Students from San Francisco University High School’s A.P. Environmental Studies Class recently took advantage of a unique research opportunity in the Van Norden Meadow, part of the Royal Gorge Property conserved by the Truckee Donner Land Trust. When the land trust acquired the property in 2012, they were required to mitigate Van Norden Reservoir, a man-made lake dating back to the 20’s. At the end of June, 2016 the reservoir was drained, exposing soils that have been submerged for majority of the 100 years. Three months later, this class came to Soda Springs to create independent scientific research projects around this uncommon ecological event.

Students measuring water quality on Donner Summit

The projects students conducted, ranged from surveying amphibian and aquatic insect populations, to comparing the water quality of isolated pools in the Yuba River and Castle Creek, and analyzing soil nutrients from the historic reservoir bed up to the nearby mountains.

The duo of Nick Michael and Kate Elkort compared levels of soil nutrients in the historic reservoir bed to soils in the adjacent meadow. Their project focused on the three main nutrients plants need to survive, Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium. They found that despite the surrounding area being incredibly low in biologically available Nitrogen and Phosphorus, the historic reservoir bed had much higher levels of both. Their data also found that both locations had comparably high levels of Potassium, which they attributed to the granite-dominated local geology. Soils in the reservoir bed also contained more moisture than soils in the meadow.

Below is a trip recap from Kate.

“In late September I spent four days near Tahoe in Van Norden meadow posing a hypothesis and creating an experiment that would attempt to answer my question. When I arrived at the Clair Tappaan Lodge, the Headwaters Science Institute instructors greeted us and debriefed us on what we would be doing. They gave us background information on the changes in the environment, and what resources and tools we could use to test our questions.

They informed our class that a dam had recently been opened and as a result, the lake had been drained and the lakebed was exposed. I realized this was a great chance to pose a question around this changing environment. The recently exposed lakebed captured my attention because it was a really rare opportunity to see secondary succession occurring naturally. I decided to research the nutrients in the lakebed soil and compare them to to the nutrients in the meadow soil. To answer my question, I took 25 soil core samples from the exposed lakebed and from the meadow and I suspended them in water to test them for potassium, nitrogen and phosphorus. After completing the nutrient tests I concluded that phosphorus and nitrogen levels were significantly different between the meadow soil and the exposed lakebed soil.

Map of Kate’s Study Sites

The experience was one of the most meaningful, interesting and educational activities I have partaken in. It was so meaningful to connect what I had learned in class to a real ecosystem I was conducting tests in. It was also incredibly meaningful to create a question and experiments based entirely on an aspect of the ecosystem that I was interested in. I liked every aspect of my experience but I would say I had the most fun giving my final presentation. Even though it required work, making graphs, doing t-tests, and explaining how are data supports our original hypothesis, it was incredibly applicable and helped me engage in the material in a way that I have never experienced before. I really benefited from standing up in front my classmates and explaining how our data explained and supported our hypothesis. This process helped me grow as a student and improved my capabilities as scientist. Overall, I’m really grateful to the Headwaters Science Institute for allowing me to participate in such an amazing opportunity and allowing me to explore a question that I was really passionate about.”

Here some of Nick and Kate’s graphs and results of their statistical tests. You can see all of the students presentations here. Past Student Research