Camosun Bog -st
1. How was the bog formed?
A bog is an ecosystem where plants are adapted to an acid environment, low nutrients, high water table, and little oxygen in the water. The bog is formed when a lake slowly fills up with plant debris. Sphagnum moss and other plants grow out from the lake's edge. As sphagnum dies, more sphagnum grows on top of it.
2. What is the keystone species of a bog? Read about sphagnum moss. How does Sphagnum maintain the acidic conditions?
The keystone species of a bog is sphagnum moss. The sphagnum moss is a plant that is favored by low oxygen, low nutrients, and moist acidic conditions. Sphagnum moss is sometimes referred to as peat is essential to a bog. Without sphagnum a bog would not exist. Sphagnum maintains acidic conditions by absorbing water and pumping hydrogen ions into its surroundings which creates a very acidic environment.
3. What is peat? How is it different from soil?
Peat is dead sphagnum. As sphagnum dies and turns into peat, the new sphagnum grows on top of it. Sphagnum doesn't decay easily. Nutrients locked up in peat keeping nutrients low. Peat moss has different texture and weight and it is light and spongy and difficult to wet.
4. Why is digging through a bog like digging through time?
Digging through a bog is like digging through time because peat doesn't decay so the dead sphagnum from a long time ago still has its structural integrity. You have sphagnum growing on top of the dead sphagnum and the process repeats.
5.We never found any bodies in the bog, but some artifacts were preserved in Camosun bog. What were they?
-Artifacts include a hockey puck from the 1940s when the local boys used to play hockey on Devil's Hole.
-Glass Marbles in all the areas of the bog
-Button hat from the 50s
-coins(the oldest being a silver coin from the 1870s Spain)
-nib and ink
6. This woman remembers playing hockey in Camosun bog. What were some of her observations?
She remembers playing hockey and being a goalie because she couldn't skate well enough. Lake was a lot bigger before and the boys used to build a fire in the flat area. The fire was built to dry anyone who fell in the bog. The trees were only 10-11ft tall. She remembers picking huckleberries and eating them. She remembers this being strictly her playground at lunchtime and weekends. She used to also go skating on the bog.
7. How are bogs carbon sinks? Why is this important?
In a bog, CO2 that gets synthesized 2000 years ago is still stuck in the bog as peat and the CO2 doesn't come out. A bog has highly acidic conditions and things don't decay normally. CO2 enters and carbon doesn't get released meanwhile O2 gets released. This is important because it absorbs carbon dioxide which helps with global warming.
8. Camosun bog, məqʷe:m, is the traditional territory of the Musqueam people. How long have they been using this area for food, medicine,and culture?
There is evidence of their use of the bog for the past 4000 years and according to their oral history of the region, their activity dates back to 9000 years.
9. What nearly destroyed the bog?
The development of a city nearly destroyed the bog. Drains that were installed in 1929 also reduced the water levels which destroyed sphagnum moss. Invasive plants outcompeted the native bog. The hemlock trees, rooted in peat behaved like a forest planted in a waterbed. Fallen trees during a windstorm.
10. The change in abiotic conditions caused "invasives" to go into the bog. These are actually native forest species and not invasives to BC but they are invaders to a bog. What plants are these?
Invasive species include: Groundcover: polytrichum moss, fern( deer, sword, bracken, all the ferns)
Skunk cabbage, salad, juncus
Bushes: huckleberry, some blueberry species, salmonberry, blackberry
Trees: western hemlock, birches, mountain ash
11. What are the native plants in a bog?
Native Plants include:
Groundcovers: sphagnum moss, arctic starflower, bunchberry, cloudberry, bog cranberry, sundew
Bushes: labrador tea, kalmia, bog blueberry
Trees: lodgepole pine(also shore pine), Saskatoon berry, caskara
Comments
Post a Comment