Inevitably, everything that is exciting will eventually become mundane. An event that was once a "Eureka!" moment leading to instant happiness becomes routine, ordinary, and relatively uninteresting. This is how I feel about collecting Funaria; now that we have our senses tuned into the habitat of the plant, finding it is as easy as finding railroad tracks. These we found about ten miles from where we stayed in Maltaville, and again right along the Connecticut River, at the border between Vermont and New Hampshire. Finding Funaria, even large populations, is now routine and not very exciting. I can go from seeing train tracks to being back in the car with 20 sample bags within like twenty minutes.
This underscores another importance of general moss collecting, that I talked about yesterday. It breaks up the monotony of only collecting one plant from essentially one habitat, allowing me to explore dense forests and mountain streams to collect whatever I find interesting. Piers usually ends up staying out of the car longer than I, but that's okay, because it allows me to write and to plan our route. The collections will continue to interrupt the monotony when I get back to Durham, as well- it's going to get boring, measuring seta lengths and doing DNA extractions. Identifying mosses, meanwhile, is like solving a puzzle. I work my way through a giant key to mosses, looking at microscopic characters that distinguish families, genera, and species.
We were almost completely stumped by the state of New Hampshire. At least in the southern part of the state, they have turned all the unused railways into hiking trails, removing the rails, ties, and gravel. I joked that Funaria should be listed as critically endangered in the state if they continue to remove its precious habitat. We were only successful in finding two patches of Funaria flavicans, but at least we didn't totally strike out.
Massachusetts also had its interesting moments. Driving south to Worcester (which I will never be able to pronounce correctly, according to Mike's friend Max), we passed over some railroad tracks. We pulled into a side street to investigate and found Funaria same as ever. As I was collecting, I noticed Piers was gone, which is not unusual, since he sometimes wanders off in search of something less weedy. What was unusual was the two state trooper cars sitting next to mine on the road. Apparently across the street from these tracks was a state corrections facility, and the troopers were not too happy I was there. Luckily, though, one of them was a Marine who spent a lot of time in Camp Lejeune, and so was a Duke fan. I shared some stories with him and he let us go without much problem. Oh well, it's not a true field trip unless you run into the authorities at least once.
We got to Providence and hit a bit of a snag as the guy we were staying with wasn't at his apartment. While we waited for him, we took out some bags from the very first stop, at that lumber yard in central Virginia. We hadn't seen anything like the samples we collected since, and it maybe that most of the population isn't Funaria at all! We won't know for sure until we get back to the lab. The good news is that I know at least some of the plants are Funaria. On top of that, what really mattered that day is that we THOUGHT it was Funaria, because at that point we were really frustrated by our Funaria-detecting ability. We're experts now, and we know what to do- follow the trains.
I got to stop by Brown and see Mike, which was very nice- we played some tennis (exercise thoroughly confused my body, which has begun to mesh with my drivers' seat), got some pizza, and met with some of his friends. Tomorrow, I'm headed home, to Hardyston New Jersey, via Rhode Island, Connecticut, and southern New York. Mom has promised pulled pork BBQ, which I'm sure will be up to Piers' Arkansas standards!
Miles Traveled: 255
Funaria Populations: 4
This underscores another importance of general moss collecting, that I talked about yesterday. It breaks up the monotony of only collecting one plant from essentially one habitat, allowing me to explore dense forests and mountain streams to collect whatever I find interesting. Piers usually ends up staying out of the car longer than I, but that's okay, because it allows me to write and to plan our route. The collections will continue to interrupt the monotony when I get back to Durham, as well- it's going to get boring, measuring seta lengths and doing DNA extractions. Identifying mosses, meanwhile, is like solving a puzzle. I work my way through a giant key to mosses, looking at microscopic characters that distinguish families, genera, and species.
We were almost completely stumped by the state of New Hampshire. At least in the southern part of the state, they have turned all the unused railways into hiking trails, removing the rails, ties, and gravel. I joked that Funaria should be listed as critically endangered in the state if they continue to remove its precious habitat. We were only successful in finding two patches of Funaria flavicans, but at least we didn't totally strike out.
Massachusetts also had its interesting moments. Driving south to Worcester (which I will never be able to pronounce correctly, according to Mike's friend Max), we passed over some railroad tracks. We pulled into a side street to investigate and found Funaria same as ever. As I was collecting, I noticed Piers was gone, which is not unusual, since he sometimes wanders off in search of something less weedy. What was unusual was the two state trooper cars sitting next to mine on the road. Apparently across the street from these tracks was a state corrections facility, and the troopers were not too happy I was there. Luckily, though, one of them was a Marine who spent a lot of time in Camp Lejeune, and so was a Duke fan. I shared some stories with him and he let us go without much problem. Oh well, it's not a true field trip unless you run into the authorities at least once.
We got to Providence and hit a bit of a snag as the guy we were staying with wasn't at his apartment. While we waited for him, we took out some bags from the very first stop, at that lumber yard in central Virginia. We hadn't seen anything like the samples we collected since, and it maybe that most of the population isn't Funaria at all! We won't know for sure until we get back to the lab. The good news is that I know at least some of the plants are Funaria. On top of that, what really mattered that day is that we THOUGHT it was Funaria, because at that point we were really frustrated by our Funaria-detecting ability. We're experts now, and we know what to do- follow the trains.
I got to stop by Brown and see Mike, which was very nice- we played some tennis (exercise thoroughly confused my body, which has begun to mesh with my drivers' seat), got some pizza, and met with some of his friends. Tomorrow, I'm headed home, to Hardyston New Jersey, via Rhode Island, Connecticut, and southern New York. Mom has promised pulled pork BBQ, which I'm sure will be up to Piers' Arkansas standards!
Miles Traveled: 255
Funaria Populations: 4
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