Yesterday was the final time I would be visiting Redstone quarry for the place-based phenology assignment, so I decided to thoroughly check every spot of the quarry I could.
The biggest change I noticed were the abundance of flowers on tree as we get later into spring, some of the colors really livened up the quarry and lead to me seeing a few pollinators while I was at the quarry.
I also noticed on many pine trees tiny pinecones had begun to sprout and grow so they can drop their seeds later in the winter, I just thought it was cool how small they were currently and while these wont become the largest pinecones they will still get a lot bigger.
I took this photo from a high up point at the quarry to capture the tree cover that has returned, It homes a lot of birds, some of which I saw being a Bluejay, Blackbird, Black capped Chickadee and a species of woodpecker I was not able to see enough to specifically identify.
I wanted to put these 2 parts of the waters system in the quarry next to each other to show nutrient pollution here. The one with algae is closer to the road, but within the pool there are reeds and on the other side of the reeds there isn’t as much algae blooming really whim shows how they take out nitrogen and phosphorus. There was really only that one pool of excessive algae in the water too it wasn’t as bad everywhere else.
I wanted to include these 2 plants I found in the quarry, growing on what’s probably a tiny bit of soil met by sear rock. Its very cool seeing that maple sapling especially because its roots are most likely furthering the break down of the rock in the quarry to soil so it can be used by plants.
There were also these plant growing on moss and liken that was growing on some of the areas where it was just flat rocks which I thought were very cool since even in the fall I didn’t see these growing.
I also found a dried gourd that had already been broken into, so decided to open it more to take some seeds for myself to see if I could germinate them, but Inside along the inner walls there was this funky pattern where the seeds were held and it reminded me of honeycomb in a way.
I also thought id include this fun lil box I found stuck in-between the rock wall of the quarry, there were names dated back from 2020 which shows I’ve missed it every time I have visited, and the box itself was labeled 2016 for the expiration of the Altoids inside. I put it back where I found it to keep the cycle going for whoever else may find it.
I see nature and culture intersecting in this place through the people who use it. Its surrounded by a suburb so its get used like a part of one with people going on walks through it, hanging out, and bringing their dogs to go on walks here. Its a place where people in urban areas can reconnect with this little pocket of nature.
I am not a part of this place, I say that because I really only came to do the assignments, and because of going home over summer and winter break its not a place I can continuously return to consistently so I don’t feel like I can really become ingrained in this place as a part of it.