Once more, Ms.Mai and I departed YangZhuoRa. This time we were going to investigate net fishing at Lake Erhai for my inquiry project. So far I have been to a cormorant fisher, net seller and a fish seller. This was the first time I would work with a fisher that uses nets. 

Today's Journal entry will be the second installment of my earth journals. This one will be on the topic of the biosphere in Xizhou, specifically in the mountains. To see my previous installment click here.

Today I will write my observations for the biosphere in Xizhou. While we were on the mountain, I discovered and abundance of things. There were many different plants but the one I saw the most on the mountains were pine trees. As we were climbing up the "remote" part of the mountain, we saw many of those pine trees, sticking out everywhere. Pine trees are very popular here because of the temperature. Also the fact that they do not need a lot of water.

The lithosphere has an enourmous impact on Xizhou, its populace, and the surrounding area. The main effect the lithosphere has on the populace of the area is the rain shadow created by Cangshan. This affects the vegetation in the area, and as a result, the food consumed by the village. Opposing Cangshan is Erhai, a rift lake created through tectonic movement. On the other side of the lake (relative to the village or Cangshan) there are many foothills, presumably also caused through tectonic movement.

This weekend, the Jailbreak group went on our three-day hike. On the first day, we climbed from 2000m to 2600m on CangShan Mountain. On the second day, we ascended another 600m to 3200m. The third day we descended down to 2000m back to Xizhou.

For my choice –sphere, I decided to observe the lithosphere. The hike was a great opportunity for me to observe the mountains close up. As stated before in my previous journal, the CangShan Mountains formed when two tectonic plates, the Indian and Eurasian, collided.

This Earth Journal, I will only be talking about atmosphere. You can check out my last earth journal here. 

The air in Xizhou is definitely cleaner than that of Shanghai. For one, you can actually see the blue sky here, instead of gray smog. When first coming to Xizhou, I could immediately tell that the atmosphere was very different from Shanghai’s atmosphere. Later, I observed why it may be so different.

Todays earth journal will be only on the biosphere.

From from Friday to Sunday we went on a three day hike. While up there we had to go through a lot of thick vegetation. Up on the mountains we saw thin bamboo, pine trees, fern, moss and a bunch of other plants that I cannot name. Throughout the hike there was piles and piles of pine needles and pine cones coating the ground making it more slippery. There was also occasional sap coming from the trees. To sum up, there were trees and plants everywhere.

*Note: This journal is part of my SAS Essentials work for science.*

For our science work at Microcampus, we are supposed to observe two -spheres and write about our findings in our journals. One is the hydrosphere, and the second one is an option of either the atmosphere, biosphere or lithosphere. This is the second earth journal, in which I will be focusing on my choice -sphere, the atmosphere, which is about the air in Xizhou.