The area of study I have decided upon is located in Monck Provincial Park located 20km from Merritt, BC. Upon first observations I was a little underwhelmed with the amount of questions I had about the ecosystem. Monck Park is home to a dominant coniferous forest with a few deciduous trees such as (Acer glabrum var. douglasii) the douglas maple or rocky mountain maple. The ecosystem consists predominantly of Ponderosa Pine and Bunchgrass a volcanic rock cliffside and even on the best of days in the summer it is very dry. While I was unable to observe any actively growing or interacting organic variables within the ecosystem I was able to identify a few inorganic factors that may contribute to the distribution of organisms throughout Monck Provincial Park.
The area of Monck Park I have chosen to study has a perimeter of 1km with a paved road splitting it down the middle.
This road will not only act as a type of gradient but also as a control for my further observations. This area is riddled trail systems and eroded stipes of mountain side that I can only assume are tributaries in the spring when the melt runoff is guided into Nicola Lake. This assumption has led me to believe that Monck Provincial Park is also a drainage basin. Many interconnecting tributaries all lead down the mountainside and I will discover on my next field observation whether they lead into Nicola Lake. Due to the lacking abundance of animals life at this time of year my study has driven me to monitor plant life, more specifically the plant life along the dried tributaries vs. the coniferous forest lining the tributaries.
My Three Questions:
- How do the tributaries influence species diversity during two different seasons, ie. winter and spring?
- What are the factors that contribute to the growth and success of the less common Douglas Maple in Monck Provincial Park.? Does abundance increase with increasing proximity to a consistent water source?
- How the species richness of ground cover plants influenced by the proximity of tributaries?
Sounds like a good study site. I’m wondering why you are narrowing in on a 1 km area, depending on your question and sampling you may want to consider these restrictions. Is it because there are no other trails in this area other than the road? I’m guessing for question 1, you mean animal species diversity? You may want to narrow down to birds, or mammals, or insects. All of your questions have potential though and for blog 3 you will narrow in on one and develop your hypothesis and start to think of sampling design.
I had narrowed in on this specific 1km area specifically for my first field observation in order to learn more about the landscape and organisms around there. Within this 1km area included a few tributaries with legitimate trails alongside them as well as a couple different unique areas of study on either side of the main road. Since then I have gone back and with the help of the website links you sent me I was able to see the length of the tributary runs nearly 4km into the mountain with roughly 700m elevation gain. I’ve narrowed in on a few specific tributaries that I will try and study from one end to the other for the purpose of this field study comparing the abundance of douglas maple trees with the flow and quantity of water ect.