Solo Hike 2

What I see:

• Nature in a relatively pure form, aside from the cars and streets, this is undisturbed
• still lots of birds
• the light shining through the trees lets me see the small insects flying in bunches
• the shadowed basketball court, this time with no one on it
• the big glare off of the house across from me

What I hear:

• Lots of cars today, many more than last time
• Wind and leaves
• More insects, but mainly bees and crickets
• Car doors closing
• Distant music

What I smell:

• The dampness of the dew still there from the morning
• Lots of flowers that are just starting to bloom
• Freshly cut grass
• The eucalyptus tree that looms directly above me

About Me!

I’m a bay area guy. My family has been here for years; my great-grandparents moved here in 1942 and both my parents were raised close by. I have lived at my moms house in Richmond for my entire life, and have moved countless places around the Bay Area with my Dad and Stepmother. I have not really had an impact ecologically, but I am beginning to get more out into nature, and help my mom in the garden. I wrote a book about To Kill A Mockingbird a few years ago as a project that received an A. My favorite animal is the Panda Bear, an animal that I have liked since preschool and an animal my grandmother adored. I really hope that Richmond cleans up. Even though this will be a very gradual change, I think that the process of removing most of the bad areas and connecting the communities will be great for my city. I don’t spend a whole lot of time in my town. I go to school in Marin and I basically come home and stay in the house. Most of the other activities that I am a part of take place in cities surrounding Richmond because there is not a whole lot to do in my city. I recommend that people do not come into Richmond scared. Many people are under the impression that the entire city is bad neighborhoods but it is not so. Most of Richmond is not like this and people would find this out if they actually came to Richmond. Just be friendly, and all will be well!

Here is a picture of me in my natural element, on the baseball field.

Berry Challenge!

Taking a plant under my wing was an interesting task to handle. There has only been one other time where I had to take care of a plant on my own (a vegetable garden) and I did not pay that much attention to it. My strawberry though, was a different story. I placed it in a, area on the side of my house that receives sunlight for most of the day. At the beginning, it was very easy to take care of because of the frequent rains of the spring, but it has gotten increasingly difficult as of late. With the work load kicking up,and me not getting home until 7 o'clock, I had trouble remembering to water the plant. However, once the first bud popped up, I was determined to grow the plant into a fully developed plant that would match my grandmother's plant which yields about 10 berries per year.

Observations:

• The plant is growing very fast
• It looks like something's eating it...
• There are new leaves almost every day
• New buds are popping up almost daily
• It looks like the plant is dying. Leaves are turning red, and a bud looks dead too
• Why are leaves dying
• More leaves dying, this doesn't make sense!
• I'm watering well, not too often, not too far between
• My first strawberry is finally here, how long will it take?
• Berry from green -> white
• The berry is getting red from the bottom up
• Almost all the way ripe!
• The berries are pretty good, do they taste better when the plant is older?

Community Information

Come one, come all! Richmond is the new place to be for all of the hummingbirds in the bay area. With plants that you love like salvia, fuchsia, petunias, and jasmine you are guaranteed to have a great time. All of these plants flourish in the climate of Richmond, so you don't ALL have to go to that one house anymore! There is also lots of shelter, including your favorite trees to nest in. If you come to Richmond, there will be lots of chances to put on a show for the humans who grow plants strictly to see you fly up, and drink their nectar. The climate is perfect too, so you don't have to worry about huddling up with your mate(s) in the winter. Your babies will be safe here too, there are virtually no predators that you have to worry about avoiding like you have to do in Marin. You will feel very safe letting your kids go off into the wild to get the hang of flying. Richmond is the perfect city for you and your family! For more information, visit www.nikkosberryberry.com we hope to see you soon!

Solo Hike 1

Solo Hike 1: This spot is very peaceful. I still see lots of cars, but the sound of the every day traffic is distant.

What I see:

• Lots of plants, grass, trees.
• There are lots of birds too. Swallows, jays, crows, and some I don't know the names of
• The basketball court is full of people, as it usually is on a friday night.
• Only the occasional car drives by.

What I hear:

• Birds chirping
• insects buzzing, but I don't know where it's coming from
• Tires on the concrete
• Basketball shoes squeaking on the blacktop
• the rustle of the leaves of trees

What I feel:

• Like this is how I should
• This park is very quiet, I should have taken the time to sit here before
• Places like this should be more popular instead of playing video games.

Food Web, Native vs. Non-Native, Ecology

The food web in Richmond is very small. Due to the lack of wildlife, there is not very many, if any predators in the area. The largest predators are domestic cats, there are no snakes, deer, foxes, wolves, or any other predators that roam free in large, open areas like Novato. The most dominant decomposers in Richmond are worms. They have a very strong presence in my garden, and in the gardens near our house. The insects that dominate are aphids, which are then eaten by the ladybugs. There are also dragonflies, beetles, bees, wasps, and the occasional preying mantis in the garden as well. The birds feed on all of the different types of insect, and sometimes a cat will kill and eat a bird. The biodiversity in Richmond mostly comes from plants, not from animals. There are many, many different types of plants in the area that are native, and non-native as well. Compared to the amount of biodiversity that the california floristic province had, Richmond is a very disappointing city. There are not lots of different trees, or animals like the CFP has. Humans have had a profound effect on the biodiversity in Richmond. The removal of all of the wild plants during the industrialization made many species rapidly disappear from the city, leaving only the animals that were fit to survive still in the area. We have also had a large effect on the CFP. The way that we have treated such fertile land has lead to it being really tough to restore it to its natural state.

Native plants are very helpful to an ecosystem. Plants native to any area support the wildlife that is native, giving the animals food and shelter in a plant that they are familiar with. When an area has lots of native plants, the area usually thrives because of the natural balance that the plants and animals have with each other. Plants and animals that are both native to a certain area easily coexist, so the area thrives. On the contrary, non-native plants are often invasive. This means that the plan spreads extremely quickly, and often kills off native plants and animals by taking the sun, and root space from the plants, leading to the death of the native plant. This eventually will kill the native animals because they do not have shelter, and cannot quickly adapt to a new environment. The only naturally occurring body of water near my house is the Pacific ocean. But one body of water has a large effect on my town, and the surrounding areas. I live about 10 minutes away from the San Pablo Reservoir. This reservoir supplies water for Richmond, and most of the rest of the east bay as well. The reservoir's levels had been very low for the last four, or five years, but with the heavy rains of late 2010, and early 2011, the reservoir overflowed for the first time since 2006.

Vegetation

There is not very much vegetation in my town. The houses are relatively close together making wild plants scarce. Some native plants include, iris, lilies, penstemon, poppies, erigeron, salvia, aquilegia, heucheria, and digitalis. These flowers are not common in the wild, but due to the fact that they are native, they are very popular in gardens in the area. My mom's garden is home to most of these plants as well. Before the heavy development that took place in Richmond, the city was a grassland. The city of Richmond is very flat, and without houses the city would be a very large grassland with native flowers, and trees growing abundantly. Some of these native trees are the madrone, pacific dogwood (these cause major allergies), tanbark oak, california laurel, incense cedar, and the catalina redwood. The soil at my house is very good. The way that it has been treated over the years has greatly improved the soil from a dry and hard soil to a soil that is very light and airy. Our backyard soil is very dark and rich because we have used lots of grape seed and shell compost that greatly enriches the soil. The soil is always moist, and there always lots of worms in it.