The farm!

Greetings!

I wanted to share with you what we have been doing at the Eldridge Environmental Education Center. Me and my friends started a millipede farm! We also have some roly-poly bugs in there, too! We collected from the area. We found them by turning over rocks by Salt Creek! You could find them in your backyard, too! They live in our soil and help break down detritus. That's the fancy word for dead leaves and sticks and stuff.
  Here is a picture of our tank. We put in soil that we found in the area, alot of dead leaves and a decomposing turkey tail mushroom. Turkey tails are those fungi that you see growing like little steps up the trunk of a tree.

  Millipedes and pill bugs (another word for the roly poly) are herbivores. That means they don't eat meat. If you look closely at them you can see that there bodies are in segments - or little parts. Not all one part like us (mammals) are. They are very different animals but they have the same defense - curl up into a ball. When they get nervous they curl up into a little ball and they stay very still. (You can see this if you try to pick them up.) Animals that like to eat bugs lose interest in eating if a bug is not moving and looks dead. So curling up into a ball is a pretty good strategy to avaoid being eaten!

Here is a picture of a millipede  tickling my face. I named him Max.

  Millipedes and pill bugs are part of a big group of animals called arthropods. These are animals that wear their skeleton (their hardest parts) on the outside of their bodies! A skeleton on the outside is called an exoskeleton. We are mammals so we have an endoskeleton! Exo- in front of words means "outer or outside" and Endo- means "inner or inside".
  Tune in next time for more juicy details of our farm's residents!
Eco.

Dear Eco

Greetings!

I have received another great email! Two brothers were walking through the woods and they found a skull. They wanted to know what animal it was from so they sent me a picture:

Here was my response:

Thank you for those great pictures! I love being a part of your family of Eco's! I am so happy to hear that you go hiking with your family. I love hiking. 

I think it is an opossum's skull. The size makes sense and also it has those big side eye sockets. Animals that have large eye sockets on more of the side of their head are considered "prey" animals - as opposed to forward-facing eye sockets like humans or owls which mean they are "predator" animals. Prey and predator are just words that tell us where an animal would fall on a food chain. "Prey" means they would be toward the bottom and "Predator" means they would be towards the top. 

The reason prey animals have their eyes more on the side of their head is so they can easily see if their are any predators chasing them. Predator animals use their forward facing eyes to be a better hunter. It's easier to focus on what's in front of you when you have both eyes facing forward. 

Great find! Keep looking for interesting things on your hikes! I can't wait to see more pictures of what you find out there. 

Keep exploring!

 

Here is a picture of me with my new friends! 

Until next time my friends,

Eco

Dear Molly

Greetings friends!
I recently received a great email from one of my dear friends, Molly. I want to share her message and her great question with all of you!

Here is her letter:

   Dear Eco,

I have ants in my house. 

The sun is out and it's really beautiful to play outside.

We have bees living in our wall.  We found a hole in the brick. The bees left yellow powder right outside the hole. Then the bees plugged up their hole all by themselves.  What kind of bees are they?

Good bye Eco, I love you.
Love, Molly

I also want to share my response with all of you, too. Some of you may have the same question!

Dear Molly,

Bees sometimes can be a problem. But usually its only a problem that lasts for a short time instead of forever. They only live in a hive for a short time. Then they leave and find a new place. I found a really cool video about getting bees out of a house. Make sure you ask your parents permission to watch it! http://www.wimp.com/beesextracted/

 I would guess that you have honey bees. Honey bees like to live in colonies (alot of family members living in the same place). There are alot of bees that live around us don't live in colonies, too. They live by themselves.

The yellow powder is pollen from flowers! When a bee eats from a flower it gets the pollen all over its legs. When it brings that pollen to other flowers it helps those flowers make baby flowers. So when they come back home to their hive it just gets knocked off their legs.

Great questions Molly!

Love,

Eco


Thank you so much Molly! I can't wait for more amazing emails!
 Eco

Why did the turtle cross the road....

Greetings friends!

In the past week I have found 2 turtles at Eldridge park that have been quite a distance from the pond!



Here is a picture of the most recent turtle's location.

The one before that was found under the swings on the playground! Both of the turtles were of the same species - Red-eared slider. Here is a picture of one close up

You can see why its named a Red-eared slider! Those red markings are not on any other turtle in this area so it's easy to identify. They are often kept as pets. They started showing up in our ponds and streams 30 years ago. It's possible that people released them into our water systems after buying them as pets.

The turtles I have found out of the pond have been males. But the females nest from mid-May into early July. Sometimes when people find turtles away from their pond its a female looking for a good spot to make their nests. All turtles lay their eggs on land - not in the water!

I tried to ask this turtle for a ride but he was so nervous he wouldn't walk with me on its back.

Whenever you find a turtle on land or on the side of a road be very careful when going near to it. Some turtles, like the snapping turtle, are dangerous and can really hurt you. It's better to leave wildlife alone when you come close. Just give animals enough space so they don't feel scared. Sometimes when animals feel scared they might try to defend themselves by biting or scratching.

Environmental teachers, ecologists, and other professionals in the environmental field could be called on for help when figuring out what to do with wildlife that might get in the way of human activity.

Don't forget! We share this world with all the animals that live here. It's their home, too.
Until next time my friends!
Eco

Dandelions!

Greetings friends!

I wanted to talk about one of my favorite flowers...DANDELIONS! They are just everywhere! They are such a beautiful yellow, too. Did you know dandelions can tell you the weather? Dandelion flowers close up when it's under 50 degrees. They open when the temperature is above. When you see some open and some close you know it's right around 50. They are so helpful!

Dandelions are a very old organism (genetically speaking), they are thought to have evolved about 30 million years ago! They are genetically prepared for any type of environement they are thrown into. This means that the genetic information that is in the dandelions in youur yard is 30 millions years old!  That's amazing. Most organisms alive today aren't fortunate enough to have won the lottery with their genes. Dandelions are one tough flower!

Here's a picture of me holding a dandelion flower and then a dandelion that has gone to seed. Dandelions are really special because they can reproduce asexually. That means they can basically just clone themselves. That's awesome! No wonder there are so many!

Dandelions are part of the sunflower family. Sometimes its referred to as the Aster family. All members  of this family have developed composit flowers. This means that one flower head is actually comprised of many individual flowers. I pulled apart a dandelion to show you here.

See how there are little green bases in the flower for each whitish - yellow part? If you pulled out on of those little green pods at the bottom of the yelllow you would be pulling out one flower! Since we are talking about little flowers that make up a big flower we call each of those little flowers florets. This may sounds a little confusing so I would recommend going out and pullin a part a dandelion for yourself.

Dandelions are an amazing flower that has stood the test of time. They are so much fun to pick and so much fun to make wishes on! The next time you see a dandelion say "Thanks for being you!"

Until next time my friends,
Eco

Jack in the Pulpit

Greetings!

Spring has sprung! I have been spending everyday outside walking around Eldridge Park. It is beautiful now! Everything is growing and green! On my walk today in our woods I noticed a funny looking plant. I took a picture with it.

This is a Jack in the Pulpit or Arisaema triphyllum.

It is a very noticeable plant. It has three big leaves and a cool middle flower. It looks like a pitcher plant! The hood wraps around and covers the little flower cluster in the center. The hood part is called a spathe (this is the "pulpit" part of the name) and the little hotdog-y looking thing poking out is called a spadix (this is "Jack").

It flowers from April to June. It is fly pollinated. Usually plants that are pollinated by flies don't smell that great to you or I. Even though I rummage through garbage on a nightly basis I still prefer the sweet smell of bee pollinated flowers. 

Jack in the Pulpit is not edible, either. The plant contains a chemical called oxalic acid. This is a chemical that causes a burning feeling when the raw plant is eaten. The Native Americans did use to eat, though. They knew how to prepare it in a way that made the root of the plant safe to eat.  They would use it as a treatment for sore eyes.

I can't wait until our Jack in the Pulpit grows its berries! It has really cool bright red berries. You'll have to come look for it!

Until next time my friends,
Eco

Chinese Mystery Snails!

Hey friends!
I was dipping in the pond at Eldridge yesterday with my friends and we found a bunch of big snails! There's a picture of me next to one! I have never seen a snail that big before! I asked Mr. John and Ms. Beth what they were.  Turns out they are called Chinese Mystery Snails! I thought that sounded like a made up name but that's really what they were called. Their fancy scientific name is Cipangopaludina chinensis malleata. They are an exotic species. That means someone brought them over from Asia and they made themselves at home here in America. They were first brought to San Francisco for the Chinese food markets there in the 1800s. They are eaten in China and other Asian countries because they are delicious and nutritious. (I have never tried one myself, though) Since then, they have gotten into our freshwater systems (all of our water that doesn't have salt in it, like the ocean does) and their population boomed! The females can live up to 5 years and over their lifetime they can have more than 170 babies!

Exotic species (plants and animals that naturally shouldn't be here) can be harmful to the ecosystems they enter. If an exotic species starts to take over spaces native species should be living we call them an invasive species. Chinese mystery snails haven't done a lot of damage to the lakes and ponds and streams they live in. Scientists consider them generally "benign". This means they aren't as bad as say Asian Carp or Buckthorn. Scientists are worried about them because they can carry parasites and diseases that can hurt our native animals. The parasites that they can carry are little flatworms called flukes. These can hurt many different kinds of animals. Not every snail has them, though but we should always be careful and wash our hands if we come in contact with these big snails!

Now you know what they are keep your eyes out for them! They might be coming to a pond or stream near you!!

Until next time my friends!
Eco