meganwaskom's Journal

52 degrees Farenheit, moderate to heavy rainfall, full cloud cover.

I observed a few species of plant that seemed to have fully bloomed in the area, and added them to my account. I am having trouble identifying a few of the species using the inaturalist species identification methods, and the fact that they are most likely not native species and were brought here by human intervention makes them hard to identify using online plant guides of the northwest, which focuses more on native species and not on common species.

I decided to identify more species on campus now, rather than earlier in the year, as the plant species on campus finally started blooming and fruiting, making them so much easier to identify. It was high 60's, mostly sunny, mild weather perfect for making observations and taking pictures. Almost all of the species I identified were most likely affected by human interaction or planted specifically by the grounds-people who manage the flora on campus.
I was only able to get to genus on the inaturalist observations for certain species, which is unfortunate considering that getting to taxa is more valued on this website, but I was not able to identify these species further than that. By comparison to other trips I've taken (like the one in Schmitz Park) identifying species was much harder, and species I put up as and ID please were only identified by the experts to genus. It could be in part that Schmitz Park had a lot of easily identifiable native species, or that I took a lot more pictures that day than I did this trip through the UW.

First, my group went to the tree tour, which detailed different types of trees on campus. We went to each station and detailed each type of tree, which I wrote down in the notes section for each tree. Each tree we looked at had a different connection to the PNW and to the campus, even though most of them were not native to the area, the species were well adapted to the environment and are not invasive or harmful.
I then went on the mosses and lichens tour, and started with identifying mosses on the Burke Gilman, and then learning about the life-cycle of mosses near the UW farm. We then trekked up to the area near Pacar to identify lichen, which were all on one tree near the road heading towards Kane past the Burke museum.
On the way, I also identified the lupines near the fisheries building, and a Northern Flicker between the road near the Burke and Kane. I needed help identifying the bird, since the picture I took is not good enough to use in a field guide identification, and it didn't look like any type of bird we had seen previously on campus or on the field trips.

Union Bay Natural Area

low 60's
partially sunny
partial cloud cover
low wind

Today we learned about types of fungi and forbs available for observation on the UW campus. It is very hard to identify fungi, but we were on our tour able to see a wide variety of different classes and species of fungi in the union bay natural area to the east of campus. It was a mild spring day just after a medium rain shower the day before, so the mushrooms and fungi were in close to ideal conditions for observation, and many juvenile and adult specimens were growing (see the pleated inkcap for an example). I'm not sure if I got the spellings right for these species, so I have added them to ID please so someone could correct my spelling if it is incorrect.
Forbs came directly after, and we learned about different flowering plants in the Union Bay Natural Area, including Morning Glory, tall buttercups, common dandelions and skunk cabbage, which I didn't know was a flowering plant until I found out where the flowers actually are on the structure. The tour also went over the pollinators each plant tries to attract and how they are pollinated. The plants the tour went over are almost all flowering angiosperms that rely on pollinating in at least some capacity for reproduction and breeding, in comparison to all of the tours so far this was much more prominent in each station of the tour. There were also a lot more examples in the Union Bay Natural Area than in other parts of campus, so it is most likely the best place, at least in this season, to observe a multitude of native or adapted fungi and forbs on campus.

Union Bay Natural Area

Mids 60's
very little cloud cover
sunny/partially cloudy
Mid afternoon
no precipitation

The tour started with birds, and we were able to see both examples of nests and many species that make their home in the Union Bay Natural Area and the water surrounding it. We saw two types of swallow hunting together, mallards and their ducklings, american robins, hummingbirds, Canadian geese, crows and Red Wing Blackbirds, as well as a bald Eagle late in the tour. I heard song sparrows as well as seagulls and many other unidentified species as well. Most of the species on land near the campus were smaller species, but some larger species were seen farther out, too far to photograph but could be seen and identified by the group through binoculars.
The waterfowl tour went over some specific species that you could observe in the Union Bay Natural Area but were not present at the time. The ones that were present were different types of ducks and ducklings in the ponds surrounding by trees, and waterfowl far out on the bay that were barely visible. This tour was the most visually appealing, as it went over different behaviors and the specimens moved and showed different actions. This also made it harder to observe and identify the specimens, as they would not stay still and let you pick them up like plants do or let you take samples as trees and plants do.