Chalchiuhtlicue: Charcoal (7/30)

Measurement site from last week.

Exposed Cypress tree roots in the burn scar

Over the weekend I managed to find myself a book store and an art supply. After bumming out, reading comics, and getting myself a new set of pens, I feel refreshed. I slept in and had a long chat with my mentor and with my youngest brother over the weekend, so I'm feeling pretty mellow.

So today, after hitting snooze once (or twice, or more) I crawled out of bed and started the week. I didn't know what the plan was, but the weather is a little cooler this week, so we had a day in the field.

Fire equipment for the small fire we had over the weekend

Last week I spent a bunch of time working on some elevation spreadsheets, and today we went out to an area that burned in 2008 to continue the work. Before the fire that took out that section of forest, a few wells were installed and surveyed for elevations. To determine how much peat soil was lost in that fire, we went out to take some new elevations.

Oh, the walk was so much easier than those well runs. We had more to lug around, but (for me at least,) it wasn't terrible. The peat, instead of being mucky, crunched underfoot instead of sucking my feet into the earth. The fire had burned away the nutrients in the soil, leaving the ground and tree matter crunchy and blackened. By the end of the day, it looked like I had rolled around the bottom of a charcoal grill.

Palamedes Swallowtail- Thanks, Mao!

At first I was nervous about falling- the charred wood that made up the slash trail looked soft and dangerous, and I was worried I would completely wipe out. I mean, I did a few times, but it was fine, because after I stumbled, all I had to do was stand back up.

I also only saw two blackberry bushes. I squashed them both.

We spent a little time at two different plots, surveying the elevation at two old wells. One had melted in the fire, and the other was in pretty good shape. Surveying was pretty straightforward, and in the open air, the sounds of frogs resounded as loudly as a symphonic concert.

On the way back, we loaded up an old datalogger and wandered back. The way back seemed to be a little weaker, and when I was clambering over a log and when I landed, my foot went straight through the peat and I landed, face first into a patch of fennel. My allergies drove me crazy all day after, but the walk was one of the better ones.