¡Saludos! Wow, what a day to introduce our team to a week long of research in Las Chinampas. Excellent breakfast, interesting ride through the heart of Mexico City, with an even more excellent driver, Eduardo, who brought us safely to and from our site. With the sun shining and birds chirping, we were quickly introduced to the field of Chinampas wetland conservation research and split into three groups. Our groups focused on water physio-chemistry, soil sampling, and canal morphometry.
Water physio-chemistry focuses on PH, temperature, and the amount of bacteria and organic material found in the water. Some of the activities included taking water samples from the canal, testing the water at different depths within various locations in the canals, and using a Secchi Disk to determine water clarity.
Soil sampling focused on the techniques used by farmers in the Chinampas to determine the amount of salt within their agricultural plots. The groups sampled soil from two different locations that were growing tomatoes and at each location five samples were taken by hand, placed in bags, and stored for later analysis in the lab.
Canal morphometry focused on measuring the infrastructure of the canals, specifically the width, the depth, the flood-line indentation, and the shape of the canal bottom. The purpose of measuring is to monitor the change of the canals infrastructure over time. The groups used a ladder bridge placed across the width of the canal in order to take the needed measurements. These measurements were taken every four meters down the length of the canal.
If these activities were not enough to fill our day we headed over to UNAM (National Autonomous University of Mexico) for a guided tour by the head of the research project, Dr. Claudia Ponce de León. She was incredibly well spoken, engaging, and walked us through every step of analyzing water samples. For example, one of the technologies she showed us is gas chromatography which can isolate organic matter. Also, she demonstrated another technology called the ultrasonic bath by cleaning some of our jewelry items and returning them nice and shiny, just as we concluded our tour.
All in all, a very full day. ¡Saludos!
Crystal and Sue
Conserving Wetlands and Traditional Agriculture in Mexico 