Manoa+Stream+(Mark,+Taylor,+Staci,+Nana)

Mark's Journal



Visit #1 For my semester project, my group and I decided to go to Manoa Stream. Manoa stream is a pretty active stream that starts from Manoa falls and joins in with Palolo stream to form the Manoa-Palolo Drainage Canal; which feeds off into the Ala Wai Canal. From today's visit, it was obvious that the water was unclean; due to the murkiness of the water and the leptospirosis signs. The stream is really lively; with ducks swimming and flying everywhere and trees and bushes growing along the sides of the stream. Today, I counted 28 ducks. On one side of the stream, it's full of houses all the way down and on the other side there is Manoa Valley District Park. Also, along the side with the houses (east side), there is a concrete side walk, which the ducks lay on top and sleep. I also noticed that there are very few fish that live in the stream...i think the ducks prey on them for food (predator-prey relationship). Someone also created a make-shift dam, which the river flows through and there is also a little island near the center of the stream, where weeds are starting to grow.

I think this is a good location for this project because it's convenient for everyone, being located in manoa.

Visit #2 On our most recent visit, we realized that there were 34 ducks, compared to the 28 from last time. Also, the water seemed to be much more flowing and lively compared to our first visit; this is because couple days before we went to Manoa Stream, there were slight drizzles and rains in the manoa district. But, the topic I will be testing is the plant life and how strong the leaves are in certain areas of the stream. I think this would be a good topic to test my experiment on because the stream is very green and lively with plants. I also noticed that the side of the stream with the houses seem to have more plant life because there is more space compared to the side with the baseball field. But, there is something that might hinder me from completing this experiment because it seems that on the lower side of the stream, there is less trees and more grass, so leaves of the same type are very scarce.

Assigned Journal #2 While watching and observing the life of the stream, I noticed that there isn't an abundant amount of larger fish, there are only small ones swimming here and there. I think this is because of a predator-prey relationship between the ducks and the fish. While i was waiting for my group, i went onto the bridge, just to get a look of the stream from a different view and i saw ducks swimming around and dunking their heads under the water. As i looked closer, i realized that there was a school of guppies swimming around, avoiding the ducks. From this example, you can see that there is a predator-prey relationship that takes place in Manoa stream. Also from this example, it was obvious that the ducks works together to catch the fish because they seemed to surround the fish and attack by taking turns. I think this would be a "mutualism" type of relationship because all the ducks benefit from living and working together. I didn't really notice any type of competition, the ducks and fish kind of just do whatever they want; there was no type of "taking over" type of thing. And lastly, i think there is a type of invasive species at manoa stream, which is the long, california looking grass that is everywhere.

Visit #3 On my third visit to Manoa stream, i looked for plants that grew both on the top and bottom parts of the stream so i can collect leaves to experiment with. Since there were none, i decided to change my topic from leaves to the current (speed) of the water. Since i went to the stream during the day and afternoon times on the same day, i noticed that the water is much clearer during the afternoon and wondered if it would change the flow (speed) of the stream or if the flow (speed) affected the clarity of the stream. The stream would be faster (more flowing) in the morning because the rain water from the valley would be more plentiful in the morning than the afternoon (since the all the rain water from the valley is already downstream.) If there was no rain the night before you visit Manoa stream, the stream would be clear because the water would move slower; not kicking up and dirt. If we were to cut the grass down, in a matter of about a week, it will be grown back again because of the abundant amount of water. If we were to float a duck in the same area, just test them at different times of the day, the experiments taking place in the morning will go quicker because the water is flowing faster.

Assigned Journal #3Some things that may drive natural selection in my ecosystem is the fish. Whether, the fish are more camouflaged to the environment or if they are just faster than the others. This is "survival of the fittest" and seeing who can survive the ducks feeding frenzy. Another thing that may drive natural selection in my ecosystem are the plants. Since they all need sunlight, and there is a gigantic amount of plants and grass; who can retain the most sunlight will succeed and grow larger (taking in more sunlight.)

From the beginning of this project until now, i have seen a huge difference in the plant growth, the grass is much taller and out of control from before. Visit #4The observations from last time were quite the same; the morning water was more cloudy and flowing faster compared to the afternoon water, where it was calmer and the turbidity was higher. The only thing is that this time, the water was flowing much faster because there was some isolated showers in the Manoa district. To conduct my experiment, first of all, I had to go to Manoa Stream and set up my equipment. I conducted my two experiments on Sunday, November 30 and Sunday, December 7. For my experiment, I collected data through time; the amount of time it takes for the duck to go down stream for ten feet. These visits went by sort of fast because I decided to go by myself instead of my group so there weren’t any disruptions. But, my mom and my brother came to help me take pictures and video. I conducted my experiment by first of all, placing a ten-foot string among the side of the water to use as my measuring system. After doing so, I got my rubber duck and placed it over the water, waiting for my mom to say, “go” and start the stopwatch. After releasing the rubber duck into the stream, I would run down to the bottom of the line with my net and wait for the duck to flow down and cross the finish line. I told my mom, “stop” and she would give me the time to write down on my notebook. I did this experiment two times just to make sure that both times were in the ballpark. I also conducted this experiment in two different parts of the stream, one on the top (near the hala tree) and one on the bottom (on the little man-made island). The stream is flowing faster in the morning than the afternoon because the water from Manoa falls flows faster in the morning due to the rain from night. By the time afternoon comes, the rainwater has already flowed down the stream. Assigned Journal Entry #4: Carbon Cycle =Taylor's Journal=

__**Free Journal #1 **__ Staci Mihara, Nana Aso, Mark Ogata and I originally planned on going to Sandy Beach to observe the tide pools (note picture of Sandy Beach with Mark's journal entry) but instead we agreed to observe nature at Manoa Stream instead. The area we observed was by the baseball field next to the parking lot and indoor gym and the basketball courts. This is a prime (: place to study because as Mark said, it's convenient for everyone in our group to get there: Staci lives at Punchbowl, Mark's parents can drive him there and I can pick up Nana on the way to the stream. Not only is it convenient, but it's a safe place to bring expensive belongings like laptops and cameras, because there aren't really that many ways to damage it besides from dropping it into the stream or on the ground, not like the difficulties we would face at Sandy's, with the waves and water everywhere.

At Manoa stream, the main animal organism would be the ducks (or at least the most visible) because the ducks are EVERYWHERE, either floating on top of the water or on the grass/cement/rocks. The duck's niche would most likely be the stream in general because their location is all up and down the view of the stream. I'm not too sure what the ducks eat, but usually ducks eat fish, so my hypothesis is that fish make up the duck's diet - either that or the plant life around the stream. Regular grass, hala tree leaves and other plants that surround the area because ducks can eat as much as they want wherever they want as long as they're willing to walk there and I don't know exactly how far they walk.
 * __Assigned Journal #1 __**

Other organisms are the fish or tadpoles that live in the water and around the rocks of the stream although we did not observe those organisms as closely as the plants or ducks. But the plants that were there were mostly the same shade of green, suggesting the same health level through them all, even though the water is very dirty and has leptospirosis in it (as well as duck doodoo)

** When we were at Manoa Stream, Mark and Nana counted the number of ducks to be 34 ducks. Staci and I took pictures. My main focus when visiting the streams would be to see the water level difference each time we visit the stream. This week was kind of rainy (but not too hard) in Manoa and the water levels rose a little bit. Although I didn’t take an accurate reading, because I didn’t have a ruler, I measured the water depth/height by putting a piece of construction paper in the water until it reached the bottom of the stream and measured up to where the water mark went. The watermark went up almost to the top of the paper with about a 4-inch dry area margin. The water level where I tested was near the edge of the stream (because I didn’t want to go into the water) and almost by the rocks. ** I didn’t step onto a rock and measure the water because I’ve noticed that there’s a “bump” in the stream where some of the rocks are dry and aren’t completely submerged in the stream, meaning the water level would be exceptionally low there and it wouldn’t be an accurate measurement of the area of the whole stream.
 * __Free Journal #2  __ **

A symbioses relationship that the organisms in Manoa Stream share would be between the two species of the ducks and the plants because the wild ducks mainly eat the vegetation surrounding the stream and the plants that they eat get a steady, constant flow of water from the stream.
 * __Assigned Journal Entry #2 __**

At Manoa Stream, the water levels seemed to be the same and the rocks that were there last time were in almost the same amount of water because there wasn’t a significant change in the water levels. When I did the construction paper test, the water was around the same and there was about the same margin of dry area (4-inches). This would mean that the only factor that would change the water levels would be the rainfall prior to our visits to the stream. This is a potential problem because we only visit the stream once a week (Saturdays at around 10 am) and there might’ve been a heavy rainfall earlier in the week that wouldn’t have a drastic affect on it by the time of our next visit. My hypotheses are: 1) If there is a heavy rainfall in the beginning of the week, then the water level of the stream won’t have a difference of more than around an inch because the rainfall in the Manoa district is the main factor in the water level each week. 2) If there is a heavy rainfall the day of or the day before our visit to Manoa Stream, then the water would rise exponentially and the rocks in the water would be completely submerged because the rainwater would fill the stream and the water would overflow onto the sides of the stream. 3) If there were a dramatic increase of plants around the stream, then the water level would drop slightly because the extra plants would need the stream water to grow. ^This is the "bump" in the stream as referred to in free journal entry #2. The picture below this is where I took my observations for the testing:
 * __Free Journal #3 __**