Field Notes

<--2020-09-10 14:25:00 | 2020-10-05 10:45:00-->
Other sites visited today: East End | West Pond | Bouldin Alfalfa
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Bouldin Corn: 2020-09-23 13:30:00 (DOY 267)
Author: Daphne Szutu
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Summary: Regular data collection/cleaning, corn not harvested yet, reburied SHF2, VWC3 reading 9999--not fixed, typo in CR1000 program--fixed, brought 1 FD chamber back to test in lab, brought 1 FD chamber to BA, swapped PurpleAir sensor, power outage 9/22 morning

2020-09-23
Bouldin Corn

I arrived at 13:30 PDT. It was a sunny and breezy day with blue skies and hazy horizons. The corn is dry and brown and has not been harvested, although fields around us have been harvested and mostly disked. Looking at the data, there was a power outage on 2020-09-22 between 7:00 and 11:00, along with some smaller blips every few days.

I downloaded met, camera, and USB GHG data. I topped off the wash reservoir and cleaned flux and rad sensors.
SHF2 had much larger diurnal max than the other 2 SHF plates; I reburied it from the surface to about 2 cm deep.

VWC3 (sn 17133) was reading 7999 since early September. I cycled the power, but the readings did not change. I unwired the sensor to bring it back to the lab to test, but then I remembered that I would have to free it from a spiral of metal conduit, so I thought better of that, re-wired the sensor, and continued troubleshooting. There was a typo in the CR1000 program since 2020-02-20 that caused the datalogger to collect VWC sensor data every 10 minutes into a 600-minute cycle (once every 10 hours). I fixed the typo so the program is now collecting VWC sensor data every 10 seconds into a 600-second cycle (once every 10 minutes). The 10-second delay allows the sensors to warm up before the measurement. The sensor read 0 in air and 9999 in soil. I tried switching the wiring with the adjacent, working channel, but that did not seem to make a difference. In the end, Iâ€™m not sure what was wrong with the sensor so maybe I will have to bring it back to the lab next time anyways.

It was a little tricky to troubleshoot the VWC sensors because the datalogger only measures them every 10 minutes instead of every 30 seconds. I ended up fudging the laptop time so that it would be closer to the 10-minute interval. Thereâ€™s probably a better way, like with flags I can set through LoggerNet. Before I left, I double-checked that my cellphone, laptop, and datalogger time all matched.

I also downloaded and cleared 2 of the FD chambers (sn FD20180048 on a short white collar, sn FD20180067 on a tall black chamber). I removed sn FD20180048 to use at alfalfa, since the 2 chambers there have been collecting only noise. I could not connect to the 3rd chamber (sn FD20180047), so I brought it back to the lab for testing. This one frequently has trouble connecting in the field, but then seems to start up in the lab fine.

I also downloaded PA files and swapped sensors: sn 84f3ebd5ffb1 came back to the lab for testing (it rarely has files saved to the card) and sn 68c63acc07a9 went up. It was tricky to plug the micro-USB power cable into the new PA because the female end is not wedged into tightly enough. I used a small screwdriver to hold the female end in place to plug the power cable in. Try not to disconnect the power at the PA sensor in the future if you need to plug it back in right away.

LI-7500 readings:
CO2 398ppm
H2O 521ppm
T 31.2C
P 101.1kPa
SS 98-->100 after cleaning
LI7700 readings:
CH4 1.94ppm
RSSI 32-->82 after cleaning

I left at 15:25 PDT.

0 photos found

6 sets found

17 BC_met graphs found