New Picture of my sit spot!

As you are leaving Dana, the science building on campus, you turn left and then cross the parking lot past moody. After that you keep walking straight to the next parking lot near the gym you turn right and then go straight up the hill and you will spot two massive trees I sit in between them, for shade and to focus on the one tree that is one of the three things I have decided to keep track of this semester. I  got to my sit spot at around 1:40 pm and left at 2:41 for that hour I experienced a lot of differences not only in my sit spot but the three things I am going to keep track of. One is the grass, which is starting to become less and less green. I believe that is due to the changes in the weather so frequently that one week it’s cooler and then back to the 90-degree weather.

This is the close up on the grass where my sit spot is looking a little less green because of the weather and from leaves sitting upon it.

On September 29th, 2019 the weather was miserably hot, and I am someone who does not do well in extreme hot or extreme cold, because I have a sensitivity learning difference, but I stuck it out! Which I am very proud of myself, I kept thinking I don’t know if I will be able to last. Speaking of which the weather at my sit spot was miserably hot and I do not do good in warm weather. If I could guess it was around 90 degrees with like 50% humidity. It was not ideal, and I sweat all over, but I am just hoping it will start to get colder soon.

The second thing that I noticed changes was the tree I deiced to focus on which I believe it is an American Sycamore due to the sheading of the bark and the tree turning whiteish gray. The leaves on the tree are starting to become more yellow, brownish, and falling off. I do find that very interesting due to that it is still pretty hot out, but maybe due to the more humid weather the tree is confused, and it is making the tree think let’s drop them. Another hypothesis about the grass is the drastic changes in the weather could make the tree confused,  to be or not to be. It’s still hot outside, but it wasn’t a couple days ago so should I start dropping them now or wait? I wonder why they are losing earlier than usual?

I have noticed that the bark is shedding and turning white also that the leaves are turning colors earlier than they usually.

The last of the changes were with the squirrels. I had noticed in my session that I believe there were fewer squirrels then when I first observed them in my first session. Like the last two changes, I think it is again due to the weather. It was colder in temperature in my first session then it was for this one. I guess why squirrels are always connected to fall and not summer. They probably go into hiding as much as they cane when it is scorching out, and then when it gets colder in temperature, they come out more to get nuts and food.

The lone squirrel I only noticed one at my second session today. Hopefull you can spot it.

My favorite part of the session was getting to walk all around my sit spot and get to explore where I will be sitting over this semester. I chose to look at three different things the stump I was talking about in my last session, a tree that is down the hill that I stare at every sit spot, and a purple flower and the purple flower is also an adaptation I noticed as well. To start off the stump, I wanted to touch and feel the grooves of it, and I get to see the rings of the tree. The rings of a tree I believe tells you how old the tree is I did not count them, but next session I surely will. The grooves were very rough, and it was refreshing to see that a tree once stood there. The other one I looked at the tree at the bottom of the hill was a very different looking tree to the American Sycamore the edges of the bark at intents of some sort and vertical lines and groves going up and down it. I did look it up once I got back to my room, and I found out the tree was an American Tulip Tree. It was interesting to notice that there are different trees all around me in my sit spot and I guess I never realized that each tree has a specific characteristic that is different from another if it’s the bark or leaves. Then the third one is the purple flower, which I am going to talk about more in the adaptation section.

The Tree that I took a closer look at during my walk around session

I loved walking around my sit spot to find things to examine it was hard. Since my sit spot is on a hill in between two dorm rooms, it is more like a valley, then a hill to be honest. So it gave me a chance to walk near and far and to explore life around me. I have been wanting to look at the stump, so I am thrilled that I got a chance to look at that more closely. I think getting this time to take a look at things closer gave me a chance to get more personal invited to the lives of the bugs and plants that live around me every day. I have never thought of doing it on my own because I can’t find time to do anything since I am usually slammed with work. These blog sessions give me a chance to do just that, and I enjoy doing them!

The three adaptions I noticed by walking around, and just sitting in my sit spot is the American Sycamore and  American Tulip Tree losing its leaves, the squirrel and the purple flower. How I discused, the changes in the trees, I think the challenge is the weather changing to be colder, and the adaptation is to go into a hibernation state. There was one adaptation about the American Sycamore I find quite exciting, and it is that I guess when it loses its leaves, it also sheds its bark as well. I wonder why that is. Possibly, that is also how it sleeps through the harshness of the winter, but animals grow more fur or hair because of the winter and get rid of it during the summer because of the weather. It is just an exciting adaptation. Then the squirrels do an adaption as well to try and get away from predators, once they have the food they scurry up a tree to eat the nuts or whatever they found that time for eating. That way, a predator will have a harder time to see them while they are munching on a snack. Last is the purple flower that I briefly mentioned. When I first came to my sit spot, those flowers were not there, and I wondered why did they appear all of a sudden. Well, the adaptation could be that it rained the day before and the soil finally got enough rain so they could look brighter than usual or open there stoma and collect that water and more sun since it was a sunny day on Sunday.

The flowers that came out of nowhere!

I think it was hard to think of 3 adaptions cause I had only thought of 2, but as I sat there in silence and thought more and more I got it! I think it was because there isn’t a lot of the things directly around me, but I remember sitting and thinking about it helped me out a lot.