Field Practical

Fungi are interesting--and so hard to find!!! It's crazy to think about the difference in size between the tiny fungi that help decompose the litter and the immense mahogany trees that tower above it. It was a fairly easy project, although right about now I'm dealing with the statistics (not so fun as hunting for flowering fungi?). The mahogany trees were the most difficult to do plots for, since there were large changes in slope from one half of the tree to another.

I think I took great pictures though, which helped us sort them without not cutting them, which is great since I'm sure they have an important role in nutrient cycling. After the first two plots Lauren and I also became better at spotting the little suckers, and it was pretty easy after that. The hardest part it seems is comparing all the data; between trees and between locations, which is another question that has arisen from our data collection.

It's cool to see how observation and data collection can bring about other questions, both refining a current question, discarding that one altogether, or coming up with an additional question that has arisen in relation to the data collected. it's a tedious process in my opinion, but I mean, I feel science is heavily a trial-and-error arena, with alot of sleepless nights, field mishaps, etc.