Lincoln Park : Week 7

Date: May 19, 2013
Weather: Cloudy/ Overcast
Time of day: 12pm-1pm
Temperature: about 66 degrees Fahrenheit

Today, although it was not sunny, it was great weather. A lot of people were at Lincoln Park today, enjoying nature, out for a jog, barbecuing, etc. Right when I walked into the park, I was able to hear a lot of chickadees above me in the canopy, but I was not able to spot one. I was also to identify and hear a lot of american robins. My area has not changed much from last week, but I do see some more plants blooming their flowers and soon have their berries. I was able to spot a bee nearby by it's loud buzzing, it landed on a log and seemed to be digging or "tunneling?" But it soon took off and as it noticed me, observing it overhead. The Thimbleberry had grew more of its white papery flowers, but still no berries. The Salmonberry however had tons of berries that were full and ripened. I was able to find a couple where the birds haven't eaten them up yet. I also noticed that the tall oregon grape had grew its berries, they were still green and had not ripened yet. It was very frustrating in a way to find mushrooms at my site! I was looking everywhere, under logs, in logs, on trees, on the ground, on the pines, but I was not coming up with any mushrooms. But I did find a good amount of moss at my site, Oregon beaked moss, was the most common moss I noticed. I was very determined to find fungi at my location, and on the log that I had passed by earlier, I noticed some type orange little circular thing on the log, there was a couple of them but not many, they had pores all over them and wouldn't budge when I tried to move them. They were also hard. On a broadleaf tree nearby, was Oakmoss lichen growing on the branches! I was very excited, I though it was old man's beard at first, but it didn't seem to stringy or long, it was more forky looking. I ended up walking around not too far from my location to find some mushrooms. As I was walking I heard something moving in the shrub nearby, then a small bird flew out of it and landed near a salmonberry bush, on a trunk of a douglas fir. The bird had a dark/ black head and white chest, white beak, and brownish/ dark feathers with somewhat of a white streak on it's tail. It seemed to be gathering some nesting materials, I was able to get a picture of it, in hopes someone can help my ID it later. I thought maybe it could have been a Dark-eyed Junco. As the bird flew away I continued my search for mushrooms, and finally I spotted a couple Artist's conk or Artist's fungus. The cap of the mushroom was flat or somewhat convex in shape and was dark brown to gray-ish in color. Towards the edge of the cap it was more white in color, which continued on underneath the mushroom to it's spores. The spores where white in color and they were pores. This mushroom was directly attached to tree and was very hard and the texture was smooth to a little wrinkly. I was very excited to find these, they grew on different types of trees, I found one on a douglas fir and another on a maple.

I was unable to go down to the beach to check on the mallard female duck and her ducklings, but I was very excited on my observations and findings.