Capstone Research Updates
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Archive for month: April, 2015
JuxtaposeJS Trial
Here is a great new tool to compare things at two points in time.
Lake Shasta
Zuma Beach
Total %Germination and Survival
After concluding the Common Garden study at CSU Channel Islands on March 31, 2015 I censused successfully germinated seedlings for survival.
Figure 1: % Germination and Survival of SRI Island Torrey pine (Pinus torreyana insularis) with different irrigation and leaf litter treatments. HP = High Irrigation, LP = Low Irrigation, +LL = Leaf Litter Presence, -LL = Leaf Litter Absence.
The take away …
The presence or absence of leaf litter appears to be a critical factor in germination and survival under drought (LP) conditions. Without the presence of leaf litter or consistent rains (HP) the Island Torrey pine seed bank viability is highly impacted.
Analysis: Island Torrey Pine Reproductive Habitat
Over the past few weeks I have been working hard to quantify the reproductive habitat for the Island Torrey pine. Using ArcMap v. 10.21 I began testing several distances (m) using Global Moran’s I for each grove. This test performs a statistical analysis for trees with (seedlings+saplings) and clusters reproductive trees with a high or low value of (seedlings+saplings) giving a highly significant (P<0.001) distance between individuals. I then performed a Hot Spot Analysis for each grove using this significant distance. The following maps show the current reproductive area based upon a high or low density of (seedlings+saplings) around a reproductive parent tree.
My blog 2015-04-20 00:49:12
Roadkill can be found everywhere!
Roadkill in Urban, Suburban, and Natural Environments
Synanthropic species are species that have tendencies to compete well in urban environments. Urban environments have specific attributes that can allow certain species to thrive whilst others fail to compete. However, it must be defined what an urban environment is and what about it can affect the species in the area. This can be anything from abiotic factors to anthropic factors. One of the major factors however are roads, which can cause things such as habitat destruction as well as interference with natural habits of species. Looking at a series of six different roads split into natural, suburban, and urban environments it was found that a majority of the roadkill find their way into suburban environments. Although of the roadkill, small species took a larger 0.0019 percent of the total species in urban environments . This insinuates that species vary depending on the type of environment that is present.
