Matt Strong

FOR 480 Wed Journal

Week of February 25-29, 2008

The events of this journal took place during the week of February 25-29. Our main goal for this week was to collect as much information as possible during our cruise for the upcoming inventory report. We have been collecting inventory data for the past three weeks as outlined in our inventory proposal that we developed in the previous weeks. To get to this point we collected preliminary data in a cursory cruise and developed maps and an appropriate number of random plot locations in each stand. Our main focus in the field this week was timber cruising where we collected data regarding species, size, merchantable boardfeet, basal area, and stems per acre. We also collected data about the regeneration that exists on the property such as species and size.

Taylor records data taken at one of our inventory plots.

The biggest challenge of the week was similar to past weeks in that the weather was once again very poor. On Tuesday the 26^th it was cold and rainy and a miserable day to be outdoors. These conditions made it difficult to record data and keep our data sheets and maps from being ruined. On Thursday the property was covered in snow which made the assessment of regeneration difficult as well as forcing us to travel more slowly between plots.

Steep and slippery slopes made for slow travel.

The week wasn’t all bad, however. Though the weather was against us again, we were able to get a surprising number of plots done. We were able to go out into the field two days this week with all of our group members which was something that the weather or conflicting schedules had prevented us from achieving before. The snow was inconvenient at times, but it made for a scenic day in the field and seemed to boost morale somewhat. It also helped to make some wildlife signs more prominent. The landowners and neighbors had reported seeing bobcats on the property and we had discussed some suitable habitat for the species along some of the cliff lines and rock shelters. In the snow we were able to find a track.

Bobcat prints along a cliff line.

My feelings towards the project at this point are pretty poor. The last few weeks have been very stressful because we have been playing catch up due to missing days in the field because of weather conditions. We already had a heavy workload that has been compounded with the addition of wildlife and hydrological elements. I am feeling a little better this week because I think we finally made it over the hump as far as data collection. We still have lots of work to do with the deadline fast approaching, however. We had thought that as we collected more data, the total number of plots that we needed would decrease as our variance decreased when we ran the numbers. This has not been the case as each day we had a few outliers that were far from the mean. If we could have done it differently I wish that we would have calculated our variance at the stand level instead of using the tract as a whole. This might be something that we will try in the coming weeks.

Parting Shot: A rare butternut tree covered in snow.