This week we spent time ironing out details and testing some of our methods. We met with another lab and found pretty much all of the chemicals we will need to run our tests. Pictured above is Western Catalpa pollen stained in aniline blue, which is a dye that has been used to distinguish between viable and inviable pollen. I am excited to test out a few of our other methods in the coming days!
We spent a day near the Mountain Research Station to check on a few germination plots and demographic sites. Again, we found no positive signs of germination (but a few were too young to tell). We did, however, find a few flower buds on one of our focal species! If this warm weather persists, we should have flowers in no time!
