Diario de sheetalbhatia

This week I did not get to visit Half Moon Bay as my allergies acted up quite severely resulting in my stay at home for most of the week. However, I did in fact get to find many species of lichen around my neighborhood. On September 29, I went on a walk around my neighborhood and found not only lichens, but flowers, a lizard, and a wolf spider as well. I began this walk around 2 pm so it was quite warm outside. I walked up and down hills and had an overall count of 3000 steps. I also uploaded some observations that I took last week from Central Park which I did not upload last week (the observation of the American Crow was from today). Next week I hope to visit the Fitzgerald Marine Reserve in Half Moon Bay to find different crabs and other types of aquatic animals.

This week I went to Seal Point Park, Ryder Park and Mariners Point in Foster City. I arrived at Ryder Park around 3:00pm and was in search of some birds. It was quite windy, yet the weather was still pretty warm. I walked a total of 4,000 steps with no major incline. I first visited Ryder Park where I found quite a few different plants as well as what I thought to be a wasp. I then crossed a small bridge to Seal Point Park where I found a butterfly and some other plant species in addition to many different birds. After this, I drove to Mariners Point which was further down the street where there was a small isolated beach. The tide was high so it was difficult to find crabs and snails. However, I did in fact find some sea lettuce washed up on the shoreline. I hope to visit again when the sea is very low so it may be best to visit during the morning hours.

Today I went with my bestie Carson to Fitzgerald Marine Reserve and Pescadero State Beach. We first arrived at Fitzgerald Marine Reserve around 9:30 am this morning. The weather was not too cold or warm, but it was breezy. We climbed some onto some rocks to look tidepools and we did in fact find some up on the higher rocks as the tide was somewhat high. I found some sea anemones, barnacles, and a dead crab. There were also a lot of red algae washed up from the tide. After spending about 45 minutes there we then went to Pescadero State Beach where I also saw an anemone, but there weren't any crustaceans visible. We spent about 40 minutes there as well. There were a lot of rocks and inclines we had to go through in order to explore the beach as much as we could. In total I walked about 3,500 steps. It would be hard to go at low tide which would be very early in the morning and later in the evening since it's a far drive for us. However, I will definitely go again to Fitzgerald Marine Reserve, possibly during the evening to look for other aquatic organisms such as starfish.

This week I had a very busy schedule and barely had time to go outside. However, I did manage to go on a walk outside around my neighborhood after it had rained. I expected to possibly see some earthworms, but the sidewalks were drying up so there weren't too many in plain sight. Some may have dried up and thus, not easy to distinguish. Although, I did find one earthworm that looked like it may have been stepped on, then dried up since its posterior end looked shriveled up. It hasn't been raining long enough for the mushrooms to emerge from the soil so I am looking forward to going outside next week and in the hopes of finding some different mushrooms which I have yet to observe.

This week I was very busy in terms of my schedule so I didn't get a chance to go anywhere. However, thankfully it rained an ample amount about a week ago and has been drizzling over the past week so I was hoping to find some mushrooms. I went on a walk around 1:45 to 2:20 pm on October 30 around my neighborhood, expecting to find some mushrooms sprouted above the ground. I took about 1,700 steps in addition to an equivalent of 7 flights in incline. A lot of my neighbors had gorilla hair in their front yard, most of which was already dried up, so it was hard to find mushrooms along the edges of those yards. Although, there were a few homes that had soil in the front yard that was still wet near the edge of the sidewalk and I luckily found some mushrooms there. The most common places where I found mushrooms were next to a big rock or in small crevices. I hope to possibly go to Kiteboard Beach at Mariners Point in Foster City next week to find some sponges.