Red Team - April 7-14

For those of you who finished up early, a quick little update on field work in the beginning of April. Most of the cactus seemed to bloom on the week off around Gila Bend, but there were more annuals up than the week before. While Sarah and I had been wary of the impending heat, we lucked out with rain and quite a cold snap. We were not so lucky however when it came to tires - 3 flats. Hawk and the rest of the gang at the tire shop say, "Hello!"

It's a dissertation!

As Aaryn proudly presented his baby Kent in the previous post, I am finally presenting my baby dissertation "FOREST DIVERSITY AND CONSERVATION IN THE WESTERN AMAZON BASED ON TREE INVENTORY AND REMOTE SENSING DATA" here. It's the longest paper I've ever written (355 pages). The complete draft of this dissertation can be downloaded from here. I'm defending in three weeks and will upload the final version of this baby to share.

Ophelia

a sensei-tional week

This week, a couple of undocumented workers joined us out in the field.


The first thing we did was put them to work, clipping our extensive fields of biomass.

They also carried their own instruments.

We discovered a new bio-control agent for Sahara mustard.

The undocumented workers christened Susan as the legendary Poncho Villa.


After hours, we got all cleaned up and ready to hit the hoppin' mecca of Quartzsite.


Thanks, Steve and Jill, for a rockin' good time! And next time you see Jill, be sure to ask her about her close encounter at Quartzsite's Reader's Oasis bookstore.

New sneak-peek movie trailer!

A Landscape of Juxtoposition

Sunrise in the low, flat valleys. Tapes pulled taut across our transects. The comfort of the morning before it really heats up. The sharp, clear light casting on western hills, defining and projecting the sharp ridges and ripples of the old mountains. Cool winds, the relict of the night, in their last fleeting tickles across our skin, gracefully halt as the sun creeps above the mountains and the day really begins.

This job has been a crisp lesson on the contrast of image and reality in the desert. It's not all vast, pristine scenes. It's not all drama, granduer, and wilderness. Because our hand has swept across this land, it's far less than that.

This past week, we camped near feedlots teeming with ruined water and beaten soil; under powerlines whose robot-like towers gave buzzards room to roost; beside a 'lake' nestled in a middle-of-nowhere wasteland where ATV's probably outnumber coyotes; withi sight of a massive microwave relay station; we've driven down arrow straight natural gas pipelines; we've marched across range where the only thing the cattle seem to eat is bufflegrass; we logged almost 900 miles of driving; and we almost always were lulled to sleep by the distant roar of commerce on the highways and rails. Commercial flights; private prop-planes; constant military air traffic; flyovers less than 500 feet above us; missles hanging phallically, poised for release to inseminate the world with more war. Endless noise. Never silence. Deep rumbles, high-pitch whines; all degrees of motor, wheel, road, and steel. Everyone is racing towards nothing. What is this?

Here, in the place called Sonoran, where the motorhomes outnumber actual houses; where ATV's outnumber any other form of recreation; we travel on roads built exclusively in the name of the desecration of the earth. Old miners roads, pipelines, gravel hauling routes, along railways, between point A and point B that only came into being because of some vein in the mountain bled so that we might get a little richer.

When the morning comes, and the sky begins to glow, and the birds begin their singing, and we stir in our clammy sacks woven from the blood of the Earths ancient mudswamps; we might find that singular moment of unity between air, sky, soil, earth, our brother and sister creatures, and our selves. We can, if we remember to, before we start racing around like everyone else, point A to point B, eyes stuck to the little poor helpless plants that we mercilessly and voraciously tug and snip and rip from the soil. "Thank you, I'm sorry; thank you, I'm sorry; thank you, I'm sorry...."thousands of times, over and over, until I forget what I'm sorry for, and the bags pile up, and we drive somewhere else. The mountain sits there, unchanged, immovable, silent, wondering when someone will STOP...and listen, for a moment, and find within the humming, droning, rumbling, tired old sounds of deisel and gas coughing us along our dimly lit paths, and there, between the wheezing breaths of societies freneticism; a moth on the chicory flower, or a sad dove heralding the new day, or the clickity-clickity-clicking of thousands of stiff spiney wolfberry branches dancing in the wild summit wind of an ancient volcano.

Inhale; exhale; joining our breath with the Earths; accepting that what we exhale from this stuff of ours, we promptly inhale deeply into our lungs to be part of us. We are now what we have just been. And then we drive some more, desert passing by, the plants just there, waiting to be draped by another tape, another day.

It's a boy!

Ok, so we knew that already, but it seemed like an appropriate title.

Our newest desert rat is Kent Frederick Olsson, born March 8, 2011 at 7:57 a.m. weighing in at 8 lbs, 4 oz and measuring 51cm in length. We will not be joining you in the field this week but will be there in spirit. Enjoy the desert!

Red Team - Snow and Motor Cross

After our braggart post last week, we thought that we should remind you all that despite all the lovely amenities afforded us at the posh Sells Recreation Center, it is dry...as in no beer before dinner while watching the sun set after a long hard day of work. Last week, we would have traded the showers for beer.

As for the actual field work last trip, we were joined over the weekend by Sasha, clipper extraordinaire.

The three of us got to work in a less disturbed area which was a treat for us all, but the dust storm made the plots a little harrowing. Its only a few miles to the mountains in the 2nd photo. You could fly a kite, but you couldn't see it (the weather according to a gas station man).

The snow on the mountains the next day however was worth the scratched cornea Julie got. Saturday we also found our first Desert Tortoises--yes, plural, but also dead. Still it was interesting to see the carapaces and wonder what got them in the end.







Things remained interesting along the border. We worked in Cabeza Prieta Refuge one day and were promptly checked out by a helicopter hovering 100 ft from us and 20 ft off the ground. Guess the black garbage bag Sarah was carrying didn't look full enough to be problematic. While there Sarah was able to realize the her dream of a shorts plot.


The highlight however was on Thursday morning when a team of 5-7 BP on dirt bikes came zooming into our plot (sorry no pics) followed 2 minutes later by a lone dirt bike that died 50 ft East of our subplot and then 50 ft North of our subplot. Alvarez told us they were tracking a group of 12 UDAs through the area, and he knew about buffle grass!

We are featured in Inside NAU, a publication of the Office of Public Affairs

Find a story about this project here!

Cave research in the Atacama Desert in Chile

Jut Wynne, Ph.D. candidate of LLECB, has been conducting cave conservation and management research in the Atacama Desert in northern Chile.

Check out the gorgeous landscape and Tucúquere (Bubo magellanicus) from a small cave in Canyon Cartarpe on their first day:

Home on the range...

...where the deer and the antelope run for their lives! Life on BMGR and YPG: constant thunder, but not from the clouds. A variety of aircraft: F-16's loaded with very large bombs, F-15's screaming through the night sky and accomplishing dizzying aerial manuevers, A-10 Warthogs slowly tumbling through space loaded with unknown artillery, overflights by Blackhawk helicopters, fiery displays of flares launched to and fro above us, and many planes we hear but cannot see. In the distance, smoke rising from constantly bombarded hills, steady rumblings from the Army's long-distance weapons testing, and odd low-pitch humms from the electro-scramblers used in flight training. All this should make us feel safe, right? Hmmm...and we didn't even take pictures of the real crazy stuff we saw. It must be seen to be believed.

Heyya folks,

Walt and I just got outta our week at YPG and Kofa NWR. We had a good trip, got nine plots done, spent a day with Luke, and saw some awesome country. The roads are mostly terrible, but that seems to be an aspect of this job that is hard to avoid. The botanizing was fun at times; better than south of I-8 on the BMGR which was just alota creosote and plantago. I'd like to share some thoughts regarding fire, invasives, and their ecology in the Sonoran desert. These notes are merely my personal observations and interpretation, and I'd appreciate peoples feedback and critique. This aspect of this project can be useful to all of us as naturalists in this ecosystem, and a valuable qualitative context for the lab crew who will see lotsa numbers but have too few days in the field observing the pretty neat patterns and processes out there in the 'real world'. Thanks, please add comments and/or new posts to build on these thoughts.

Soil types (which are directly related to geologic parent material and landscape position) have a pretty strong effect on fine fuels variables (species presence, abundance, condition, plant height, density, etc).

Valley-fill alluvium composed of decomposed granite and sand thus far has the most dense, continuous cover of low annuals (mostly Plantago ovata). These are the soils encountered in much of BMGR. Valley-fill alluvium of decomposed rhyolite, andesite, and other granitic volcanics seems to support a less continuous cover of annuals, but a more diverse assemblage. Desert pavement, generally composed of basalts, tuffs, and other volcanics are harsh environments and have the lowest cover, richness, fuel continuity, etc. Within the desert pavement, isolated patches of disturbed soils (directly linked to rodent, rabbit, and canid borrowing) offer refugia for annual plants, and are often colonized by native annuals and Schizmus barbatus. Also, within the desert pavement, linear erosional features offer similar conditions. Hillside soils, composed of volcanic rocks, bedrock, and gravel offer little space for plant colonization and thus far seem to be composed mostly of native annuals, especially our unknown ‘AST001’ which this week I confirmed as Calycoseris wrightii, as well as Eriogonum trichopes, which is abundant and widespread in desert pavement, seldom encountered in alluvium of volcanic origin, and almost nonexistent in decomposed granite alluvium.

Ocular estimation of fine fuel importance, based on general patterns observed (data will probably match this pretty well); from top to bottom the most important species in contribution to fine fuels:

1) Plantago ovata

2) Amsinckia intermedia

3) Eriogonum trichopes

4) Cryptantha & Pectocarya spp.

5) Lepidium lasiocarpum & Lepidium spp.

6) Schizmus barbatus

7) Native Brassicaceae spp.

8) Buffelgrass (mostly observed in roadside ditches and scattered in washes)

9) Brassica tournefortii

10) all others

*the contribution of native shrubs to fire activity cannot be overlooked, especially Ambrosia spp in the creosote valleys (drought-deciduous plants are very dry right now), and a wide range of shrubs in the upper Sonoran where the vegetation appears to be generally denser. Also, throughout the desert pavement areas, shrubs offer soil enrichment & microclimatic conditions that allow fine fuels to establish beneath them. I think the data will show this to a degree.

We have observed past fire evidence almost everywhere we have been. I am a keen observer of fires effects on forest and woodland structure and have applied my understanding of these systems to the Sonoran communities we’ve been in. The more obvious evidence we have seen includes recently killed shrubs (sometimes just charred micro-stumps persist, and sometimes, especially with creosote, the leafless skeleton persists), charred and fallen trees (mostly palo-verde & ironwood, which appear to have virtually no tolerance of fire), fire-scarred saguaro, and in the McDowell Mtn area, absolute devastation of most cacti, especially chainfruit cholla, buckhorn cholla, and Christmas cholla. The more subtle evidence consists of stand structural characteristics like saguaro age-class distribution, ocotillo that appear to be stump sprouts (does this species sprout following fire??), shrub re-sprouting (brittlebush, jojoba, and Celtis pallida respond favorably to fire, showing rapid re-growth and generally larger height attainment), and annual forb canopy continuity (only at McDowell Mtn Park did we see an obvious dominance of Schizmus in burnt areas). Fires appear to have been most prevalent in the valleys, and less common on the mountainsides. The alluvial valley-fill soils generally support more fine fuels than the mountainsides, so it may be that fires rage through the flats and only just barely creep up the slopes. However, we have had very few plots in the higher mountainside areas so it’s possible that we have just not yet seen any burnt slopes. Fire definitely simplifies these ecosystems through promotion of fire-tolerant shrubs, a reduction in cacti, increasing fine fuel continuity, and unseen effects on the wider suite of native forbs and grasses that I have not yet observed because of the dry conditions this year. The burnt Sonoran ecosystem loses its beauty to a noticeable degree, and at times looks haggard. It would be an interesting effort to overlay fire occurrence layers with our data, although accurate records probably do not exist, and our plots are too far spaced to really say anything too specific in regards to community response to fire.

Thanks folks-

Joe

Week 4 - Gila Bend to the Tonto

We spent last week in Gila Bend, home of the best Mexican food we've found in AZ. Heather graciously volunteered to help us out for the weekend. Little did we (or Heather) know that she brings the rain....we had a few breaks in the weather, but it didn't really stop for Heather's entire visit. And yes, she was still smiling! Thank you for all the help Heather!

After the floods, we took off to the Tonto to help out Karen and Daniel who had to abandon ship, and leave their vehicle on a clay road that became extremly dangerous during the storm. Their story is definitely worth hearing over a beer. I think it is enough to say that the Forest Service rescue team who arrived at 11 pm to save them were named Thor and Thorina. Seriously. Thorina. Still makes me smile.

From Tonto to Yuma Proving Ground

Took a quick trip to the desert. Thought I'd share a few photos. (Susan and Natalie, I'd like to apologize for not getting any photos of our day in the field, I think I'd left my camera in the car that day.....)

Met up with Karen, Daniel, Nat, and Tasya in Tonto

Gnarly roads in YPG

We found this lizard hiding under a rock in the road, my lizard-squeezer friend says it's a Western Banded Gecko, Coleonyx variegatus.

Beavertail Cactus

Met up with Joe and Walt

Red Team - Week 3 Tohono O'odham

The red team had quite the eventful week on the Tohono O'odham Nation. After a lovely morning in Ike's Coffee Shop and a lunch at In-N-Out, we made our way to the nation. We were fortunate enough to stay the entire week at the Sells Rec Center where the staff was friendly and the showers were hot. Even got to watch a movie on the Smart Screen! Saturday morning we had the pleasure of being locked into the rec center parking lot; the second time in my life I've been accidentally locked into somewhere. Tues morning we encountered our subplot from hell--velvet mesquite just taller than either of us (top row, 2nd from left). We're still picking thorns out of our skin. Thursday morning our slowly leaking tire finally gave up leading to a tire change on a Silverado in under 40 min. Not too shabby given that we hadn't even eaten breakfast yet.

We did see one of our first wildflowers, saw numerous burros, flushed some UDA's, and got to watch every border patrol agent that drove past our truck stop and look. It took all my will-power not to click the alarm to watch them freak out.

Thanks to Karen, the Sells Rec Staff, and all the residents that made us feel so welcomed!

from next to Nothing to beyond Hope

in the beginning, we were next to Nothing...

we found the Land of a Thousand Chollas...... and they found us.

we left our mark on the tomato during Shower Day
(good showers here in Wikiup, by the way!)

from here we encountered the Unforgettable Women of Wenden and the place where Salome danced (who's read Skinny Legs and All...?)
by the end of it all, we were beyond Hope.

Joke

How do you make a tissue dance? Put a little boogie in it!

Progress as of Feb. 22nd, 2011

WARNING: the embedded KML viewer does not appear to run very well in Firefox. It loads fast in Google Chrome if you want to try that.

These are all plots we've sampled so far. The green check-marks represent detections of our target invasives (invasives are present on at least one of the subplots), the red X's non-detections (target invasives are not present on any of the subplots), and the blue question-marks "unknowns". A plot get's an unknown classification if the data have not been submitted to me yet, or if the datasheets (where you are supposed to circle "yes" or "no" for the presence of any of the target invasives on the subplot) are incomplete. This is the case on datasheets for several of the plots. We should try to make sure this field gets an entry every time we sample a subplot. Plots for which you've submitted photos on our Picasa page have images associated with the features when you click on them on the map. It's a nice way to be able to relate what's visible in the imagery in Google Earth to what we know is on the ground.

First work period

I've been going through all of your photos to organize and file datasheets and subplot photos. I thought I should share some of my favorite non-plot photos. 

Rain in the forecast!

Phoenix, AZ

Tucson, AZ

Yuma, AZ

Hawk - Our Valentine's Hero

We would like to send out a special thanks to Hawk, who put Susan and Natalie back on the road. Thanks, Hawk! Hope you're having a great one!

Red Team - Week 1

while we are waiting for our gps files, we decided to update! besides being very cold, last week was really fun. we worked with aaryn, brett, and tom. five people can make a plot very fast! on wednesday night we had to snuggle in the car because it was so cold, and now sarah has a cold. it was a smug free week.