sheetalbhatia's Journal

This week, once again, I was very busy and didn't have any time to go anywhere. However, I wasn't too worried about not getting any observations into iNaturalist because I knew there would probably be many different mushrooms, most likely bigger and more apparent ones, since its been about two weeks since it has rained with off and on showers. I took yet another walk around my neighborhood from 12:45-1:15pm on November 2, trying to find as many mushrooms as I could and just as I expected I found a wide variety of different mushrooms! I tracked around 2,473 steps with an incline equivalent to 8 flights of stairs. As it has been my second week of observing mushrooms, I looked particularly closely in areas where I thought they would be growing. For example, near rocks, in small damp crevices, along the edge of the sidewalk where the grass and cement meet and where water may collect, as well as general areas of damp grass. I expect to have more time next week to possibly visit Coyote Point Marina in Foster City or possibly Laurelwood Park in San Mateo.

This week I went to Kiteboard Beach at Mariners Point in Foster City. I went around 1:15pm on November 12 as I expected the tide to be low during that time. The tide was very low and shoreline was covered in sea lettuce and alga as well as sponges. The temperature was quite warm since the suns rays were beaming down as I looked around the beach, and there was little to no breeze. My main goal was to just find a sponge which I did in fact find as they were abundant along the shoreline. However, I tried to find one with some color to it so that it may be easier to identify as almost all of them were brown. Fortunately I ended up finding a sponge with a orange/red color. I also found an abundance of mushrooms on November 9 during a walk around my neighborhood. Hopefully my sponge or one mushroom that I found get verified as I am in need of one more phylum.

This week I did not go anywhere in particular as I already have 10 phylums covered and I also had quite a busy schedule. However, I did go on a few walks this week around my neighborhood and particularly on November 18 around 4:30pm, I found some moss on a tree near my house. It was a little cloudy and cold outside and I walked about 3,000 steps in total during that walk. In addition, I didn't find too many mushrooms on my walk on November 16 around 1:15pm; however, I did find some along the edge of the sidewalk pavement where it met the front yard of one my neighbor's homes. It was a little cooler that day as well and I tracked an incline equivalent to 8 flights of stairs.