A Trip to Muir Woods

 

While on vacation in San Francisco, my family took a short drive to Muir Woods National Monument. We were surprised to find such tranquility so close to the busy city.

Muir Woods is best known for the towering coastal redwood (Sequoia sempervirens) trees that made us feel tiny by comparison.

There were multiple other visitors at Muir Woods, but many times we found that we had the trail to ourselves. This may be because we visited the park on a weekday in the fall.  Because it was autumn, we caught a hint of fall foliage, something we sometimes miss from our days living on the East Coast.

Another surprise and benefit to visiting Muir Woods in the late fall was seeing clusters of little red ladybugs huddled together in preparation for the winter.

You can see these clusters of ladybugs beginning in late fall and continuing into early spring. They stay close to each other to keep warm and find a mate. The ladybugs can easily be found on wooden fence posts on the Fern Creek and Bootjack Trails.

We often enjoy attending guided walks when we visit a national park. The guided walk at Muir Woods lead by a volunteer was very informative and something I would recommend.

My daughter was able to add to her collection of Junior Ranger badges by completing an activity booklet and taking a pledge to protect all national parks, continue  learning about them, and to share her knowledge with others.

Our family thoroughly enjoyed our time in San Francisco, and Muir Woods is definitely a spot we would all like to return to one day.

Here is a link to the Muir Woods National Monument website:

National Park Service: Muir Woods National Monument

If you plan to go to San Francisco and are interested in other places to visit, check out this blogpost about the California Academy of Sciences:

Teaching Resources from the California Academy of Sciences

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Summertime Science: Garden Plant Families

 

Who doesn’t love their produce garden-fresh? One of the most satisfying endeavors for me personally is growing and harvesting food in my garden. Picking something right off the plant to enjoy myself or share with others is very rewarding. I enjoy the process of supporting the plants’ growth, and I appreciate understanding how each of my plants is related to the other wild and cultivated plants in our world.

I am fortunate to have the privilege of tending a plot in our local community garden. Recently I planted a couple of cherry tomato seedlings. You may know that tomatoes are part of the nightshade family (Solanaceae). If you compare the flowers of a tomato plant with those of a wild nightshade, you will notice similarities.

Tomato Plant Flowers

Nightshade Flowers

Flowers of both the garden tomato and the wild nightshade are perfect, or bisexual, flowers. They are star-shaped with five petals, and at the center, fused anthers (male part) surround the style (female part). Other members of the nightshade family that you may see in your garden include bell and hot peppers, eggplant, and potato.

Some of the other plants now in bloom are members of the gourd family (Cucurbitaceae). In addition to gourds, this plant family includes pumpkins, squash, melons, and cucumbers.

Cucumber Blossom

Squash Blossom

A wild member of the gourd family native to Southern California is wild cucumber. Despite its name, it's not edible. The fruit is prickly and toxic!

Wild Cucumber (Marah macrocarpa)

Members of the gourd family typically have flowers with five fused petals. Flowers are unisexual, meaning that each flower has either male parts or female parts. It can be fun to hand pollinate these flowers. If you are interested in trying hand pollination in your garden, there is information about this in an earlier blogpost: 

Summertime Science in the Garden: Pollination

One of the showier flowers currently in bloom is the sweet pea.

Sweet Pea Flowers

My Daughter with Sweet Pea Flower Bouquet 

Sweet peas are members of the bean family, or Fabaceae. Flowers are bisexual with five petals. They have bilateral symmetry, with one large petal at the top and four smaller ones below. Green beans and other kinds of beans, peas, lentils, and peanuts belong to this family. So do many wild plants, including acacia, locust trees, and lupines. 

Lupine, Member of the Bean Family

If you have the chance, I highly recommend spending some time in a garden this summer!

If you would like to read other blogposts related to exploring science in the garden, see these blogposts:

Springtime Science in the Garden: Plant "Cousins" and a Baby Skunk!

Summertime Science in the Garden: Pollination

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Springtime Science in the Garden: Plant "Cousins" and a Baby Skunk!

Mysterious holes were appearing in my garden plot. Sometimes I would find a plant or two pulled up, and sometimes not. Either way, the plant was thrown to the side and left untouched. Talk around the Juniper-Front Community Garden informed me that others were experiencing the same issue, and skunks were a principal suspect. This theory made sense to me because I had been seeing more skunks than usual in the neighborhood early in the morning. One morning I was a bit startled but also pretty excited to see a mama skunk with her nervous baby sneak into our garden through an opening in the concrete wall.

Although I was too intimidated to follow the skunks around and try to observe them actually digging the holes, some internet sources describing the kind of holes skunks dig (shallow with dirt tossed around them) made me think that they were likely responsible. It was frustrating to be losing plants after investing time, resources, and hope into my little seeds, but honestly, how could I stay mad at anything so cute as a baby skunk? 

The fight to save my plants sparked an interest in some informal experiments to deter the skunks. Would a tomato cage protect the plants? Are the skunks that gardeners suspect are digging up our plants more interested in compost containing eggshells? These experiments have not been strictly controlled, and they are ongoing and as yet inconclusive, but they are still interesting (when not too frustrating)!

Gardens are filled with opportunities for informal science education. Just digging around in the soil to weed, plant, or harvest leads to new discoveries.

Bringing students or my own child to spend time in a garden inevitably leads to new learning and a connection with the natural world. I've often been surprised at how excited middle school students get over finding a tiny insect, spider, or worm! Gardens attract pollinators and other wildlife that everyone enjoys experiencing.

Looking carefully at garden flowers is a nice springtime activity that can help you learn about plant families. I enjoy observing flowers as an adult, and children can be engaged this way, too. Did you know that tiny strawberry plants and tall apple trees are in the same plant family, meaning they are fairly closely related? Although a look at the entire plant would fool you into thinking otherwise, if you compare their flowers, you can see that their flower structure is very similar. Notice the similar structure of the strawberry and apple blossoms, including their five petals.

Strawberry Flower

Apple Blossoms Photo by Anastasiya Romanova on Unsplash

Both strawberry plants and apple trees are members of the rose family, Rosaceae. If you compare their blossoms with the photo of a wild rose below, you can see similarities, such as the number of petals.

Being in the same plant family means that the plants had a relatively recent common ancestor. How could the strawberry plant and apple tree evolve to be so very different while their flowers remained so similar? Natural selection favors traits that help a plant survive and reproduce. Traits such as growing tall could potentially be beneficial, but a change in the structure of a flower- the plant’s reproductive part- could render the plant unable to reproduce. Changes in flower structure are risky and could be an evolutionary dead end if the plant has no offspring. This is why flower structure stays more constant as other plant parts evolve over time, and why looking for similarities in flower structure gives us a window into the evolutionary history of the plant and helps us identify plant families.

Whether watching for pollinators and other wildlife, observing flowers, or just digging around, a garden in the springtime is well worth a visit!

If you are interested in reading my blogpost on summertime in the garden, follow this link:

Summertime Science in the Garden: Pollinators

If you would like to know how to help collect data on local pollinators, here is a blogpost about the Great Sunflower Project:

Get Outdoors with Citizen Science! The Great Sunflower Project

Michigan State University Extension has a webpage on skunk holes versus other holes in your garden or yard:

https://www.canr.msu.edu/news/whos_that_digging_in_my_yard_skunks_raccoons_or_moles

Thanks to Kerry Woods for sharing his vast knowledge and love of plants with me.

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Teaching Resources from the California Academy of Sciences

The online resources offered by the California Academy of Sciences have been valuable to me as a science teacher. Recently I took a trip to San Francisco and visited the museum with my family. We really enjoyed the exhibits, and it seemed like a wonderful place to bring students on a field trip. If you live in the Bay Area or are ever visiting, it's worth a trip!

The California Academy of Sciences is a sizable science museum that houses impressive exhibits on four floors. It's topped with a living roof covered in native plants that attract and feed local pollinators.

There were many exhibits in the museum that we enjoyed. Some of the highlights were the aquarium, the planetarium show, and a living rainforest exhibit. 

The aquarium presented marine ecosystems from around the world though we especially enjoyed viewing the large tank with kelp, sea anemones, and fish found on the California coast.

As we entered the rainforest exhibit, we immediately felt the increase in temperature and humidity. The exhibit is filled with tropical plants, and you can see butterflies fluttering close by.

I have a love of rocks and minerals and was impressed by their collection, which was beautiful to view. 

Tickets to the California Academy of Sciences can be a little pricey, but as of the writing of this blogpost, San Francisco school groups get free admission, and the ticket price is reduced for other school groups.

Before ever visiting the museum itself, I used multiple online teaching resources from the California Academy of Sciences with my middle school students. I always found the  resources, which include video simulations and short films, to be of a very high quality. 

One of my favorite resources is a short video simulation depicting a kelp forest food web that teaches students how sea otters, sea urchins, kelp, and other ocean life are connected to one another and to the sun. This video could be used to help teach standards related to ecology, particularly NGSS standard MS-LS2-3: Develop a model to describe the cycling of matter and flow of energy among living and nonliving parts of an ecosystem. Guiding questions to ask students are provided. Here is a link to the video:

Take a Virtual Dive in a Kelp Forest

Another video I like is a simulation of photosynthesis viewed from inside a leaf. This video is a good resource for teaching NGSS standard MS-LS1-6: Construct a scientific explanation based on evidence for the role of photosynthesis in the cycling of matter and flow of energy into and out of organisms. Here's a link to the video:

Travel Deep Inside a Leaf

The California Academy of Sciences has multiple teacher resources that include lesson plans, videos, and short films available online at no cost. These resources along with information on field trips and professional development can be found here:

California Academy of Sciences Educator Resources

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It's Tide Pool Season in California!

 

As we get closer to winter, the low tides become especially low, so this is an excellent time for viewing ocean life in tide pools. It's a time of year I always look forward to! 

Tide pooling season begins in the fall and continues through the winter and into early spring. It is at these times when you can catch a negative tide during the daytime. If you want to plan a trip, it is helpful to first consult a tide chart like this one for San Diego:

Tide Chart for San Diego

A ranger at Cabrillo National Monument said that any tide at or below 0.7 feet is good for viewing sea life, and the lower the tide, the better.

A trip to the tide pools is always a favorite among students. It feels great to get out to the ocean, and there are always so many things to explore and discover.

California Sea Hare

California Sea Hare Eggs

Tide pooling is a nice activity to do with your family, too!

If you plan to explore to explore tide pools with a school group and live in the San Diego area, Cabrillo National Monument offers some great ranger-lead programs for K-12 students. Their programs are free, and many are aligned with the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). 

With middle school students, I have participated in the Science Sampler and the Climate Kids programs, both for grades 5 - 12. The Science Sampler program engages students in practicing data collection on populations of organisms living in tide pools, modeling the way in which biologists collect this data at Cabrillo National Monument. The Climate Kids program addresses the affects of climate change, specifically ocean acidification, on sea life. 

Another benefit of a ranger-lead experience is having an expert help you spot hard-to-find creatures such as nudibranchs, sea hares, and on rare occasions, an octopus.

Spanish Shawl Nudibranch

If you are interested in learning more about the science programs offered at Cabrillo National Monument, follow this link:

Cabrillo National Monument Science Programs

Whether you explore tide pools independently or with a ranger, here are some things you might like to have with you:

* Closed-toe shoes with good traction (old sneakers)

* Pants that can be rolled up and warm layers on your upper body

* Sun protection (hat, sunscreen)

* Towel(s)

* Change of socks, shoes, and clothing (just in case you slip in the water)

* A Ziplock bag for your cell phone, if you bring one (not advised for students)

When wading in the tide pools, keep your eyes out for big waves, and avoid turning your back to them. Walk between the rocks rather than stepping on them. If you step on rocks to avoid walking in the water, you could easily slip on algae and really get yourself wet!

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Why Do Leaves Change Color in the Fall?

 

Why do leaves change color in the fall? This is the question I posed to my ten-year-old daughter when we took a short trip to Maine this month. I gave her the assignment of doing some research on the topic and writing a response. When I read what she had written, I thought that she had done very well with her explanation. I told her that we should share it with others, who might enjoy learning from what she had written. She suggested I post it on my blog, so here it is! The following piece and the photo of foliage above were done by her.

The leaves change color in the fall because the leaves start producing less chlorophyll. If you are wondering, chlorophyll is a chemical that makes leaves green. Chlorophyll is responsible for photosynthesis, when plants take in water and carbon dioxide and use sunlight to make sugar to feed themselves. In the fall, there is less sunlight, which means less photosynthesis for the plants and less need for chlorophyll. When this happens, the trees prepare to go dormant in the winter. Without chlorophyll, the green leaves start turning into red, orange, yellow, and brown leaves. As the chlorophyll breaks down, the carotenoids, orange-yellow and brown pigments, and anthocyanin, red and purple pigments, are revealed and/or created. (Most anthocyanin is created in the fall.) That is why sometimes the leaves are not solid colors, but a mix of colors because the carotenoids and the anthocyanin are slowly being revealed and/or created while the chlorophyll breaks down.

I hope that you enjoyed reading my daughter's work and perhaps learned something, too!

If you are interested in other blogposts related to science topics we explored while on vacation, here are a couple of links:

Snow Science: Freezing and Melting Points the Same?!

Slime: Vacation Fun with Polymers!

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Summertime Science in the Garden: Pollination

Bumblebee visiting gayfeather flowers in my dad's garden in Maine

Summer is a great season to spend time in a garden, and you often receive a little science lesson in the process. I enjoy watching various pollinators at work as they visit flowers. One of my favorites is the bumblebee, which is able to access pollen unavailable to other pollinators. Its secret is buzzing at a specific frequency that causes the flower's anthers to open and release pollen. (To learn more about buzz pollination, see the link at the end of this post to a Science Friday video on this topic.)

I learned about the importance of pollinators the hard way one year when my zucchini plants produced lots of flowers but no zucchini! I discovered that zucchini and other squash flowers are monoecious, meaning they have separate male and female flowers on the same plant. They can't self-pollinate, like some perfect flowers do, but instead rely on pollinators for the flowers to develop into fruits, the zucchini. Pollinators carry pollen from the anthers of a male flower to the stigma of a female flower. You can see these flower parts in the photos below, taken in my plot in the Juniper-Front Community Garden in San Diego.

Male squash flower with pollen-covered anther in the center

Female flower with stigma in the center

Fellow gardeners suggested that I plant some flowers to attract pollinators, and this has been very helpful. I learned that humans can serve as pollinators, too! This is a fun activity to do with kids. To hand pollinate a zucchini or other squash flower, remove the petals from a male squash blossom, and rub its anthers on the stigma of a female flower. One male flower can be used to pollinate multiple female flowers. 

Female blossom- note ovary below petals

Three days later: ovary developing into fruit

Male flower- note absence of ovary below petals

Once the flower has been pollinated, the pollen forms a tube that travels from the stigma down through the style to fertilize the ovules at the base of the pistil, triggering the development of the zucchini fruit. I now use this trick to pollinate my zucchini and spaghetti squash flowers with great success! 

If you enjoy watching pollinators and think you might be interested in helping collect data on pollinators in your area, you can learn about a citizen science project called The Great Sunflower Project in this blog post:

Get Outdoors with Citizen Science! The Great Sunflower Project

To learn more about buzz pollination, check out this Science Friday video:

Science Friday Video on Buzz Pollination

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