I went to my sit spot on 10/04/2020 at 9:40am to observe my organism. I chose the yellow flowers that were adorning my sit spot. They are located on the edges of the trail. I chose the yellow flower because although they are one of the things I have been keeping track of, I still did not know what they were called. I ended up identifying this yellow flower as a yellow crownbeard. Its botanical name is Verbesina Occidentalis.

The yellow flowers at the time of day were all facing the risen sun. Most of the flower’s petals seemed to have fallen off. Its leaves were long, wide, and green, some had holes which looked as if they had been chewed through. It also had a very tall stem (it met my hip while standing). The center of the flower was all that was really left. It had what looked like mini flowers protruding from its center with pointed edges.  I found these small little red berry remnants on some of the flowers. The red berry remnant looks shriveled as if it had been dried up.

The history of this species is that they bloom in the late summer/autumn and are native to arkansas. They are a part of the sunflower family. Its plant type is an herb and usually grows in moist soil. These plants grow to be typically 7 feet and its flower grows to be 2-3 inches. The yellow crownbeard is perennial which means its life cycle exceeds two years. It can be used for insect control in home gardens.

I tried identifying the organism first by typing in key descriptions into a search engine and going through the results, but it turns out that there are many yellow flowers that have similar characteristics to that of my organisms. Therefore I decided to download a plant identification app and hope that this would steer me in the right direction. The first suggestion that i received from the app was a yellow crownbeard which is also known as a stick weed. After making sure that this was in fact the species I had been observing and comparing the characteristics from the app to the characteristics of the actual species I was pretty sure that this was in fact a Yellow crownbeard (Verbesina occidentalis).

Overall, my experience observing the organism was fulfilling because I had the opportunity to learn more about the species that make up my sit spot. I was able to notice the smaller details of the plant and watch how other species interacted with it. The experience of taking notes while observing allowed me to be creative with what I was observing. I found myself enjoying the 30 minutes of focus because it served as a break from the multitude of tasks I yet to begin.