Mull Wood Report
Referral/Deferral Mull Wood Report instructions 2020-21 (Ecology 4209NATSCI)
Mull Wood Report
For those to complete the Mull Wood report via a deferral or referral, please use the data set provided below. For this report, you will have to apply the same rules and regulations as for the original Mull Wood report (see Mull Wood Practical & Report Handout 2020-21 on CANVAS). The report should be limited to 2000 words and should have a clear introduction including aims, objectives and predictions, a method section, results, discussions and potentially conclusions/recommendations. Statistical analysis and graphical presentation of data should be presented for the light intensity and the mycorrhiza data (instead of leaf litter depth), and results should be compared and discussed in the context of literature and the wider impact of your results. Since you cannot take mean values of pH (pH is recorded on a log scale), you may want to transfer pH values into H+ ion concentrations before you perform any statistics.
Please use the Mull Wood Practical & Report Handout and the Mull Wood Report Guidance Notes and Marking Criteria (available on CANVAS under Mull Wood Materials) to obtain more detailed information regarding methods, structure and the presentation of results and statistics. You are also encouraged to read and quote the literature provided on CANVAS (see Mull Wood Literature). Further guidance can be obtained from a poor EXAMPLE Field Report and from a good EXAMPLE Field Report on CANVAS (see Mull Wood Materials).
Please note that the deadline for the Mull Wood coursework deferral/referral submission is
02 July 2021
Please submit a hard copy (doc, docx, pdf) in the respective Canvas column or by email to the module leader Torsten Wronski (T.Wronski@ljmu.ac.uk).
Referral/deferral data set 2020-21
1, 2) Tree density and forest cover stratification diagram (community structure)
Mature trees were classified as any tree over 3m height and made up most of the top story (canopy). Saplings were classified as up to 3 m and made up part of understory. Shrubbery, which included Rhododendron and bramble, was classified as 1-3 m and was part of shrub layer. Ground cover (leaf litter) was the top covering above soil, for example herbs, ferns and mosses.
| Area with low density rhododendron | Area with high density rhododendron |
| Mature trees: 47, broad mixture of oak (13), alder (3), ash (4), hazel (10), birch (13), Unknown (4). Top story height approx. 13 m. | Mature trees: 21, mainly oak trees (11), established before rhododendron colonized understory, with sycamores (2), and an ash (1), closer to path on periphery, also birch (8), top story up to 15m. |
| Saplings: 22, a mixture of willow possibly (crack), alder, oak and birch. | Saplings: 5, these looked less healthy than in the other plot due to less branching and thinner canopy, all but one birch. |
| Shrub cover: 10% Rhododendron cover just starting to colonize in clumps up to 2m height. 70% bramble cover, thick and up to 2m high in places. Ferns/bracken 5%, bare ground 15% | Shrub cover: 70% Rhododendron, 30% bramble, growing dense and up to 3m high. |
| Ground cover: Mixture of leaf litter with hazel and oak leaves, identified majority oak, areas of moss growing on ground, fungi growing in places. | Groundcover leaf litter, mainly Rhododendron and oak. Near path, there were root blocks of either fern or bracken and some grass in sparse clumps. |
| Observations, small stream running through middle of area, evidence of rabbits with large deposits of droppings. Ladybird found in dead tree leaf hibernating. Little dead wood. | Observation: path ran around edge of area. Dead wood in area including 3 fallen trees, most likely oak and 2 rotten stumps. Obvious differences were health of trees amount of top story cover was less than in low-density area. 15 wasp galls found on sapling. |
- Soil pH
| No-Rhododendron | 9.26 | 8.30 | 7.61 | 7.84 | 7.63 | 7.70 | 6.95 | 6.59 | 6.36 | 6.51 |
| Rhododendron | 7.0 | 6.57 | 6.35 | 5.99 | 6.06 | 6.04 | 6.01 | 5.76 | 5.85 | 6.41 |
- Light readings
| No-Rhododendron | 33.70 | 58.32 | 20.57 | 14.99 | 35.45 | 21.75 | 21.93 | 10.75 | 10.96 |
| Rhododendron | 27.68 | 33.87 | 18.89 | 27.44 | 26.22 | 21.68 | 12.32 | 13.13 | 31.75 |
- Mycorrhiza fungi species richness
Test for differences in the species abundance between the Rhododendron and the no-Rhododendron plot. The following 15 mycorrhiza species abundance samples were obtained from Mull Wood:
| Rhododendron | No-Rhododendron |
| 3 | 4 |
| 2 | 5 |
| 1 | 6 |
| 4 | 7 |
| 3 | 6 |
| 2 | 7 |
| 4 | 8 |
| 5 | 5 |
| 3 | 8 |
| 1 | 5 |
| 2 | 11 |
| 3 | 8 |
| 2 | 9 |
| 1 | 5 |
| 13 | 12 |
- Leaf Litter invertebrates
Ten times a handful of soil (leaf litter) was scooped onto a white plastic tray.
No-Rhododendron plot
- Worms x2
- Springtail x1
Woodlice x1
Slug x1
Worm x1
- Snail x1
Caterpillar x1 - Roundworm x1
Slug x3
- Springtail x2
- Roundworm x1
Woodlice x1
Springtail x1
- Roundworm x2
Insect Larvae x6
Woodlice x1
*In this area ladybirds were seen hibernating on the trees*
Rhododendron plot
- Worm x1
- Insect Larvae x1
- Spring Tail x1
- Insect Larvae x1
- Millipede x1
Insect Larvae x1
- Woodlice x1
Insect Larvae x2