Vegetation

Luscious Living

Aquatic Plants:

This week we studied the vegetation and invasive plants that inhabit Stu Visser trails. There are a variety of plants that make up this small park because its wide variety of habitats. The ponds and small river make it an excellent place for lilly pads and algae to flourish. The pond is often left unstirred because it's protected from the wind by trees allowing pollen and such to collect, making it an excellent habitat for things such as planktonic and crystalplex algae. The bacteria on the bottom also must be flourishing because of the vast amounts of decaying material resting on the bottom.

Invasive species:

Upon our adventure we did find one type of invasive plant. 

The Garlic Mustard seed was the culprit. They grow to be about 3-4 feet in height and have a notorious reputation for spreading faster than the chicken pox. In a study done in a quality woodlot in ohio the mustard seed expanded 120 feet from it's previous position. This isn't just one seed plant that expanded that far, this means the entire 120 square feet (give or take) were covered with them.

Why are they such a problem?

The plants over power other plants in the battle for resources and breathing room; they have the ability to drown out tree saplings even! When they begin to cover large areas of the forest they inhibit the ability for the forest to regenerate. The end result could be no forest at all, just a bunch of mustard seed.

Read more: http://www.ipm.msu.edu/garlicAbout.htm

What else we saw:

The Stu Visser Trails has a variety of different oak, pine, and maple trees. All of the tree species we observed seem to be native and not invasive. There was also an expanse of ferns that support the digestive system of an herbivore. There's a plexus of wild flowers that might be a tasty snack for a herbivore or passing humming bird as well. Maple Tree seeds were everywhere in the parking lot as well as on the paths. Their ability to travel is so amazingly designed, seeing as the closest maple tree, in some cases, were a good 50 feet away.

Ecosystem

Due to the recent tree cutting activity Winstrom Park has been closed, therefore we decided to go to Stu Visser trails. This park consists of a main trail through a pretty densely lavished forest, including a river and two small ponds.

The ecosystem of Stu Visser trails includes a variety of animals. Every thing from beetles and minnows to coyotes and large mouth bass have the possibility of inhabiting this park. The property of this park has the ability to support many different types of animals because it's wide variety of marshes, rivers, ponds, trees, and so on. We found sign of many animals including even a coyote (right). The swampy and lush environment supports much of the prey the Coyote feeds on. 

Not only does the park consist of land based creatures, it also supports an expanse of water based creatures. We found evidence of ducks inhabiting our park, which makes sense because the pond in the park would support a lot of the things a duck likes to eat. On the top of the pond we even noticed some duck weed, a ducks favorite snack. These ponds also have the ability to support everything minnows and frogs to large mouth bass. As well, this pond can support a wide variety of algae that would be a tasty snack to all sorts of animals.

For land based creatures there's plenty of things for herbivores, the start of a food chain, to feed off of. There's all sorts of plants, flowers, and berries for things such as deer, rabbits, and birds to eat. The plentiful trees also support things such as squirrels are birds (left). We even found evidence that the birds eggs are being eaten by predators. This could be a result of another more dominant bird or possibly a scavenger coming along and eating whatever.







Here's an example of what a small portion of a food web for Stu Visser trails could consist of:

Spring Fever

As result of the tree removal taking place the trails of Winstrom Park are closed, therefore we were not able to thoroughly search the woods for signs of spring. However, we were able to find some evidence that spring is among us on the soccer fields and near the parking lot.

The trees getting taken down are Scotch and Austrian Pines because their life span is up. This means these trees are dying, if not dead, and could fall over and cause problems if not taken care of. 

Read More Here

We were able to gather up a little evidence from the parking lot and field areas however!


When I think of spring I know the first thing that comes to my mind is blooming and reproduction. Now there are two types of reproduction: Asexual and Sexual reproduction


Sexual Reproduction (to the right):
- The most common form of reproduction among plants and animals (i.e. mating)


Asexual Reproduction (to the left):
- Reproduction used by bacteria, yeast, hydra, and some types of Jellyfish
- The organism splits into two or more individuals




Plants is the main focus of Spring however. The most common form of reproduction amongst plants is sexual. There a variety of ways one plant can pollinate another, whether it be shooting is pollen into the air, using other plants to pollinate it, or just simply touching each other. 

 

Human Pollution

Fortunately, this post is going to be a very short one. We found little to no evidence of pollution in our park! This is a wonderful accomplishment for Winstrom Park because I know that it has struggle with controlling the littering of its visitors.

Don't let this good news get to your head because it could possible be just because the number of visitors significantly drops during the winter months. To get a true handle on the amount of pollution, summertime is the best option. 

Reasons for Lower Levels of Pollution:

- Strict fines for littering

- Park Cleaners

- Colder weather

- Recent demolishing of trees

- Lots of Trash Cans

- We measured the amount of trash we found as we walked around the trails of the park. We hardly found any of this solid pollution anywhere, mainly in the river. This could be from places other than the park that is simply carrying it downstream. 

- Regardless, we measured out about 9 square inches of trash collected against this log. 

-Adding in the cigarette butts and other miscellaneous small items that were scattered about we considered that to be about another 9 inches (there were a lot of cigarette butts, probably because it's a frisbee golf course). 

- This gave us a total of 18 square inches of trash 

- Winstrom Park is about 200 acres in area

If I were to put an estimate on the amount of solid pollution (garbage) that is in the park at this point in time I would say it is about a square .09 square inches per acre

Energy

ENERGY:
Power derived from the utilization of physical or chemical resources


Forms of Energy in Nature:
- Wind
- Sun
- Photosynthesis
- Metabolism


Now that Spring is upon us, photosynthesis is going to become one of the greatest factors in creating energy. As things begin budding they begin using sunlight to create energy.              
                                                                  How It Works:

Photosynthesis is used by almost every plant to create energy to sustain life on its own. In order to execute this process, there are a variety things that need to happen. Within the plant there organelles called chloroplasts. The chemical chlorophyl gives the chloroplasts the green tint we commonly see in leaves and plants. As a result of this, the chloroplasts attract a certain amount of sun light which is used in the Krebs Cycle (a series of chemical reactions) along with water and oxygen to create ATP (adenosine triphosphate). This ATP  and carbon dioxide is then used in another chemical reaction known as the Calvin Cycle to create glucose (glucose is energy).

Diagram of Photosythesis
http://p3sts1011.blogspot.com/2011/03/314.html

Wind:

Another well known source of energy is the Wind. Commonly we see electric windmills used to collect and harness this energy for human use. Within our park we have open fields where this could be an option. If this happened we could supply neighboring houses with green renewable energy! This is one step towards a greener earth. 

Check out more on how these windmills work here: http://www.thegeneralelectric.com/how-windmills-generate-electricity.html

Metabolism:

Organisms also must have a way of converting their food into energy. Our metabolisms are the way us organisms convert our food into usable energy, in order to keep us functioning. At Winstrom I found plenty of ways animals can get their energy. Grass and pine cones are a delicious treat for scavengers. 

How It Works:

After food is eaten, molecules in the digestive system called enzymes break proteins down into amino acids, fats into fatty acids, and carbohydrates into simple sugars (glucose). In addition to sugar, both amino acids and fatty acids can be used as energy sources by the body when needed. These compounds are absorbed into the blood, which transports them to the cells.