BioBlitz was an event I will never forget because of the tortuous heat, the walking, bugs, and a most importantly, a new learning experience. When I arrived at the ferry, I signed in, got a t-shirt and hat, and waited for the buses to arrive to take us to Fresh Kills. During the bus ride, I was assigned a group and I was lucky enough to be a in a group with my friends. Upon our arrival we were told to go the tents to meet the rest of the members in our group, as well as the guides who would be helping us during this process. My group was assigned Lichens. Personally, I had a great amount of trepidation because I had never heard of lichen or even seen what one looks like. My guides, Jessie and Naomi, were graduate students who were studying these intriguing organisms. They gave us materials including magnifying glasses, ruler, a string, and a sheet to collect data. From a five minute speech about lichens (because they realized that none of us knew what a lichen was by …show more content…
We were given a clear sheet with nine boxes containing ten circles within each of them. We were told to place the sheet on top of the lichen and look for other lichens in that area and tree barks. We did this on each side of the tree: north, east, south, and west. There was only one lichen on the tree and it was on the south side. We then classified it as being a crutose lichen with some help from our guides. We then measured the circumference of the tree and took some samples. We repeated this for another tree when coming back to the tents. The lichens that were found that day were mostly crustose lichens. In the tents, we got to observe the samples collected from each group under a microscope. We did some calculations to see what percent of the lichen was in the area that was mapped out according to our clear sheet with nine