reginahfinn's Journal

Today, I walked down to and around the Reservoir in search of animals, specifically, insects. However, this proved to be a very hard task. While originally, I believed that this would be one of the easiest Nature Walks to complete, I found that in turn, I could not even fully complete it to the ability I wanted to. It was only at the end of my walk when I was exiting the Res. , that I was able to spot any insects at all. After 30 minutes of walking and seeing birds, geese, ducks, and squirrels, I spotted a moth on a railing by the football facility. I was rather puzzled that I hadn’t seen any insects till then! How did I only come across 1 insect when they are the most bountiful animal on Earth? The only reason I could think of is that this is how insects adapt to the cold. This is the coldest res walk/nature walk I have been on. With the seasons changing, these insects must all change their habits to fit the weather. I did some research, and insects migrate, burrow, and hide to avoid the dangerous effects of the charges in the climate. Thus, by having the insect walk closer to the end of the semester and closer to winter, it made it much harder to find them in the wild. Thus, while I was unable to find enough insects in the wild, I do believe that this walk helped illuminate the innate behavior these insects have to survive.

Today, I walked around the Reservoir before my classes. Today was probably the coldest it has been however, I was still able to just be in a sweatshirt. This week's activity, finding plants, was much easier to find than the fungi. It was also refreshing to have a sunny day again. This week, I found each of the types of plants relatively easily. In connection with this week's class material, I was able to observe the relative abundance of each of these plants in accordance with their evolutionary development. When walking around the reservoir, I saw tons of flowering plants and only had small instances where I saw moss. This aligns with our class discussion on which plants are most prominent in society in accordance with evolution. Furthermore, I also noticed the location of these plants related to our discussion on the challenges of being a land plant. The moss I found was only green on the side closest to the water, indicating its trouble in retaining the water.

I began my walk today around the Chestnut Hill Reservation in very misty weather. Although there was no sun and lots of dark clouds in the sky, it was not too cold and I enjoyed the chilled air in my rain jacket. Rather quickly I ran into trouble finding examples of fungi around the reservation. Instead, once I made my way around the reservoir, I ventured into the forested hiking path. There, I was able to find varying types of fungi on trees and on the ground. Their variety in color and shapes indicated a different evolutionary history. Due to their visual differences and lack of sexual reproduction in fungi, the only way to categorize them would be through phylogeny. I also thought about the lack of competition or protection that the yellow fungi must have. We talked about how birds of paradise use a high amount of their energy to produce their colors. Unlike the rest of the fungi I photographed on my walk that were brown or neutral colors, this fungi had a bright yellow color against the tree. Therefore, I would assume that the yellow fungi are either a very different species that aren’t competing for the same resources, or is poisonous so it is not eaten. Overall, even though at the start I was discouraged thinking I would not find any examples of fungi, I had a really good time seeing the variety in such a small location.

On this Wednesday, like most of my Wednesday mornings, I went on a morning walk around the chestnut hill reservoir. Since it was early in the morning, it was still cool with a breezy coming off the water. While a reservoir is manmade by nature, many of the plants and animals I found around it greatly represent the biodiversity around us. I wanted to find both animals and plants. More specifically, I wanted to look for plants that would be considered maybe weeds in a garden but, here in the wild, contribute to the beauty of biodiversity. First, while I couldn’t properly identify the wild plants I spotted around campus, they are a good example of convergent or divergent evolution. These plants seem to be from different species groups from my observation, however, their leaves look similar on different scales. Therefore, they either evolved divergently from a relatively close ancestor or had convergent evolution from different recent ancestors to look similar. I also loved seeing the American Asters around the reservoir, which look similar to one of my favorite flowers: a daisy. I took a picture of them as I would hypothesize that they could be a close relative to daisies. I also found it super cool to see so many animals in the reservoir. At home, I live near a really beautiful pond. Growing up, I always remember seeing geese, swans, turtles, and fish living together. However, a recent construction accident causes oil and other contaminants to get into a small part of the pond. This has left it very different than before, and I haven't seen any turtles or swans in a while. As we discussed in class, human interaction can cause many issues in our environment that animals and plants can not evolve to survive in. Therefore, seeing them in the Chestnut Hill Reservoir is a testament to the maintenance and protection the town provides. Finally, while walking around the Reservoir, it made me think about the cultural ecosystem service this space provides us and how lucky we are to have it.