Lab #3 Plant Identification

Last Wednesday on a very hot day in Macon, GA also known as Maconga, our lab group set forth to discover the plants, trees and shrubberies that inherit our dear campus at Mercer University.
quick side note:

The fact that we were looking at shrubberies took me back to Monty Python and the Holy Grail soo......Ni!!!

I just couldn't help myself. So without further ado here is an incomplete list of the entire walk, but one that is sufficient for this lab report, which requires 5 trees that cannot be cut down with a herring, 5 shrubberies from Roger the shrubber, and 5 plants that currently do not have a potential Monty Python reference. 

Trees

1. Ginkgo Biloba

Besides having a super awesome name, this handy dandy tree is dioecious which means that there are male trees and female trees. They cannot reproduce on their own. This tree is also the national tree of China.

2. Water Oak -Quercus Nigra

This is the type of oak tree that was in my backyard growing up. I always think of this type of oak tree when I hear "Oak".

3. Crepe Myrtle - Lagerstroemia

This beautiful tree is all over the South. I think that it's beautiful and almost a crime to cut them down to stumps. They're too pretty for that.

4. Magnolia Grandiflora or Magnolia Trees

These are great climbing trees...great ones to fall out of too. They are beautiful especially when they bloom with there large white flowers. It's just a beautiful scene that is associated with the South and it's elegance.

5. Dogwoods- Cornus Florida

This tree also known as the flowering dogwood is one of my favorite trees of all time! It's so pretty when it blooms, especially if there is more than one color of blossoms around. 

Plants

1. Aloe

From wikipedia I learned that Aloe is actually a genus which has over 400 species, the super cool plant we have here is actually Aloe Vera or true aloe. It has medicinal qualities and is awesome on a sunburn.

2. Phlox 

This pretty flower grows around Tarver Library, and there are 67 species of it. I think the kind we have here is the moss phlox.

3.Hostas

This is the Hosta plant, it loves sunlight which is probably why it is not thriving next to the administration building. There may be as many as 45 species of hosta plants, and on a side note these are my mom's favorite.

4. Mexican Petunia

The Mexican Petunia, or Ruellia angustifolia is also known as Britton's Wild Petunia and the Mexican Bluebell. It is a native to Mexico, is drought resistant, and has a long bloom period. 

5. Monkey Grass

This common hedging grass is also known as mondo grass, fountain plant, and Ophiopogon japonicus. In Chinese medicine the tuber can be used for hacking coughs, dry tongue and mouth, and constipation.

Shrubs (That were not designed, arranged, or sold by Roger the shrubber)

1. Holly Ilex

This pokey holiday oriented bush, is formally called Holly Ilex, and the berries are actually called drupes.

2. Azaleas

These beautiful plants are a big deal in the South and have two sub-genera of Rhododendron, Pentanthera and Tsutsuji. At Callaway Gardens, every year they have an Azalea bowl when their azaleas bloom. It is gorgeous.

3. Oakleaf Hydrangeas

 The Oakleaf Hydrangea is one of two species of hydrangea that are native to the Southeast, the other being the silver leaf hydrangea. It's proper name is hydrangea quercifolia.

4. Rusty Blackhaw

This is the Rusty Blackhaw or Viburnum rufidulum. It's fall color is a burgundy red, and it has good drought and cold tolerance. 

5. Southern Highbush Blueberry

 This delicious shrub is known in the scientific realm as Vaccinium corymbosum. I know it as a blueberry bush.  The berries ripen during the summer months and they delicious!

Hooray for nature walks!

Little Timmy The Sunflower

My little sunflower is growing slowly but surely. His little leaves are about to totally go over the lip of the cup, and there are tiny little sprouts in the dirt which are adorable. Once my camera is located there will be photos. :)

Lab #2 - Playing in the Ocmulgee

So a couple of weeks ago we had our lab that was in the Ocmulgee River. While others did things like count clams, measure flow rates, and measure elevation across a transect, I picked up trashed and discovered that baby catfish will live inside cans. I didn't actually discover it was baby catfish, since I dropped/ threw the can back in the water screaming "Oh my gosh there is something alive in there!" So here is what those other cool kids did.

Map of Clam Concentrations...I don't think you should eat these...

They found that when the water had a good steady that wasn't too fast that the clams did well. They also did well near the sand banks, but on the sand banks and in deep fast current not so much.


And here is a handy dandy graph from the river transect team, showing the elevation of the Ocmulgee River relative to how far they were from the starting point on the bank.

This lab was a lot of fun, and we found some interesting things in the river, lots of cans, a McDonald's toy and some people even found luggage. Though we did not ride down the river on a log, or see the Ocmulgee River Monster, cousin to the Loch Ness Monster, it was a very interesting and fun lab.

Lab #1 Cartography- Part Three- Google Earth

This is my happy place in Macon, its Washington Park across the street from one of my other happy places, which is JCup. Washington Park is a cool little park with a waterfall and trees. It is just beautiful.  Joshua Cup is also a super awesome place to hang out and they have amazing coffee. J-Cup beats Jit-Joes everyday of the week.

Lab #1 Cartography- Part Two- Handout

Here is my attempt at an isarithmic map. In hindsight I probably should have used different colors, but I was attempting to go for a gradation of color. I hope that the outlining of the sections help.

Lab #1 Cartography- Part One- Maps

Part One : Types of Maps

In lab on Wednesday we learned about different types of maps, in particular the isarithmic map, choropleth map, proportional symbol map, and dot density map.

• Isarithmic maps or contour maps use the lines of the contours, to identify the difference between them. They do not respect boundaries placed on regions such as state or county lines since whatever the contours are mapping don;t. A common example of one is a weather map, showing temperatures. 

• Choropleth maps unlike isarithmic maps do stay within boundaries such a state and county lines since they are measuring something within those pre-defined regions. The regions are differetiated by color or shading. A common example for this is an election map displaying what regions went to what candidate or party.  

• Dot Density maps use dot to represent an amount of whatever is being counted. A high concentration of dots indicate a high concentration of what is being measured. A population density map is an example many are familiar with. The darker, or in this case lighter, the color the more people that are living in that area. 

quite possibly my favorite tree

Cornus Florida or the Flowering Dogwood is probably one of my favorite trees in the world. As I was attempting to find a picture of it, I discovered that there are in fact several types of dogwood trees, and the flowering type is found mostly in the Eastern United States. This has peaked my interest in this type of tree, simply because this is something I didn't know that I didn't know to borrow an anecdote from class this past Thursday.