What to bring

• Raingear, Lunch and water, Handlens, Plant Id book (and any lichen books),Container (pack) for lichens

One of the techniques for estimating/sampling lichens makes use of the fact that they are often loosely attached to the trees. With the recent windstorm, many lichens were blown off the trees and branches were also dislodged. Scatterfall plots consist of looking at all of the lichens that have fallen, estimating their abundance and identifying them. Although we won’t be able to identify all the lichens, getting them to genus shouldn’t be too difficult for the common ones. What type of lichens are likely to be missed by scatterfall sampling?

1. Materials needed: notebook, plant id book, meter stick.
2. Randomly select an area to sample in the old-growth forest. One way to do a "semi-random" sample, is to have you and your partner randomly pick numbers between 1 and 100. Assign compass directions to each number and then pace off the numbers chosen. Make this spot a particular corner of your plot. e.g. you pick 77; your partner picks 12. So you pace 77 paces perpendicular to the trail and then 12 parallel. Make this the SW corner of your plot.
3. Measure and mark the corners of your plot (a square 1 m on a side). Use some sticks
4. Collect a sample of each type of lichen in your plot. Include any lichens that are on fallen sticks. For each lichen type, count and record the number of individual lichens found. An individual is one lichen so a stick may contain many individuals.
5. Record your data in a notebook e.g Lichen A (you have a sample of Lichen A for identification later), then the number of individuals for Lichen A etc.
6. After you are done with your plot, rate the abundance for each lichen using the following codes: 1-rare (less than 3 individuals, 2-uncommon (4-10 individuals), 3- common (10-25 individuals, 4- Abundant (>25 individuals)

See how many of the species on your list you can find.