Yesterday we went to a swamp on the northeast side of Lake Pontchartrain to set up an experiment in the swamp. We took a 100' long "water structure" and a pump with us to set up an area by the water in the swamp with the idea of flooding a small area for about three days. The scientists are then going to study the effects of the flooding on the soil and the plants. In a way, they intend to simulate another small Hurricane Katrina in that spot. We ran into problems with the pump, however, so had to roll the water structure back up and head back to New Orleans until they can get new accessories for the pump. The water structure weighed about 150 pounds, which we had to carry into the swamp and unroll. The rubber boots that I had on were not quite high enough--got a little wet! The water structure is acutally two rubber tubes to hold water covered by a plastic roll around it to hold the tubes in place. This was in a place where people had homes that had been destroyed by the hurricane. In order to roll out the water structure, we had to lift items like doors, light fixtures, pieces of wood, etc. that had once been someone's house and throw them somewhere else.
We may be going back again tomorrow and trying again. It was interesting talking to the scientists and learning about how they have to apply for grants, etc., to get the money to do their research.
Yesterday afternoon I learned how to feed caterpillars. These were not caterpillars that they collected from the swamp, but ones that they raise in the lab to dissect and do research on. We just had to put a clump of food that looks and smells like bad cheese in a cup, pick out five caterpillars from the old cup, and put them into the new cup. They don't want more than five caterpillars in a cup.
Today I went to the mud room (also called the zoo) and searched the bags for anything that was moving, such as a moth. We then entered it into the database. We were supposed to go to Honey Island Swamp today, but it is raining very hard right now, so I'm just going to work on entering things into the database this afernoon. Some of the other teachers went yesterday. They brought back some very interesting pictures of some very large alligators!!!! Maybe it's a good thing that we're not going out there today . . . They searched out there all day, and only brought back about 15 caterpillars. They use GPS positioning to pick out what area of the swamp they want to go to, pick out a tree to position, and then work in a small area based on that tree. In that way, they keep track of where each caterpillar came from.
Thursday, October 4, 2007
Monday, October 1, 2007
Websites to Visit
In the top right-hand corner of the blog, you will see three links. The first one is a link to www.teachertube.com, which is kind of a YouTube for teachers. Sarah, the teacher from Maine, has posted some videos she took on Sunday. One of them is a video of a deserted high school science lab in the 9th Ward, which is the area destroyed by Hurricane Katrina. She climbed in a hole in the fence and took the video! Another one is of the oldest cemetery in New Orleans, and another is of one of the places where the levee breached during the hurricane. I also added a short video of Dr. Dyer talking about how they send specimens out to be named and cataloged.
Just right-click and then click on Open.
Be sure to turn on Skype tomorrow morning and just leave it on all day. I'll try and call you sometime during the day.
Just right-click and then click on Open.
Be sure to turn on Skype tomorrow morning and just leave it on all day. I'll try and call you sometime during the day.
Questions
You students have lots of good questions about caterpillars! Unfortunately, I don't know most of the answers, so I will ask some of the professors here tomorrow. We haven't actually worked with caterpillars yet. I think that starts tomorrow. Tomorrow we teachers divide up--one of us dissects caterpillars; two of us are helping to set up greenhouse experiments; and two of us do something called curation.
Today I learned that they are now estimating that there are between 3 million and 30 million different species of these critters all over the world, and they really haven't even begun to catalog them yet. They are studying the interactions of caterpillars, the plants, and the parasitoids that feed on them. I learned that a parasitoid is something that lays eggs in the caterpillars and devours them until it emerges from the caterpillar (which usually kills the caterpillar. The parasitoid is one of two types: a wasp or a fly, basically. I also learned that caterpillars are very picky as to what plants they feed on. Up north, they may feed on a few types of plants. As you go south to the rainforests, they get very, very picky about their food. They might only prefer one type of plant. If they don't have that plant, they just don't eat, and die.
What they do here is go out and find caterpillars, put them in bags, and wait to see if they get a moth (butterflies are moths) or if they get a parasitoid (fly or wasp). They study what type of caterpillar feeds on what type of plant. They are studying what kinds of damage was done by the hurricanes, and how that affects which caterpillars and parasitoids. As global warming continues, they expect more extreme weather events, which will in turn affect all the insects, which affects the plants, which eventually affects all of us.
They bring the caterpillars back and put them in the "mud room", feed them their plants, and wait to see what happens. They call the mud room the "zoo". It actually is a zoo since caterpillars are animals, and they are in cages being watched! They have to clean out their cages, and make sure their "animals" are healthy. When they die, they are studied, mounted on pins, and sent out to labs for classification, be given official names, and cataloged in the databases.
Hopefully, I will get to start learning how to work with their databases tomorrow.
I hope you were all listening to Rebecca (the head grad student) who said how much she needs computer skills in her work, and how she wished she had had a class like yours when she was in high school. She has to learn it now, which takes a lot of time she could be using otherwise to do various things.
A few weeks ago they had a computer analyst from New York who spent her vacation time helping them catalog things in the database. They were very happy that she came and helped them.
Tomorrow I would like to try and Skype with all of you via the webcam in Room 242 and the web cam that I have with me. I'm also going to post a couple of websites for you to go look at.
I miss all of you! Be good for the sub.
Love,
Ms. O.
P.S. To whoever asked on the blog--A days have 3rd lunch, B days have 1st lunch!
Today I learned that they are now estimating that there are between 3 million and 30 million different species of these critters all over the world, and they really haven't even begun to catalog them yet. They are studying the interactions of caterpillars, the plants, and the parasitoids that feed on them. I learned that a parasitoid is something that lays eggs in the caterpillars and devours them until it emerges from the caterpillar (which usually kills the caterpillar. The parasitoid is one of two types: a wasp or a fly, basically. I also learned that caterpillars are very picky as to what plants they feed on. Up north, they may feed on a few types of plants. As you go south to the rainforests, they get very, very picky about their food. They might only prefer one type of plant. If they don't have that plant, they just don't eat, and die.
What they do here is go out and find caterpillars, put them in bags, and wait to see if they get a moth (butterflies are moths) or if they get a parasitoid (fly or wasp). They study what type of caterpillar feeds on what type of plant. They are studying what kinds of damage was done by the hurricanes, and how that affects which caterpillars and parasitoids. As global warming continues, they expect more extreme weather events, which will in turn affect all the insects, which affects the plants, which eventually affects all of us.
They bring the caterpillars back and put them in the "mud room", feed them their plants, and wait to see what happens. They call the mud room the "zoo". It actually is a zoo since caterpillars are animals, and they are in cages being watched! They have to clean out their cages, and make sure their "animals" are healthy. When they die, they are studied, mounted on pins, and sent out to labs for classification, be given official names, and cataloged in the databases.
Hopefully, I will get to start learning how to work with their databases tomorrow.
I hope you were all listening to Rebecca (the head grad student) who said how much she needs computer skills in her work, and how she wished she had had a class like yours when she was in high school. She has to learn it now, which takes a lot of time she could be using otherwise to do various things.
A few weeks ago they had a computer analyst from New York who spent her vacation time helping them catalog things in the database. They were very happy that she came and helped them.
Tomorrow I would like to try and Skype with all of you via the webcam in Room 242 and the web cam that I have with me. I'm also going to post a couple of websites for you to go look at.
I miss all of you! Be good for the sub.
Love,
Ms. O.
P.S. To whoever asked on the blog--A days have 3rd lunch, B days have 1st lunch!
Orientation
This has been very interesting so far. Yesterday I had some free time before we had to meet each other at 4:30, so I took a bus down to the French Quarter and looked around. It wasn't really what I expected. I also went to Magazine Street, which is a very famous street in the middle of the Garden District. If any of you have ever read any Anne Rice novels (the vampire Lestat, etc.,) you'll know what I'm talking about. I saw some cemeteries of the "undead"!
Last night we went out to dinner at a Mediterranean-style restaurant and met each other. Melanie is an elementary teacher; Noreen is an elementary ELL teacher; Joe is a high school science teacher; and Sarah is a middle school science teacher.
We are staying on St. Charles street (a famous street) across from Tulane University. Tulane is a traditionally Jewish-based university. Down the street a bit is Loyola University, which is a traditionally Catholic university. They share a lot of resources.
The streetcars on St. Charles Street still are not working since Katrina (two years ago in September). They do have buses, however, but it is difficult at times to get one to stop and pick you up. I walked for miles and miles. Finally, a nice lady who was out walking felt badly for me, insisted on going and getting her car, and gave me a cup of fresh ice water in a Mardi Gra cup and a ride back to my guest house. It turns out that she is an English teacher here. She is married to a man from MN and he has relatives in Bloomfield, IA. I told her that if she is ever in Des Moines, she has a free dinner coming! It's true about southern hospitality!
Today we went walking around Audubon Park, which is by my guest house. It is really pretty. I will attach some photos. Then we went to the lab and met Dr. Dyer. His talk was fascinating. I learned a lot about caterpillars and parasitoids. It also made me become more interested in global warming.
I have to get back to the lab now--we are out for lunch, and try to do an Adobe Connect with some of you at the school. The first attempt this morning didn't go very well. Not enough bandwidth is one reason.
Talk to you later.
Last night we went out to dinner at a Mediterranean-style restaurant and met each other. Melanie is an elementary teacher; Noreen is an elementary ELL teacher; Joe is a high school science teacher; and Sarah is a middle school science teacher.
We are staying on St. Charles street (a famous street) across from Tulane University. Tulane is a traditionally Jewish-based university. Down the street a bit is Loyola University, which is a traditionally Catholic university. They share a lot of resources.
The streetcars on St. Charles Street still are not working since Katrina (two years ago in September). They do have buses, however, but it is difficult at times to get one to stop and pick you up. I walked for miles and miles. Finally, a nice lady who was out walking felt badly for me, insisted on going and getting her car, and gave me a cup of fresh ice water in a Mardi Gra cup and a ride back to my guest house. It turns out that she is an English teacher here. She is married to a man from MN and he has relatives in Bloomfield, IA. I told her that if she is ever in Des Moines, she has a free dinner coming! It's true about southern hospitality!
Today we went walking around Audubon Park, which is by my guest house. It is really pretty. I will attach some photos. Then we went to the lab and met Dr. Dyer. His talk was fascinating. I learned a lot about caterpillars and parasitoids. It also made me become more interested in global warming.
I have to get back to the lab now--we are out for lunch, and try to do an Adobe Connect with some of you at the school. The first attempt this morning didn't go very well. Not enough bandwidth is one reason.
Talk to you later.
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