NASA Visitor Center

Back in the early days of HoLLIE classes, we met in the parking lot of the NASA Goddard Visitor Center before going to our class; it was before it opened so I wanted to go back to see the visitor center exhibits. Last week – it happened. It was a cloudy morning with rain in the forecast. The center opens at 10 and I was there a few minutes afterward. There were only a couple of other early visitors.

I decided to do the outdoor Goddard Rocket Garden and Astobiology Walk first – since I wasn’t sure the weather would stay dry. Did you know that grooved pavement used for airport runways and other pavements was the result of a NASA Wallops Island study from the 1960s?

I took a lot of pictures of the astrobiology walk and made a slide show of them below (use the arrows to go through at your own speed).

My favorite displays were the two showing banded iron specimens.

Inside – there was a full-side mechanical prototype of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO). We saw the operational control room for the mission during the HoLLIE class. It’s quite a thrill to know that the mission is ongoing – knowing that my daughter was an undergraduate at Cornell when LRO reached the moon and she helped with some of the initial image calibration since she had developed calibration skills in her part-time job calibrating images from the Mars rover.

There was also an exhibit of the new James Web Space Telescope – comparing its mirror with the one on the Hubble Space Telescope.

There was also a fun exhibit with two cameras and monitors. One was an infrared camera. It picked up the residual heat from ones feet on the carpet as one walked away from its field of view!

I bought a Cassini Grand Finale t-shirt for my daughter at the gift store; she used some data from Cassini for a couple of papers while she was an undergraduate. Hurray for good experiences!

Fishmobile

Last week, I volunteered when the Phillips Wharf Environmental Center’s Fishmobile visited an elementary school in Carroll County, Maryland.

The Fishmobile is a bus fitted with aquarium tanks for live exhibits of animals from the Chesapeake Bay and bookcases/walls of related materials. It’s a field trip that comes to the school! Groups of 10-12 students take about 15 minutes in the bus to see everything…spending another 15 minutes outside getting more details about horseshoe crabs. There were 4 classes of 4th graders that came through in 2 hours!

I managed to take pictures of some of the animals in the Fishmobile before the students arrived. There were small horseshoe crabs – the smallest being a little larger than a quarter. They were active all over the bottom of their tank.

The oyster toadfish was not happy after the first few groups and retreated to the back of the tank. I was glad I got a picture of him.

The lined seahorse was one that was harder to photograph. It was a good discussion starter since the seahorse depends on the grasses in the bay and is becoming more numerous now that they are recovering. I was impressed that the 4th graders were aware of the grasses even if they didn’t know about the seahorses.

The only animal in the Fishmobile that the students could touch was the diamondback terrapin. They were told to use 2 fingers gently on his back…because he can bite! He evidently is very accustomed to handling…and he has a name: Larry. There was a baby diamondback terrapin (hatched last fall) in a neighboring tank that didn’t move around very much.

There was also a small box turtle and a mystery box with a box turtle shell. We prompted the students that tried the mystery box to feel whether the shell was flat or domed…and then to look at all the turtles on display to identify what kind of shell was in the mystery box.

The fish that had a name linked to history was the hogchoker. It is a flounder like fish that lives in the grassy areas of the bay. When the colonists collected the grasses to fee to their pigs, sometimes this fish was harvested with the grasses….and choked the pig that tired to eat it. That’s how it got its name.

The bookcases had jaws from a modern shark…and a fossil tooth, a dolphin skull, and the molt of a horseshoe crab. There was a wall of various kinds of trash with estimates of how long it took to degrade. Plastic water bottles and fishing line take 100s of years!

Gleanings of the Week Ending April 7, 2018

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

How Do We Carry Our Shopping Home Now? | CleanTechnica – I’ve been using my collection of reusable bags for years. Some of them are over 10 years old and still in great shape. Occasionally, I still get a Lightweight Plastic Bag (or a newspaper in plastic, or other plastic bag packaging) which I take back to the bag recycling bin at my grocery store. I’m always sad when I set a grocery cart full of stuff in the plastic bags…hope none of them escape into the environment.

A Harlequin Duck’s Long Cross-Country Migration – Cool Green Science – A bird banded in Glacier National Park migrated to Long Island! Zoom lenses on cameras and binoculars make it possible to record banding info from a distance.

BBC - Future - The small Scottish isle leading the world in electricity – Eigg has an off-grid electric system powered by wind, water, and solar…they average 90-95% renewable energy. The time of year they tend to need back up generators is in the spring.

Implications of access to high-quality fruits and vegetables: Quality has potential to impact consumer selection and consumption in rural areas -- ScienceDaily – There has been a lot of discussion about food deserts in big cities – places that lack affordable, high-quality food. It appears that food deserts occur in rural areas as well.

Top 25 Endemic Wild Birds – National Geographic – The weekly bird photography fix! The chickadee we see frequently in our areas of the Mid-Atlantic of the US is endemic to our part of the world (and is one of the 25 pictured).

New Beginnings: Cherry Blossoms and Helen Taft's Landscape Diplomacy – Some years we manage to see the peak of the cherry blossoms around the tidal basin in Washington DC….but every year we enjoy the cherry tree in our front year. It is always at least a week later than the ones in DC.

US electricity use drops, renewables push fossil fuels out of the mix | Ars Technica – Total electrical generation was down 1.5 percent in 2017. Coal and natural gas declines were more than that with renewable energy projects coming online. Energy efficiency has made a difference! Another article reported that some utilities are planning for the uptick in electric vehicles to cause the trend in electricity generation to turn upward again. Right now – it seems like people that buy electric cars are often the same people that install solar panels; that could result in no uptick to the draw from the electric utility.

The Life Issue | WIRED – A collection of thought provoking articles about ‘what it means to live in an age of improvisation.’ I started with the articles about the 55-infinity age group.

Microscopic Images of Seeds • Insteading – hmm…maybe I’ll take a magnified look at seeds before I plant them in my flower beds.

Meditate regularly for an improved attention span in old age – Nice to know that something enjoyable immediately is also good for the long term too!

Brookside Gardens – April 2018

The day after we were at Arlington Cemetery, we walked around Brookside Gardens. It is one of my favorite places to take visitors to our area. We decided to walk around outdoors first.

 There were several kinds of deciduous magnolias blooming. Last year many of them were caught in a late frost so I was glad to see them.

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The crocus and snowdrops were done for the year but there were other bulbs providing color and there will be tulips soon; they are just beginning to send up their buds.

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I saw a stump that I hadn’t noticed before beside one of the paths I use frequently. It’s rotting from the outside in!

Now sprouting plants draw are colorful…draw attention with their textures as well.

When we went inside the conservatory, the warm moist air felt good after being out in the cold. There was a lot of work going on in the building. The room where the butterfly exhibit will be by the end of the month was completely closed and the other room was getting some new plantings. I noticed that the large white bird-of-paradise plant had a lot of dried flowers and a few that were still fresh. We warmed up – made a quick stop at the gift shop – and were on our way – pleased with our morning out and about.

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Arlington National Cemetery

Earlier this week we walked around Arlington National Cemetery. It’s a place we take out-of-town guests occasionally…more when we first moved to the area than recently when the traffic between where we live in Maryland and Washington, DC/Arlington, VA has increased so much. It was easy enough getting there the morning we went – easy to park in the garage near the visitor center. It was a little colder than we anticipated and there were busloads of students and tourists both arriving and leaving as we walked toward the visitor center. There was a short line to go through security and then a lot of people inside the building.

I was glad to walk through the doors to the cemetery side of the building! The first sight I photographed was the sculpture that was there….something to look at and appreciate.

The long rows of white marble tombstones flow in every direction broken my trees and walkways. The deciduous magnolia were the main trees in bloom. Arlington House is closed for rehabilitation and we didn’t walk up to it; the flag was at half mast in front of the house so there must have been a funeral near the time we were in the cemetery.

Just below Arlington house is the John F. Kennedy grave site. Every time I have visited Arlington Cemetery this has been a place to see. This time I also turned around and photographed the Washington and Lincoln Memorial and one of the famous Kennedy quotes.

The guard was changing at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. We arrived a little after it started so I was not able to get a good picture. As it finished, and we turned to leave I enjoyed the frilly daffodils and understory of violets in front of the balustrade.

We walked back through the cemetery and I managed to take pictures of Lincoln Memorial as we drove over Memorial Bridge. There appears to be some renovation work going on with this monument too.

HoLLIE – Week 8

The Week 8 of HoLLIE (Howard County Legacy Leadership Institute for the Environment) class was a week later than originally planned because of our late season snowstorm. As I passed the gate and started up the drive toward Belmont Manor, I realized that not only was it the last day of class, it was also the last days of the ash trees in the park. The trees along the drive had been marked since the beginning of class and there was a truck already in position to start cutting one of the larger trees down. After I parked, I took pictures of one that has already been cut along the road between the manor house and the carriage house. The emerald ash borer has changed the landscape of our area of Maryland.

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The last two environmental lectures were “Why protecting the environment is really about protecting our own health” and “The relationship between climate and weather.” The lectures were followed by a segment reflecting on leadership strengths and ‘what’s next’ for the class cohort and feedback on the class overall.

The grand finale of the day was seeing the baby chicks and a visit to Myrtle Woods Farm which would become their home: pigs, chickens, hoop houses with veggies and edible flowers….fields with high fences to keep out the deer ready for planting. Its 9 acres of farm surrounded by housing developments!

I’m still reflecting on my follow-up to the class. I’ve done the easy thing of signing up for a few more volunteer activities like what I do with the pre-K through high school field trips with the Howard County Conservancy. I’m exploring other volunteering that diverges from my education focus up until now and am not sure yet on the direction I will take….something that is directed more toward adults or communities rather than children and their education – probably.

I judge the value of a class these days by how much I act upon what I learn afterwards. By that measure – HoLLIE is headed toward the top of my all time list of actionable classes!

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 31, 2018

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

 4 Psychology Lessons That Can Teach Us About Inspiring Climate Action | CleanTechnica – Good ideas – particularly if anticipating a lot of disagreement or people being too depressed about the prospect of the future for Earth to take action.

Top 25 Wild Raptors – National Geographic – From around the world…no bald eagle in this group of photos.

After 250 Years of Dams, Rhode Island River Restored for Migratory Fish – Cool Green Science – Maryland is also removing dams. Bloede’s Dam (see blog post about it here)

Hummingbirds Make an Incredible Journey North – Cool Green Science – This little birds make a very long journey. Hope our recent cold weather has not made is a problematic year for them.

Saving Terrapins From Drowning in Crab Traps – Cool Green Science – Hopefully this can be a success story for terrapins around Long Island…time will tell.

Elusive Deep-Sea Anglerfish Seen Mating for the First Time | Smart News | Smithsonian – I’d only see pictures of dead specimens or drawings. The 2.5 minute video shows a living fish moving slowly through the water with filaments that glow surrounding it. Still very fierce looking but also a slow moving graceful beauty.

Drug-related mortality rates are not randomly distributed across the US -- ScienceDaily – The map says it all. The hotspots for drug-related deaths in the US are not necessarily where historically high drug use happened.

The 20 most beautiful libraries in the U.S. - Curbed – I’ve only been in one of these: the reading room of the Legal Research Library at the University of Michigan; it was part of the campus tour when my daughter visited the university before she added it to her short list that she would apply to for her undergraduate studies. I remember it being very quiet even though people were walking around – cork floors are quiet floors!

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch Is Much Larger and Chunkier Than We Thought | Smart News | Smithsonian – Ugh! It was bad even before the more precise measurements came in. There has to be a way to start cleaning it up and keeping more garbage from getting into the ocean.

Landscape Photography Series Tells “Winter’s Tale” of Snowy Forests – Hopefully we’ve had our last bought with snowy weather here in Maryland. I do enjoy the snowy forests…for a little while.

Sunrise Alarm

After I posted about the sunrise back on March 18th, I remember a time when I wondered why there were not alarm clocks that would be relative to sunrise rather than the same time every day. Well – there are apps for that! I found several when I thought to check and chose Sun Alarm from Volker Voecking Software Engineering. I set the alarm on my phone to go off at 10 minutes before sunrise for my location.

I usually get up earlier than the alarm…but find that I am seeing more sunrises because I look to the east when the alarm goes off. Seeing a beautiful sunrise is a boost at the beginning of the day that is always welcome. The picture I’m including with this post was taken last Tuesday…about 9 minutes before sunrise.

Zooming – March 2018

I use the zoom on my camera for some many reasons – to frame the picture I want (taking out some items in the foreground),

To get a shot that looks close up without having to get close to the object either because what I want to photograph is too high, there is a barrier, or I don’t want to go traipsing through ice and snow.

Sometimes I use the zoom to get a better view than I can get with my eyes – particularly with wildlife that would not sit still if I moved any closer to them.

Birding through a Window – March 2018

I was out and about more during March than earlier in the year so I wasn’t around to see birds through my office window as much. I did catch the birds that seem to always bee around: the blue jays,

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The cardinals,

The mourning doves,

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The juncos (they’ll be leaving for their nesting grounds in the north soon),

The titmouse, and

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The Carolina wren.

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There are the ones I see less often – so continue to view them as special:

the pileated woodpecker and

The northern flicker.

There seemed to be more flocks of birds in the yard and around the feeder/bath: cowbirds,

Crows,

Grackles,

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Starlings, and

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Robins of course (I always associate springtime and flocks of robins coming through…some staying for the season and others continuing northward).

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All in all – a good number of birds around in March through high winds and snow….the swings of temperature. It’s been a wild weather month.

Ten Little Celebrations – March 2018

March 2018 had a lot to celebrate; some of the top ten were unexpected.

The Snow Day just last week was our first substantial snow of the winter. There had been so many forecasts that didn’t quite pan out that I didn’t bother to buy the makings for snow ice cream like I usually do. We celebrated with just the view and that we didn’t have to get out in the thick of the event.

Beavers at Mt. Pleasant

Two birds with fish at Conowingo. I celebrated that we saw both a bald eagle and a cormorant getting their fish within a relative short period of time after we got to Conowingo.

Another sign of spring – the first pre-K field trip of the season. I enjoy all of the volunteering I do but somehow the youngest children almost always are the highlight of the season.

The HoLLIE classes continued from February into March; each one was a finely-honed learning experience. I was overwhelmed with little celebrations so I picked a bird that I saw on one of the field trips that I had not seen before in our area – a hooded merganser pair.

The shell spiral in my front flowerbed was a visual celebration – somehow it made the day for me. I think earlier it had been covered with leaves but after the March winds, its whiteness made it stand out.

I also celebrated that we didn’t lose electrical power in the wind storm like a lot of other neighborhoods did. There was some siding damage and at least one tree down in our neighborhood….but nothing happened to our house.

The miniature iris at Brookside were something I did not expect; I didn’t remember them from previous years. Seeing them blooming among the other spring bulbs was a treat.

Yellow grass might not be something to celebrate in other seasons, but the bright color was like a beacon at the end of winter.

Finishing up our 2017 taxes was worth celebrating too. It’s something that happens every year and I’m glad my husband does more of the work…it’s celebration – and relief – when they are done.

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 24, 2018

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Top 25 Migratory Wild Birds – National Geographic Blog – Lots of birds on the move this time of year.

Photobook Captures Diverse Beauty of 100 Different Types of Chickens – Who knew there were so many kinds of chickens!

Some states now advocate coexistence with–rather than killing of–coyotes – National Geographic – We have an overpopulation of deer in our area…and we hear coyotes more frequently. The only time I’ve seen them is a blurring running away from me. I’m cheering them on this spring; maybe they will help limit the size of the deer population.

BBC - Future - Why being a loner may be good for your health – Being alone is not the same as being lonely!

Strange and Unbelievable Facts About Shrews – Cool Green Science – I’ve never seen a shrew – or maybe I just didn’t realize what I was seeing. Watch the 2 videos!

Migrations and Other Colorful Natural Phenomena – Appreciating the natural world…

State-by-state causes of infant mortality in the US: State-by-state analysis links sudden unexpected deaths of infants (SUDI) to high proportion of full-term infant mortality in the U.S. -- ScienceDaily – I was surprised at the variability within the US.

Are Bird Feeders Helping Cardinals Expand Their Range? – Cool Green Science – A positive for bird feeders? I know we have cardinals that visit our feeder area almost every day…all year long.

Historical Sign of Chesapeake Winter, the Canvasback, Still Brightens the Bay – National Geographic – There numbers are greatly reduced…but they still are quite a site. I am already planning a field trip for next winter!

Zion National Park – I came close to visiting this park but the Federal Government shut down that October….it’s a place I’ll eventually visit. It’s also a great place for this article to use for a photography tutorial.

Snow Day - Part 2

By mid-morning – it was obvious that the ‘big snow’ was going to be during the day on Wednesday. The backyard became a winter wonderland with snow accumulating on every available surface.

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The azalea that has been showing a lot of stem and leaf color earlier in the day became indistinguishable from other mounds of snow.

After lunch I opened the garage door and took a snow measurement on the driveway – a little over 4.5 inches and it was still snowing. I also photographed the sidewalk in front of our house. I wondered if the plum tree was going to have some breakage from the weight of the snow; there was no wind – a good thing.

I decided to shovel the driveway. The snow was not as heavy as I thought it would be – which made the job easier. There were plops of snow falling from the trees and I could hear some slow trickles of water. The temperature was about 33 degrees.

A little while after I came in from shoveling, the snow plow made a down and back pass at our street. Later in the day they came back and did the side streets. Events for Thursday began to be cancelled.

The next morning (Thursday), there was still snow on the trees at sunrise. But the day was sunny and the forecast was for a high of 45…probably the last of the snow days! I got some pictures of the forest and the maple blossom in the morning sunlight.

Snow Day - Part 1

The forecast Tuesday night was for a lot of snow in our area overnight and all day Wednesday, so meetings were cancelled, schools closed, and the recycle truck pickup to our neighborhood delayed. The temperature hovered close to freezing. I saw some deer crossing our street at dusk as the announcements came out.

 I had planned to shovel my driveway in the morning and then again later in the day since the snow was going to be wet and heavy. I was anticipating getting a workout. But….

The temperature stayed high enough that the streets and driveways were mostly clear in the morning. I took pictures and enjoyed the relative quiet of the neighborhood without rumbling vehicles (no buses or recycle truck). It seemed that there were less cars on our street; the adults were taking a snow day just like the school children – a time to savor being at home. In the front of our house, I took pictures through the skinny windows on both sides of the front door of vegetation laden with snow and ice: daffodils,

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Azalea, and

Bushes.

In the back, there was the top of the snow filled pine,

The heated birdbath with the snow knocked off its rim by birds that visited,

And a gutter filling in with snow and ice (hopefully it will melt and drain gracefully).

It started to snow again, and I decided to wait for the afternoon to take a walk (hoping that I would not need to shovel the driveway at all).

Cormorant at Conowingo

We didn’t see as many cormorants as eagles last weekend at Conowingo – but we saw one just as it caught a fish and then focus on swallowing it over the next 3-4 minutes. The fish was probably the maximize size the bird could swallow! But it finally did…letting the river move it downstream as it got the meal down. The last picture shows it moving upstream. Surely it wasn’t ready for another fish!

We didn’t see any Great Blue Herons last weekend. They are probably around but very focused on keeping their eggs warm. This is the time of year that both herons and eagles would be laying eggs and incubating them. I saw an article about one of the eaglets in a nest near Washington DC had already hatched.

I almost always take a picture of the Paulownia tree near the parking lot. The velvety buds have not opened yet. I noticed a larger tree near the water than I had not noticed before. It’s harder to photograph but I might try next time.

Bald Eagles at Conowingo Dam

Last weekend we got up early and headed to Conowingo Dam to photograph Bald Eagles. We go there about 30 minutes after sunrise and saw eagles in the trees next to the parking lot at the Conowingo Fisherman’s Park. There were two eagles in the trees near where we parked…along with a black vulture.

Both types of birds were enjoying the bright sunlight on the cold morning.

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There were other birds on the opposite side of the river….too far way for good pictures.

It seemed at first that there wasn’t going to be much action. Then one of the eagles took off.

It flew out over the river swooped down and came up with a fish!

It flew back to almost where it had been before…and started to enjoy the meal.

Then a second eagle appeared and wanted a share of the fish. My husband tried to take pictures of the tussle that ensued. The eagle with the fish is above the challenger in this picture. I just stood and watched.

Tomorrow’s post will feature a Cormorant at Conowingo.

HoLLIE – Week 7

The Week 7 of HoLLIE (Howard County Legacy Leadership Institute for the Environment) class focused on County Government (Office of Community Sustainability, Department of Planning and Zoning, and Department of Public Works) and the Saving the Places We Love (Ned Tillman) followed by a hike in Patapsco Valley State Park.

Some memorable factoids about the county:

• 20% of the land is in conservation or agricultural easements (that means the land must stay – forever – in compliance with the easement specifications)
• The methane generated by the landfill is captured rather than flared (as much as possible)
• Elementary school students are consistently better at getting their food waste into compost bins than middle or high schoolers
• The composting facility is patterned after successful facilities in California; the build of the second of three phases will start in October. They are at capacity now with the part of the county (residences and schools) currently enrolled.

In the afternoon the hike to Patapsco Valley State Park was similar to the hike made several years ago with my Master Naturalist Class (blog post here back in April 2015). We hiked the short hill to Cascade Falls and looked at cracks in rocks – some that determined the path of the stream that continues down to the river.

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We crossed the swinging bridge and walked to where the trail is blocked off for the removal of Bloede’s Dam.

The state is taking out dams on this part of the Patapsco that no longer serve any purpose (the basins for all of them are full of sediment); after the removal, fish and eels should be able to move upstream and reestablish their natural life cycles.

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The challenge with this dam is the rerouting of the sewer line (see the big pipe that goes through the dam parallel to the path….that’s a sewer pipe!) while the same is removed.

There is a lot of history in the area as well. As we walked the path to the dam we saw an arch built in 1869 (ran on top) and there was a sign for the mill where Patapsco Superlative flour was made until 1905.

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As we walked back – we noticed a heron in the river. It looked scruffy – like it was not quite dry from it’s last plunge to catch a fish. We saw blue birds and cardinals too.

The tress along the river are not large. Storms that bring heavy rains are particularly damaging in this stretch of the river. In Hurricane Agnes (1972) the river was 40 feet above normal. It’s hard to imagine that any of the trees planted by the CCC in the 1930s survived.

Next week is the last class and I am already trying to think about what changes this course has prompted. Some I’ve started already because it is an easy progression from something I already do. The more substantial changes I have started thinking about are more complex and there are more choices involved.

Previous HoLLIE posts: Week 1, Week 2, week 3, week 4, week 5, week 6

March Sunrise

About the only perk for going to daylight savings time is being up for sunrise again. I noticed the one yesterday via its reflection on clouds in the west at first. The clouds had a pink tinge over the tree tops. I took the picture through my office window.

I went downstairs and took a picture through the narrow window beside the door. The color was already becoming more orange.

I opened the door, so I would avoid the window frame (and the smudges on the glass).

That’s when I heard the red winged blackbirds. They were across the street in a treetop – greeting the new day with their chatter.

The cat was waiting for me when I turned around from the open front door. Fortunately, he is not a cat that is always looking for an opportunity to escape to the great outdoors!

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 17, 2018

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

A Day in The Park: Cuyahoga Valley National Park | National Parks Traveler – I’ve been to the park but only saw a small part of it. Next time I need to be more organized!

Top 25 Wild Waterbirds – National Geographic Blog – Some of these birds were familiar….some unfamiliar and living far away from the US!

BBC - Future - The quest to tackle the rubbish dump in orbit – There is getting to be a lot of junk up there!

Flood risk from American rivers is greatly underestimated -- ScienceDaily – A high resolution model that maps flood risk across the whole continent and includes small streams shows 41 million Americans at risk from flooding rivers rather than 13 million estimated by FEMA (their maps only include 60% of the continent and does not include smaller streams). Seems like anyone buying a house would be keen to know if there was a flood risk for the property and FEMA maps are giving a false sense of security. Here’s the link to the full paper: Estimates of present and future flood risk in the conterminous United States - IOPscience

Recycled carbon fiber improves permeable pavement: Technique reduces waste, improves strength and durability -- ScienceDaily – From Washington State University…in partnership with Boeing

Incredible Pictures of the Caterpillars of New England – I’m going to keep a sharper lookout for caterpillars in our area this summer….get subjects for photography because they don’t move very fast!

Spring Break Goes Wild(life) – Cool Green Science – Lots of places to go in the spring – other than a southern beach.

High-Fiber Diet Shifts Gut Microbes, Lowering Blood Sugar in Diabetics -  If this pans out, they need to get it out to doctors treating patients with type 2 diabetes rather than focusing on all the new (and somewhat expensive) drugs that can have side effects.

The Metamorphosis of Butterflies – A 5-minute video from TED-Ed.

A Place for Pollinators: Bees and Butterflies call National Monuments Home – At Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, a 4-year study found 650 unique bee species from 54 genre of native bees, 3 of which were new to the state of Utah. We need pollinators like native bees for the rest the ecosystem to continue! We should strive to keep the special places (not pockets) of species diversity to not only to sustain our planet…but to help it regenerate. The people alive today are the stewards of the future Earth.

Signs of a Beaver

I was at Howard County Conservancy’s Mt. Pleasant Farm earlier this week for some training and we walked down to the Davis Branch. There are two areas along the stream that we use for the 7th grade program.

After learning what would be done at each of those we hiked a little further along on the part of the stream that was restored last year – to see the area that the beaver has started to explore. The indication is some trees that have been downed in typical beaver fashion. The one with the bark stripped looks like a beech tree (beavers eat the inner bark of trees and beeches are one that they like!).

There was a mound of debris across part of the trickling stream and I wondered if it was from our recent wind storms or the beginning of a beaver dam. This will be a place I’ll walk down to see when I come to Mt Pleasant this spring!