Twig Lichen

Took the dogs for a walk after reading some articles on relationships between substrate chemistry and lichen diversity in northern hemisphere coniferous forests and decided to pick up one of many twigs on the ground covered in what I believe to be Xanthoria polycarpa.  No soredia, and definitely not growing on rock.

Lab Day - Aqua Regia

After the initial hype and buildup surrounding the preparation, use, and disposal  of aqua regia, I was disappointed by how innocuous the actual process was.  No horrific burns.  No screams of pain.  To an observer it would have looked as if we were carefully pipetting water into test tubes. Alas, the aqua regia component of lab is complete, and soon we'll be off to the ICP-MS!

Key Council 2010 - Slime Molds

Was going through my camera and realized I had some pictures from a foray this fall with the PNW Key Council.  The mushrooming was good but I was captivated by the different slime molds (Myxomycetes) we seemed to be finding.  These were two of the more colorful varieties; never was able to identify them.  Both were growing on fallen logs, coastal area near Deception Pass, WA.

EEON Soil Cores

Just remembered I had these photos from a couple weeks ago on my phone.  We took soil cores, and these happen to be the ones from our 'lowland' riparian site.  You can make out the dark organic top layer and its easy to see the alder leaves at the soil surface.

Currently working on getting these soils into a form amenable to ICP-MS analysis, meaning acid-digests. Yay!

Bryophyte Flora of North America

Used the Bryophyte Flora of North America along with the USDA plants website to annotate and update some new moss and liverwort additions to the Evergreen herbarium.  It's continually being updated with current family and genus names.

http://www.mobot.org/plantscience/BFNA/bfnamenu.htm

Lichen Community on a Stick

I know its not a bryophyte, but I'm honestly more interested in lichens, and I ended up spotting this branch with at least five different ones, ranging from crustose to fruticose.  I grabbed it primarily because of the crustose apothecia (the small orangish discs).  Curious to compare lichen ascospores to what I remember about your 'normal', unlichenized ascomycete spores.