Life on the Outer Coast

I think it was a bit late when I was writing last night's post. A 9,000 years before present carbon layer wasn't likely to come from pine forest fires as Pine was mostly displaced by that point in time by Spruce and alders. Should probably think abit more about what I'm writing now and then. Sitka spruce isn't a tree that I associate much with fires. I suspect it would have germinated well in the exposed mineral soil that might have been the result of the fires, but it is hard to imagine that species too happy in a dry climate. Maybe the climate was similar to that of the southern coast of British Columbia.

I did talk to Tom Ager about the carbon layer. He hadn't heard specifically about the charcoal layer that Jim Baichtal talked about last night, but said that it did fit in well with the evidence suggesting a warm dry early Holocene climate along the coast of British Columbia through the Gulf of Alaska. The dry, warm period seems to have lasted for a couple of thousand years. The few charcoal layers that Tom has radiocarbon dated came from the same period. He has not looked for charcoal specifically, but found some exposed peat located in road cuts and quarrys.

Managed to bump into Jim Baichtal this morning while searching for coffee. Fortunately for me, he was quite happy to answer my questions about last nights talk. I confirmed that it was the slightly more liquid lower crust that was being displaced. He also said that the thinner, denser oceanic crust was more flexible than the continental crust, bulges more readily? He said he would send a few of the powerpoint slides that pertained to Sitka and a protocol he had developed for sampling in marine clays.

I've included the photo collage that John Hudson sent of the root wad we found in the west valley last week. It was a small tree for the stand, but is a nice start for looking at root wad colonization. I should probably return and measure the size and record a little information about the area.

Looked at the channel on my way back in the building this afternoon, the 85 common mergansers caught my eye. Seems like a greater number than I typically see.