Post One: Observations

The study area chosen for this field study is in the Lower Mainland, in an area where many small creeks transect the topography. This particular creek meanders in an approximately north to south direction with residential homes backing onto it from both eastern and western banks. From the relatively flat areas of the back yards, there is a slope of about forty five degrees for approximately twenty five to forty feet ending at the edge of the creek. Spanning one back yard is a distance of approximately seventy five feet.

At the time the homes were built, in 1983, the engineering of the housing development was required to include a large scale drainage plan. The solution was to run an approximately three foot in diameter metal pipe from the east to the west across the creek (see area indicated on Google overhead map). To accomplish this task, the entire western bank of the creek was cleared of all trees and vegetation. The heavy equipment that was brought in to install the pipe left very few remnants of plant life. Since that time, the re-growth of the plants and trees in the creek bank of my own back yard is exciting and provides opportunities for study.

Overhead Google map of the area – unable to load to the blog.

Over the years, staff from the Federal Department of Fisheries have visited the creek to promote it as a salmon spawning creek where human traffic is discouraged. The Municipality of Surrey staff have come by to inform the residents of plans to build a public trail through the creek. As of this date, the trail has not been built.
During years of family life, participating in “Christmas tree chipping” events where evergreen seedlings were given to be planted along municipal “green belt” areas, has resulted in human interference with the natural process of vegetative succession. The status of the area at this time is that there are three types of vegetation within this riparian slope. One is where no seedlings were planted and has a well-established growth of cottonwood trees with other minor varieties of plant life underneath. The second is where the evergreen trees were planted and have thrived, creating a different undergrowth type. The third is at the area where the pipe crosses the creek; this area, due to the former clearing of trees receives more direct sunlight and consists mostly of smaller, lower growing shrubs.
Interesting questions for a potential project are:
1. The impacts of the amount of sunlight on the undergrowth for each of the three area types: evergreen trees, deciduous trees or no trees.
2. A comparison of this area of the creek bank to that of another area up stream that was not cleared when the subdivision was created.
3. What invasive species have demonstrated in the years since the area became residential and how widespread are they becoming?