Chum a Stump, and tree base for 'the bears'!

[charlie g]

Each year when I handel moss and lichen covered tree limbs for fire wood...I whistfully think of the tribes of water bears whose domains I'm disrupting. Okay..I need to get a life!

Just as we all may enjoy a flower bed, a planned garden, this Spring'18 ( today it's snow flurries where I reside!) I am setting up a collection of tree stump 'water bear parks', tree base 'water bear parks'...as soon as above freezing weather predominates the days...I will ad slow-drip bottles to these 'water bear parks'.

For over a year I have noticed how specific stumps, specific tree base mosss assemblages really seem to flourish when periodically chumed with a spatula of garden soil, and sprayed with liquid plant food. But now I will ad drip bottles to a few of the bear parks...and tiny catch basins down stream of where the drip feed first moistens the parks.

A German biologists article on his tree-hole researches of meiofauna/protists gave me incentive to apply these setups this Spring'18. And the International Society of Tardigrade Hunters was a great source of microscopy pleasure we all can experience: https://tardigradehunters.weebly.com/

Charlie Guevara, fingerlakes/US tired of snow flurries...waiting for Spring'18

[charlie g]

So with my selected chumed stumps, and chumed tree bass moss asemblages...I will start DIY drip bottles and down stream catch basins...err...soon as freeze at nights discontinues in my region.

Although it was always free to join...I'm not clear if the ISOTH is still an active society...I guess we can email the academic base of this terrific microscopy/ nature world views society and finfd out.

Charlie Guevara.

[coominya]

Hi charlie. In the freeze do the Tardigrades still live there, underground? Or are they dormant like their furred cousins.

[charlie g]

Hi,comyga, just like the Beatles song: "Oh Bla die, Oh Bla Da...life goes on"..all life communities either go dormant in their habitats...or endure in active metabolic state..in below freezing climate conditions.

My sense here in approx. 43 degree-north latitude of our dear globe, my sense is that once water flows...once freeze of water temps are gone...active growth/ active metabolism resumes...we rejoice in this as: Springtime...a great time for outdoor microscopy! Charlie guevara

[desertrat]

Mentioning your latitude makes me realize how much local geography and weather patterns can have on the local climate. I also live at 43N and 2600 feet elevation, but our winters are much milder than upstate New York and we usually only get a little snow. In the last week we've had really nice spring weather with temperatures in the 70s. Which reminds me I need to get out soon and get some more pond water samples.

[charlie g]

Wow, desert rat (I once kept a wild but caught 'kangaroo rat' as a great pet...I now understand it very dangerous to keep wild rodents due a lot of viruses they may carry...desert rat=kangaroo rat??)...

I always think of Idaho as having severe 'central continental cold air from Canada'...your winters are mild...live and learn!

Very soon it will be wam enough to setup a few DIY drip bottles and see how 'the water bear parks' manifest relative to moss assemblages with no infusions of drip-bottles. Charlie guevara

[desertrat]

Southwestern Idaho along the Snake river plain has mild winters. Some parts of northern Idaho are more like you imagine. There's a town up north, I don't remember if it's McCall or Moscow, but the locals refer to it as "Little Siberia".