It was a quiet and productive day the Lab save for a few interruptions from our fine arachnid colleagues, who are lately becoming rather bold. This afternoon Lea introduced me to ImageJ, a free and opensource image processing software developed by the NIH. To study how spacing effects reproductive success Lea took photographs of her stunt ranch plots 9 times between April 17 and June 16 2019. These photographs will be analyzed with ImageJ to identify flower species and location within each of the plot and eventually the processed data will be combined to create a large spatial data map. At least that’s the goal, right now we are more in a building expertise phase. Having made little headway this afternoon, I plan to continue tinkering with the software on my own and hopefully have a working analysis macro in a few weeks. Additionally, I continue to add entries to the biomass dataset which I hope will help provide a deeper insight into plants reproductive success.

This morning Priti and I learned how to use the computer to count scanned achenes. I found counting to be a much smoother process than cleaning and, in a couple of hours, had counted over 5,000 achenes. An average Echinacea head produces about 150 achenes. The number of achenes a head produces is a pretty good indicator of what is called “reproductive effort”, the energy expended in the pursuit of reproduction. Sadly, a harsh reality of life is that reproductive effort doesn’t always translate into reproductive success. A much better predictor of fitness is seed set or achene viability, however this is difficult to find without splitting open every single achene. However here at the Echinacea Project they have quite the clever work around, X-Rays! Each sample of achenes are randomized and those fruits that make it through are collected into sheets of 20 samples and doused with low, completely safe levels of white-hot X-radiation. The X-ray images are fed into a computer program which allows researchers (like me!) to see inside and classify them by the fullness of their embryo (Empty, Full, or Partial). This provides a stronger indicator for the fitness of the individual plant. The coming week I am excited to learn more about what affects Echinacea seed set or reproductive success.

Hello Floggers!

My name is David Zimmerman and I am a new Echinacea Project intern for Fall of 2019. I am a student at the College of DuPage, where I also work as a tutor concentrating on introductory Biology. Never having worked in a lab before, I am very excited to learn how plant and population biology research is conducted and for the opportunity to translate what I learn into a research project. I am very thankful for this opportunity and looking forward to working with you all in the future!

A little more about me:

My interest in prairie ecology was sparked relatively recently after a series of injuries sidelined me from my job as a musician. To help the healing process I began to take daily walks through the Schulenberg Prairie. As winter melted into spring I observed the landscape change with new growth pushing up through snow and debris. Curious, I bought a field guide to identify all the new plant life that now accompanied me on my walks. The more species I identified the more that appeared and as the prairie reached it full height in late summer I marveled at how such a rich ecosystem could seemingly appear from nowhere and how little I really knew about the world around me. This realization has propelled me in my study of Biology and Ecology and I am thrilled to continue my educational journey this fall at the Echinacea Project.

After a full morning and afternoon of demography at the Aanenson remnant, followed by some measuring in P1, Team Echinacea ended the working day with an evening of relaxation and fun! We started off with some team shirt tie-dying, led by resident experts Erin and Amy.

After bagging our newly dyed shirts, we started up preparations for our evening bonfire. Over the course of the past year, the goats have been eating away at the throngs of buckthorn that have been encroaching on our prairie plots. Once the goats have had their fill, all of the dead branches and trunks were gathered together to make this summer’s bonfire pile. With the fire started, the team started shucking corn, cutting sweet potato, and cutting branches for hot dog roasting.

After following our fireside appetizers with Jean’s amazing pasta made with fresh basil pesto, we finished off the night with stargazing and s’mores over the last of the embers. Overall, a great ending to a productive day in the field.