The Forests of SERC
Hello,
Today before our learning sessions began, I took a walk with a couple of the other teachers and we discovered Muddy Creek. It was beautiful as you can see. A few hours later Dr. Jess Parker took us on a tour which included immature, intermediate, and "old growth" forest examples. At the end of the day, we took another walk to Hog Island. During our learning sessions we discovered the purpose of the research project we will be working on. Tomorrow, we will add to the baseline (beginning) data for a study here at the North American Research Center (NARC) another name for the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (SERC). The study examines the diversity and spatial distribution of different tree species within specific areas of the research center. I will work with the 6 other teachers who are here to install long-term structures (study plots) and map the trees within the study plot. Mapping the trees involves measuring the diameter (actually circumference) at 1.3 meters from the ground. This measurement is used to calculate the volume of the tree and based on the density of the particular species to calculate the amount of biomass which the tree accounts for. In other words, we are trying to figure out how massive these trees are, more later about why this is important. We also make observations about the canopy of the tree relative to the trees neighboring it. After all of this "learning" we went outside to practice on 16 trees designed for this purpose. ( Click here to see Stacey Leichman Cahn's blog video of the practice activities). After practicing we compared our results and discussed possible error that could affect the data. Can you think of at least one possible error I might make which could adversely affect the accuracy of the data I am collecting?
It is 5:00 now, and I have another learning session about Cultural Perceptions of Climate Change in about 30 minutes.
The pictures included in this post are of Muddy Creek, Dr. Jess Parker, and from my walk this afternoon and the measure
ment practice time.
posted by Kate Shannon @ 3:45 PM
12 Comments:
you could probably mess up from tree to tree by not accuratly measuring.
i love you mrs shanaynay we have an awesome sub and mr.basara is really funny. thanks
hey we all miss u and hope you stay safe
you could measure mostly big ones or mostly small ones so it wouldn't be accurate
you could get one huge tree or one small tree that would act as an outlier.
Amelia SM
Hello Mrs. Shannon,
I am here with your students and we are talking about plants and climate change. I hope you are having a great week. Thanks for putting this blog together. It is very informative and the pictures are great.
Janis Slater
Sounds like fun! LOLZ
This is my second blog. Carbon dioxide in the air is what makes a seed turn into a tree log. thats what I learned today.
I am glad that you enjoyed Dr. Basara. Our study measures all trees that are 1 cm around or larger and we do find all sizes of trees and shrubs to measure. Today we measured a tree with a DBH (diameter at breast height) of 96 centimeters.
One of the variable might be how loose or tight the thing your measuring with is around the tree.
Emily M. - SM
Yeah Dr. Basara was really cool! I hope you are having a great time!
Wow Ms. Shannon those are some good pictures looks like you are having some fun and also looks like some hard work.
Connor Martin
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