Field Notes

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Other sites visited today: Mayberry | Vaira

Tonzi: 2024-02-16 10:45:00 (DOY 47)
Author: Joe Verfaillie
Others: Sophie, Troy, Jess, Francis

Summary: Set up the SIF trailer, replaced cable and reinstalled SHF #2, new old battery for soil co2 cow fence, changed pt den #1 to PST.

Tonzi
2024-02-16

Sophie and I arrived at 10:45. Troy, Jess and Francis from UC Davis were waiting at the gate with the SIF trailer. I was planning to do some maintenance stuff today while Troy and team set up a SIF spectrometer and thermal camera on a trailer mounted telescoping tower next to the Tonzi Tower.

At the site I took down the cow fence and Troy tried to back in the trailer in just north of our tower. There was a soft spot next to the road that the big 4x4 truck couldn’t get enough of a grip to push the trailer slightly up hill to the tower. We tried unhooking the trailer and manually lifting the tongue and pushing but could only manage a foot or so.

While we were standing there scratching our heads, one of the cow ranchers drove up on his quad. He was willing to help and arranged to pull the trailer with the quad while we lifted the tongue. In about three sustained heaves we managed to get the trailer in place. Troy and team spent the rest of the day until dark getting everything mounted, wired, and tied down. The Cow rancher mentioned their rule of thumb that the grass grows when the nighttime and daytime temperatures add up to 100F.

I was hoping to replace a bunch of rotted SHF cables the cows dug up last time. I don’t think they actually damaged the cables but most of the insulation hard rotted off. I dug up SHF #4 sn 00068 that was at the base of the tripod holding the RH/T. It was buried 10cm deep. There were a bunch of insect paths/holes under the plate so maybe only a 1/2 to 1/3 of the bottom side of the plate was actually touching soil. It was a self-calibrating one but we never use that function. I cut off both wires, sealed the heater wires with some heat shrink and spliced a new cable on. It was functional, but I could do a much better job in the lab. I think I’ll see if we have some spare plates in the lab and swap them out for repair. I put this plate back in at 2cm.

I swapped the fence charger battery at soil co2. The cows had broken that fence again but it wasn’t powered. The fence around the main tower had power and was undisturbed. After fixing everything at the soil co2 fence it was working well.

I set the clock on the first point dendrometer – they are all on daylight savings. But I didn’t have a card reader to collect the data. I decided to wait on the others so I can collect the data when I set the time. The serial terminal needs to be configured to buffer your text and only send it when you press enter.

Around 14:30 I went to Varia to check on the pond CR10x that lost some data. I returned about 15:15 to collect Sophie and head for home. Troy and crew continued to get things working before leaving after dark.

Field Data

No tank data

No TZ Well data found

No TZ Moisture Point data found

No VR Moisture Point data found

No TZ grass heigth found

No VR grass heigth found

No TZ Tree DBH found

No water potential data found

No TZ Grass Biomass data found

No TZ OakLeaves Biomass data found

No TZ PineNeedles Biomass data found

4 photos found

20240216TZ_InstallingSIF.jpg ( 2024-02-16 12:11:06 ) Full size: 1920x1440
Installing SIF experiment with Troy, Jess, Francis and Sophie

20240216TZ_HeatFluxPlateSoil.jpg ( 2024-02-16 12:16:39 ) Full size: 1079x1920
Insect paths or holes have removed much of the soil contact on the underside of the heat flux plate