Over the last week I noticed a few changes of the surrounding vegetation. The bright October leaves have dulled and started falling off of the trees and the reeds around the pond have turned brown. The water level of the pond has also rised due to the rainfalls, which indicates that the retention basin is doing its job by catching runoff. I have also noticed that there is less algae on the surface of the water than last week. This may be because of the water being stirred around and the lack of sunlight for photosynthesis. Six organisms that I have observed at my site are sugar maples (Acer saccharum), basswoods (Tilia americana), paper birch (Betula papyrifera), shaggy mane mushrooms (Coprinus comatus) , an eastern cottontail rabbit (Sylvilagus floridanus) and a pair of mallard ducks (Anas platyrhynchos). The trees that surround the site are all young and have been planted recently. I noticed the mushrooms on October 30th at around 8:30 pm. I was surprised because I hadn’t noticed them while visiting the site earlier that day. After further research I found that they are called shaggy mane mushrooms, also known as lawyer’s wig mushrooms. I was also surprised to see that the two mallard ducks had green heads indicating that they are both males. I previously assumed that the pair would be one male and a female. I am curious as to why the two mallards haven’t started their migration to the south yet. I noticed that they are always diving down in the water so it could be possible that the pond is a good food source and the two ducks are trying to take advantage of it before leaving. For this assignment I mapped out my site. This gave me insight as to why the retention pond is located where it is. I noticed that the small basin is surrounded by impermeable surfaces such as a parking lot and residencies. It is definitely an efficient spot to catch runoff.
