Ravenna Creek 2020

Journal Entry 3 Time: Monday, October 26th, 2020, from 1:30 to 2:30 pm Location: The far eastern portion of Ravenna Park in Seattle, WA.  Temperature: ~48℉ Weather: Generally overcast with little in the way of wind or precipitation.  This week I noticed a few changes regarding the plants within my observation site on Ravenna Creek. The Vine Maples near the upstream waterfall had begun to turn brown along the margins of their seven lobed leaves, standing in stark contrast to the Bigleaf Maple saplings at the site, which showed little in the way of browning. Despite this, I found some Bigleaf Maple leaves that had fallen onto the ground. They had the unmistakable five lobes of the Bigleaf Maple, being at least eight inches across . Gauging from the size of the leaves I would assume that they came from a more adult tree, as the leaves on the saplings on the stream bank had leaves perhaps half that size in width, being about four inches across at their broadest point. From this...

Journal 2 Time: Tuesday, October 20th, 2020, from 3:15 to 4:30 pm Location: The far eastern portion of Ravenna Park in Seattle, WA.  Temperature: ~57℉ Weather: Clear skies with intermittent cover and a light breeze. Upon returning to my observation site near Ravenna Creek I immediately noticed a few things that had changed about the site. My close up observation spot, located on a patch of ground and a log on the cut bank, was missing the large characteristic mushrooms that I observed and described in the last journal post. The patch of bark the mushrooms had stood upon appeared to have been broken off, with the fresh wood underneath the bark having the appearance of being stamped upon or crushed. I also noticed that some newer, smaller mushrooms had appeared. These newer and smaller mushrooms had a dull grey brown color and a half spherical cap. The stalks were slender and the apex of the cap was noticeably darker than the rest of the cap. The caps were no more than a centimeter ...

Journal 1  10/12/2020 I have had experience with nature since a relatively young age. Back in elementary school I would often spend most of my time in the woods reading the works of authors such as Gary Paulsen, author of Hatchet , as well as the works of Mark Twain; The Adventures of Tom Sawyer was one of my favorites. In conjunction with this reading I participated in both the Cub Scouts and the Boy Scouts, though I had significantly less enthusiasm and spent less time in the Boy Scouts due to a variety of reasons, ranging from the overtly religious nature of the organization to the excessive amount of bureaucracy for what I largely viewed as a camping club. I was also a major fan of the Survivorman television show by Les Stroud, where Les would venture into the wilderness alone with his camera gear and minimal equipment to demonstrate the difficulty of survival under less than ideal circumstances. One of my favorite parts of these shows and books were their descriptions of pla...