Station 1: The Erratic boulder

            This boulder is well known to most people who frequent Ravenna Park, mainly because it looks out of place. The Vashon lobe of the Cordilleran ice sheet moved the boulder almost 20,000 years ago. The boulder sits in the creek that runs through the bottom of the ravine. Since the boulder sits in water the surrounding area is damp, making it a perfect place for moss to grow. There is also a Pacific Yew (Taxus brevifolia) that has lots of moss growing all over it. The Yew is a tree that does well in moist areas, and usually have a handful of central trunks that branches grow from.  Traditionally, the Native American tribes of the Pacific Northwest made paddles for canoes and bows for hunting with the wood from the Yew.  

Stations 2: Devils Club

            Devils club is an understory shrub that can be found mostly in old growth forests of the North West. This spot in Ravenna Park is one of the only one can find Devil’s club at in the entire park. It was not as tall as most of the Devil’s club I came across with when visiting the more preserved old growth forest near Crescent Lake, out on the Olympic Peninsula. The stems of the plant are of the thicker variety when comparing it to other shrubs. It also has spines covering most of the thick stems, with larger leaves extending out form the tops of the stems.

Station 3: Picnic Area

           

            The picnic area is an example of an ecological disturbance caused by humans. Much of Ravenna Park and the surrounding area was logged and clear-cut for human consumption over the years. Over time conservationist have worked hard to try and preserve the natural history of the park. On my walks through the park this quarter I have come across countless instances of young native trees and shrubs being planted in and efforts to further restore the natural ecosystem. There has also been signs posted in areas where a conversation effort is taking place, to let the general public know to take any extra precautions needed to ensure that the restoration is successful. However, there often needs to be a balance between conservation efforts and providing a recreational space for people in the community.

Station 4: The Top of Ravenna Park Bridge

            The top of the bridge that crosses the top of the park is a great place to go bird watching because the viewpoint is up in the canopy of the trees of the park. At first glance the park seems to be dominated by the American Crow, and you can constantly hear their loud caawing call. On my first visit to the top of the bridge I was able to observe a group of crows trying to drive out a couple of larger adult Bald Eagles. Bald Eagles typically are found near larger bodies of water, where they can take advantage of large supplies of fish. In addition to the larger birds just described there are an abundance of smaller songbirds. The American Robin is one that someone is almost guaranteed to hear and see while walking through the park, especially in the early morning hours. They are found all over North America and can be identified by the mahogany red-brown color of its breast. They can often be seen on the forest floor feeding on worms, insects, and other invertebrates. A slightly more rare bird I was able to come across from the vantage point at the top of the bridge was a Golden Crowned Kinglet. It was sitting there perched on the branch of a tall spruce or fir.    

Station 5: The Creek Before the trail splits

            This area of the creek is located on the right hand side when walking through the park from the baseball field. This larger creek bed is located just before the trail splits off. It is located just across from where we observed the devils club. This spot is a great place to look for invertebrates. One of the best places to look for nymphs is under larger rocks in moving water because stoneflies like highly oxygenated water. These nymphs eventually get taken by the current and dragged along to a place where they can under go their metamorphosis. Another commonly found invertebrate found in the stream is the fresh water leach. A good place to look for the inverts is underneath rocks above the moving water, where it is calmer. They feed on the blood of fish, frogs, and other mammals, detecting potential prey by the vibrations in the water. Finally, giant crane flies are probably one of the easiest invertebrates to spot because of their abundance and size. They like to breed in damp places, so the edges of the creek might be a good place to look for these guys. They have extremely long legs as compared to the rest of their bodies

Today was a warm and sunny 67 degrees on my walk through Ravenna Park. When arriving at my observation site I was surprised to see many of the horsetails that had grown almost four feet tall had been trampled or crushed by something or someone. Therefore there were a fair amount of dried out dead horsetails lying on the ground near my feet. There were also less salmon berries ripe for picking on the bushes around my spot. I was only able to find one ripe enough to let one of my friends that I dragged along with try. Many of the berries looked like they had been half eaten or already picked. The soft soil and mud that had existed in previous weeks was almost entirely gone. I was able to feel the ground squish beneath my feet as I approached the nurse log looking for salmon berries, but for the most part the ground was much drier.

While sitting at my spot I was only able to spot one bird fly across the landscape just above the tops of the salmon berry bushes. I believe it was a black-capped chickadee because of the black head and smaller size as I saw it fly by. It perched briefly on a hemlock branch and then quickly flew away further down the hill toward the creek where I was unable to follow it. I decided to leave my spot and search for a higher viewpoint, and while moving I saw an American Robin hopping along across the trail most likely looking for insects along the ground, but my friend and I approached it too quickly and scared it off. I was able to see its lighter almost mahogany colored breast, and larger sized torso compared to the chickadee. Walking along one of the upper trails a song sparrow swooped in and landed on a branch of a big leaf maple. It began to call out adding a few upward inflections at the end of the standard song. It then begun to fly rapidly between the branch it was on and another branch a few feet away on. To me it looked like either a territorial display or maybe a mating display, however I did not spot another sparrow in the area. Eventually some crows flew by and scared away the song sparrow.

It is Wednesday, May 18^th. It is just after one, and its muggy and over cast here at Ravenna park. When first walking up to my observation spot, I was astonished at how large the horse tails had gotten. It has been three weeks since I had been back to my site, and the shrubs have overtaken the nurse log almost completely. If I did not know there was a nurse log ten feet in front of me, I would have never been able to tell it was there. The horse tails were getting so tall and thick that they have also started to engulf the low hanging branches of the western hemlock to my left. The biggest surprise was the amount of bright red salmon berries. I noticed many of the red berries were half eaten, but I found a nice red one, with no holes, and ate it. I was also able to recognize the sounds of a song sparrow singing, but could not spot it.

Horse tail surrounding Hemlock branches

He looks like he is wearing a crown, with a fuzzy black fur coat.

He’s moving from colorful throne to throne, bring a piece of each city with him.

He is a well-nourished king who is larger than all the rest of his subjects.

There is constant excitement following him throughout the air.

He is the Yellow Faced Bumble Bee!

Our trip began early one sunny Saturday morning. This was my first time traveling to Whidbey Island, so as we drove across the island to Skyroot Farm, I tried to take in my surroundings. One unique thing that I noticed was the trees often were sculpted one direction or another and not as tall as seen in thicker forests, likely because of the strong winds that come off the sound. There was a great example of two Doug Firs on opposite sides of the farm that had been sculpted to almost be leaning in towards each other. As we continued to explore Beth’s farm there were a lot of different small habitats. Walking through the meadow I noticed that the soil underneath the grass in the lower meadows was soft and sometimes a little damp. This was probably due to the river that ran through the farm. As we trekked through the meadow I noticed that it was made up mostly of grass, but also rushes, horse tail, skunk cabbage and other smaller plants like stinging nettles. I saw a lot dragonflies and a white and black striped bee.   After some lunch the group caught a Song Sparrow, which we compared to the chickens roaming around the grounds. The scaly talons make birds one of the closest living reptiles to dinosaurs.

Rushes and Horse Tail

Skunk Cabbage, Rushes, Horse Tail

Grass and Bee

Song Sparrow

The picture below does a good job of showing the different habitats across the farm. The patch of trees in the middle is a grove of alders down by the stream that runs through the farm. I also took a picture of a extremely young alder just sprouting on the top of a smaller hill, which had dryer soil due to the exposure to sun light and distance from the stream. On the top of that hill we also came across a branch on an alder that had round 30 tent caterpillars living on it. For an unknown reason to me, they were very active and moving quickly from side to side. The hill seemed to have slightly poorer quality of soil, which may be why the new alder was one of the few trees or shrubs to be able to sprout there.

Sprouting Alder

 Tent Caterpillars

The next spot we visited was Ebbey’s landing on the north west side of the island. 

This area was a prairie in the rain shadow of the Olympic Mountains. Here we saw many of the same plants and trees as in the center of the island, but they had adapted to the different climate. Many of the trees were not at tall and would sometimes grow out of the side of the steep bluffs. Many of the shrubs such as the Tall Oregon Grape did not grow as tall, but grew wider, probably due to the frequency of high winds. We also got see some golden paintbrush flowers growing along the grass prairie hillside, an extremely rare and almost extinct species of flower.

Tall Oregon Grape

I was also able to spot a nest of some larger bird, possibly an eagle or hawk because we saw both a bald eagle and red tailed hawk patrolling the coast there. Probably the most amazing part of the trip was when one of the bald eagles we saw started to fly directly at us. It was jaw dropping seeing the massive bird fly directly at us; there might have been a split second of fear.