Environmental Science Goes Wild
March 07, 2008
The Environment Science class is participating in an year long outdoor laboratory activity.
Last September students set up a 100 m2 study area. Each month we visit the study area and observe and log all living things found in their area, as well as noting weather conditions and environmental changes since we last visited.
During our February visit we began a second ongoing activity to observe bud burst in trees. We tagged individual trees to be studied and took pictures of tree buds for later comparisons. This activity is part of a nationwide study to determine if bud burst is occurring earlier due to global warming. Our most interesting discovery on our most recent trip to the study area was an area in the snow with footprints and blood spots. We determined by the tracks that the prey animal was an Eastern Cottontail Rabbit. There were no predator tracks so we hypothesized the predator was a bird.
