuga heterophylla),
Gadwall ducks (Anas strepera)
Western Poison Oak (Toxicodendron diversilobum)
Western Trumpet Honeysuckle (Lonicera ciliosa)

Daily Account: Skykomish and Beyond
May 12, 2012

Temperature Changing throughout the day, high around 76 warmer to east

Today, we traversed highway 2, from the Skykomish River to Leavenworth, looking at the changes in plant life and ecosystems over a transition from west to east. There were lots of cool things to see, the weather was beautiful (no clouds, blue sky), and it was cool to see the complete contrast with the change in climate, seeing a large variety of plants, trees, lizards, and more.

Our first stop was just out of Gold Bar (Lat: 47.8537, Long: -121.697), on the edge of the Skykomish. I should start by saying this place is an example of a Riparian habitat, one which in parts has been eroded by floods, yet has a nice array of plants and trees, some of which I’d seen, others which are new to my schema for plant life in the pacific northwest/Washington state. The first thing we noticed stepping out of the cars was a tall cottonwood tree in the middle of the parking area. The last time someone mentioned this tree, I was so overwhelmed with information and a bit confused (there may not have been noticeable leaves either), that I didn’t see which tree out of the millions there seemed to be. This time however, the Black Cottonwood (Populus balsamifera) was abundant along the river and surrounding area, its beautiful shiny leaves almost silvery in the sun. Another particular cottonwood we saw had roots exposed above the surface of the ground. Apparently, it uses its roots to self-propagate, sending out new roots from the trunk of the tree. The exposed roots are a result of flooding, where the bank has been in the past. Other trees we saw include: Western flowering Dogwood (Cornus nuttallii) at the opening by the road (didn’t notice anywhere else, and on a side note, the leaves are quite interesting in their papery nature and in the fact that they have a sort of spiraled sheath inside that allows one to pull them apart and not fully separate the whole..I wonder what the adaptive nature of this is), a few Red Alder (Alnus rubra), a couple Big leaf Maple, a Cherry tree, and a Crabapple tree (Malus domestica). We also saw many other tall shrubs such as Beaked Hazelnut (Corylus cornuta) (apparently wind pollenated tree as recognized by catkins), Vine Maple (Acer circinatum), among others.

In one area, the understory was made up of flowering/berry producing shrubs, all around the same location, which I found interesting because I’m not used to seeing them all together at once. These shrubs were Thimbleberry (Rubus parviflorus)which someone mentioned is in the rose family, although I’m not positive this is true since according to Pojar it doesn’t seem so; Trailing Blackberry (Rubus Ursinus)/(unlike the Himilayan Blackberry seen in Seattle, this crawls low to the ground instead of arching first), which wasn’t too abundant but lay scattered alongside the road; Salmonberry (Rubus spectabilis), which I recently discovered interacts with Salmon in some way, I think a naturalist mentioned the salmon used to fertilize it somehow; and Wild Strawberry (Fragaria virginiana), which I have yet to see produce fruit more extensive than flowers. It surprised me that these all grew together, especially the Salmonberry, since I thought it usually prefers more moist habitats than the one in which we found it. Maybe this is why there were only a small number of patches at this site.

We also found lots of Stinky Bob (Geranium robertianum), growing low in the understory, with lots of small pink flowers scattered about, although after smelling it, I personally didn’t find it to be all that stinky. Although it’s an invasive species, we encountered lots of Scotchbroom (Cytisus scoparius) as well, particularly on the banks of the river, we learned that it takes a special kind of insect to pollenate it…well maybe not too special, but if you find plump bumblebees special, then this is how the plant perpetuates itself. The pollen is protected inside the yellow flowers, until something heavy enough comes and interacts with the plants “popping” mechanism. I never knew this about Scotchbroom, and I also didn’t know that it grows in Riparian habitats like this one. I know this plant is nonnative and I’m wondering where it comes from. Also it seems pretty good at adapting to different situations, but where is it most common? I’ve often seen it on roadsides, but do bumblebees fly in these areas? Would they be even more affected by the pollution because of this?
Other invasive species we found were Japanese Knotweed (Fallopia japonica), and Sweet Vernel Grass (Anthoxanthum odoratum), the second characterized by the fine white hairs on its flowers and stem. The grass interestingly is moving north and came from California. I wonder why this is; is this the way the wind tends to blow? I suppose it must be if it’s wind pollenated, but it’s amazing that it’s growing up here now; I wonder how long it’s taken to reach this part of the country, it seems like it would be a slow process.

Next we transition to a much wetter place, off Index (rd), a temperate forest habitat with about two and a half times the rainfall of Seattle. This was probably my favorite, with the beautiful moss hanging on every tree and the greenness extending far into the forest. Here we saw many familiar things, and a few things in question, for example, there were two plants that both looked like fringecup such as Large-leaved Avens (Geum macrophyllum), and another Geranium looking one I still can’t place. These, and Stinky Bob covered the side of the road until we walked past the edge of the forest, the first two not so surprising to me, yet Stinky Bob a bit suprising since I’ve always noticed in in slightly drier habitats, although it makes since, as apparently it is an introduced Eurasian weed. Salmonberry rinks this location as like the previous one, but farther in it gets much more interesting. Apparently a place of frequent rainfall like this is home to a lot of epiphytic plants such as licorice fern, a deciduous species, yet one that loses its leaves in the summer, the opposite the deciduous trees of the area. This is cool, as it means they will get more sunlight in the winter without the canopy of leaves blocking it out. These licorice ferns were on many of the trees in the area, growing not bigger than about a foot in length, and overwhelmingly sweet to the taste (in my opinion). We also saw lots of stumps providing stands for Red Huckleberry (Vaccinium Parviflorum), (Is this an epiphytic species?). False Lily of the Valley covered the forest floor (it seems to like the more moist shady climate everywhere I see it), along with a few stalks here and there of Hooker’s Fairybell (Disporum hookeri) with twin flowers growing beneath the leaves. Nearby a stump we found a small patch about three feet wide of Spiny Wood Fern (Dryopteris expansa), and a log about five feet away with a small black millipede (Harpaphe haydeniana) on its side. The millipede must be common in this area as I’ve seen ones alike before with the yellow stripe down the sides. Do we have many centipedes here? I think they like warmer climates, but I’m curious. Stinging Nettle (Urtica dioica) and Devil’s Club (Oplopanax horridum) stalks popped up once or twice, the latter’s spiny stem a giveaway (although I mistook a plant by the greenhouse the other day with like stem for this and was far off).

And if I must talk about mushrooms which I am learning to avoid because I think the spores make my nose itchy, I will say we saw a few at this site, such as: Coprinellus nopsis, Polyporus Badius (with the hand lens you can see the tons of pores on the underside), and Artist Conk (Ganoderma Applanatum), (also pretty cool because it actually acts as a tablet on its white underside, something I’ve seen in gifts but never live).

Wow, we did do a lot today. Next, we stopped at Money Creek campground (Lat: 47.72917, Long: -121.40694), and found Long-Tailed Wild Ginger (Asarum caudatum)!..Among other things, this pleasant smelling plant I’ve wanted to find for a while now, and found it today growing with jug-like purple flowers, and waxy netlike veined leaves, those which were only waxy in the smaller leaves though I don’t know why. Also in the area were several other unfamiliar species. On the way into the campground, we saw lots of Vanilla Leaf (Achlys triphylla), three leaflets per leaf and on many a bunch in the ground sprung tiny white flowers; Sweet Colts Foot (Petasites palmatus), Yellow Wood Violet (Viola glabella), with bright yellow flowers and heart shaped leaves growing low to the forest floor. There was also something from the carrot family, but I’m not sure what it is yet. At this site we also found some happy lichen, such as Genus Hypogymnia, black on its bottom and white on top, with inflated lobes that were hollow and white on the inside. It also had brown splotches in places, which I now know are called apothecia, a place where the lichen produces spores. I’m sure lichen is in fact happier here, as I recently learned they are largely sensitive to pollution, thus they are scarce around campus and in the city. Away from the pollution however you can find it in larger numbers, and we also saw Platismatia glauca, a very similar kind with a white top and black bottom, but more flat and without the hollow lobes. Down by the river, we also saw a Stonefly (order Plecoptera) at the water’s edge a (resting?) on a rock. It was larger than I imagined and I’m wondering what eats them, fish or birds or both? A rock doesn’t seem like the best place to hang out if the latter is the case. Nearby was a mayfly (Order Ephemeroptera), with claws at the ends of its feet for gripping rocks. Apparently, their adult lives a very short as their name suggests. About ten feet away from the bank was a Cherry tree, identified by its metallic leaves. Also at this stop we found Star Flowered False Solomon’s Seal (Smilacina Stellata), which looked similar to the Hooker’s Fairybells however, the flowers grew above the leaves instead of below. Lastly, there was a large stretch of Marsh Forget Me Nots (Myosotis scorpioides) along the roadside, growing a few inches off the ground and blooming in small blue flowers with white centers.

Our next and last stop of the day was right at the entrance to Leavenworth, east of Steven’s pass (Lat: 47.589, Long: -120.676), where the climate is much warmer and drier. All the new species on this side of the pass were overwhelming, in a similar way I felt about trees in the beginning of the quarter. It was hard to keep up, yet in hindsight, this is interesting and makes sense, as I haven’t spent much time in the area, although I’m amazed by how different the flora was. Upon climbing a small slope we came upon an open stand of Ponderosa Pine trees (Pinus ponderosa), probably 20-30’ tall, with three needles in clusters. As someone else mentioned, from afar these have an interesting texture to them, although I’m not sure what word best describes it (plush…), and where we began they were definitely abundant and a dominant species of the canopy. In the understory we found many plants including: Indian Consumption Plant (Lomatium nudicaule), Arrowleaf Balsamroot (Balsamorhiza sagitata), Saskatoon (Amelanchier alnifolia), with some Chocolate Lilies nearby (Fritillaria lanceolata), (on the subject of chocolate lilies, it was interesting to see how they grow, one or two here and there yet producing very large flowers. Are flowers similar to animals in the different strategies in which they pass on their genes? I mean, of course they all have different techniques and adaptations, but is it more costly but somehow more advantageous to produce larger but fewer flowers or the reverse, large numbers of smaller flowers? And how does this relate to the animals pollenating it? I know it’s all part of a larger picture, and I just can’t stop asking why. Next we found Western Peony (Paeonia brownii), Ocean Spray (Holodiscus discolor), Twolobe larkspur (Delphinium nuttallianum), with purple/blue flowers blooming, Yarrow (Achillea millefolium), Eriogonum sp., whose leaves looked a little like Swiss chard, and whose plant didn’t have as many flowers as pictures of the varieties I’ve seen on the internet. We saw Mouse ear cress (Arabidopsis thaliana) which I learned is in the mustard family and like the white rat of plant genetics. I find this pretty interesting, and discovered the reason for this is that it’s geographically widespread, and has a relatively short life cycle/reproductive cycle (?), which makes it ideal to study. In between some other rocks we found Death-Camas (Zygadenus venenosus), with white flowers and stamen with yellow anthers on the ends. The flower of this plant is supposedly pollinated by only one insect according to some, while someone else in the group mentioned they’d seen it pollinated by at least three or four. Also it’s interesting, the flowers on this look totally different than the purple camas, but I suppose when the Native Americans were farming the crops and trying to weed out the fatal kind, they might have looked similar as far as the rest of the plant goes.

One of the coolest things we saw was the Western Fence Lizard (Sceloporus occidentalis), the males of which have sapphire/deep blue undersides due to sexual selection, that change color depending on their mood. Also, interesting about these guys is the ticks behind their (ears?), and the idea I think someone mentioned of them being immune to Lyme disease. I’m not a hundred percent sold on this and would like to know more.

Other new creatures we ran into include: the Sara Orange Tip butterfly (Anthocharis sara), a Snakefly (Agulla sp.) with its long ova-depositor, a butterfly in the lycaenidae family, (blue in color, apparently has tips on bottom of wings to trick predators and protect themselves. All of these were found in or around a nearby Lewis's Mock-orange (Philadelphus lewisii), a deciduous shrub this one about seven feet tall.

Other things learned at the end of the trip: I learned that Douglas Fir doesn’t self pruned itself, so when a fire comes around it’s in trouble, but when there are no fires, a forest such as the one we visited will gradually be taken over by Douglas firs, as opposed to all the Ponderosa Pines there now.

We also found a Bolete mushroom (Boletus edulis), back in the wooded area of Ponderosa pines, surrounded by rose bushes and Saskatoon, and some Indian Paintbrush (Castilleja hispida), blooming bright fiery red/orange in spots along the trail (not super abundant however). Beside one tree, I think a Ponderosa Pine, we found a colony of Harvester Ants (Pogonomyrmex sp.).

Overall this was a good trip, although overwhelming at times with all the new species.

Species List:
Black Cottonwood (Populus balsamifera)
Western flowering Dogwood (Cornus nuttallii)
Red Alder (Alnus rubra)
Big Leaf Maple (Acer macrophyllum)
Beaked Hazelnut (Corylus cornuta)
Thimbleberry (Rubus parviflorus)
Vine Maple (Acer circinatum)
Trailing Blackberry (Rubus Ursinus)
Salmonberry (Rubus spectabilis)
Wild Strawberry (Fragaria virginiana)
Stinky Bob (Geranium robertianum)
Scotchbroom (Cytisus scoparius)
Sweet Vernel Grass (Anthoxanthum odoratum)
Japanese Knotweed (Fallopia japonica)
Large-leaved Avens (Geum macrophyllum)
Red Huckleberry (Vaccinium Parviflorum)
Hooker’s Fairybell (Disporum hookeri)
Spiny Wood Fern (Dryopteris expansa),
Millipede (Harpaphe haydeniana)
Stinging Nettle (Urtica dioica)
Devil’s Club (Oplopanax horridum)
Coprinellus nopsis
Polyporus Badius
Artist Conk (Ganoderma Applanatum)
Long-Tailed Wild Ginger (Asarum caudatum)
Vanilla Leaf (Achlys triphylla)
Sweet Colts Foot (Petasites palmatus)
Yellow Wood Violet (Viola glabella)
Genus Hypogymnia
Platismatia glauca
Stonefly (order Plecoptera)
Mayfly (Order Ephemeroptera)
Star Flowered False Solomon’s Seal (Smilacina Stellata),
Marsh Forget Me Nots (Myosotis scorpioides)
Ponderosa Pine (Pinus ponderosa)
Indian Consumption Plant (Lomatium nudicaule)
Arrowleaf Balsamroot (Balsamorhiza sagitata)
Saskatoon (Amelanchier alnifolia)
Chocolate Lily (Fritillaria lanceolata)
Western Peony (Paeonia brownii)
Ocean Spray (Holodiscus discolor)
Twolobe larkspur (Delphinium nuttallianum)
Yarrow (Achillea millefolium)
Eriogonum sp.,
Mouse ear cress (Arabidopsis thaliana)
Death-Camas (Zygadenus venenosus)
Western Fence Lizard (Sceloporus occidentalis)
Sara Orange Tip butterfly (Anthocharis sara)
Snakefly (Agulla sp.)
Lewis's Mock-orange (Philadelphus lewisii)
Bolete mushroom (Boletus edulis)
Indian Paintbrush (Castilleja hispida)
Harvester Ants (Pogonomyrmex sp.)

Daily Account: The Bug Lab
May 3, 2012

Today we went to the Entomology lab in Johnson Hall to talk to Evan Sugden about the study of insects and how they connect to natural history. I learned a lot from this class and now am beginning to understand why some people find insects so interesting.

He began by pointing out that if an alien were looking at earth from afar, he wouldn’t say this is the planet of the apes, or anything else, he would call it the “planet of the insects,” due to the fact that in terms of population insects dominate our planet and are the most diverse body of species living here. They are also immensely important, and we couldn’t really get along without them. Although I knew insects were everywhere, I didn’t realize what the numbers actually look like, and how they contribute directly and indirectly to our lives and function. Evan grouped their activities into those that affect the natural world and the human world. In the natural world, the things insects do are neither good nor bad, they just are, something I’ve heard before in my animal behavior class via natural selection and evolution, which is what may be happening, but whether or not it should be happening is a human perspective apart from the raw course of behavior. In the natural world, bugs provide food for other organisms like salmon, which makes sense, but what surprised me is that without insects, we probably wouldn’t have salmon, which would be terrible for many other reasons as well. We would also be buried under layers of waste if it weren’t for insects like flies, termites, and dung beetles; those who commit acts such as chewing holes in rotten wood so bacteria can do its part and finish the decomposition process. They are also a part of soil formation, something I’d like to understand more since he only touched on it in class. Insects also play a part of vegetation control and keeping plant life in check, while at the other end of the scale, helping some plants reproduce through pollination.

In the human world, we tend to view insects as pests, something I already knew, but apparently we also use them for other things such as medicinal purposes. While insects do create competition for food in the occupation of crops and sometimes in our homes, and they can also be disease vectors of deadly things like malaria, insects do have positive impacts on the human world, ones we tend to overlook, and some slightly shocking as well. Apparently, we use insects to control other invasive pests who become problems in cases such as the loss of a natural predator in an area. Insects are also nutritious, although for me the jury’s still out on whether they actually taste good. I have heard of other cultures eating them though. On a side note, what makes them so nutritious? Are all insects okay to eat or are they like plants in the nature of edibility? We also use things like maggots (completely surprising to me) to treat wounds and their extract to make allantoin, a type of medicine.

On the subject of beetles, they have wings that conserve water, called Elitra (sp?), they are nocturnal, and apparently make up 1/5 of all animal species diversity. This is kind of funny as I hardly ever notice beetles, but I suppose it makes sense looking at the times they are more active. He also mentioned another reason we don’t see them as much is because they do most of their interaction with the environment in the immature stage (grubs), and their adult life is short, kind of like the life of a caterpillar. This makes sense, since they become more conspicuous as adults and if all they need to do is reproduce in this time they should spend as little time above ground as possible.

I also didn’t know that butterflies are actually moths adapted to day flight, and the ancestors of bees are wasps. We discussed how unlike wasps, bees are fuzzy because they pollinate partially by getting pollen all over them and then grooming it off. They have also evolved tightly with plants due to the reciprocal need of the plant and pollinator. Someone asked how the queen bee gets chosen in a hive, a question I’d been puzzled about as well. Apparently, certain eggs get a supercharged diet that helps develop their sexual organs, and these bees become queens. But how do the other bees know who she is? And is the egg chosen at random? We later got to look at the cross section of a hive and distinguish all the drones, workers and the queen, very interesting, and it amazes me that the bees can still live under these conditions. He did point out, however, that the native bees are going extinct, partly because they are so sensitive to toxins in the air called neonicotinoids, and also due to the introduction of a similar European honeybee. In fact, these smaller, “Africanized” wild bees are now essentially dependent on their keepers for survival, thought they are the most efficient pollinators for many crops.

On the subject of the queen, she apparently lays about 1egg/minute and apprx. ½ million eggs before she dies. This is crazy! Then again I suppose it makes sense in terms of furthering one’s genes. If you can stay in the hive and lay eggs and be fully protected all your life, there is a good chance your genes will be projected into the future. Perhaps there is another reason for their structure of life, but I’m not sure yet. Also, the queen bee only has one mating episode in her whole life, a 2-3 day period of flight where she goes and mates with males from other colonies. Incredibly, this provides her with enough sperm to lay those ½ million eggs. Further, I asked who she mates with. According to the bee guy, she can detect the odor of her own drones, though he wasn’t completely sure.

He also said that bee stings can be used to alleviate symptoms of arthritis, because they activate the immune system. To me this sounded similar to acupuncture, but he said something different is actually happening.

Also, the honeybees we were looking at manage to keep the hive at a temperature of 93-96 degrees Fahrenheit which is extremely warm for all those little guys. This temperature, in combination with the fact that they can take sugar droplets in mandibles and fan them with their wings to cause evaporation, allows them to produce honey. The temperature also means these bees don’t have to migrate in the winter, unlike solitary bees who do not have this capability of keeping the hive warm enough to survive. Are bumblebees solitary bees? I would think so, but they build their nests in pre-existing rodent holes, and I’m wondering if this changes the need to worry about temperature, or whether bumblebees are similar to honeybees in the way they nest.

Evan also pointed out that male bees never sting, because the stinger is a reproductive device of the female related to egg laying and defense of her nest. If a nest gets too crowded, the bees will swarm, and the hive undergoes a fission in which you get two colonies out of one.

Daily Account: Burke Museum day 2
Thursday April 26, 2012
1:30-3:30pm

Today we went to the Burke museum for the second time to talk about birds. Through three different rotations we talked about reproduction, sexual selection, and the different factors that can change populations over time. Some of the conversations reminded me of what I’d learned and considered in an animal behavior class last year. We first talked about populations and the need for museums to keep records of the past for determining how a population is changing, for example whether there are many more young being born than there are older, or whether the population is currently stable, etc. We can use specimens to figure out which birds are in which locations and if and how they’re migrating over time. Susan talked about how in some migratory birds (I think we were talking about Townsend’s warblers), the adult males have to fly back before the females to claim nesting grounds, from which the females choose a few weeks later. What I didn’t realize was that the older males can fly back sooner because they have more body fat sooner, and therefore find the better nests lower on the mountain as opposed to the so-so nests of the younger birds, who are less likely to mate for this reason. Thus we can get a ratio of the ages of birds on the mountain. This is something we can only tell by keeping a record and history of the birds. In this way, we can take a snapshot in time to learn more about behavior patterns and ecology of a place over time.
Next we looked at Marbled Murlets (Brachyramphus marmoratus), and differentiated between the Juvenile and adult birds by the differences in their plumage. A question that came up was why are there two different colored males? The answer once known, seems obvious: it is because the birds were taken from different seasons. There were two different patterns, one of a light underside and a darker back, and the other of a male who was dark all over. The first was taken outside of mating season, whereas they acquired the second specimen during mating season. The reason for this is that during mating season the males spend time nesting in trees where they camouflage better if dark. In the off season, they spend much of their time on the water, where from the underside a light belly blends in with the surface, just as a dark back blends from above. I think this is the reasoning for penguin coloring as well.
Apparently, another bird, the robin is found all over the world, yet drastically different in size and other details. Someone noticed that Robins further North might have redder breasts, a hypothesis, still undetermined. We do know however, that they don’t all lay blue eggs.
Following this discussion, we talked to Seever (sp?) about Reproduction and Sexual selection. First things first: there are some downright beautiful birds, albeit also extremely conspicuous, such as peasants, and the majority of them are male. Yes, this conspicuousness is bad for survival, Seever says, but in terms of reproductive success, more matings = more offspring which weighs more on the scale of importance when it comes to getting your genes into the future if you’re a bird. Females on the other hand, are typically less conspicuous, because they are usually the ones in charge of parental care and need to stay out of sight to protect their young. Apparently, in most species the males don’t even come near the nest. In this structure of life, males also tend to be bigger, and I’m pretty sure it has to do with the fact that males need to fight of other males for females (sexual dimorpism).
In one particular species however, the Jesus Christ birds/Hassanas, the females tend to be bigger. As is the case for many shorebirds hawks, eagles, etc. These marsh-dwelling Hassanas are polyandrous, meaning the female has a harem of males she lays clutches for. In this species the females actually fight for territory, with very sharp carpel spines which I never would have known of had Seever not shown us an example. There are also high rates of predation in the tropics. Is this because there are land animals that have access to the nests too? I thought this was the same for seagulls, with fox predation. Is this a similar situation? Also in this species, the male incubates the eggs, and a clutch is limited to four eggs at a time, a quantity which we don’t seem to know the exact reason for at the moment.
According to Seever, there is also a lot of cuckolding going on in the Hassanas. This is because if a male has to wait in line for a clutch, he might defect to another female’s nest. However, the female he’s with wants his genes and to keep him for herself, so she gets the best genes possible, therefore to avoid defection, she offers the second in line male EPC. The consequences of this are ironic. The second-in-line male actually gets a better deal, because after the EPC, the clutch she lays for the first in line is partly genetically the second guys genes. Then, she’ll lay a whole new clutch for the second male to have all to himself. But the question is, is he really better off if there’s always another guy second in line? Is there always someone in line?
Next, we talked to Josh about eggs. Upon observation of several different clutches of eggs, we concluded a lot about the birds responsible for them. The first observation that came up was that none of the eggs in the case were completely round. I actually find this quite interesting, and I’m wondering if there’s an adaptive benefit to having non-rounded eggs. Are there any birds that lay round eggs? This may seem like a silly question, but I am curious. Anyway, the conversation quickly turned to birds called Weavers, most likely named this due to the round hanging nests they weave in the trees in Africa. Weavers are colonial nesters, unlike many other species. Another observation was that the eggs were different colors even though they were all from the same bird. Apparently, there is a selection for having a “signature” on your eggs because of the egg dumping phenomenon of females from the same species go into others’ nests and dump eggs, because it is a lot less energetically costly if you can have someone else raise your kids. On the other hand the babysitters aren’t too keen on the idea as far as natural selection goes, so having your own egg color means it’s easier to distinguish impostor eggs. Another species to use this clever behavior is the Brown-headed Cowbird (Molothrus ater).
Brown headed cowbirds apparently do not nest at all, using the nests of other species of birds to raise their young. They lay 40-50 eggs in one season, finding all kinds of hosts. Later when the young cowbirds have hatched and received all their nurture from the host, the cowbird parent returns to retrieve her nestling. The question is why do the hosts go with it? Even if the egg looks so different, and they have to feed a monster of a cowbird along with their young, why don’t they just chuck the egg out of the nest while they can? Well, sometimes they do, and most of the time they do notice the difference in the cowbird’s egg, however, some birds cannot tell or cannot manage to rid the nest of the egg. One reason they don’t get rid of the egg is that there’s a potential for it to be costly. If they destroy the wrong egg, or loose one of their own while pecking at it, it might make more sense adaptively to raise the extra young bird. While they can tell a difference, the males apparently have a harder time telling the eggs apart, and they are the ones spending a lot of time in the nest feeding the babies. Something else I found interesting was the red color of the inside of the baby cowbirds’ mouths. Ironically, it may act as a super stimulus for the hurrying host bird to feed it faster, along with the fact that the cowbird infants are usually larger and this usually corresponds to reproducing more and without parasitism this is the bird to devote time and energy to. Some birds beaks can’t puncture a cowbird egg, so the size of the host and its beak matters as well. Josh showed us one video of a bird using her talons to get rid of the egg, but this is not a common occurrence. There is definitely an “evolutionary lag” going on for the hosts, and they may catch up eventually and find a way to better adapt, though it is quite complex what the cowbirds have going on. They even keep track of where they’ve laid eggs, thus can check in on them and throw out hosts young if theirs isn’t there (the mafia phenomenon). According to Josh, these birds have lost the ability to nest. My question was about evolutionary lag, and will the other birds will eventually develop a way to evolutionarily “outsmart” the Brown-headed Cowbird? I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

Species List:
Marbled Murlets (Brachyramphus marmoratus)
Brown-headed Cowbird (Molothrus ater).

Daily Account: Cowen Park
Monday, 4/23/12
12:00-1:30pm
Temperature: 70s, approx. 73, Sunny, blue skies

Today we went to Cowen/Ravenna Park in the Ravenna neighborhood north of the University. Cowen and Ravenna park, actually have a pretty interesting history I’m discovering only now after having been there hundreds of times before. Apparently, the parks (connected by a trail leading through the middle) were formed by the melt-off from the Vashon glacial sheet was retreating north. It first left a lake called Lake Russel which disappeared in the glacial retreat, however, after this the Green lake basin, left over from all the melting emptied through the Ravenna ravine into lake Washington. I’m wondering first of all how closely the Greenlake basin is related to the man-made lake millions of people visit we now call green lake, and whether the basin was in the same general area. Also, is the trail through the center of the park the remnants of the ravine? There are creeks on both sides of the trail, and large, almost canyon like sides (banks?) running up until one again reaches the road and civilization. There are also two bridges built over the park. I don’t know how old these bridges are, but I’m wondering whether they were initially built simply to fill the gap, or how recently there was water running through the ravine they call the Ravenna ravine. If the ravine emptied the basin into lake Washington, which way did the water flow? Southeast? And how long ago did all this happen? It must have been a few hundred years, because there are some redwoods in the middle of the park that look pretty darn old. According to what I’m reading, the “deeper pockets of the basin become Bitter, Haller and Greenlakes.” Again what is the correlation with Green Lake? I know we’ve named community centers after Bitter and Green lakes, so it would be interesting to know how long ago all this happened. Apparently, the ravine deepened, becoming what it is today? From what I’ve seen, it is still a relatively wet habitat with lots of water loving plants.* (*After I say water loving, however, I think back to the Greenhouse at the UW and the fact that those desert plants did like water, they just couldn’t compete with the other adapted plants, from what I understood.) Here we go; another park history says the basin continued to drain through 1911. There is a lot more information on it on the Seattle Parks’ website, however, I think I can conclude that what I saw today is probably a fair amount different than it was back a hundred years ago. Though now I wonder how the plant life has changed or remained the same over the years. I wonder whether the same species were there in the same places then or if not where and how did they get to where they are today?
Anyway, today was beautiful and there were lots birds singing and bees buzzing. Now, I’ve been to this park hundreds of times because I went to nature camp for the lengths of a few summers when I was little. I probably learned a lot then, but a lot of it I’ve also forgotten and I didn’t realize how many different species of plants inhabit the park. There was a lot to see, many things in bloom, and many things I recognized but had to re-identify. First, the park was abundant with Horsetail (Equisetum arvens), with erect stems about a foot tall, especially in the wetter places near the creeks that run on either side of the trail. There was also some Tall Oregon Grape (Mahonia aquifolium) scattered at the beginning of the trail, though I didn’t see it much through the rest of the walk. Common Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale), found itself underneath the bridge about 30-50ft away from the creek, the only place I noticed it, which makes sense because the floor there is more disturbed than other parts of the park. There was a stretch of 3-4 plants I didn’t recognize such as one tree/shrub 5’-20’ tall with opposite leaves looking like sets of four from above. Another plant had purple flowers and sedge-like leaves (perhaps Spanish Bluebells?), followed by what I think might have been a Western Yew, growing with Salal, Sword Fern, Horsetail, and neighboring a Beaked Hazelnut Tree (Corylus cornuta), the latter which had very soft leaves, but no hazelnuts yet. Under a second Hazelnut we found to my surprise some Pacific Bleeding Heart (Dicentra formosa), actually a pretty large patch occupied the side of the trail next to a young red cedar, maybe 60’ away from the creek. Closer to the creek we found Money plant (Lunaria annua) though I’m still not convinced of this identification as there was no money on it. There was also what I think was Trailing Black Currant (Ribes laxiflorum) growing next to the cedar nearby. Another plant, that which I didn’t know at the time, had very shiny, translucent, rubbery leaves and was covering the ground near a section of the park where the creek gets wider. Intuitively I guessed Wild Ginger, with the feeling that this wasn’t right, and now know this was False Lily of the Valley (Maianthemum dilatatum). Finally, nearby the False Lily was a tree-like plant, one which looked very alive, but was growing horizontally and I still can’t figure out what it was, but it had “bushels” or bunches of needles coming outward, and the center of the needle bunch began as yellow but graduated into green on the ends, looking to me like new needles, unless the tree had fallen or was recently cut down.
This was as far as we got today, a question I might have would be: what kinds of animals live in Cowen/Ravenna park? I’m trying to remember whether the Northern Flicker or Woodpeckers inhabit the park but I can’t remember and would like to spend some time one day checking into this.

Species List:
Horsetail (Equisetum arvense)
Tall Oregon Grape (Mahonia aquifolium)
Common Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale)
Beaked Hazelnut Tree (Corylus cornuta)
Pacific Bleeding Heart (Dicentra formosa)
Money plant (Lunaria annua)
Trailing Black Currant (Ribes laxiflorum)
False Lily of the Valley (Maianthemum dilatatum)

Daily Account : Seward Park Day 2
Saturday April 28, 2012
Latitude: 47.551 Longitude: -122.261
Weather: Partly sunny, ~62 degrees

Today I went to Seward Park for a second time to take a closer look at the park with a naturalist. I learned and saw a ton more than last time, and the weather decided to cooperate too. Although much of the park is in the shade of the forest, the open areas were warm and full of sun and life. To start from the beginning, I learned that Seward Park has three types of habitats/climates: riparian, since it is located right on Lake Washington; temperate forest, with the many different types of evergreen trees and plants on the 300 acres it occupies; and finally, the park has a bit of prairie left over from when the Indians used to burn the fields to grow Camas (Camassia quamash), a beautiful flower and staple food.
We went on a botany walk and managed to find our ways through the forest and prairie, and saw many cool things. Commencing with native plants, we identified things like Fringe Cup (Tellima grandiflora), Western Trillium (Trillium ovatum), Vine Maple (Acer circinatum), Evergreen Huckleberry (Vaccinium ovatum), Kinnikinnick (Arctostaphylos uva-ursi), Western Flowering Dogwood (Cornus nuttallii), False Lily of the Valley (Maianthemum dilatatum), Nootka Rose (Rosa nutkana), and a few others we couldn’t be certain of. As far as the Nootka Rose goes, I didn’t know that they have two particularly large spines/prickles at the base of each leaf, spines which are much bigger than the spiny stem I’ve noticed in the past. Apparently, spines are actually modified leaflets. This I don’t completely understand as they look nothing like leaves, let alone leaflets, and would like to know more about the “anatomy(?)” of plants so I can understand why they look the way they look. On the same note, we talked about Trillium and False Lily of the Valley, both of which have Monocot leaves. According to the naturalist, as well as a website I checked out later this afternoon, plants with Monocot leaves come from one seed leaf (still not sure what this means exactly), have erect flowers, and grow with veins parallel to each other, with the exception of this detail in Trillium. Corn is also a Monocot. Dicots are most other plants, and include wild ginger (whose leaves have a similar shape to the Trillium), those whose veins are not parallel but more of a net formation or “snakelike.” Apparently Dicots’ flowers are often hidden. Is this true for all of them? I’m definitely going to keep a lookout from now on and try to keep track of the characteristics of both types of plants.
On the way up the trail we also saw an old log with what looked like pinecone bits in it, the work of our Native Douglas Squirrel.
Next we looked at the bark of the different trees around us. On large Douglas Fir we identified, the bark was very fluted/chunky, a giveaway for older trees for which it is difficult to see the needles. An adjacent redwood was quite different, its bark fuzzy and of course very red. What I hadn’t noticed before was how the needles of the Redwood (I think it was a Coast Redwood) grew flat and on a plane, as compared to the Douglas Fir. According to the naturalist, the redwoods in the park were planted by some gardener, as redwood seedlings cannot survive our summers. What I really want to know is why all these trees adapted the way they did. Then again I want to know that about everything so…
We also saw several Madrone trees, however, they didn’t look like they were doing very well, and the naturalist said they have a lot of trouble with pollution, and don’t respond well to disturbances.
The Western Red Cedar, one I’ve seen many times, came with a background I hadn’t heard before. Accodrding to the naturalist, the Western Red Cedar was like the “tree of life” to the native Americans, as they used its bark for everything from baskets and boats to clothing and baby diapers, by peeling off strips of the tree (only a portion at a time so as not to hurt the tree).
We also saw a Bald Eagle on our walk, sitting in a tree which may have had a crows nest in it, because crows kept swooping in and trying to attack the eagle, aims to which the eagle won in domination with its erect posture and loud calls. Apparently eagles can live to be 30-40 years old, and don’t lay a clutch every single year because it is not necessary due to their longevity.
A few things I found were edible that I didn’t know before such as Indian Plum (which by the way smells like pea/cucumber when you crush the leaves), and Fern fronds, also called fiddleheads. The question is whether all ferns have edible fronds or just certain types like the sword fern. We noticed that the Lady fern has slanted leaflets that do not grow on a plane like some other ferns.
We also saw Oceanspray (Holodiscus discolor), and Large-Leaved Avens (Geum macrophylum), the latter whose leaves were oddly more rounded at its base and graduating into pointy as you reach the top. It tricks you into thinking there are two different plants, while it is really only a single stem.
There was also a question about Skunk Cabbage (Lysichiton americanum). Because it smells so bad we were wondering, who pollinates it? Apparently, the answer is flies because it smells like dead flesh, something I still haven’t really experienced significantly enough to appreciate how bad it smells…not that that’s a bad thing. It’s distinct enough with its huge bulb-like flowers.
As we moved towards the drier prairie remains, we saw more Madrone trees, these looking healthier, along with tiny black mushrooms I have yet to identify, Shore Pine (Pinus contorta), Gary Oak (Quercus garryana), Camas (Camassia quamash), a Muscovy Duck (Cairina moschata), and Spring Gold (Lomatium utriculatum). Apparently the Camas only blooms for a short time like a few weeks out of the year.
One last cool fact about the park is that the park has never been logged, mainly because the peninsula it is now used to be an island seasonally, which is interesting and makes me wonder why it doesn’t become an island anymore.

Species List:
Camas (Camassia quamash)
Fringe Cup (Tellima grandiflora)
Western Trillium (Trillium ovatum)
Vine Maple (Acer circinatum)
Evergreen Huckleberry (Vaccinium ovatum)
Kinnikinnick (Arctostaphylos uva-ursi)
Western Flowering Dogwood (Cornus nuttallii)
False Lily of the Valley (Maianthemum dilatatum)
Nootka Rose (Rosa nutkana)
Oceanspray (Holodiscus discolor)
Large-Leaved Avens (Geum macrophylum)
Skunk Cabbage (Lysichiton americanum)
Shore Pine (Pinus contorta)
Gary Oak (Quercus garryana)
Camas (Camassia quamash)
Muscovy Duck (Cairina moschata)
Spring Gold (Lomatium utriculatum)

Daily Account/Journal: Burke Museum 1st Visit
April 24, 2012
2:45pm

Today we went to the Burke Museum to hear about birds and the records/specimens at the museum from the Collections Manager, Robert Faucett. It was really cool to go downstairs and see all the behind the scene things that go on inside the museum. I was a bit surprised when we first stopped at a table where two students/people, were working on the hides (?) of mammals, and we could see the actual tissue as they prepared the specimens. I didn’t realize how hands on the processes are to preserve history through specimens. I also didn’t realize there were so many types of specimens. Rob talked about four different kinds of specimens and what they were used for including the steady skin specimen, used to identify things to a particular species, because if we only had the skeletal specimen, we wouldn’t know what coloring went where and so forth. On the other hand, I hadn’t considered before that the skeletal specimen would be used to determine the size of an animal, something the first specimen can’t do because it acts kind of like a sock. Another not so aesthetic yet useful specimen is the tissue specimen, for looking at DNA, protein structures, etc. Last, which I found interesting in later conversation was the spread wing specimen, for learning about plumage patterns for example of the Black Footed Albatross. Rob pointed out that the Albatross has evolved a way of losing its feathers so precisely and in the best possible way according to the energetic cost to replace feathers, as well as the need to still be able to fly and catch fish, in one in a huge number of possibilities. The technicality of this and the details of the way it works fascinate me, He pointed out the difference in feathers on the wing of the bird, and compared this birds “lifestyle” to that of the Canada Goose, which has a dramatically different behavior of losing all its feathers at once because it only has to eat grass, and can stop somewhere where there are no predators until its feathers come back. It makes me wonder though, what are the predators of a Canada Goose, and if they can stop temporarily to regenerate feathers, why don’t they spend their lives moving from island to island, instead of migrating like they do? Or do they migrate for that reason? It seems awfully far to fly, and costly to their fitness, if there isn’t some other benefit, which there must be, but what is it?
I also didn’t know that in order to fly better, birds need more breast muscle and a hollowed skull? (not sure if its skull or wings), and that their heads/(wings) become more hollow as they age. How fast does this happen? Is this why baby birds have more trouble flying, or is it a combination of other things? Is it simply large breast muscle or is it a ratio of that to size of the bird?
It’s amazing how much you can tell from looking at specimens over time and keeping a record of everything you find. I guess the Burke Museum really is an analogy for a library, but it almost seems different to me, because its “books” or resources are being analyzed continually, but maybe I just haven’t had a close-up enough view of a library.
Man, so many interesting things. The other thing I found really interesting was the history of the Townsends and Hermit Warblers. Apparently, the two species are identical through binoculars looking at their DNA, which still doesn’t completely make sense to me, but they are quite different when it comes to coloring, and behavior patterns, and this is causing a shift of population habitat as a system, which is incredible, moving south. Rob talked about how the there is a separation in habitats with the Townsend's Warblers to the north, the Hermit Warblers south, and also a hybrid group in the middle. He asked us to consider what happens if you’re a bird, singing, and another bird comes and attacks you, what do you do? Well you get out of its territory/move, but in this case the only way to go is south because the Townsend's Warblers, the aggressive ones are north, and there is no lodge pole forest in other directions. I asked if there were any birds as aggressive as the Townsend's Warbler and he said no, however, he did say that the Hermit Warblers are nearing the edge of the lodge pole pine forest which is their habitat, which will make for some very interesting studies later. I’m curious what will happen, and thought about the Hawk dove population and (Evolutionary Stable Strategy) ESS, and wondered whether the species will become one and just be a ratio of more aggressive birds to less aggressive ones, or what else could possibly happen, unless the Hermit Warblers go extinct, which I wouldn’t think would happen. It was cool to see the gradient of pure Townsend's to pure Hermit Warbler though and notice their differences in coloring. I wonder what the temperaments of the hybrids are like in comparison. Rob gave me lots of interesting things to think about and I’m interested to hear more on Thursday.

Species list:

Townsend's Warbler (Dendroica townsendi)
Hermit Warbler (Dendroica occidentalis)
Black-footed Albatross (Diomedea nigripes)
Canada Goose (Branta canadensis)