Field Notes

<--2013-01-17 09:30:00 | 2013-02-14 09:15:00-->
Other sites visited today: DWR Corn | West Pond | Twitchell Rice | Mayberry

Sherman Island: 2013-01-30 12:30:00 (DOY 30)
Author: Cove Sturtevant
Others: Laurie

Summary: Swapped out LI-7500 s/n 0035 for calibrated 0041. No more ants in the box. Might be some sensor-channel mismatch in the Soil CO2 theta probes. Investigate for next time. Swap out Soil CO2 #6 next time to repair associated thermocouple.

Sherman
2013-01-30

We arrived about 12:30 PST. It was fabulous out, and the cows knew it too. Sunny, about 15 °C, with a mild breeze. The field was considerably drier than last time, no mucky parts but still well-trampled with a very short green grass layer. The water under the bridge was considerable but less than usual as well.

I downloaded data, did general tower maintenance, and swapped out the 7500 while Laurie did moisture point, well depth, and installed a new moisture sensor (details below). We unfortunately forgot the soil respiration head, so no soil respiration measurements today.

It appears the ant problem in the big box has been nipped in the bud as a result of the baits I set out two weeks ago. For reference, they are the Terro outdoor liquid bait stations, and they work like sweet syrupy magic on those poor little ants.

LGR readings: 11:31, 24.5 °C, 117.94 Torr (adjusted to 147.8 Torr), 13.86 us, 10 Hz, 2.353 ppm

I removed LI-7500 head and box s/n 0035 and installed head and box s/n 0041.

7500 readings prior to swap (s/n 0035):
CO2: 17.5 mmol m-3 (bumped to 17.7 after cleaning)
H2O: 445 mmol m-3 (bumped to 420 after cleaning)
diag: 248 (247 after cleaning)
p = 102.68 kPa
sos = 341 m s-1

7500 readings after swap (s/n 0041):
CO2: 17.45 mmol m-3
H2O: 380 mmol m-3
diag: 248

The autocam was off when I pulled the card. There were 292 files on the card. This was also the situation at DWR corn, which is interesting, given that it’s been nice and sunny.

Per instructions from Sara, Laurie replaced what appears to be Soil CO2 Theta probe #4 (from its placement in the multiplexor), but we think it was Theta Probe #3 we were really after, since that channel looked a bit low. Sara and I talked and there might be a bit of mismatch between what probes go with which channels, so next time we’re out we should trace each probe to its location in the multiplexor and associate it with the correct channel.

Laurie also checked out the thermocouple wire for SoilT_6, since it is reading _INF, but found no above-ground breaks and that the wiring looked good. Next time we should swap out soil CO2 probe #6 (and associated thermocouple) with a replacement to pull this one in for thermocouple repair.

As a final aside, when I was cleaning the radiation instruments outside the fence, I inadvertently leaned up against the cow zapper (electric fence). Wowee! Quite a jolt, I can see why it keeps the cows out. Laurie can testify on the quality of my yelp.

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7 sets found

No data found for SI_mp.
11 SI_met graphs found