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Hello everyone! Today was a very nice day up here at Kensington! So nice in fact that several of us went to the lake up near Hoffman. We had a blast and even saw a shark, though it ended up being just a toy… On other news, Sara Z, the last team member that is living in Kensington, joined us today. She safely arrived from Chicagoland around 8 and got settled in. Hope Sara is excited for Stipa searches, because I am! -Kory Today was a relaxing day for team Echinacea. Dayvis and Marie headed out in the wee hours of the morning to Fargo where they did some exploring and checked out a Nordic Festival. Ilse and I headed over to Alexandria in the morning to do our first load of laundry of the summer and to visit the farmers market. Reina was also in Alexandria checking out more books at the library and doing some shopping of her own. The afternoon didn’t have too many highlights — the refrigerator got reorganized and Ilse and Sarah B went out for runs. Kory returned from the cities and I finished my book (Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese — I highly recommend it), and then we all cooked up various fixings for dinner. Our final team member (Sara Z) will be joining us tomorrow. A couple days ago we moved around various furniture to create a cozy living space in the loft. Check it out!
Today I went with Gretel to Staffanson to look for flowering plants. We walked along the east and west transects and found quite a few plants that should flower next week or the week after that! I still don’t know exactly where the transect lies in the large remnant that is Staffanson, but I’m sure I’ll learn! 🙂 Sarah B Although we are down two team members (Kory left today for the weekend, and Mike will be gone for the next week), the crew accomplished everything on the agenda today. In the morning, we assessed the flowering status of Echinacea in the ’99 South garden. Because plants are spaced at 33cm, it can be very easy to forget at which position you were last measuring. According to Gretel, however, it is not all about using the meter stick: having a good approximate distance in mind can really boost efficiency. After we finished in the ’99 South garden, we moved on to assess flowering in the ’96/’97 and ’99 gardens. For each plant, we noted the presence of aphids as well as whether or not the plant was expected to flower. Only 2 plants possessed conspicuous aphids.
In the afternoon, the conditions couldn’t have been better for a third day of Stipa searching! This particular activity seems to be the most polarizing of anything we have done thus far. Out of everyone, Sarah derives the most enjoyment from searching for this elusive grass – this is likely due to the fact that she consistently finds the greatest number of Stipa plants. Today, however, Gretel topped her by two plants. At the end of the day, the whereabouts of 43 Stipa were noted and logged. Sarah and Gretel drove to Stapphanson later in the afternoon to look for flowering Echinacea. While they were doing that, Dayvis, Lydia, Ise, and I went out to Hegg Lake. Dayvis looked for flowering Echinacea to use in his pollinator experiment, while I flagged the seven angustifolia parents of the one year-old hybrids that I’ll be studying. On the home front, grilled cheese with tomato and onion is on the dinner menu for tonight. Reina found a loaf of blue, moldy bread in the fridge, and rumors abound regarding the origin of the abandoned walker in the basement. This morning for Kory’s birthday he was sent to go weed the garden, along with Reina, Mike and Dayvis. The rest of us worked on data entry and some other odds and ends. In the late morning we went out to find the grasses planted just north of the Echinacea plants in the common garden, there was not much to find, but the team of Sarah and Gretel won by finding 10 plants. Most of us only found three. The afternoon was time to work on individual projects. Turned out to be another beautiful day in Kensington! Hi all, My name is Ilse (pronounced ILL-suh) Renner. I am originally from Green Bay and I recently graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire with a major in biology and a minor in chemistry, I plan on attending graduate school in the near future. My biology major focused on ecology and plant biology. Previous research I have been involved with focused on taxonomic vs functional based beta diversity of forest community understories, I’m excited for this chance to work in the prairies this summer! Recently I have been using aster to analyze the 1997 common garden experiment, and will continue with that this summer. As of yet I have analyzed data on fitness with respect to head count based on different populations, but analysis on achene count is in process as are a few other analyses from different perspectives (not based solely on population of origin)…so stay tuned! In addition to the ongoing analyses I will be contributing to other members’ studies this summer. In my free time I can usually be found running the roads of Kensington in the young hours of the morning. I also enjoy biking and playing the violin. Today was yet another very productive day. As we walked back to the cars to head back for lunch, Stuart stopped to point out Heliopsis helianthoides, also known as false sunflower. This plant has composite flower heads, as does Echinacea angustifolia, so it was good to learn about the similarities in structure between the two such as ray flowers and bracts. Our afternoon was spent using PDAs (Visor) to input data about plants in the inbreeding gardens. We worked in groups of 2 again, along with Per and Hattie who helped us (they were awesome!). The weather turned hot and humid at this point but root beer floats were waiting for us when we finished! That was my personal highlight of the day. In the common garden, we saw some E. angustifolia due to flower quite soon. Exciting! After that, the team headed back to the old town hall to eat dinner (pasta with shrimp and artichokes) and then watch a movie (Donnie Darko). All in all, a pretty good day! 🙂 Sarah Baker Hey everyone! My name is Lydia English and I just graduated from Carleton College a couple weeks ago. I’m originally from Rhode Island where my parents and two cats reside, but I just can’t get enough of the midwest so I’ll be spending another year out here. My interests lie in conservation biology and restoration ecology and this will be my second summer working in prairies. I’ll be looking to continue Katherine’s work on aphids and their effects on Echinacea fitness and phenology, but I’m also really interested in the compatibility experiments. Overall I think it’ll be a fun and exciting summer! If you’d like to check out my page at the Echinacea Project’s website click here
Today we spent the morning working on the recruitment experiment at Hegg Lake and a waterfowl production area southwest of Kensington. We were quite productive during the morning, finishing four plots! While we were in the field, we found an array of new forbs flowering for the first time. After today, we are finished with the recruitment experiment and will be moving on to work in the common gardens. In the afternoon we were treated to a presentation by Amy Dykstra on seedling recruitment. It was helpful to get more background information on Echinacea and the different ongoing experiments we get to be involved with. We ended the day by preparing for tomorrow and readying the necessary flags for flagging common garden 2 at Hegg Lake.
My name is Mike Howe and I am a senior at Gustavus Adolphus College in St. Peter Minnesota. After spending one summer studying plant demography and pollen limitation in prairies, I was lucky to get involved with the Echinacea Project for this summer. This summer I will be working with Dr. Pamela Kittelson focusing on how genetic diversity interacts with herbivory and ecophysiological traits. One of the ecophysiological traits we hope to explore is photosynthetic rate using a LiCor-6400 machine. It should be interesting to relate photosynthesis and other ecophysiological traits to genetic diversity. In my spare time, I am an avid cyclist, runner, and I Nordic ski for Gustavus. I am planning on exploring the roads around Kensington via my bike and rollerskis! Hope to see you around up here!
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