Lab 7

Hitchiti Experimental Forest


The hike we went on during this lab was perhaps my favorite. It is always nice to get out of the class room and enjoy the outdoors. During this lab we did various things such as: identifying plants, witnessing the destruction caused by the southern pine beetle, examining rock formations, discussing controlled forest fires, hugging trees and walking. A few highlights of the trip were finding a harmless garden snake and also getting some much needed exercise.

Our destination for the trip was where the creek that ran through the park met the Ocmulgee river. The rocky river bed of this area contrasted the sandy river bed that is in the city of Macon. We also got to see a example of a hole worn into the bed rock by the forces created by flowing water. Finally, we took a family picture then used the service road for the long trip back to our cars.

    

Lab 6

Jackson Springs and Geology

During this lab, we visited Jackson Springs Park in order to look a rocks located in the river bedrock and in the creek bed in the area. Also, we discussed some of the history of the area.

The river bedrock was largely composed of mica. Also, the lines in the rock tend toward the same direction which is evident in many of the surround rock structures in the area. We then traveled to the park area to take samples from the creek bed. Commonly found rocks in the area were granite, feldspar, and rocks composed from hornblende and quartz.

We also took scoops of the creek bed and put into the separation tool that allowed us to see the different grain sizes of materials in the creek bed. In this we saw many pebbles, sands, and eventually silt.