User: | Open Learning Faculty Member:
The site I chose is about one acre of land and is where a river flows out of a lake. The area is mostly water but has a fair bit of plants and trees on the edges of the river. I visited this location on February 17th at around 1:30pm. At the time it was -21 degrees C (wind chill of -28 degrees C) with overcast clouds and 15 km/hr north west winds. There was about a foot to a foot-and-a-half of snow on the ground. The area is located in northern Alberta (Slave Lake) so it is almost completely flat. The vegetation mostly consists of cattails closest to the rivers edge and spruce trees, shrubs and grasses off shore. Three questions that are interesting or striking to me are as follows.
- I noticed that most of the vegetation there is dormant during the winter. For example tall yellow grass sticking out of the snow. A possible research question could be related to how vegetation can survive in such cold weather and deep snow. Or the types of adaptations they have that allow them to survive in this environment.
- I noticed a fair bit of deer tracks in the area which made me wonder how much vegetation was available for animals during these months since almost everything was covered in a deep layer of snow.
- Finally I noticed a lot of cattails on the rivers edge as well as low spots in the area such as ditches. Cattail require moisture in the soil to maintain themselves while dormant (which explains why I found them in lower areas of the landscape) but is this affected by extreme weather conditions (for example the week prior to these observations the temperatures reached -45 degrees C)? How are they affected when the river is frozen? Can they retain moisture the same in cold temperatures? Can the cold weather preserve seeds better?
