#tidmarsh

It's a 2-in-1 post. Or is it a 2-for-1 post? I digress. More crap for me to ramble on about! Hurrah! Went on a 5-ish hike with a student and professor, and we hiked up Mount Toby, the highest peak in the valley, which isn't saying much because it was only about 1,200 feet. But I did climb to the top of the Sunderland fire tower at the top. The view was incredible to say the least. On the way down we saw a waterfall and on the drive back we drove past two more. Okay, now onto Todd the postdoc and strange crap he says. Nia did warn me that "Todd's a strange dude," but I didn't think much of it until spending a week with him and the other REP intern. He's a wicked strange dude. Every story he told us about his friends involved him saying that his friends were "strange," while he himself was a "normal" dude. Yeah, sure thing Todd. He told us one story at Gloriana and Evan's house that was the most ridiculous thing. (Okay, it wasn't that ridiculous, but it was ridiculous in this situation.) He had bought a 1984 BW bus and while he and his wife were moving from Alaska to Washington state, his buddy and his wife drove the VW bus for them. Todd and his wife had like 12 gallons of beer they were bringing with them because Todd had worked at a brewery in Alaska. Perfectly legal to drive across the boarder with closed containers of beer. Todd's friend's wife had taped an unknown amount of weed to herself. No joke. So these two, driving across the boarder from Alaska into Canada begin to apparently break out in sweat because they're nervous that they'll be caught transporting a ridiculous amount of weed from one country to another. Of course they get stopped, but the boarder control people never found the weed. Good grief. 😂 Another story Todd told us (when Gloriana and Evan were not present), was how he doesn't want to be buried in the ground when he dies. I'm telling ya, Todd is a strange dude. Anyways, he said he wants his body to be placed into a glass coffin in the side of a cliff, so people can look up and see his dead, decaying body. "They'd be lucky to see my dead and decomposing body!" Um, not really, Todd. I could go on, but I'll leave it at that.

A quick recap of my week (I'm leaving out some details because I could go on and on about my week)- Monday: Left MoHo at 8am, got to the cranberry bogs at 1030am and worked until about 630pm. We had to rent a pump and generator to drain the wetland (trust us, we're environmental scientists), then we were able to pound the metal stakes into the ground and mark them with spray paint so we know which stakes belong to which plots. Then Gloriana and Evan invited us over for a dinner of salmon (I don't eat fish), a cheesy risotto, and grilled asparagus. They even offered us wine (the chardonnay was delightful) and cheeses and crackers. Too kind of them. Tuesday- We started working at 8am, and had to remove buckets and buckets and buckets of soil from each of the plots. Depending on how much biochar and/or peat we had to add to a plot determined how much we removed. The more biochar/peat, the more soil we had to dig up. Anywhere from 1-10 five gallon buckets of soil were removed from each of the 35 plots. We worked until about 430pm, and then called it a day because there was a chance of thunderstorms. In the evening. Turns out thunderstorms did indeed roll through, around 7pm, and that drenched our already flooded plots. Wednesday- The heat finally broke. The high on Wednesday was about 65/70 with a nice breeze- much better than the previous two days of 90 degrees and hot sunshine. We got up and got to the plots at 8am, and decided we should rent another pump and generator because the plots were under a ridiculous amount of water. So Todd the postdoc called the rental place we got he first generator from, and got two more generators, a 2" and a 3" generator. So we hauled them to the plots, hooked them up, and then we had a slight issue. The 3" generator wouldn't work. So we ended up using just the two 2" generators that we had to drain the wetland. We dug trenches and holes and ditches to drain the water to the pumps. After our lunch break, we spent the next few hours amending our plots and filling them with biochar and peat. We only amended 12 out of 35 plots before we called it quits at 7pm. Thursday- AKA the day from hell. Not really, but it was a 12 hour work day. We figured we'd get out to the plots by 7am to get a head start on draining the plots. So once we hooked up the generators again, Todd the postdoc drove to the rental place to drop off the broken 3" generator. So we dug more holes and trenches and really drained out our site. We worked until 7pm, equalling a 12 hour work day to amend the rest of our plots (23 of them), then fill in the trenches that were within the plot-space. What a production. Then Gloriana and Evan invited us over for dinner again, which was really too kind of them. We had pasta with a "tomah-to and bah-zil sauce" (Gloriana pronounced it like that 😂), cauliflower with cheese, grilled portables mushrooms (I hate mushrooms, they're dirt without the texture), shrimp (once again I don't each fish), and bread with butter. Also more wine and cheese and crackers. So freaking good. It was definitely what we needed after a 12 hour day in the field. Friday- We got to the plots at 8am, and all we had to do was drain the site one last time and fill in the ditches around the outer edge of the plots. We then installed water loggers, which essentially are giant 2" wide PVC pipes with holes drilled in the bottom half. Once you install them in the ground with an auger (to drill a hole in the dirt), you place it in the ground. Then when you want to figure out where the water table is, you can do that a few different ways. (Mainly with dropping a measuring tape into the hole and figuring out how deep the water is.) We got back to campus just in time for me to swing by Aux to pick up my package- allergy pills and a hammock I ordered from Amazon. Protip- if you take allergy pills, get them from Amazon. They're only like $13 for a 365 day supply of the generic stuff. You cannot beat that. Also, I've just really wanted a hammock for awhile. I'll see if I can get around to using it sometime tomorrow. In short- -my arms are dead -my whole body is sore -I'm so glad the weekend is here so I can just (mostly) veg out - Tidmarsh was wonderful and the weather couldn't have been much better

Tomorrow we decided to get up and out to the plots at 7 am, meaning we have to get up around 6 am to eat breakfast, change, yadda yadda. I was goning to post some photos here, but the wifi is so ridiculous and pathetic that ya’ll will have to wait till the weekend to see them. At any rate, I’ll probably post them to Facebook. 

Todd the postdoc was talking to himself yet again today in the bog as we were setting up our plots. "What'd you do this summer?" "Oh, I just dug some trenches." -Todd to himself "And drained a wetland" -me to Todd "Yeah I drained a swamp, but not like Donald Trump said he would. I swear I'm an environmentalist!" -Todd again "It's all in the name of science!" -me to Todd So today, as you might have guessed from our conversation, we dug some trenches to drain the water so that we could essentially drain the wetland. I promise we are actually environmental scientists, and we're doing this in the name of science. We can mix biochar into our plots which have anywhere from 1-3 inches of water in them, because it'll just end up floating and going into other plots and causing all sorts of chaos that we aren't looking to get into. Speaking of rain and flooded wetlands, it seems as though every day we go out there, we end up seeing more and more water in our plots! That's not possible (at least it shouldn't be possible) because it hasn't rained in several days now. Lo and behold, a nice thunderstorm rolled through around 7 pm, drenching our plots. (We assume it drenched our plots- we were already back at the guest house when this occurred.) "Aw, things gonna be drenched tomorrow" -Todd, about our plots which were already covered in water before the thunderstorm rolled through "Wow, you can't even see across the bog" -Todd, stating the obvious, that you actually could not see across the bog from the porch of the guesthouse because of the rain that was coming down Before all of that unfolded, I asked Todd for the keys to the fleet vehicle so I could head out to the store. He told me where the keys were, and off I went. Once I came back with a 6-pack of hard cider, he asked "Wait, so you really just went out to get some cider?" Why, yes, Todd, I did. We were allowed to use their house to cook ourselves dinner once they left for the night. Evan and Gloriana had some meeting they had to attend in Plymouth regarding the restoration of the cranberry bogs. All I wanted to do was heat up my meal in the microwave. Once I figured out where the microwave was, I opened it and put my food inside. Then I pressed "quick start," and the microwave beeped angrily at me. Fine then. So I tried hitting other buttons and nothing. So Todd came over and struggled just as much as I did. Finally, Marge comes over, presses a couple of buttons, and bam, the microwave starts up. What gives?! I just started laughing and laughing, because I couldn't work the microwave for the life of me. Todd opened their fridge, poked around and found a beer he'd enjoy, and then began a hunt for a bottle opener. Todd's bottle opener was at the guest house, a mere one minute walk away. But he didn't want to walk back to the guest house just to open his beer (which wasn't his, but I digress) when he could find a bottle opener in their kitchen. So he opened drawer after drawer, struggling to find a bottle opener. I opened drawer after drawer, and finally found it in a drawer with garlic next to the oven. Strange. Thank GOD the heatwave is over. Tomorrow's high is around 70, maybe. Same goes for the rest of the week. Tomorrow we'll be mixing peat and soil and biochar and adding them to the plots. Todd says it should take us about 1 hour to do 2 plots, and we have 35 plots, meaning it'll take us all of Wednesday and Thursday to amend the plots. (Granted, the 5 control plots are already done because we don't have to add anything to them, so we only have to amend 30 plots.) I am going to read some more of The Omnivore's Dilemma before heading off to bed. Hopefully the frogs won't be as vocal as last night, but that's a stretch. They're already croaking away...

I am sitting on the second floor balcony as I write this, with peepers and other organisms making a wounderous assortment of noises, almost as if a choir. It's so peaceful and nature-y. Marge said the back of my neck was sunburned. As soon as I got in the shower, I could tell my cheeks were sunburnt. I did wear sunscreen and I reapplied twice, but alas, I still managed to burn my super pale skin. Figures. Gloriana (an MHC alum!!!) and her husband, Evan, had us all over for dinner this evening- salmon (Marge is a vegetarian and I don't eat fish), cheeses risotto with peas, and asparagus for dinner. YUM! When we got there around 7 pm after a long day in the field, they offered us cheeses and some crackers, along with either beer, wine, water, or any other beverage they had on hand. I took them up on their offer and asked for some white wine- I knew that was a good bet vs red wine (I haven't had red wine before) or beer (I wasn't sure what hey had on had/I'm more of a hard cider person, anyways). Evan said he had some Chardonnay, so I accepted that offer, and he brought me a glass with the bottle of Chardonnay, which he place in some sort of bottle cooler-thing. I poured myself a glass, had some cheese and crackers, and my night was off to a terrific start. We had dinner on the screened in porch, where we talked about biochar, marijuana, beer, maple syrup, Mount Holyoke, and many other things while we listened to the peepers kick up over the evening. Peepers are frogs that make some sort of peeping noise- you've probably heard them before, making strange assorted noises, especially at night. Finally, it was just a great night filled with good company, except we were the company. Gloriana and Evan invited us into their beautiful, uniquely designed home for a dinner of salmon (which I didn't indulge upon because I don't eat seafood), asparagus, and a cheeses risotto with peas, finished off with vanilla ice cream and Vermont maple syrup. Delicious to say the least after a long day of field work in 90 degree heat, without a cloud in the sky. I had more Chardonnay than I probably should have, causing me to become a bit tipsy, but oh well. (Please excuse any typos or random errors that I may have made in this post because of the Chardonnay.) Tomorrow we begin around 8am, measuring and weighing out the biochar, peat, and soil, all to amend/alter the plots. It'll be a grand time, and it may (or may not!) get broken up by thunderstorms. I'm just glad the heat had finally died down, and I'll be able to sleep well tonight in the guest house. Hoo-rah!

I also packed for the week out at Tidmarsh, and I think I overpacked. I packed my UnderArmour duffle bag and a small L.L.Bean duffle bag, along with my very small Camelbak backpack. But hey, I need field clothes, lounging clothes, snacks, and toiletries for the week.

Tomorrow- TIDMARSH! Weeee! The weather looks beautiful for establishing our plots. I just hope that the area is dry, although that’s a long shot. The bright side is that we’re out there all next week, and the weather looks fabulous! No rain, sun, hurray!

I was only supposed to have one meeting today, but another one popped up last minute, and I managed to get free lunch out of it because it was right during lunch time. Hoo-rah! Played pickup in Northampton today at Oxbow. Pickup is essentially frisbee with a bunch of random people in the area for the summer. Evan was there, and looked homeless because of his dirty shirt and hair that wasn't even remotely under control, several of my teammates were there, and a lot of random dudes from Amherst and UMass ultimate teams were there. And my god were some of them were gorgeous. But I digress. It rained towards the end of the game, which made seeing nearly impossible with rain-covered glasses. But I began to break in my new Adidas cleats, so that's a plus. Tomorrow I go to Tidmarsh- YAY! Just for a few hours to figure out how we are going to set up our experimental plots and such. I'm honestly to pumped, it'll be great.