Work is in full swing

The first few weeks of official training are over, and plot surveying has begun. Three others and I leave at seven each morning and get back at five in the evening. We begin our day by looking at a map of the plots we have to survey, and then program them into a GPS unit that will direct us to them. The plots are scattered at various sites in the Ozark forests. Each plot has four subplots, and each subplot has four quadrants. A quadrant is the square meter from which we survey plants and other data. Thus far together we have only been able to complete a maximum of four plots a day, which is about sixteen square meters of survey per person. We could definitely do more in one day, but this last week has been a series of severe thunderstorms and tornadoes that have cut our outside work by a few hours a day. While inside, we mounted herbarium specimens and studied new plants. To help us work faster, we are each given a field computer that we enter the data into from each quadrant. This includes the canopy coverage, the dead woody debris, the percent vegetation cover and the individual species of plants found.

I must say that repetitively identifying plants and writing out their Latin names is a surefire way of learning botany. Although it is quite exhausting, I am very pleased with this job and look forward to see how much this aids me with the Northeastern flora.