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Blog 6: Data Collection
I collected samples in Muir Creek, an old growth coastal rainforest west of Victoria. The terrain is very rough but there is a path through the site. I used the path as a transect line and sampled in four 30x30m quadrants space 100m apart along the line using a GPS. In each quadrant I located all stumps and logs hosting vascular growth and compared to the growth on the ground nearby. I quickly realized that just counting plants around stumps was not a fair comparison density wise. I measured the diameter of each stump and log, looked for the densest group of plants on the ground and superimposed the surface area of the stump on that spot. That way I could determine if plant growth on the ground was more or less dense than on the stump. I found a total of 21 samples. Only problems were minor. Every visit it was raining quite heavily in the rainforest, which made note taking difficult. I brought a camera to supplement the notes. I discovered previously that this very helpful as long as the picture file numbers are carefully recorded in the notes with each object. Otherwise I would have a couple hundred pictures of stumps that all look the same which would be completely useless.
