Field Notes

<--2023-01-06 12:10:00 | 2023-02-01 14:05:00-->
Other sites visited today: Gilbert Tract | Bouldin Alfalfa | Hill Slough

Bouldin Corn: 2023-01-19 12:00:00 (DOY 19)
Author: Daphne Szutu
Others: Kyle

Summary: Regular data collection/cleaning, cold and breezy, more line power outages in the past 2 weeks, 7550 thermometer bad--swapped

2023-01-19
Bouldin Corn

Kyle and I arrived at 12:00. It was cold, mostly overcast, and windy. The water level at the tower is still high, and our three neighboring wheat fields (S, E, SE) are fully inundated now. Charlotte was also on site, waiting on Picarro as they remotely checked diagnostics on the analyzer. The set of 9 chambers are on dry ground on the slope, directly below the road.

During our last site visit, we had removed both boardwalks for storm prep. Charlotte, Kyle, and I worked together to put both boardwalks up so we could service the tower. The water level was so high that I got some water in my boots while we hefted the heavy boardwalk around on the soft ground.

Kyle cleaned flux and rad sensors. There were some fresh, red entrails on the edge on the Arable Mark 3, with one edge of the entrail stretching all the way from the Arable to the phenocam enclosure. I temporarily removed one of the Arable spikes to poke the entrail off our sensors.

I downloaded met, cam, USB, PA, and IRT data. There have been a few more power outages in the last 2 weeks, each about a day or less. There were some short, mis-dated files on the PA card but the majority of the data was ok. CardConvert could not access the fast IRT data at first, but it worked fine after I repaired the IRT microSDcard in the lab, so we have complete IRT data. Both the PA and IRT issues were probably caused by the recent power outages.

I swapped out the 7550 thermometer. The broken one is one of the homemade ones. I think they tend to go bad after the inside gets wet.

dfPAR was working here but I checked the enclosure because some enclosures had water pooled at the bottom with the recent rain. This enclosure had about 1/2cm of water on the bottom. I dumped it out but I think I pulled out one of the screws holding the plastic box to the metal bracket. The sensor is still level but a little loose. I'll look at it more next time. I think one of the screws holding the PAR sensor to the top of the enclosure was rusted, so water is coming in through the screwhole (even though there was an o-ring), if not in more places.

I tightened the two tiedowns on the east side of the tower. They were only a little loose.

The 7500 read: 626ppm CO2, 401mmol/m3 H2O, 146.8C, 102.2kPa, 102SS
The 7500 with new thermometer read: 422ppm CO2, 368mmol/m3 H2O, 10.1C, 102.4kPa, 102SS (did not clean)
The 7700 read: 2.0ppm CH4, 32RSSI --> 78 after cleaning

We left at 13:25 PST and drove by a researcher looking for banded Aleutian cackling geese. She said there aren't many this year near our site because the recent storms have scattered all of the flocks.

I thought about driving the back way to alfalfa, but there was a giant mud pit right where we turn left to go east. I u-turned to try the road that goes behind the duck club, but that didn't look great either. I ended up exiting the usual way, up the muddy on-ramp to get back onto Highway 12.

0 photos found

6 sets found

17 BC_met graphs found