Schoolyard Naturalists

Camp Gross Staff Training

2009-07-02T06:38:00.000-07:00

Camp Gross Camp Staff Training Session
July 1, 2009

Four guiding principles for being a camp counselor (and for working with children in all different situations)

Children like to Move and Make Noise – When I first heard Bill Brennan (see Billy “B”) say this in a workshop on song writing, singing and movement for working with children it struck a chord in me. It articulated what I knew from my years of experience in working with children. Children like to move and make noise. As a camp counselor or youth leader my job isn’t to stop children from moving and making noise, it’s to help them move and make noise in the direction needed. As a youth leader am I prepared to do this?

Children Do Not Have A Short Attention Span – Think back to the sage advise given to us by someone (your mom, a teacher, a camp program director) when we first started working with children, “Remember, kids have a short attention span.” Well, this advice is was WRONG (actually not wrong just misdirected). Years ago when I heard a presentation by Michael Brandwein speaking on the attention span of children, he spoke about youth leaders needing to have good attention grabbers. Again, this is something that I had known all along from experience. Saying children have a short attention span doesn’t help me do my job as a youth leader. It lays the problem on the children, when the problem is really what do I have that will help me capture the attention of the children I am working with. Children have an attention span, sometimes short other times long. I need tips, tricks, techniques that will help me keep that child’s attention on the situation at hand instead of on something else.

Just Do It – I wish I had trademarked this phrase when I first started using it while advising and training camp counselors, youth leaders and teachers years before it was made popular by a Nike ad campaign. Too many times we spend too much time talking to children, instead of letting them “Just Do It”. Children don’t need to know everything before they start on something. They learn by doing. As a camp counselor, more doing is much better than more talking.

Everything I Do Teaches – This is a personal philosophy that goes much beyond just being a camp counselor. In today’s world everyone points to all the negative influences – TV, celebrities, the media, politicians, investment bankers – that affect the development of children. Well, where are the positive influences going to come from, from you and me. Hillary Rodham Clinton made this African folk phrase “It takes a village” popular a few years back. What makes up that village? Individuals do. Everything you do teaches those around you. As a camp counselor this is the most important thing to remember, you may say one thing but if you do another your actions will teach much better than your words.

With these four principles in mind what tips, tricks, and techniques will I have at the ready as a youth leader to help me in my work with children. Here is a list of games, activities, challenges, puzzles and presentations that I shared with the Camp Gross staff.

What is it Bag (also known as a Grock Bag)
Rope Circle
Circle Pass Games
Magic Sticks
Suns and Planets
Finger on the Nose Trick
Move That Finger
Sharp Eyes
ESP
Nail Balance Challenge
Fork Balance Challenge
Pick Up the Straws Challenge
Crook of the Elbow
Maze

These activities come from a wide range of resources and experiences. I’ll blog about these later.

If you want to know details of how to do any of the activities e-mail me.

Last Owl Study of the School Year

2009-06-15T15:16:00.000-07:00

Sorry, Lincoln Elementary in Schenectady. I've been meaning to get your data up on my blog but I haven't kept up with it. Here it is a week late.

Mrs. Coman's class - 7 pellets: 17 mice, 3 shrews, 0 moles, 0 birds
Ms. Cuda's class - 8 pellets: 19 mice, 1 shrew, 0 moles, 0 birds
Ms. Miller's class - 7 pellets: 18 mice, 7 shrews, 0 moles, 0 birds
Mrs. Zebrowski's class - 6 pellets: 14 mice, 3 shrews, 0 moles, 0 birds

Totals for all four classes - 28 pellets: 68 mice, 14 shrews, 0 moles, 0 birds

Mice are definitely the most common food eaten by barn owls, with shrews the second most common. We don't have enough evidence to indicate which are more preferred, moles or birds.

Compare this data with the other owl pellets dissection that I've done with school written up here on this blog.

Birding at King Elementary

2009-05-29T21:35:00.000-07:00

I just finished my ecologist-in-residence program at the King Elementary School in Warwick. The 5th grade classes joined me as ornithologists to do a survey of birds at the school. In two days I took 5 classes out to find birds in the woods, wetland and fields that surround the school. The 5 classes were: Mrs. Curtain (May 28, 10:30-11:30), Mrs. Kunath (May 29, 10:00-11:00), Mrs. Shook (May 29, 11:15-12:15), Mrs. Boccia (May 29, 1:00-2:00) and Ms. Davis (May 29, 2:30-3:30). We identified a total of 41 species between the five classes and two days. I’m listing the birds identified, with which classes saw or heard them noted by the teacher’s initial.

Canada Goose K
Mallard B
Great Blue Heron K, S
Black Vulture C, S, D
Turkey Vulture C, K, S, B, D
Red-tailed Hawk S, D
Killdeer K
Mourning Dove K
Chimney Swift C, K, S
Red-bellied Woodpecker C, K
Downy Woodpecker S
Hairy Woodpecker S
Northern Flicker B, D
Eastern Phoebe I saw when not with students
Great Crested Flycatcher S
Eastern Kingbird C, K, S, B, D
Blue Jay K, D
American Crow C, K, S, B, D
Tree Swallow S, D
Tufted Titmouse C
White-breasted Nuthatch I saw when not with students
House Wren C, S, B, D
Eastern Bluebird C, B, D
American Robin C, S, B, D
Gray Catbird K, S, D
Northern Mockingbird C, K, S, B, D
Brown Thrasher S
European Starling C, K, S, B, D
Cedar Waxwing C, K, S, B
Yellow Warbler C, K, S, D
Chipping Sparrow C, K, S, D
Song Sparrow K, S, D
Northern Cardinal K, S, B, D
Rose-breasted Grosbeak C, K
Red-winged Blackbird C, K, S, B, D
Common Grackle C, K, S, B, D
Brown-headed Cowbird K, S
Baltimore Oriole C, S, B
Purple Finch S
American Goldfinch K
House Sparrow C, K, B, D

Not a bad day for birds. The habitat at King is great. It’s interesting that we did not get black-capped chickadee or common yellowthroat. A few other birds that are probably at King are wild turkey, sharp-shinned hawk, kestrel, rock pigeon, ruby-throated hummingbird, barn swallow, field sparrow and eastern meadowlark.

More Owl Pellet Data

2009-05-28T19:13:00.000-07:00

In early May I was at the Leptondale Elementary School in the Wallkill Central School District where 4th grade classes took apart owl pellets. Here is the data from those classes.

Mrs. Dannemann's class - 9 pellets, 20 mice, 1 shrew, 0 moles, 0 birds
Mrs. Psilopoulos class - 12 pellets, 22 mice, 2 shrews, 1 mole, 0 birds
Mrs. Davis/Mrs. Gundersen's class - 11 pellets, 11 mice, 2 shrew, 0 moles, 0 birds
Mr. Zupan's class - 10 pellets, 29 mice, 0 shrews, 0 moles, 0 birds
For a total of - 42 pellets, 82 mice, 5 shrews, 1 mole, 0 birds

Later in May at the Altamont Elementary School in the Guilderland Central School District I worked with two fourth grade classes. Here the results from there.

Mrs. Vogel's class - 10 pellets, 21 mice, 5 shrew, 0 moles, 1 bird
Mrs. Sanger's class - 12 pellets, 30 mice, 1 shrew, 1 mole, 1 bird
For a total of - 22 pellets, 51 mice, 6 shrew, 1 mole, 2 birds

You can add up the results of the two classes with the other owl data that I've posted here.

I have one more owl ecology session to do this school year at the Lincoln Elementary School is Schenectady. After doing that class I'll write an entry reviewing the overall results for this year.

Leaf Litter Critters

2009-05-27T18:51:00.001-07:00

My apologies to the 3rd grade students and teachers at Harmony Hill Elementary in Cohoes for the length of time it has taken me to make this entry. My recent visit to King Elementary in Warwick with 2nd grades got me moving to complete this.

Leaf litter offers a great chance to investigate terrestrial invertebrates. Any wooded area will do for a hands-on exploration. The dead leaves and branches found along the forest floor provide food and shelter for many creatures including centipedes, millipedes, isopods, insects, worms, snails and slugs. All you need is an old white sheet, some large plastic storage tubs, some white plastic food tubs (for example margarine or cream cheese containers), white plastic spoons and small paint brushes.

Collect a bunch of leaf litter in the plastic tubs and dump it on the white sheet. Using plastic spoons or small paint brushes look through the leaf litter and capture the creepy crawly creatures.

Here are some of the creatures that we captured.

Sow bugs are isopods that feed on dead plant material. They might be one of the most numerous of the leaf litter invertebrates. This one is a relative of the rolly polly that is seen in the video below. This isopod can not roll up to protect itself.

Millipedes are plant eating arthropods. The word millipede means thousand legs. Actually a millipede is an arthropod with four legs for each body segment. It looks like this millipede has about 50 segments. How many legs would it have?

Since millipedes are plant eaters they do not have to be as fast a mover as centipedes. Be sure to see how fast the centipede moves in the video below.

The harvest man are not true spiders, although they are closely related. Harvest men are hunters eating other small invertebrates. They kill their prey with a venomous bite. Many people think that harves men have the most poisonous venom of all spiders. This is not true.

Most people think of snails as water creatures. There are many aquatic snails, but there are also terestrial, or land, snails.

Here are two species. Note how they have different shell patterns.

Snails can not come out of their shell. When you find an empty shell, it is the remains of a snail that has died.

Snails eat plants.

Here is a crab spider. They are called crab spiders because the two front pairs of legs are larger than the back four legs. This gives the spider the appearance of have crab-like claws. Like all spiders, crab spiders are hunters, eating other small invertebrates.

Beetles are the most numerous of all insects. This beetle is one of the species of ground beetles. I need to do some research to find the family that this belongs to. When I have I will post it here.

Here are some videos of some of these leaf litter inhabitants.

From Helicopter to Seedling

2009-05-24T18:02:00.000-07:00

Most every schoolyard has a place where wind blown seeds accumulate – maybe in a corner of the schoolyard, along a fence or near a flower bed. On my recent visit to Harmony Hill Elementary School in Cohoes, NY we found just such a place with Mrs. Slater’s and Mrs. Brooks 1st grade classes. It was along a flower bed surrounding some trees in front of the school. Norway maple seeds had blown in and were germinating.

We discovered these seedlings as we were doing a schoolyard ecology field trip. In this one spot we found maple seeds – most of the students know these as “helicopter” seeds – in various states, from unsuccessful seeds to seeds that had started to germinate to seedlings that had grown to about 2 inches tall. Not only could we find the seeds and seedlings on the ground, when we looked up into the trees we could see newly forming seeds. It was easy to observe that each tree had hundreds of seeds. We explored how the seeds, when ripe, would be blown about by the wind. Many seeds might end up in bad places like the school roof, the sidewalk or the parking lot where they would not successfully grow. Other seeds might end up in what starts off as a good spot – the lawn, or in the case of our exploration, the flowerbed – where the seed can germinate and start to grow but never become a tree because it would be mowed or weeded out by school caretakers. Still other seeds might end up in a good spot, say in the bushes at the edge of the lawn, only to be eaten by a mouse or a chipmunk, or to sprout into a seedling and be eaten by a rabbit or a deer.

All those seeds – goners! No wonder when we observed the seeds on the maple trees we saw hundreds, probably thousands of seeds. Successful plants, like the Norway maple, produce many seeds each year. Thousands of those seeds never make it, but some will. These will grow into trees that will keep the species going. As a matter of fact, trees like the Norway maple are an invasive species. They are not native to North America. They were planted by people because they do better in urban environments. They are more tolerant of urban pollution so they grow well as a street tree. Over time, their seeds spread about and it does better than other native trees, ending up crowding out the native species. Check any urban park and you will see that the predominant tree growing in the forested areas is likely to be the Norway maple.

Check you schoolyard. There are lots of plants to investigate outside. There’s lots of opportunity to see live, in action, what students are reading about and studying in the classroom.

Can you count the number of seeds here? This is just one of dozens, perhaps hundreds of branches on this one Norway maple, each with just as many seeds. Why so many seeds? When these seeds ripen they will turn brown and fall of the tree.

The wind will scatter them far and wide. One of these seed will end up in a flower bed. It's seems like a great place for the seed to grow. There is plenty of sun, soil and water. Let's see what happens to that seed. We can see that the seed has started to germinate.

The first part of the seedling to grow is the tap root. Here we see that it has sprung from the seed which is still attached to the helicopter wing, called a samara. At this point there are no green leaves or green parts of the plant to produce food so the seedling is using food made by the parent tree that was stored in the cotyledons of the seed. That's why I say the seed is made up of two things, the baby plant and the baby plant's lunch box. First the tap root secures the seedling to the ground and then, to borrow a rhyme from Billy "B" (see Billy "B" link), "the root grows deep, deep into the ground, searches for water and drinks it when it's found"!

As the tap root grows it will send out many root branches, just like the main trunk sending out many branches above ground. Here we can see some of these rootlets. At the end of these rootlets there will be very small root hairs that suck up water and nutrients from the ground that will be used for the seedlings growth.

Here is a seedling that has sprouted and is still connected to the "helicopter" wing. It now has a shoot of growth on the tap root with green leaves. The green leaves are now producing food - "green leaves make food" - that will be used by the seedling to grow.

The end result is this Norway maple seedling growing in a flower bed at the Harmony Hill Elementary School in Cohoes, NY. This may seem like a good spot to grow but not really. The seedling will most likely not become a mature maple tree because it will be removed as an undesireable plant in the flower bed. So what may have looked like a good place to grow ends up a bad place. Many of the seeds from the parent maple will end up in bad places like this, but since the parent tree produces so many seeds some will end up in good places and grow to become mature trees and keep the maple life cycle going.

You can see this story happening in any school or back yard. The life cycle of a tree for all to see and explore.

Soil

2009-05-20T06:06:00.000-07:00

My school program schedule is as busy as ever. It’s been hard to keep up with this blog. I do have two posts in the works from my visit to the Harmony Hill Elementary School in Cohoes, NY. One of my difficulties is having to connect to the internet at home with dial-up, which really slows the process when I’m trying to upload video.

Well I’ve just got home from the Adirondacks after doing a Nature Tunes and Tales Campfire program for the Homer Junior High School’s Science Club. What a great bunch kids! The campfire program was a culmination for their four day exploration of the Adirondacks. I think they had a good time and learned some things from my presentation. I know I had a great time.

In doing my usual routine I introduced the students to one of the American Sign Language words for soil. This is done by holding both hands, palm towards ones self, with all fingers pointing upward, then rubbing the finger tips together. As is the case many times when I teach students this sign someone makes the comment “That’s the sign for money!”

When this happens I often go off on a tangential routine about how money wouldn’t exist without soil. Unfortunately I was pressed for time and couldn’t do it with my presentation, so I told the students I would post it on my blog. Here it is.

Yes, it is a “slang” hand symbol for money that many people know. If you stop to think about it, though, without soil we wouldn’t have money. You see money is a way that we have arranged to acquire things. You make money, you buy something from someone. They now have money so they can buy something else from someone else.

Take me for example. I’m wearing this cotton t-shirt that I bought because it had this cool message on it, “In wildness is the preservation of the world.” Someone silk screened the message on it and I paid them money for the shirt. They gave the money to a t-shirt manufacturer for shirts to silk screen. The t-shirt manufacturer bought cotton cloth from a cotton mill with the money so they could make the shirts. The cotton mill uses the money to buy raw cotton from the cotton farmers so they can weave it into cotton fabric. The cotton farmers buy cotton seed and farming equipment with the money so they can plant the cotton in soil to grow the cotton plants. No soil, no cotton. No cotton, no cotton cloth. No cotton cloth, no t-shirt. For that matter no cotton pants, socks or underwear! Oh, oh!

How about my belt? I bought it from a craftsman that makes leather belts. He bought the leather to make the belt from a tannery. The tannery buys the raw animal skins to make into leather from a meat processing factory. The factory bought the animals from a farmer. The farmer used the money to feed the animals food crops that were grown in the soil. No soil, no food crops. No food crops, no animals. No animals, no animal skins. No animal skins, no leather. No leather, no belt. My pants would be falling down. But wait, aren't my pants made from cotton?!?

How about the rubber that’s a part of the front of my shoes? I bought the shoes from a store. The store bought the shoe from a shoe factory. The shoe factory bought rubber to make into parts of the shoe from a rubber factory. The rubber factory buys the raw rubber from a rubber plantation. The rubber plantation grows rubber trees that have roots growing in the soil. No soil, no rubber trees. No rubber trees, no rubber sap. No rubber sap, no rubber. No rubber, my toes would be sticking out of the front of these shoes!

Even the cash itself – 1, 5, 10, 20, 50, 100 dollar bills, made from paper, made from trees that have roots growing in the soil. No soil, no trees, no paper money.

Ah, but you say you used a credit card to buy this stuff. The credit card is made from plastic, that is made from fossil fuels, that were once plants growing millions of years ago. Plants with roots growing in the soil!

Yes. The ASL sign for soil is like the slang sign for money. But without soil we really wouldn’t have money or the flow of commerce that we use the money for.

Central Valley Entomology

2009-04-28T19:56:00.001-07:00

During my visit with the 2nd grade entomologists at Central Valley Elementary School I had the chance to explain how scientist identify the more common orders of insects. I used an insect identification sheet developed by Anita Sanchez to organize our discussion. Unfortunately there was not enough time to cover all seven of the orders of insects that were shown. Here is a review of these common orders of insects, the names entomologists use for them and how these names help us identify them.

Butterflies and Moths – are called Lepidoptera, which means scale wing. If you’ve ever held a moth or butterfly you might have noticed the dusty powder that was left on your fingers. This powder is actually scales from the wings and body of the insect. These scales give color and strength to the wings. Butterflies and moths go through complete metamorphosis, which means they start off as an egg that hatches into a larva. The larva of moths and butterflies are often called caterpillars. The larvae eat and grow. When they are too big for their exoskeleton skin they shed, or molt the skin. Their new skin has room for them to grow. A larva can molt several times before it molts into a pupa. The pupa of a butterfly is called a chrysalis. The pupa of a moth is called a cocoon. Inside the pupa the larva is undergoing a complete change of its body growing all the things it will have as an adult, especially wings. When it emerges from the pupa it will pump up its wings so that they spread and flatten out. When the wings are dry the adult insect flies away to mate and lay eggs.

Bugs – are called Hemiptera, which means half wing. They get this name because the two wings they have are half thick, near the body and half thin further from their body. All bugs are insects but not all insects are bugs. To tell if it is a bug look for a triangle shape on the back of the insect where their thorax meets their abdomen. Bugs undergo what is called incomplete metamorphosis. When a bug hatches from the egg it doesn’t look worm-like, like a caterpillar or maggot. The newly hatched bug looks quite a bit like an insect with three body parts, antenna and six legs. The one thing it will not have is wings. This young bug is called a nymph. The nymph eats and grows. When it is too big for its exoskeleton it molts the skin and emerges a little larger. Upon its last molt it will emerge from the old exoskeleton but now have wings that will spread out, flatten and dry. Once dry the adult bug flies off to look for mates and lay eggs.

Ants, Bees, Wasps and Hornets – are called Hymenoptera, which mean thin skin wing. The hymenoptera have four thin skin, or membranous wings. Many of them, for example ants and honeybees, live in large groups or colonies. In these colonies there is one female that lays the eggs. This is the queen. She will have many daughters, often called workers, that will never lay eggs. In the case of ants these daughters will never have wings. They take care of the queen, feed the larvae and build and protect the nest. At certain times of the year the queen will lay eggs that will grow into adult queens and drones (the males). These adults will have wings. They live in the nest only a few days then fly away to find mates. After they mate the drones will soon die. The queens will start a new nest. The first larvae to hatch will be fed extra eggs that the queen lays for food. After undergoing complete metamorphosis, these first larvae will emerge as worker ants, daughters of the queen, that will now take over building and caring for the nest and all the ants living in it. The queen will spend the rest of her life laying eggs. Some queen ants can live up to 10 years and lay a million eggs in their lifetime.

Flies – are called Diptera, which means two wings. All flies have two wings. Some flies look like bees, yellow bodies with black stripes. Some bees look like flies. The way to tell them apart is to count their wings. Bees have four wings. Flies have two wings. Many insect have fly in their name but are not really flies. Generally speaking if the name is compound, butterfly, dragonfly, mayfly, the insect is not a true fly or dipteran. True flies will have names that are not compound such as house fly, deer fly or black fly. The flies go through complete metamorphosis. The larvae of flies are called maggots.

Dragonfly – are called Odonata, which means toothed. The dragonflies get this name for their predatory behavior, eating many small insects and other animals, both when they are nymphs in the water and adults flying around in the air. One of their favorite foods is mosquitoes. I have watched dragonflies at my pond chase and catch deer flies in mid-air. Dragonflies are not true flies. They undergo incomplete metamorphosis.

Beetles – are called Coleoptera, which means shield wing. The beetles have four wings, two for flying and two that serve as shields that protect the flying wings. When a beetle takes off it lifts open it’s shield wings, unfolds it’s flying wings and flies off. When the beetle lands it folds up it’s flying wings and then closes down it’s shield wings. When the shield wings are closed they meet in a long line down the back of the beetle’s abdomen. The best beetle to see this happen is the lady bug (notice that the lady bug is actually a beetle called the lady bird beetle – it does not have a triangle shape on it’s back like the true bugs, the hemiptera). Beetles go through complete metamorphosis. Beetle larvae are called grubs.

Grasshoppers and Crickets – are called Orthopter, which means straight wing. They get this name because adult grasshoppers have wings that are folded like a hand fan and thus appearing to be straight. Grasshoppers undergo incomplete metamorphosis, hatching out of the eggs as nymphs that look like little tiny grasshoppers. We caught one of these nymphs in our entomology expedition outside.

These seven are among the more common orders of insects. There are about 28 orders of insects. I say about because scientist do not all agree on some of the orders of insects. Some scientist want to combine some orders, while other scientists think it is best to keep them separate. Some of the other orders of more familiar insects include mayflies (Ephemeroptera), fleas (Siphonaptera), cicadas (Homoptera) and earwigs (Dermaptera).

Spiders are not insects. They have eight legs and two body parts (a cephalothorax – which means head-thorax and an abdomen). Entomologists study spiders for several reasons. One reason is that they are relatives of insects. Spiders and insects are arthropods. Other arthropods include centipedes, millipedes and crustaceans (crabs, lobsters, crayfish and shrimp). All arthropods have exoskeletons that are shed or molted when the animals outgrow them. Another reason entomologists study spiders is that where ever you capture insects you will also capture spiders. That is because spiders prey upon insects (although there are some insects that turn the dinner table around and eat spiders).

Insects are the most numerous of all animals. They live all around us, even in our houses. That means there are many insects that can be studied without have to travel far. You can study ants on the playground, beetles in an old rotting log, or caterpillars on leafy branches. When you do these studies you are being an entomologist.

2009 Landis Arboretum Spring Hawk Watch

2009-04-25T15:24:00.000-07:00

Every year I start off the Landis Arboretum Family Programs (see http://www.LandisArboretum.org) with a Spring Hawk Watch. This year’s watch looked to be a great one, with a clear sunny day and temperatures in the 70’s predicted. It turned out to be a wonderful day to be outside, although there weren’t as many hawks as hoped for.

The Arboretum looks out to the east and south over the Schoharie River. With the north flowing river being a natural migration corridor for hawks and its incredible views the Arboretum is a nice place to catch glimpses of hawks on their northward journey. Unfortunately today didn’t provide as many hawks as in the past. I am not sure that the unseasonably warm weather was to blame. Actually it’s more likely the steady winds from the west may have been more the reason. In any case there weren’t as many hawks as we’ve had on good days in the past, but as the saying goes, “A bad day birding beats a good day at the office.”

The highlight of the day was the sighting of at least 2 bald eagles, one an adult and the other a juvenile, probably a second year bird. There may have been a third eagle, since a second adult was seen after the first in a different location (both were flying up river – southward). I am wondering if these birds may be nesting somewhere near the Arboretum along the Schoharie River.

We also observed four broad-winged hawks and three osprey. All of these birds were flying strongly northward and thus seemed to be migrating through to their northerly nesting territories.

A number of red-tailed hawks were observed flying about in many different directions. None seemed to be moving strongly northward which makes me think that these hawks are resident birds moving about their territories here in the Schoharie Valley.

Rounding out our observations were a kestrel, a sharp-shinned hawk and a variety of unidentifiable raptors, buteos and accipiters. These unidentifiable hawks were quite a distance out, very likely pushed off the ridge that the Arboretum sits on by the predominately westerly breeze that blew consistently through out the day.

There were many other birds in evidence today, either seen or heard. You can’t spend a day looking for hawks without keeping track of these Arboretum visitors also. The most unusual was a barred owl that was heard hooting. When we first heard it we didn’t believe our ears. So I hooted back and to our amazement it responded. Here is an overall list of the 34 species of birds spotted or heard on this day.

Canada goose
mallard
turkey vulture
osprey
bald eagle
broad-winged hawk
red-tailed hawk
American kestrel
barred owl
red-bellied woodpecker
yellow-bellied sapsucker
downy woodpecker
northern flicker
eastern phoebe
blue jay
American crow
common raven
tree swallow
black capped chickadee
tufted titmouse
red-breasted nuthatch
eastern bluebird
American robin
yellow-rumped warbler
eastern towhee
chipping sparrow
song sparrow
northern cardinal
rose-breasted grosbeak (female)
eastern meadowlark
common grackle
brown-headed cowbird
purple finch
American goldfinch

Ostrander Elementary 2nd Grade Ornithologists Study Owls

2009-04-24T10:49:00.000-07:00

Mrs. Busse’s, Mrs. Lazinski’s and Mrs. Dutka’s second grade ornithologists just completed their owl pellet dissection over the last two weeks. Here is what they found:

Busse – 8 pellets dissected; 18 mice, no shrews, no moles and no birds
Lazinski – 10 pellets dissected; 19 mice, 1 shrew, no moles and no birds
Dutka – 9 pellets dissected; 20 mice, 4 shrews, no moles and no birds

You can look at the other schools where I have visited this spring to see what the ornithologists there have found by looking through previous entries in my blog (there is additional information on owl ecology and ornithology studies in these blog entries, as well as the owl pellet data). I do have a few more owl ecology classes coming up before the end of school, so there will be more data add in the near future. Here to date, is an overview of what we’ve found in our owl pellet dissections in my previous school visits this year.

Including the pellets dissected at Ostrander Elementary our total tally is:
212 pellets dissected; 447 mice, 32 shrews, 6 moles, 6 birds

The average number of animals eaten per pellet is 2.3 animals.

Check this blog for more owl pellet data as I complete my ecologist-in-residence programs through to the end of the school year.

Kings Elementary School Owl Ecology/Owl Pellet Analysis

2009-04-06T15:25:00.000-07:00

Today I visited the 3rd and ¾ PIE classes at Kings Elementary School in Warwick. We had a discussion on being ornithologists. It focused on how students might do a project to document where three common owls, the Eastern Screech-owl, the Great Horned Owl, the Barred Owl might be found in the Warwick area, including researching the owls’ habitat and calling behavior. This is exactly the kind of work that was done by many volunteer and professional ornithologists to complete the New York State Breeding Bird Atlas project, a multi-year project that was just culminated with the publishing of “The Second Atlas of Breeding Birds of New York State (see link below).

This discussion led to an owl pellet dissection and analysis. We can add this information to the other owl pellet analysis that I have done with other school and get an even better look at what owls - barn owls in the Pacific Northwest, northern California, Oregon and Washington – prefer to eat.

Why west coast barn owls? I do many owl ecology classes in which students take apart many owl pellets. I use many hundreds of pellets every year with all my school programs. It would be impossible for me to get enough pellets from wild owls since the pellets they regurgitate would be found spread all around the forested territories that the owls live in – a wild great horned owl, barred owl or screech-owl might spit out three or four pellets each night, but would likely do so at three or four different locations dispersed about the forest and forest edge environments that they live in. To find several pellets would be lucky, to find hundreds, nearly impossible, even if I were to find several owl nests and get the pellets expelled by the growing young. So, I buy my pellets from Pellets, Inc. (see link), which is a company located in Bellingham, WA. Pellets, Inc. collects barn owl pellets from the areas of northern California through Oregon into the state of Washington.

Why barn owls? When barn owls live in essentially open country areas of farmland or abandoned buildings (especially at the outskirts of towns) they roost and nest in barns, and old buildings like unused factories, churches or houses. After hunting and feeding upon several small prey animals the owls return to the roosting or nesting site and soon regurgitate a pellet. An owl might cough up three or four pellets a night. A family of five or six owls can produce 15 to 24 pellets a night. If someone knows where these roosting or nesting places are they can find many pellets. Pellets, Inc. hires people to visit such roosting and nesting places to collect pellets. The pellets are fumigated to kill moth larva, inspected and wrapped in aluminum foil and shipped out to scientists, teachers, students and naturalists.

Why fumigated? An owl pellet is mostly mammal fur with some bones stuffed in the package. Although the fur and bones are of no nutritional value for the owl there is still food available in the bones and fur. Some species of moth specialize in eating mammal fur – these are the very same moths that get into our closets and eat holes in our wool sweaters, suits and other clothing (after all, wool is sheep or other animal fur). Actually it is the larvae of the moths that do the eating. If a pellet has been lying around a long enough time, a female moth will find it and lay some eggs on the pellet. Larvae will hatch from the eggs and begin to eat the fur in the pellet. Pellets, Inc. fumigates the pellets to kill any moth larvae that happen to be in the pellet. You will sometimes find these dead larvae. They are small, about an eighth of an inch long, and brownish in color. If you look carefully at them you will see the segmented body, including the head and six small legs of the larva. If you find several dead larvae you will also likely find tiny black, sand-grain size specks. This is the frass or poop that the larvae produced when they were alive eating the fur. These larvae are performing the function of decomposers reducing the final remains of dead animals to their elemental parts that will then become part of the soil for plants to use in the cycle of life.

Here are the results of the Kings Elementary School owl pellet dissection:
Mr. Dinoto’s class – rodents, 17; shrews, zero; moles, zero; birds, 1 – 8 pellets dissected
Mrs. Flynn/Mrs. Nachtigal’s classes – rodents, 34; shrews, 2; moles, 1; birds, zero – 18 pellets dissected
Mrs. Parker’s class – rodents, 21; shrews, zero; moles, zero; birds, zero – 9 pellets dissected
Mrs. Kipp’s class – rodents, 20; shrews, 1; moles, zero; birds, 1 – 11 pellets dissected

Totals for all four groups
Rodents, 92; shrews, 3; moles, 1; birds, 2 – 46 pellets dissected

The average number of animals eaten per pellet was 2.1 animals.

Look at the other results for owl pellet dissections that I discuss here on the blog. You can compare these findings or, better yet, add them to the findings to get a better idea of what barn owls of the Pacific Northwest prefer to eat.

More Owl Pellet Analysis

2009-03-16T17:21:00.000-07:00

Last week I visited the Lynnwood Elementary School and worked with 4th grades doing Owl Ecology and Owl Pellet Dissection. Here are the results:

Mrs. Janssen’s class – 24 rodents, 1 shrew, 0 moles, 0 birds in 11 pellets
Mr. Miller’s class – 14 rodents, 1 shrew, 0 moles, 1 bird in 6 pellets
Ms. Shields’ class – 26 rodents, 0 shrews, 0 moles, 0 birds in 11 pellets
Mrs. Lodge’s class – 23 rodents, 0 shrews, 0 moles, 1 bird in 11 pellets

For a total of 87 rodents, 2 shrews, 0 moles, 2 birds in 39 pellets.

Definitely rodents are the most eaten food. In my hypothesis that I discuss with the students I state that shrews are the second most eaten food. Our analysis seems to indicate that shrews and birds are tied for second.

If we look at more owl pellets (see Previous Posts - More Owl Pellet Data and Owl Pellets and Predator Prey Relationships) we see that, indeed, shrews are the second favorite, with moles and birds a close tie for third favorite.

If we look at the number of animals eaten per pellet we find 91 animals eaten in 39 pellets for an average of 2.3, very close to the 2.5 that I predict. This supports the thought that a barn owl eats between 2 or 3 animals before it gets full and proceeds to digest their food producing a pellet.

Chicken Egg Incubation

2009-03-05T08:36:00.000-08:00

Hello scientists! It's that time of year to be ornithologists studying the life cycle of birds by incubating chicken eggs. I have incubators going at the Sapphire Elementary School and the Smith Clove Elementary School, both in Monroe-Woodbury, and will be starting incubators at the Martin Luther King Magnet School in Schenectady.

I start of the incubation program introducing students to the ecology of the chicken, a bird that has been living with people for many thousands of years. Of course, people have wanted chickens living with them for all this time because of the food they provide - their eggs and the chickens themselves - chicken nuggets, barbequed chicken, roast chicken or chicken soup with rice - "happy once, happy twice, happy chicken soup with rice". Happy for us because of the food they give us. I'm not sure how happy for the chicken since, if we are going to eat it, it has to be killed and then cut up in preparation for it to be cooked for our food.

The word chicken doesn't tell us whether it is a male or female. Like bluebird, mallard or bald eagle, it's the name of the kind of bird it is. When I say chicken, I am talking about the group, as a whole. I like to talk to students about what chickens, as a whole need to do to survive. I call it chicken business - find food, find water, look out for danger and go to the bathroom (the top four). Other chicken business includes, talking to other chickens, resting, exercising, taking a bath (not a water bath, but a dust bath to get rid of biting insects). All the activities that both male and female chickens do every day.

The male chicken is called a rooster. A farmer doesn't need a rooster to get eggs, all the farmer needs are the female chickens, the hens. A farmer also doesn't need a rooster to wake them up in the morning either - you see the roosters crow (that's what their "cockle-doodle-do" call is called) at all hours of the day and even night. That crowing is important for why the farmer might have a rooster. When roosters crow they are saying, "Check me out I'm so good looking!" This message is for the hens. If they can get the attention of the hens then they might mate and a baby chick could be in the egg laid by the hen.

The hens lay the eggs, take care of the eggs and take care of the baby chicks. Roosters pretty much do nothing to help her out in these matters. Most of the time the hens lay the eggs in the chicken coop or hen house as it is sometimes called. They usually don't make much noise, they go in lay an egg, it doesn't take much time, and when they're done it's off to do chicken business. The farmer comes and takes the eggs out of the coop and the chickens keep laying more eggs. A hen in one year can lay about 200 eggs (one egg every other day on average), although the world record egg layer laid a little more than 370 eggs in one year. That meant she laid an egg a day, with a few days in which she laid two eggs.

A hen that wants to have a family, though, will not go into the coop to lay her eggs. She'll try to find a secret hiding place instead. This hen would be called broody. She'll return to her secret hiding place each day that she is ready to lay an egg until 5 or 6 eggs are there, and she stops laying eggs. This would be called a clutch of eggs. She will now use her body to keep the eggs warm, at the special temperature of 99.5 degrees. At that temperature the embryo begins to grow. The hen will incubate the eggs for 21 days, hardly ever leaving to do chicken business. Every now and then the hen moves the eggs around, ensuring the embryo is doesn't get stuck in one spot in the egg.

When the chicks hatch mother hen's incubation business is done and new business is at hand - taking care of baby chicks and teaching them chicken business - like where to get food and water and most importantly how to look out for danger (no mother hen doesn't need to teach the chicks how to go to the bathroom - they already know how to do that). This business will take many weeks and in all this time the hen will not lay any eggs. If a farmer let's all the hens go broody there won't be any eggs to collect. Farmers usually don't let the hens incubate the eggs. The farmer looks for all the secret hiding places.

If a farmer needs new chicks the farmer has to incubate the eggs, using an incubator. The incubator keeps the eggs warm, at 99.5 degrees. Water is placed in the incubator to provide moisture for the growing chick. The eggs are turn frequently, just like mother hen would. With good care and luck, baby chicks hatch in 21 days.

One of my favorite activities is to candle the eggs at about the 8th or 9th day of incubation. A light is shown through the egg, casting shadows on the egg shell of four different things that tell of the growing chick; an air space, veins, eye spot and movement of the eye spot and veins. View this video of an egg I candled at Sapphire Elementary - it's a work in progress. I'm having some difficulties with the technology of the webcam but will work on it and hopefully get a better video soon.

More Owl Pellet Data

2009-02-06T12:55:00.000-08:00

The Young Scholars Program at Cambridge Elementary School (NY) has given me a chance to collect more data on owl prey preference. Here it is:

5 pellets dissected included the remains of:

11 mice, 1 shrew, 0 moles, 0 birds

That is an average of 2.4 animals eaten for each pellet produced.

Look at these other postings of owl pellet study for more data - Bushkill Elementary Owl Ecologists and Owl Pellets and Predator Prey Relationships

Here we are having a discussion on the three common owls of the Cambridge, NY area - the eastern screech-owl, the great-horned owl and the barred owl. The barn owl has been included in the discussion even though it is not usually found in NewYork state because the pellets that we dissect come from barn owls.

Students are busy dissecting owl pellets looking for the bones of the owl's prey. The owl eat the prey whole. Very quickly in the digestion process the bones, fur and feather (in the event that the owl has eaten a bird) are packed into a ball and regurgitated.

Here is some of the hands-on investigation that reveals what the owl ate to produce a pellet.

I have some specimens of prey items that I will photograph and post soon.

bushkill elementary owl ecologists

2009-02-04T08:44:00.000-08:00

My apologies to the 4th grade Ornithologists at Bushkill Elementary School in Nazareth, PA. I had meant to get their data online sooner but got tied up in a conference on children’s summer camps and nature programs.

During the week of January 26th we investigated the predator preferences of barn owls by dissecting owl pellets. The owl pellets were purchased from Pellets Inc. and come from the Pacific Northwest. Here is the data we collected regarding the kinds of prey barn owls eat and how many they eat in a meal that produces a pellet.

DeBoer’s class - 10 pellets dissected produced 23 mice, 1 shrew, 1 mole, 1 bird
Roth’s class - 11 pellets dissected produced 24 mice, 0 shrews, 0 moles, 0 birds
Hahn’s class - 10 pellets dissected produced 23 mice, 1 shrew, 0 moles, 0 birds
Apruzzi’s and Stump’s classes (combined) - 22 pellets dissected produced 41 mice, 1 shrew, 2 moles, 0 birds

In each class we had discussed our hypothesis that mice were the most preferred food, followed distantly by shrews, with moles and birds tied for the least desired. With each class it was clear that barn owls definitely prey more on mice than any other animal. In each class though, it wasn’t as clear as to any difference in preference for shrews, moles or birds. The percentage of prey eaten listed by class follows:

DeBoer – 88% mice, 4% shrews, 4% moles, 4% birds
Roth – 100% mice, 0% shrews, 0% moles, 0% birds
Hahn – 96% mice, 4% shrews, 0% moles, 0% birds
Apruzzi and Stump – 93% mice, 2% shrews, 5% moles, 0% birds

We agreed that we did not have a large enough sample to have a clear picture of the predation on the three less favored kinds of prey. In order to collect more data we would need to dissect more pellets. Much as the students would have loved to done this neither time nor funding allowed it. By combining the information for all three groups though, a different picture emerges. Taken in whole the 4th grades dissected a total of 53 pellets and found the following: 94% mice, 2.5% shrews, 2.5% moles, 1% birds. Perhaps we still do not have a big enough picture and should take apart even more pellets. Since we can't take apart more pellets we can look at data collected by other schools that I have worked with - see Previous Posts: Owl Pellets and Predator Prey Relationships for Monday, January 19 and the data collected by Jefferson Elementary students. How does this alter our conclusions about barn owl food preference?

One final aspect of predator prey relationship is illustrated with our dissection, the balance of nature, the number of predators balance with the number of prey. Our dissection revealed that 118 animals were eaten to produce 53 pellets. That is an average of 2.2 animals per pellet. An owl will produce about 4 pellets a night. That means in one night a barn owl will eat about 9 animals (mostly mice). In one year that owl will eat about 3,300 mice (and other small animals). Mice are prolific breeders. Owls keep the mouse population in balance by preying on these many small creatures.

Ornithology and Mid-winter Bird Survey at Bushkill Elementary

2009-01-24T05:49:00.000-08:00

At the Bushkill Elementary School in Nazareth, PA, 5th grade students joined me as ornithologists doing a survey of winter birds in the school’s environmental area. Before going into the field we spent about 15 minutes inside talking about how birds are identified. Our discussion centered on how coloration, size, shape, behavior, habitat and calls or songs are used to identify birds with the use of bird field guides. The examples of field guides were A Field Guide to the Birds, Roger Tory Peterson, Field Guide to Birds of Eastern North America by David Allen Sibley, and Birds of Pennsylvania by Franklin Haas and Roger Burrows. The discussion included why ornithologist might do a bird survey. I mentioned that two bird surveys were currently in progress across the northeast, including a bald eagle survey and a waterfowl survey. Other surveys of birds are Christmas Bird Counts, Breeding Bird Atlas projects and feeder watch projects.

Some interesting observations included a Carolina Wren that flew from an evergreen into an old garage. I explained how this wren often uses garages and similar structures as shelter. We stood in front of the garage looking into the open door. I explained that sometimes to get a bird to appear ornithologist make a “spish” sound that imitates a bird warning call. This sound can entice a bird to pop up and look around to see what all the fuss is about, giving us a chance to see it. I proceeded to “spish” and the wren popped up from behind some barrels and flew up and out through an opening in the eaves.

We also had some very good looks at a couple of northern mockingbirds. One bird in particular was observed as it looked for food upon the ground. As we approached, it flew up into some wild rose bushes along a fence line, where it began to feed upon rose hips. This bird eventually flew off and joined another mockingbird in a clump of brush. We wondered if these two birds may be starting to look for a nesting site. Several crows were observed flying in pairs and searching upper branches of some of the oaks. Again we speculated that these birds were beginning to look for a place to eventually nest.

Another notable species was sharp-shinned hawk. Two were observed as they perched in trees at a great distance. The most exciting though, was an adult that flew right over the group providing most of the students a really good look at it. A fleeting glimpse of a brown creeper was seen flying in the wooded section. We searched for it in hopes of observing its distinctive feeding behavior on tree trunks. Creepers get their name because they creep up tree trunks. They never creep down. When a creeper reaches a high point it flies down to a lower point on the trunk and starts its climb up all over again. Unfortunately we did not see the creeper again.

Two species were identified by the song only. These included black-capped chickadee and house sparrow. It is likely that for both species there were several individuals present but because we did not see them we counted them as only one bird present.

The afternoon sessions seemed to produce the most numbers of birds, both days. The morning of the second day, with very little wind and sunny conditions proved to have the greatest number of birds with 9 species seen. A total of 15 bird species were seen in the two days.

The value in doing a survey like this is that it provides a glimpse of the kinds of birds that make use of the woodlot and open fields that are a part of the school’s environmental center. Over time this record might be useful in showing trend in the diversity of the kinds of birds and their numbers. These trends might then be related to changing environmental conditions. If negative trends were detected wildlife management plans might be developed to help the affected birds. This data would also be useful in land-use planning and decision making.

More information on birds, bird surveys and citizen science is available at the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology. Click on the link to go to their website.

Our Survey Results
The birds are listed in taxonomic order.

Mrs. Dawe – 10:15 AM Thursday, Jan. 22, cloudy with strong westerly wind
Mourning Dove – 7
Blue Jay – 2
American Crow – 1
Starling – 1
Purple Finch – 1

Ms. Williams – 1:15 PM Thursday, Jan. 22, mostly sunny with no wind
Mourning Dove – 3
Downy Woodpecker – 1
American Crow – 14
Carolina Wren – 1
Starling – 12
Dark-eyed Junco – 3

Mr. Oberman – 10:15 AM Friday, Jan. 23, sunny with no wind
Sharp-shinned Hawk – 3
Blue Jay – 3
American Crow – 25
Black-capped Chickadee – 1
White-breasted Nuthatch – 1
Northern Mockingbird – 1
European Starling – 3
Dark-eyed Junco – 3
House Sparrow – 1

Mrs. Trach – 1:15 PM Friday, Jan. 23, sunny with no wind
Mourning Dove – 12
American Crow – 4
Brown Creeper - 1
American Robin – 20
Northern Mockingbird – 3
European Starling – 106

Owl Pellets and Predator Prey Relationships

2009-01-19T16:13:00.000-08:00

Last Thursday, January 15, I visited the Jefferson Elementary School in the Schalmont CSD. I did Owl Ecology for the 5th graders. It's a fun session to do that gets students excited about science, helps illustrate scientific methods and gives the students a chance to explore and understand owls and their relationship to their prey.

There are many resources about owl pellet dissection. I suggest checking out pelletsinc. for owl pellets and teaching resources. You can click on the link to reach this great resource. Here I would like to give some thoughts on how dissecting owl pellets can lead into a discussion of predator prey relationship.

The culmination of the class is to analyze the results of the owl pellet dissection. From our investigation we know, not only what the owls ate, but also how many of each of their prey were eaten. On this day we had the following results:
Mrs. Guzewich's class - 11 pellets dissected - 19 mice, 6 shrews, 1 moles, 0 birds
Mrs. Fitzgerald's class - 10 pellets dissected - 22 mice, 4 shrews, 0 moles, 0 birds
Mrs. Walker's class - 10 pellets dissected - 23 mice, 0 shrews, 0 moles, 0 birds
Mrs. Wood's class - 11 pellets dissected - 25 mice, 8 shrews, 1 mole, 1 bird

The total number of pellets dissected was 42 with a total of 89 mice, 18 shrew, 2 moles and 1 bird. That gives an average of 2.6 prey per owl pellet for the samples investigated at Jefferson Elementary. A barn owl produces about 4 pellets a night. So in one night they might eat at least 10 animals. In one year an owl might eat over 3600 mice (mice being the most common prey - the numbers seen above can help illustrate a discussion of what the most common food for barn owls is). This large consumption of prey illustrates the concept of a balance in nature between predator and prey. Prey species reproduce in large numbers. These prey support a population of predators. As the predators increase the number of prey decreases. This smaller number of prey can not support as large a population of predators. The number of predators begin to decline. As the number of predators decreases the number of prey that survive can increase, eventually allowing for an increase in the number of predators. This balance of increasing, then decreasing then again increasing is part of the story behind population cycles of wildlife.

Pond Ecology at Central Valley and Circleville

2008-11-19T14:34:00.000-08:00

In the last few weeks I’ve had the chance to do my ecologist-in-residence visits at the Central Valley Elementary School in the Monroe-Woodbury School District and the Circleville Elementary School in the Pine Bush School District where some of the students had a chance to be aquatic ecologists looking for animal life in the pond. This is one of my favorite sessions and one that the students and teachers all enjoy.

I bring in buckets of pond water (my favorite ponds to get samples from are at the Landis Arboretum in Esperance, NY – but you can find any of these creatures in most ponds throughout the Northeast). I explain how an aquatic ecologist tries to understand how pond organisms live, thrive and survive. I explain some of the equipment that an aquatic ecologist might use to investigate the pond environment. The students get to use my “uncamouflage” equipment (see my upcoming Aquatic Ecology Field Kit write-up coming soon) to capture and observe the many small creatures of the pond.

After a short time of capturing pond life we settled in for my final overview. I have taken some of the smallest samples and placed them in a special slides (available from Carolina Biological Supply Co., called “deep well slides”) that are used with old style slide projectors. I call these slides, "special aquariums" that can be used to magnify the pond animals, taking something that might be a quarter of an inch large and making it look about 30 or 40 times larger. We have the chance to look at the same enlarged creature and learn about "who is who, what they do, how they grow and where they go".

Here are a few of the creatures we recently found. All of these creatures are in the pond now as winter approaches. They will live under the ice through the winter and will be ready to continue on with their life cycle when the warm weather melts the ice on the pond next spring.

The scud or side swimmer is a kind of freshwater shrimp. They belong to a group of arthropods called amphipoda. They are scavenger, eating dead plant and animal material. They then are eaten by a lot of larger pond animals and thus are important parts of the food chain.

They often are easy to see but hard to catch. They are easy to see because they spend a lot of time swimming rapidly around in the water. They are hard to catch because as soon as they stop in a bunch of pond plants or detritus they disappear with they good camouflage.

One of my favorite creatures to show students is the phantom midge or gnat. It's called a phantom because it has a transparent (see-through) body. What a great adaptation for living in the water, to have a body that is see-through. Many times you don't notice that there is a midge larva in view. You see a few pieces of what looks like dirt floating in the water and then you see them wiggle around and notice the outline of a larva's body. Those little specks of dirt are the float bladders inside the midge that help it sink or float. You can also see it's digestive system.

The phantom midges or gnats are hunters. They use their antennae to catch small aquatic organisms and pull them to their mouths so that they can eat them. Here in this picture you can see these antennae. They look like a hook on top of the larva's head.

This past sample had hundreds of mayfly nymphs, most of them just about a quarter of an inch long. I suspect that most of these had hatched from eggs just before the cold weather arrived. They will live in the pond along with the other creatures we were capturing through the winter and be among the first of the pond insects to grow up and leave the pond next spring.

Mayfly nymphs are hunters in the pond. They will eat other small pond creatures like daphnia and copepods, along with aquatic worms and other insects.

When they are ready to leave the pond they will climb up out of the water on to a rock, or log, or dock, or something sticking out of the water and shed their exoskeleton one last time. This time their new exoskeleton will have something none of their past exoskeletons have had, wings!

When they leave the pond, though, they will have no digestive system. That means that the adult mayfly will not live long, but it leaves extra room for eggs in the females. They quickly find mates and lay eggs in the water for their species to continue on.

Here is a damselfly nymph. They are hunters while they live in the water. As they eat and grow they become to large for their exoskeletons and shed. Sometimes we are lucky and find the cast off exoskeleton they leave behind when they do.

When they are ready to leave the water they do the same as mayflies and climb up on to a dry area and shed their exoskeleton that also has new wings. They pump up their wings so that they are fully extended. The wings dry off and harden and off flies the damselfly to be a winged hunter chasing down and catching flying insects. One of their favorite insects to eat are mosquitoes.

I always leave the leach as the last of the critter to look at. What most people know about leaches if fiction from movies that they see, or folk tales that they've heard. Scientists are interested in the facts, not fiction. Here are some of the facts about leaches.

Most of the leeches that we find in a pond do not suck blood. They are either hunters or scavengers. All leeches have a suction cup tail that can grasp on to an animal like a duck or turtle. When the animal travels to another pond the leach takes a ride and can end up in a new pond far from where it started.

Blood sucking leeches get a bad rap. When they bite you usually don't feel it (not like deer flies or horse flies), after they bite it usually doesn't swell up or itch (not like mosquito or black fly bites) and to my knowledge there are no diseases passed on by leaches - not like a lot of other biting organisms like ticks [Lyme disease] or mosquitoes [West Nile virus or malaria]. They are important parts of the food chain, eating small animals or scavenging and then being food for larger animals like fish and if you eat the fish that you catch in a pond food in turn part of the food chain that ends in you.

Decomposing Deer

2008-11-13T16:40:00.000-08:00

Last year during my ecologist-in-residence at the Central Valley Elementary School we observed turkey vultures circling around what turned out to be a dead deer. During my visit this year with Mr. Petersen's class we went to check out what happened to the deer. We only found bones, mostly vertebrae and ribs along with one scapula, one femur and one humerus. Here's what I think happened to the dead deer as it decomposed and passed energy on to other organisms and returned nutrients to the environment.

The picture to the right shows a broken femur. I think the deer was hit by a car and ended up with a compound fracture of the femur. The impact of the car did not kill the deer right away and the deer was able to run up along the rock wall away from the highway. Through the action of running the sharp edges of the broken bone probably severed the femoral artery, resulting in the deer dieing.

The compound fracture would have left a gaping wound that the flies would have landed on to lay their eggs. That's why that area of the deer was more quickly consumed than the area of the upper body and head. Normally the place the flies would most likely lay eggs if there is no break in the skin would be the eyes, mouth and nose, among other open areas of the body. Notice in the picture to the left how the head area has had very little effect from fly larvae.

As the flies consumed more of the flesh of the area of the hind leg (the broken femur), that left a large opening for vultures to begin to eat the dead deer. The area shown in the picture to the right shows the affects of vultures and possibly other scavengers as they began eating the deer for food.

All of this is nature's way of recycling nutrients and passing along energy in the food chain. With the actions of the scavenger and decomposer organisms dead animals are returned to the earth and results in the continuation of life.

This kind of study and analysis is something that a terrestrial community ecologist would investigate.

Outdoor Education Conference

2008-10-28T14:24:00.003-07:00

I just got back from the New York State Outdoor Education Association annual conference. As it is every year, it was great conference. I never compare one year to another (I learned this in my years as a summer camp counselor - every year had its high points, and there was nothing to be gained by comparing one year to another). The highlights for me is always the auction - I have a blast doing it. We raise money for the Association's endowment. People have a great time (at least that's what they tell me). I'm already looking forward to next years conference which will be held September 24-27, 2009 in Fishkill, NY. The focus of the conference will be the Hudson River and local environs, as 2009 is the 400th anniversary of Henry Hudson's exploring the Hudson River.

I am trying to think what workshops I should submit for consideration to the conference committee. I think the site will lend itself nicely to a nature songs and stories campfire workshop. I might also offer to do a nature trail mapping session.

One of the key note speakers at this years conference was David Sobel who spoke on place based learning. It was an inspiring presentation that dovetailed with a workshop that I lead on integrating environmental education across the curriculum - exploring how outdoor environmental education can help teachers teach math, science, language arts, art, physical education and music. We had a spirited discussion, with a lot of good examples of nature centers, outdoor education centers and BOCES programs that provided service to schools to help them take advantage of the outdoor natural environment to stimulate learning in all areas, not just science.

I am still left though, with the question of how do we encourage all schools to take advantage of the real world to inspire and excite students in learning? It is encouraging to see the excitement of Richard Louv's book "Last Child in the Woods" has created. In fact there is legislation at the Federal level called Leave No Child Inside that is slowly moving though the halls of Congress. Newsweek in it's September 15 issue had an article on "eco-education". But it's all small steps when you think of all the schools there are and how little teachers take students into the real world to facilitate learning. I am resolved to try to contact school administrators that I know and get their opinion on how more action in bringing the real world to the classroom might happen. It would seem to me if there is to be a shift in the attitudes of schools regarding teaching in outdoor environment and immediate community surrounding the school that it will require a multi-prong approach involving pre-service (teacher preparation at the college level) teacher training, the classroom teachers, school administrators, parents and those involved in providing enrichment programs using the natural environment (nature center, outdoor center, museum, and parks program staff).

recent bell top elementary school visit

2008-10-22T16:06:00.000-07:00

I just finished my annual ecologist-in-residence visit at the Bell Top School in the East Greenbush CSD in Troy, NY. My visit culminated with my nature tunes and tales assembly program that was highlighted by a performance of "The Lorax" by Mrs. Gigglio's 3rd grade class (special appearance by Peter as the Lorax).

We investigated general ecology, insect study (including capturing a pair of mating walking sticks), aquatic ecology (study pond water organisms in water samples from the Landis Arboretum in Esperance, NY), mammals and trees.

One of the things that I empasize with all these classes is that scientist do research to find answers to the questions they come up with. An example of this has a fun side to the learning opportunity. In my tree exploration walks I end with a short discussion of how we humans use trees - for lumber, food, paper, inspiration, enjoyment, etc. I then procede to show them how I can use an acorn cap from an oak tree to make a whistle. The shrill whistle produces a group of ear plugging young scientists asking "How did you do that?" My response - "You'll have to do some research."

I suggested that they might google "acorn cap whistle" with mom or dad's help not knowing if there was indeed a site that would show how. Indeed there is! Check the link I have here or search for yourself.

Nature Walks at Smith Clove Elementary School, Central Valley, NY

2006-10-11T21:18:00.000-07:00

I’m at the Smith Clove Elementary School in Central Valley this week and next. With the 1st grade students we’ve been ecologists studying “Who is who, what they do, how they grow and where they go” in the forest ecosystem. We are taking advantage of a beautiful nature trail that crosses a stream and circles through a mixed hardwood forest, with some fairly large black cherry, white ash and variety of oak trees.

We spent some time talking about habitat – the place where animals live because they can find “ FOOD, WATER and HIDING PLACES” (I think students can better identify with hiding places versus shelter).

Trees are a big part of our exploration, including identifying a locust tree (deep “V” shaped valleys in the bark, deep enough that you can hide your pinkie in them) and a cherry tree (the burnt potato chip or burnt corn flake bark tree). We do a Billy “B” verse (I look to do it as a repeat after me chant – "Who’s Billy “B”?" – definitely a great resource, check him out on the website link) “The roots grow deep”, “Deep into the ground”, “Look for water”, “And drink it when it’s found”.

We explore rotten logs and the concept of what happens to dead things – they “DECOMPOSE”. We found a red-backed salamander under one log. These amphibians are probably the most numerous land vertebrate in our woods. Later, going back to get some pictures of the salamander I found a slug that appeared to be eating salamander eggs. Is this common? I’ll need to research that more.

Here’s something to think about. The large earthworm pictured with the red-backed salamander is the very well known nightcrawler, Lumbricus terrestris. These worms are not native to our northern woods. Their introduction and spread may actually be a problem for the small salamanders like the red-backed. The nightcrawler is out competing the smaller native worms that the red-backs feed upon, resulting in a population of the large nightcrawlers that are too big for the salamanders to eat. Scientist are studying this situation to see how the red-backed salamander will fare. The moral to the story; if you have a bunch of nightcrawlers left over after a day of fishing don’t dump them in the woods.

We found lots of fungi, one of the organisms that help to “DECOMPOSE” things. The best ones were some puff ball fungi, which gave us a chance to see how they puff out “smoke” – the tiny, dust-like spores that will blow away and grow into more fungi if they land on some dead plant material.

Larvae and Owl Pellets at Bell Top Elementary

2006-10-11T20:02:00.000-07:00

My Bell Top stay resulted in a couple of interesting activities/observations that I’d like to share. The first was on one of the school yard ecology nature walks. A student discovered these interesting caterpillars, or so we thought. Because the larva reacted to disturbance by curling back their abdomens over their bodies, my initial reaction was that they were sawflies, which are actually a kind of wasp, but I wasn’t sure so I told the kids that I would have to do some RESEARCH. There were dozens of them eating gray birch leaves, leaving many bare leaf stems. Not going with my initial thought of sawflies, I went to Caterpillars of Eastern North America looking through all of the pages. No luck, so I perused the introduction and low and behold under the section entitled "Not Quite Caterpillars" I found a photo and description of the Croesus latitarsis sawfly. My initial reaction was right, we had found sawfly larvae!

The other activity that I want to share was Owl Ecology, a class I do for many schools. In this class I introduce students to the world of ornithology. I challenge them with the fact that they could be ornithologists studying owls in their own back yard and surrounding community. We start off with the fact that scientists ask questions. What questions would we ask to start off a study of owl close to home – what would those owls be and what habitat would they live.

I like to cover the three most common owls students might encounter, the Eastern Screech-owl, the Great Horned Owl and the Barred Owl. I throw in the Common Barn Owl since the pellets we dissect come from them (check out the Pellets Inc. website link). We chant the types of habitat these owls like – the Screech-owl “Woods and fields and woods and fields – and they don’t mind buildings”; Great Horned Owl “Woods and fields and woods and fields and they don’t like buildings” (at least not a lot of buildings like in a typical city) and the Barred Owl “ Woods and woods and woods and more woods”.

We talk about the calls the owls make and how we would keeps a science journal to record our data on where we find the owls. We discuss their hunting and feeding behavior, and how they produce pellets, the ball of fur and bones regurgitated by the owl after they’re meal. We then investigate the pellets to see if indeed mice are the most favored food (I present this as a hypothesis – “Mice, or rodents, are the number one favored food, shrews are second and tied for third are moles and small birds”. Students dissect pellets, two students per pellet using their hands, a paper clip unbent to serve as a probe, a scrap piece of white paper to work on and a double-sided information sheet (on one side are instructions and a mouse skeleton diagram, on the other side is a bone sorting chart showing the various bones, skull, jaw, fore limbs, shoulder blades, hip bones, hind limbs, vertebrae and ribs). I give them these basic clues as to what to look for and what kind of animal the owls ate (incidentally the pellets come from Barn Owls of the Pacific northwest areas of northern California, Oregon and southern Washington, purchased from Pellets Inc.) – an orange/yellow claw looking bone is not a claw, it’s a jaw of a mouse (actually a vole), a tiny beak like skull with very tiny purplish teeth is from a shrew, a relatively large skull with white teeth from front to back is a mole and birds have no teeth look for a beak and keeled breastbone.

The students dive into the dissection and soon you hear “What’s this?” reverberating around the room. We take time to tally our findings and see if my hypothesis is correct. We always find that mice/rodents are indeed the most often eaten food, sometimes shrews do come out in second place, sometimes we determine that we need more data to figure out if shrew are indeed second and moles and birds third. No matter what our discoveries are it’s an exciting class.

Barn Classroom at Bell Top Elementary, East Greenbush CSD

2006-10-11T19:39:00.000-07:00

Bell Top Elementary School – October 3-5, 2006

I’ve been working with Bell Top Elementary in the East Greenbush School District for many years. They have a wonderful barn classroom that is the focus for a lot of outdoor environmental education above and beyond my residence program that I bring each year.

I’ve got to tell you what I know about the barn classroom because it’s a wonderful inspiration for all schools – an inspiration to take advantage of whatever the outdoors school environment has to offer. Every school has something outdoors that can be put to use inspiring a sense of science, a sense of wonder, a sense of questions that can lead to exploration and learning.

If I don’t have the whole story straight I apologize, but I think that I have the basics. As I understand it, it all started with a student teacher that wanted to do maple sugaring in the spring. She got the permission of the classroom teacher and the administration to do so. They went out into the woods surrounding the school, identified several maple trees, tapped them, and boiled off the sap in the classroom (actually they may have done it in the cooking classroom, yes – the school does cooking classes – a great way to inspire reading, follow directions, making measurements – a whole host of interdisciplinary learning inspired by food!) to make maple syrup.

Several years later when that same teacher, now hired by the school, returned she got the whole school (it is a small school, a couple of classes each for grades K to 5) to take on maple sugaring as a project in the spring. All kinds of learning revolved around the sugaring; reading about it, studying the Native American history of sugaring, tree identification and life cycles, measuring sap, learning about evaporation, teamwork and cooperation. The teachers got parents involved to help tend the boiling-off fire.

While tending the fire on a typical cold, drizzly early March day, the teachers and parents working the project wishfully thought, “Wouldn’t it be nice to have a little sugar shack?” I’m sure in their minds’ eye they saw a simple pole or shed structure with a roof that would keep off the rain.

This led to some research. Several people put together a grant to see what it would take to build a sugar shack. With that grant they consulted with an architect that advised them on what would need to be done to build a small sugar house/barn. Then back to the grant writing, which secured the funds to build a small barn. The architect suggested “Wouldn’t it be nice to have an English style barn for the front half and a Dutch style barn for the other half?” And that was what was built.

The barn, called the Barn Classroom, serves as focal point for apple cider pressing in the fall. In the spring it is a sugar house. Last year I did sheep shearing in the barn while a craftsperson did hand spinning of animal fiber in the art room. The Barn Classroom is the centerpiece for a beautiful nature trail that winds its way through the surrounding woods where the maple trees for springtime tapping grow. A few years ago I surveyed the nature trail with 4th and 5th graders and used that data to draw a scale map for the trail, while the K through 3rd graders developed pages for a nature trail booklet based on topics explored on nature walks I had taken them on.

What a wonderful model for school to look at. Every school should investigate what the outdoor school environment has to offer the teachers and students for learning. Every school doing so needs financial support to help them take advantage of these outdoor learning opportunities. Then , as I tell my classes, “The outdoors is our science laboratory – with all kinds of opportunities for exploring, discovering and learning.”

Field Guides and Reference Books

2006-10-02T12:19:00.000-07:00

Many time teachers and students ask me how I know what I know. The answer is from many years of listening and learning from others, and reading. There are many guide books available and more published every year. I'm sure I'm not the only naturalist that has to watch his wallet when visiting a bookstore. These are my favorites and ones that I find most useful (although any book on nature is definitely useful).

Martin, Alexander C., Herbert S. Zim and Arnold L. Nelson. American Wildlife and Plants: A Guide to Wildlife Food Habits. New York: Dover Publication, Inc. 1961.
This is a reprint of a book published in 1951. I am not sure if it is still in print, but it is well worth borrowing from a library or buying used. The first part of the book lists many of the common animals and what they eat, while the second part of the book lists common plants and which animals eat them.

Palmer, E. Laurence revised by H. Seymour Fowler. A Fieldbook of Natural History. New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company. 1949. ISBN 0-07-048425-2.
Another “golden oldy” that is out of print. It is an encyclopedia of natural history giving a short account, usually 5 or 6 paragraphs about a wide range of natural science topics starting with the stars and ending with animals. It covers the atmosphere and weather, rocks and minerals, plants (it is outdated in areas of taxonomy; for example in lists fungi in the plant kingdom), and animals, providing basic information on each.

Ehrlich, Paul R., David S. Dobkin, and Darryl Wheye. The Birder’s Handbook: A Field Guide to the Natural History of North American Birds. New York: Fireside/Simon and Schuster, Inc. 1988. ISBN 0-671-62133-5.
Another great bird resource. The left side pages present information on bird species (organized as most bird books are by taxonomic order, the most primitive birds - loons, first, and the most advanced birds - finches, at the end. The right side pages are various essays on ornithological topics. It’s called a field guide, but it could be considered an encyclopedia.

Pasquier, Roger F. Watching Birds. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Company. 1977 ISBN 0-395-25343-8.
I think this is one of the easiest books to read to learn about the biology and ecology of birds. Unfortunately I believe it is out of print.

Sibley, David A. The Sibley Guide to Birds. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. 2000.
ISBN 0-679-45122-6
Sibley, David A. The Sibley Guide to Bird Life and Behavior. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. 2001.
Two of the most recently published bird books provide a huge amount of information on North American birds.

Budliger, Robert E. and Gregory Kennedy. Birds of New York State. Auburn, WA: Lone Pine Publishing International. 2005. ISBN-13: 978-1-55105-326-4. Author Bob Budliger is a long time friend, colleague and birdwatcher of mine. We enjoyed many Christmas bird counts and few World Series of Birding days together. I have seen several other books in this series, including Birds of New England and Birds of Pennsylvania. This book is nice in that it covers only birds expected to be seen in the state.

Glassberg, Jeffrey. Butterflies through Binoculars: the East. New York: Oxford University Press. 1999. ISBN 0-19-510668-7.
Dunkle, Sidney W. Dragonflies through Binoculars: a Field Guide to Dragonflies of North America. New York: Oxford University Press. 2000. ISBN 0-19-5112687-7
Both of these recent books encourage the use of binoculars to get a close up look at two very popular insect orders, the lepidoptera (the butterfly half of the order) and the odonata.

Wagner, David L. Caterpillars of Eastern North America. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. 2005. ISBN 0-691-12144-3. Any exploration outdoors will uncover a caterpillar or two. This book is the only one that I know of that covers over 600 of the moth and butterfly caterpillars found in eastern North America. One of the greatest features of the book is a foodplant index which is a most useful aid in identifying a caterpillar.

McGavin, George C. The Pocket Guide to Insects of the Northern Hemisphere. London, England: Parkgate Books Ltd. 1998. ISBN 1-85585-362-0.
I think this is one of the best beginner books on insects. I don’t know if it is still in print. I bought mine at discount table at Barnes & Nobles (or was it Borders?). I wish I had bought all of the copies they had. It has very nice illustrations and good detailed information on about 200 insect families, just right for the beginning entomologist.

Newcomb, Lawrence. Newcomb’s Wildflower Guide. Boston: Little, Brown and Company. 1977.
One of the two classic wildflower field guides. I think naturalists are pretty well divided in half as to which guide the prefer, Newcomb’s or Peterson’s. Newcomb’s uses a code system that incorporates observations of plant parts that leads to sections of the book where the final identification is done by matching the diagram.

Peterson, Roger T. and Margaret McKenny. A Field Guide to Wildflowers of Northeastern and Northcentral North America. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company. 1968. ISBN 0-395-183251
The Peterson guide uses a visual approach that involves observations of color, form and other details. This does help lead to a better understanding of plant families (scientists use the word family for very closely related groups).

Peterson Guides: the most popular of all the field guides, probably the inspiration for most field guides and worth a short story about Roger Tory Peterson and what led him to write about and illustrate birds. The story goea, as a child in western New York he walked a long distance to school. As it was, he was often late in arriving. After many late arrivals, one of his teachers (I believe it was third grade) asked him why. He explained that on his way to school he would stop and study the many birds he encountered and before he knew it he’d be late. This teacher didn’t punish him. Instead, she said if he was going to be late that often he would have to write a report on the birds he observed. Those early bird observations, writings and drawings set Mr. Peterson on a path that would change how almost everyone looks at the natural world.

My favorite Peterson Guides:

Murie, Olaus J. A Field Guide to Animal Tracks. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company. 1974. ISBN 0-395-19978-6.
Covell, Charles V. Eastern Moths. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company. 1984. ISBN 0-395-361001
As far as I know Houghton Mifflin has not recently printed this book, although I don't think they say it is out of print. At a family nature convention many years ago I was introduced to night-lighting for moths and other nocturnal, light-attracted insects. I had to get the guide to Eastern Moths. I searched in what seemed to be almost every book store from Albany to Boston for it. I even searched for it on used book store sites like ABE.com with no luck. I finally walked into a small paperback book store in Gloucester, MA. They had two copies. I should have bought them both.

Harrison, Hal H. A Field Guide to Birds’ Nests. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company. 1975. ISBN 0-395-20434-8.

Houghton Mifflin also publishes other books and materials under the Peterson name. These are the Peterson First Guides and Peterson Flash Guides. The First Guides are intended for younger or beginning naturalists. They are described as being a simplified guide. My favorite is:

Wright, Amy B. Peterson First Guide: Caterpillars. Boston: Moughton Mifflin Company. 1993. ISBN 0-395-56499-9
There aren’t many books on caterpillars. This is a great help for identifying and learning about a very easily found creature.

The Flash Guides are plastic laminated fold-out posters. The two I use often are the Flash Guide to Hawks and the Flash Guide to Animal Tracks.

Golden Guides: another very popular series of guides in two formats published by Golden Press of New York. There are the pocket sized books called Golden Guides. The series include several dozen titles. My favorite is:

Reid, George K., Herbert Zim and George Fichter. Pond Life. New York: Golden Press. 1967.

Then there are the Golden Field Guides. These books are the standard field guide size. Probably the most popular is

Robbins, Chandler S., Bertel Bruun and Herbert S. Zim. Birds of North America. New York: Golden Press. 1983. ISBN0-307-33656-5.
This book features range maps on the same page as the bird species account, a criticism of the Peterson Field Guide to Eastern Birds. I knew an ornithologist that took his Golden Field Guide to Birds of North America and drew in all of the field mark notes found in the drawings in the Peterson guide (one of the strengths of that guide).

Another popular series is the Stokes Nature Guides published by Little Brown. My favorites:

Tyning, Thomas F. A Guide to Amphibians and Reptiles. Boston: Little, Brown and Company. 1990. ISBN 0-316-81713-9.

Stokes, Donald W. A Guide to Nature in Winter. Boston: Little, Brown and Company. 1976. ISBN 0-316-81720-1.
This is the best book on nature in winter. It almost reads like a novel and is full of information.

Stokes, Donald W. A Guide to Observing Insect Lives. Boston: Little, Brown and Company. 1983. ISBN 0-316-81727-9.

Lastly, another series of nature guides, called the Finder published by the Nature Study Guild in Rochester, NY. These are pocket sized and very inexpensive. My favorites are:

Miller, Dorcas. Track Finder: A Guide to Mammal Tracks of Eastern North America. Rochester: Nature Study Guild. 1981.

Watts, May Theilgaard and Tom Watts. Winter Tree Finder: A Manual for Identifying Deciduous Trees in Winter. Rochester: Nature Study Guild. 1970.

Watts, May Theilgaard. Tree Finder: A Manual for the Identification of Trees by Their Leaves. Rochester: Nature Study Guild. 1991.

Watts, May Theilgaard. Flower Finder: A Guide to Identification of Spring Wild Flowers and Flower Families. Rochester: Nature Study Guild. 1955.

If you have any questions or would like more information please make use of the comments on this blog.