Mindful Mondays: Animal Enrichment

Posted on by Sierra Tamkun in Animal Encounters, Any Age, Exhibits, Featured Exhibits, Health, Life Science, Mind Matters, Mindful Mondays

Written by Willow Sedam, Animal Husbandry Staff

Mindful Mondays: Animal Enrichment

Just like us, animals can get bored. Have you ever been bored stuck inside on a rainy day? Imagine if you lived your entire life in your house –  many animals kept in captivity in zoos, aquariums, and even our own homes do spend their whole lives in one place. And without proper enrichment, animals can get bored quickly!

 

So, what is enrichment?

Behavioral, or environmental, enrichment, is anything that makes an animal’s life more interesting! It could be training a dog to sit and stay, or giving an octopus a complex puzzle to solve. It can be rearranging an animal’s cage for a change of scenery, or introducing new and exciting sounds or scents to them.

 

At the museum, we have our own animals – from black-footed ferrets to tree frogs – who all need enrichment. But enrichment comes in all different shapes and sizes!

Our colony of domesticated fancy rats are smart, omnivorous foragers, and need lots to do to keep their brains working. One day, they might get a new toy or a hiding place like a tunnel or wicker ball in their enclosure. The next, they might get peanuts hidden inside of cardboard tubes that they have to sniff out and chew open to get to. One of the keys to enrichment is variability – if an animal gets the same kind of enrichment at the same time every day or week, the novelty can wear off. Switching up enrichment styles and schedules is as important as the enrichment itself!

 

But enrichment isn’t one size fits all. Every animal is different, and so are the things we give them to keep them interested and excited.

 

The museum’s ornate box turtle, Tara, isn’t very good at sniffing out treats or chewing open cardboard boxes, so her enrichment takes a different form. She gets walks – inside the museum when the weather is cold, and out in the big backyard when it’s warmer. She loves her walks, and spends her outdoors time digging, hunting ants, and finding rocks to carry around in her beak. And even Tara likes treats – though instead of peanuts, she gets mealworms, which she chases down and gobbles up! To figure out what kind of enrichment an animal needs, we have to think about what our animals would be doing in the wild; Tara is actually a Colorado native, so spending time foraging in the Big Backyard is the perfect enrichment activity for her.

But what happens when animals don’t get the enrichment they need? Like us, bored animals can become frustrated, restless, or even depressed. They can get lethargic and low-energy, pick fights with other animals in the same cage, or pace the same path over and over again. Enrichment is important for animals of all shapes and sizes, from lions and tigers to little turtles like Tara.

 

Want to try giving your pet enrichment? There are lots of different ways to, and you might already be doing it without realizing! Training your dog to sit and stay, or playing catch-the-string with your cat are some easy ways to get your pet’s mind and body active. You could also introduce your pets to new (pet-safe) foods, or interesting and novel scents. Or, rearrange their cage, move their bed, and hide their toys in new places around the house. You can even make your own puzzle feeder: take a shallow box, cut holes of various sizes in the top, and sprinkle in some treats. See how your pet thinks through the problem to get to its prize – does it fish the treats out with a paw, shake the box until they fall out, or tear it open to get to the food?

There are tons of different fun enrichment projects you and your pet can work on together – so next time you’re feeling bored, consider designing a new toy for your furry (or slimy, scaly, or feathered) friend. You just might discover that it’s just as enriching for you as it is for them!

 

 

To stay informed on the latest Mental Health: Mind Matters programs and experiences, visit the Mind Matters webpage and follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter. Don’t forget to tag us in your experiences when you visit the museum to help us #MakeItOk. 

We look forward to welcoming you to FCMoD to experience this amazing exhibit!  

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Daily Discovery: Endangered & Forgotten

Posted on by Kristin Rush in Animal Encounters, Any Age, Daily Discovery, Discovery at Home, Exhibits, Life Science, News, Spotlight, Uncategorized

Post written by Alexa Leinaweaver, Live Animal Husbandry Coordinator.

Daily Discovery: Endangered & Forgotten

National Wildlife Day is September 4, 2020! To celebrate, let’s explore some of the less well known endangered species in Colorado.

We hear a lot about endangered species these days, as the climate changes around us and human activities challenge wildlife survival. Often the articles and advertisements you see feature fuzzy and adorable animals like the Giant Panda or the Sea Otter. Here in Colorado, our featured endangered wildlife tends to be appealingly majestic, like the Grey Wolf (whose reintroduction to Colorado is on November’s ballot for 2020) or even FCMOD’s beloved Black-footed Ferrets. These are species that definitely deserve attention – but there are many more of our wildlife neighbors that need our attention and help that may not be so cute or exciting. There are so many ignored species in the world that are in difficult or dangerous situations thanks to habitat loss, pollution, water loss, and many other human activities.

Here are just a few of our Colorado wildlife neighbors in need:

Least Tern (Sterna antillarum), Federally Endangered

The Least tern is the smallest member of the gull and tern family. They’re only 9 inches long. They nest in the summer on sandbars along major rivers in the central U.S., including in Colorado. This bird was listed as federally endangered in 1985. A lot of nesting habitat in the U.S. has been lost to the birds because of the ways that humans have changed the river systems: dams and reservoirs; introduction of invasive plants; stabilizing river banks, hydropower, and diverting water.

Bonytail Chub (Gila elegans), Federally Critically Endangered

The bonytail is a freshwater fish that lives in the Colorado River basin. It can grow up to 2 feet long and can live up to 50 years. It was added to the endangered list in 1980, and is now the rarest big-river fish in the Colorado. The bonytail, along with numerous other fish species in the Colorado, suffered drastic population declines after the construction of Hoover Dam and other human projects that divert water from the river and change how the water flowed and pooled. These fish also suffer from competition from non-native fish species that humans have introduced into bonytail habitat. At this time, there is no self-sustaining wild population of these fish, and human-run hatcheries are all that maintains the species.

North Park Phacelia (Phacelia formosula), Federally Endangered

The North Park Phacelia only exists in one place in the entire world: the North Park area in Jackson County. It likes to grow on bare slopes and eroding rocks in ravines in the North Park area, where few other plants are able to survive. This phacelia was listed as federally endangered in 1982. It is threatened by livestock, off-road vehicles, commercial and residential development, and petroleum exploration. It also suffers from the loss of pollinating insects in the area, which it depends on to reproduce.

You may be wondering what you can do to be a better neighbor to these species, and the other species in our beautiful state that are threatened or endangered. Here are some steps that you can try:

Educate yourself. Learn about the different kinds of wildlife that live in Colorado with us, and what kinds of things we humans are doing that are putting them at risk.

Take action. Think about how much water you use, or whether the plants in your yard are native or invasive. Consider how much energy you use leaving on lights in an empty room, or streaming your favorite songs rather than downloading them. Look at how much gas your vehicle uses, or how many plastics or other petroleum products you use on a daily basis. Even a small change you can make in your own behavior can be a help to our endangered neighbors.

Talk to your friends and family about why this wildlife is in danger, and why it’s important to you. Your friends and family care about your thoughts and opinions. Help them to understand how important it is to help all.

Contact your representatives in government. These threatened and endangered species do not have a voice in our government, but you do. If you are old enough, vote for candidates that pay attention to wildlife. But at any age, you can make your voice heard! Make sure that your representatives know how important it is that we are good neighbors to all the wildlife in Colorado, in the country, and in the world.

Follow along with our Daily Discovery! Click here for all activities that you can do at home.

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Daily Discovery: Optical Illusions & Color Vision

Posted on by Kristin Rush in Ages 6-8, Ages 9-12, Daily Discovery, Discovery at Home, Life Science

Post written by Hannah Curtis, Education Assistant.

Daily Discovery: Optical Illusions & Color Vision

Is your brain playing tricks on you? Optical Illusions can use color, light and patterns to create images that can be deceptive or misleading to our brains. The information gathered by the eye is processed by the brain, creating an interpretation or reality, and may not match the true image. Our brains are slow, well only by one-tenth of a second, but in that time it computes, translates, reacts and process information.

Perception refers to the interpretation of what we take in through our eyes. Optical illusions occur because our brain is trying to interpret what we see and make sense of the world around us. Optical illusions simply trick our brains into seeing things which may or may not be real.

See if your brain believes your eyes with some optical illusions below. Learn how they are perceived by your eyes and interpreted by your brain!

Face Recognition

From a young age, our brains are trained to recognize and remember faces. Infants smile and react when they see a face they recognize more than a strangers face. We are able to recognize friends and family in a crowded room, and identify the sex of an individual based on slight facial features. Our “face sense” ability relies on the neurons within the fusiform gyrus in the brain.  Injury to this area can cause face blindness which prevents an individual from recognizing close relatives, or even themselves in the mirror. Location of the Fusiform Gyrusin the Brain; Labroots.

Our brains are also tricked when two faces are displayed to us at the same time. Our eyes see two face shapes, but our brain struggles to perceive them separately and will morph them together. See for yourself with this celebrity face morph experiment.

Color Illusions

Our eyes do much more than observe our surroundings, they also allows us to see those surroundings in color! The photoreceptors, respond to light, dark and color wavelengths. The rods are sensitive to changes in light and dark environment and are used more often at night. Cones are sensitive to bright light color wavelengths and are used mainly during the day. There are three different types of cones which are receptive to red, green, and blue light. The colors we see are perceived when the cells within the cones fire together sending messages to the brain for interpretation.

Just like the muscles in our body, the cone receptors can become fatigued when you stare at a color for a long period of time. The cone becomes less sensitive to that color of light and when you look away other the colors opposite on the color wheel are what we briefly see.

On a contemporary color wheel, the colors opposite orange and green are red and blue, allowing you to see the flag in it’s red, white and blue fashion!

Follow along with our Daily Discovery! Click here for all activities that you can do at home.

Educational opportunities like this are supported in part by Fort Fund.

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Fossils, Fossils Everywhere!

Posted on by Kristin Rush in Adults, Ages 6-8, Ages 9-12, Daily Discovery, Discovery at Home, Life Science, Teens

Post written by Hannah Curtis, Education Assistant.

Fossils, Fossils Everywhere!

When you hear the word fossil, what is the first thing that comes to mind? Was it dinosaurs? If it was, great! Dinosaurs have and continue to play a role in planet earth’s history. We learn about them from a young age, and I know a few three year old’s that know more about dinosaurs than I do! It is a topic of inquiry, research and storytelling. Dinosaur fossils are discovered by paleontologists every year across the globe, especially Colorado (check out the latest discovery by DMNS), but dino fossils aren’t the only thing you can find close to home! Today I will bring you closer to mammal, and reptilian species that lived after the dinosaurs reign, during the Eocene epoch about 56 million years ago!

 

The Fossil Wall in the Wildlands & Wildlife Exhibit at FCMoD

For reference, here is the earth’s geologic timescale, beginning when the Earth was formed 4.6 billion years ago to the Holocene epoch of today. Dinosaurs lived throughout the Mesozoic epoch starting at 251 million years ago, while the Eocene epoch begins at 55 million years ago. Between those two time periods, the K-T extinction event occurred which eliminated roughly 80% of all species on the earth and began the Cenozoic Era.  It’s hard to think of time as billions of years, so for perspective use your body to represent this geologic scale, now look at your pinky finger. This finger represents the Holocene epoch while the Cenozoic Era would be your arm. The modern human culture timeframe compared to the Earth’s life span is pretty small, yet not insignificant.

Geologic Time Scale

While studying at CSU to get my degree in Biological Anthropology, I was fortunate to participate in the departments Paleontology Field School season in Greybull, Wyoming! We spent two weeks in the hot sun, fossil hunting for tiny early primate jaws (smaller than a fingernail), to the teeth of large hippopotamus looking Coryphodon and everything in-between! Let’s start with the basics by talking about the different types of fossils that result from fossilization. For a quick overview of fossilization check out this video!

Coryphodon Recreation; American Museum of Natural History

Types of Fossils

Body fossils are the fossils you might be most familiar with. These are most often bones or teeth that have been mineralized or petrified. Another example of a body fossil is turtle carapace or bivalve shells. Trace fossils occur when an object’s shape or pattern design is imprinted into the earth leaving a trace of what it was. The actual object is not fossilized, but instead leaves behind clues. Footprints or trackways are trace fossils along with the pattern and texture of crocodile skins.

One of my favorite types of fossils are coprolites which is fossilized animal dung. Burrow holes created by insects like the prehistoric wasp, are filled in with sediment and compacted to reveal fossilized burrows. Even after millions of years, fossils share bits and pieces of life, animal behavior and environmental aspects with paleontologists today!

Dinosaur Coprolite on display at FCMoD

Top left: insect burrow. Top Right: crocodile skin trace fossil. Bottom: fossilized turtle carapace

Fossil Hunting

Methods of paleontology will vary depending on the site or location as well as what era or time period you are looking at. Fossils coming from the Eocene generally aren’t going to be large femurs or skulls like dinosaur paleontology. Mammals and reptiles during this time weren’t even close the size of most dinosaurs so our methods didn’t including major digging or excavating. Our main method is surface prospecting. Seen in image 1 below, teeth and bones can actually be easily spotted on the grounds surface. The sediment is clay like, but easily eroded by rainfall and flooding. As erosion occurs, fossils rise the surface. Fossilized teeth shine and sparkle with bright sun making them easy to recognize. To speed up the process of erosion we use hammers and picks to break up and loosen the sediment. After a years worth of rainfall, a new layer will be revealed for the next years fields school students.

You won’t just find small bone fragments or teeth, at some sites or locals, full or partial skeletons have been found. These fossils will likely under multiple layers of sediment and require a delicate touch and will take more than one day to retrieve. Depending on the size of the fossil, you might have to cast the fossil. Using plastering materials, you can safely remove the fossil and surrounding sediment from the ground and transport it back to a lab to be prepared.

Fossil jaw and teeth

Students speeding up erosion process

Preparation and Curation

Paleontology doesn’t end in the field. Once you return to the lab with the fossils, they need to be properly curated and processed. Each fossil is given a field accession number and analyzed to identify the taxon of the animal, along with the elements of the fossil that easily identify it. This could be which teeth, or bone it is and if it was from the right or left side of the body. The fossil is also labeled by which local it was found in, who found the fossil, and for the geology nerds the paleosol stage! Accessing and curating each specimen provides valuable context for each fossil. Without it, the story of life, and evolution during this time can’t be properly pieced together. We found over 500 individual specimens during our field school year, and they all live in the CSU Paleontology Lab where research and preparation continue. Next time you hear the word fossil, will it still be dinosaurs you think of first?

Fossil Accessing Labels

 Fossil collections storage

 

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Daily Discovery: Storytime in the Home – Daytime Nighttime Diorama

Posted on by Kristin Rush in Daily Discovery, Discovery at Home, Life Science

Post written by Lea Mikkelsen, Early Childhood Coordinator.

Daily Discovery: Storytime in the Home – Daytime Nighttime Diorama

Follow along with FCMoD’s live stream Storytime in the Home – Daytime Nighttime: All Through the Year. Then gather your supplies to make a nature diorama!

Supplies:

  • Cardboard Box
  • Construction Paper
    o Daytime Paper (light blue and yellow for the sun)
    o Nighttime Paper (dark blue and white for the moon)
  • Glue
  • Scissors
  • Rocks, sticks, moss, pine cones
  • Air dry clay
  • Animal coloring page

Instructions:

  1. Place all your supplies on a clear surface with plenty of room to work.
  2. Choose whether you want to make a Daytime or a Nighttime animal diorama.
  3. Use the Daytime or Nightime paper to make your sky and sun or moon.
  4. Color and cut out your animal. Glue a paper tab to the back of your animal to make it easier to stand up inside the diorama (like a tripod).
  5. Fill your scene with clay, rocks, moss, and sticks. Be creative! You can add any supplies you want to this!
  6. Share your creations with us using #dailydiscovery on social media! We love to see what you are making!

Image Credit: Taiga biome diorama – via Pinterest

Want to download these directions? Click here for a handy PDF!

Follow along with our Daily Discovery! Click here for all activities that you can do at home.

Educational opportunities like this are supported in part by Buell Foundation. Their support helps make access to early childhood education at FCMoD possible for everyone in our community.

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Daily Discovery: Nature Among Us – Recreators/ Descubrimiento en casa: La naturaleza entre nosotros – personas que practican diferentes actividades de recreo

Posted on by Kristin Rush in Any Age, Daily Discovery, Descubrimiento en casa, Discovery at Home, Español, Life Science

Post written by Bella Harris, Discovery Agent.

Daily Discovery: Nature Among Us – Recreators

Use your scientific skills to research recreators around Fort Collins! All you need is a camera, a pen or pencil, and a love for exploration to be a recreation researcher. Below is a table to check off different recreator sightings around Fort Collins. Try to find as many as you can! You can print this table or simply use it as an online guide. When you finish, share a picture of your table and pictures from your natural place adventures on our social media pages listed below!

Here are some recommendations for natural places to look for recreators:
● Lee Martinez Park
● Fort Collins City Park
● Spring Park
● Lory State Park
● Coyote Ridge Natural Area
● Check out here for more natural places to explore!

Instructions:

  1. Put a check by every plant you find! Or fill out your own recreator discovery at the bottom of the table. You can also document your discoveries on a piece of paper.

Please take about a week to fill out this worksheet. When you have completed as much of the table as possible, please take a photo of it! Be sure to photograph your exploration throughout natural places in Fort Collins, too!

You can upload your photos and share your adventures on the museum’s Facebook page. When creating your Nature Among Us post, please include a photo of your plants chart/list, photos of the natural places you visited, and a short description of where you went, what you saw, and how many times you explored. And don’t forget to use the hashtag #NatureAmongUs! You can also email your research results to Bella Harris.

Each week, we’ll highlight the work you have done! Looking for more adventure? Explore wildlife, plants, and pollinators with past Daily Discovery: Nature Among Us activities, available on the museum’s website at fcmod.org/blog.

Want to download these directions? Click here for a handy PDF!

Follow along with our Daily Discovery! Click here for all activities that you can do at home.

Learn more about local recreators!

Image Creidt: mtbproject.com

Traducido por Károl de Rueda y Laura Vilaret-Tuma.

Descubrimiento en casa: La naturaleza entre nosotros – personas que practican diferentes actividades de recreo

¡Usa tus habilidades científicas para investigar y observar a las personas que practican diferentes actividades de ocio en tu área o en los alrededores de Fort Collins! Solo necesitas una cámara, algo para escribir, y el entusiasmo para explorar y convertirte en un/a investigador/a del recreo. Debajo encontrarás una tabla para marcar avistamientos de personas haciendo diferentes actividades a tus alrededores. ¡Intenta encontrar tantas como puedas! Imprime esta actividad o simplemente úsala como una guía. Cuando termines, ¡comparte fotos de tus aventuras en nuestras redes sociales!

Les recomendamos estos espacios naturales en Fort Collins:
●Parque Lee Martinez (Lee Martinez Park)
● Parque de la ciudad de Fort Collins (Fort Collins City Park)
● Parque de la primavera (Spring Park)
● Parque Estatal de Lory (Lory State Park)
● Área Natural de la cresta del coyote (Coyote Ridge Natural Area)
● Haz clic en el enlace ¡y encuentra más espacios naturales para explorar!

Antes de completar esta actividad, te invitamos a llenar una breve encuesta en tu propio idioma. Con tus respuestas, aprenderemos más sobre tus intereses y sobre las diversas formas en las que podríamos adaptar nuestros programas y actividades en el futuro. ¡Muchas gracias!

Instrucciones:

  1. Marca cada persona que veas practicando alguna de estas actividades. Si te topas con alguna otra que no se encuentra en esta lista, puedes nombrarla en los espacios de “nuevo descubrimiento” al final de la tabla, o también puedes documentar estas aventuras en cualquier hoja de papel o cuaderno.

Podrías completar esta actividad durante el curso de varios días. Cuando hayas terminado la mayor parte de la tabla, tómale una foto. También asegúrate de fotografiar tus exploraciones en los varios espacios naturales que visitaste en Fort Collins.

Puedes subir tus fotos y compartir tus aventuras en nuestra página de Facebook. Cuando estés escribiendo tu publicación, por favor incluye los resultados de la tabla más arriba, una pequeña descripción sobre los lugares a los que fuiste, lo que observaste, y el número de veces que visitaste un espacio natural. Podrías utilizar la etiqueta #NatureAmongUs.

Si quieres, también puedes mandar tus investigaciones por correo electrónico a Bella Harris. Durante cada semana, estaremos  resentando estos trabajos ¡incluyendo el tuyo! a través de las redes sociales.

¿Buscas más aventuras? Explora la vida silvestre, plantas, y polinizadores en las actividades anteriores de “La naturaleza entre nosotros,” disponible en nuestro sitio web: fcmod.org/blog.

¿Te gustaría descargar esta actividad? Haz clic aquí para obtener un archivo PDF.

Para encontrar actividades, ideas y mucho más descubrimiento en casa, ¡síguenos!

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Daily Discovery: Nature Among Us – Pollinators/ Descubrimiento en casa: La naturaleza entre nosotros – los polinizadores

Posted on by Kristin Rush in Any Age, Daily Discovery, Descubrimiento en casa, Discovery at Home, Español, Life Science

Post written by Bella Harris, Discovery Agent.

Daily Discovery: Nature Among Us – Pollinators

Use your scientific skills to research pollinators around Fort Collins! All you need is a camera, a pen or pencil, and a love for exploration to be a pollinator researcher. Below is a table to check off different pollinator sightings around Fort Collins. Try to find as many as you can! You can print this table or simply use it as an online guide. When you finish, share a picture of your table and pictures from your natural place adventures on our social media pages listed below!

Here are some recommendations for natural places to look for pollinators:
● Butterfly Woods Natural Areas
● Soapstone Prairie
● Cathy Fromme Prairie Natural Areas
● Gardens on Spring Creek
● North Shields Ponds Natural Area
● Check out here for more natural places to explore!

Instructions:

  1. Put a check by every pollinator you find! Or fill out your own pollinator discovery at the bottom of the table. You can also document your discoveries on a piece of paper.

Please take about a week to fill out this worksheet. When you have completed as much of the table as possible, please take a photo of it! Be sure to photograph your exploration throughout natural places in Fort Collins, too!

You can upload your photos and share your adventures on the museum’s Facebook page. When creating your Nature Among Us post, please include a photo of your pollinator chart/list, photos of the natural places you visited, and a short description of where you went, what you saw, and how many times you explored. And don’t forget to use the hashtag #NatureAmongUs! You can also email your research results to Bella Harris.

Each week, we’ll highlight the work you have done! Stay tuned for next week’s Daily Discovery, where we will explore ourselves in Nature Among Us: Recreators.

Want to download these directions? Click here for a handy PDF!

Follow along with our Daily Discovery! Click here for all activities that you can do at home.

Learn more about local pollinators!

Image Credit: britannica.com/animal/tiger-swallowtail

Traducido por Károl de Rueda y Laura Vilaret-Tuma.

Descubrimiento en casa: La naturaleza entre nosotros – los polinizadores

¡Usa tus habilidades científicas para investigar los polinizadores que viven en tu área o en los alrededores de Fort Collins! Solo necesitas una cámara, algo para escribir, y el entusiasmo para explorar y convertirte en un/a investigador/a de estos insectos especiales. Debajo encontrarás una tabla para marcar avistamientos de polinizadores a tus alrededores. ¡Intenta encontrar tantos como puedas! Imprime esta actividad o simplemente úsala como una guía. Cuando termines, ¡comparte fotos de tus aventuras
en nuestras redes sociales!

Les recomendamos estos espacios naturales en Fort Collins para buscar polinizadores:
● Área natural de los bosques de mariposas (Butterfly Woods Natural Area)
● Pradera de piedra de jabón (Soapstone Prairie Natural Area)
● Área natural de la pradera de Cathy Fromme (Cathy Fromme Prairie Natural Area)
● Los jardines de Spring Creek (Gardens on Spring Creek)
● Área natural de los estanques de North Shields (North Shields Ponds Natural Area)
● Haz clic en el enlace ¡y encuentra más espacios naturales para explorar!

Antes de completar esta actividad, te invitamos a llenar una breve encuesta en tu propio idioma. Con tus respuestas, aprenderemos más sobre tus intereses y sobre las diversas formas en las que podríamos adaptar nuestros programas y actividades en el futuro. ¡Muchas gracias!

Instrucciones:

  1. Marca cada polinizador que veas. Si te topas con algún otro que no se encuentre en esta lista, puedes nombrarlo en los espacios de “nuevo descubrimiento” al final de la tabla, o también puedes documentar estas aventuras en cualquier hoja de papel o cuaderno.

Podrías completar esta actividad durante el curso de varios días. Cuando hayas terminado la mayor parte de la tabla, tómale una foto. También asegúrate de fotografiar tus exploraciones en los varios espacios naturales que visitaste en Fort Collins.

Puedes subir tus fotos y compartir tus aventuras en nuestra página de Facebook. Cuando estés escribiendo tu publicación, por favor incluye los resultados de la tabla más arriba, una pequeña descripción sobre los lugares a los que fuiste, lo que observaste, y el número de veces que visitaste un espacio natural. Podrías utilizar la etiqueta #NatureAmongUs.

Si quieres, también puedes mandar tus investigaciones por correo electrónico a Bella Harris. Durante cada semana, estaremos  resentando estos trabajos ¡incluyendo el tuyo! a través de las redes sociales.

Mantente sintonizado con nuestro próximo Descubrimiento en casa, titulado “La naturaleza entre nosotros: los recreadores.”

¿Te gustaría descargar esta actividad? Haz clic aquí para obtener un archivo PDF.

Para encontrar actividades, ideas y mucho más descubrimiento en casa, ¡síguenos!

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Daily Discovery: “On One Flower” Paper Flower Craft/Descubrimiento en casa: “Sobre Una Flor:” Flor de papel

Posted on by Kristin Rush in Ages 3-5, Crafts, Daily Discovery, Descubrimiento en casa, Discovery at Home, Español, Life Science

Post written by Sierra Tamkun, Learning Experiences Manager.

Daily Discovery: On One Flower Paper Flower Craft

Follow along with FCMoD’s live stream Storytime in the Home: On One Flower. Then, make your very own paper flower garden!

Supplies:

• Paper cupcake liners
• Markers, crayons, or colored pencils
• Blue and green construction paper
• Glue
• Assorted craft supplies:

  • Beads
  • Chenille stems
  • Bits of colored paper

Instructions:

1. Choose 3-4 cupcake liners to be your flowers. Color the liners to make your flowers brighter!

2. Using scissors, cut lines along the edges of your cupcake liners to make flower petals.

3. Glue your flowers onto the blue construction paper.

4. Cut stems and leaves out of the green construction paper and glue them to your blue paper sheet. If you don’t have green paper, you can draw your flower stems and leaves!

5. Decorate the center of your flower with different beads, chenille stems, or pieces of paper.

6. Draw some bugs and butterflies around your paper flower garden!

Want to download these directions? Click here for a handy PDF!

Follow along with our Daily Discovery! Click here for all activities that you can do at home.

Image credit: onelittleproject.com

Traducido por Károl de Rueda y Laura Vilaret-Tuma.

Descubrimiento en casa: Sobre Una Flor – Flor de papel

Sigue nuestro programa de transmisión en vivo “Cuentos en Casa” (Storytime in the Home) a través de las redes sociales. En esta ocasión te presentamos la historia llamada “Sobre una Flor” (versión en inglés). Después, ¡construye tu propio jardín de flores!

Artículos necesarios:

  • Marcadores, crayones o lápices de colores
  • Papel de colores incluyendo verde
  • Pegamento
  • Tijeras
  • Materiales para decorar: abalorios, brillantina, retazos de papel, etc.

Instrucciones:

  1. Para formar los pétalos de la flor, usa papel de colores y con las tijeras corta unas formas como la fotografía de arriba.
  2. Une tus pétalos con pegamento.
  3. Usando el papel verde, corta tallos y hojas para tus flores y pégalos debajo de la flor. Si no tienes papel verde, dibújalos y coloréalos.
  4. Decora el centro de las flores con abalorios, brillantina, retazos de papel o lo que quieras.
  5. Dibuja algunos insectos o mariposas para tu jardín.
  6. ¡Llena tu casa de alegría decorándola con tus flores coloridas!

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Educational opportunities like this are supported in part by Buell Foundation. Their support helps make access to early childhood education at FCMoD possible for everyone in our community.

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It’s National Pollinator Week! ?

Posted on by Kristin Rush in Animal Encounters, Any Age, Exhibits, Life Science, Uncategorized

Post written by Alexa Leinaweaver, Live Animal Husbandry Coordinator.

?It’s National Pollinator Week!

June 22-28, 2020, is the 13th annual National Pollinator Week!

What Are Pollinators?

Pollinators are animals that move pollen from one flower to another flower of the same species in the first step toward the plant reproducing. While pollinators are primarily insects (bees, beetles, flies, moths, butterflies), there are also some birds and small mammals that pollinate plants too.

More than 70% — and possibly as much as 90%! — of flowering plants are dependent on pollination for creating seeds and fruit. It is estimated that one out of every three bites of food you eat was made possible by animal pollinators!

Many of the animals that pollinate are in decline. Pollinator habitats are shrinking or getting destroyed so they have no space to live or feed. In addition, overuse of pesticides, environmental pollution, and climate change are all adding risks to these animals.

Pollinators in Colorado

In Colorado, we have a wide range of habitats and extreme changes in altitude – different bees will thrive in each area. Because of that variety of habitat, Colorado is home to more than 900 species of bees! There are more than 200 bees in Larimer County alone. The smallest bee in Colorado is the Miner Bee (Perdita salacis) at 3.5mm/0.1in; the largest is the Nevada Bumblebee (Bombus nevadensis) at 26.5mm/1in. Colorado bees are colorful, too! Different species may be the usual yellow and black, or range to red, orange, green, blue, or brown.

Most bees in Colorado (and the rest of the world too) are solitary bees that don’t live in a colony like the familiar honeybee. Most of these solitary bees are ground nesters, digging burrows in the soil or using abandoned rodent burrows. Some of the bees here are cavity nesters, finding holes or cavities in twigs or logs.

In Colorado, bees are responsible for pollinating 80% of the crops in our state.

In addition to bees, other pollinators in Colorado include approximately 250 species of butterfly and more than 1,000 species of moth. There are also 11 species of hummingbird that migrate through the state from April through September.

How can you help pollinators?

Learn more about the pollinators in the space where you live. Spend some time outside and observe the animals that are visiting your garden. What kinds of animals do you see? What colors are they? How do they behave as they visit flowers?

Create good habitats for pollinators around your home. Whether you have acres of land or just a window box, you can help pollinators by offering them food and shelter. Plant a variety of flowering plants (preferably native – CSU has a great example list of native plants for pollinators) that offer food and nesting space. Provide several different kinds of blooming plants near each other, and use plants that have different bloom times, so that flowers are available to pollinators from early spring through late fall. Plant in sunny locations that are protected from the wind.

Don’t “clean up” your yard in the fall. Leave all the dormant or dead plants alone rather than trimming them back for the winter season — cavity nesting bees and other pollinating insects will use them as a safe home during the cold weather. Leave some leaf litter around for butterflies and moths to use as insulation over the winter, rather than raking it all up and dumping it in the landfill. If you can include materials in your yard such as logs or wood nesting blocks, you provide space for species that nest in wood to survive the snow. Leave some of the ground uncovered (i.e. don’t put mulch everywhere) for the native bees that nest in the bare dirt for the winter.

Reduce use of chemicals for controlling weeds and pests, as these can hurt or kill beneficial pollinators as well.

Protect natural habitat.

 Share what you know. Talk to your friends and family about what you have learned about pollinators and how and why you are helping them. Talk to your local and state government about how important it is to protect pollinators.

 

 

 

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The Pollinator You Know: The Honeybee!

Posted on by Kristin Rush in Ages 6-8, Ages 9-12, Animal Encounters, Daily Discovery, Discovery at Home, Exhibits, Life Science, Uncategorized

Post written by Alexa Leinaweaver, Live Animal Husbandry Coordinator.

The Pollinator You Know: The Honeybee!

When most people hear about pollination, the first thing they think of is the honeybee.

The oldest bee that scientists have found so far was in Myanmar, encased in amber and dated at 100 million years old! Bees that old were hunters, eating other insects. At some point they started visiting flowers for nectar and pollen, changing into the honeybees that we know and love.

Honeybee colonies have been kept in man-made hives since Ancient Egypt and have been important throughout human history. In addition to being delicious as a sweetener in food, honey can be used to make mead (an alcoholic drink), which works as an antiseptic. It has even been used to embalm mummies! Beeswax can be used in making many products, such as candles, soap, cosmetics, and waterproofing. Honey and bees are so important that people have named their children after bees. Deborah and Melissa both mean “bee” in different languages; Pamela derives from a word for “honey”.

When Europeans colonized the Americas in the 17th century, there were no native honeybees. Native Americans tribes at the time kept and traded other kinds of bees. European settlers brought the Western Honey Bee (Apis mellifera) along with their familiar crop plants when they moved to the Americas. As we have expanded across the planet, humans have deliberately expanded the range of the Western Honey Bee, and it is now found on every continent in the world except Antarctica.

Healthy Honeybee Colonies

In a healthy honeybee colony, you can see thousands of individual bees. Most of what you see are the worker bees, which are females that cannot lay eggs. There are usually 10,000-50,000 workers per colony. The workers care for the queen and young, defend the hive with their stingers, build comb for the young honeybees and the honey, and collect food. There are also drones, which are the male honeybees. There are about 1,000 drones in a given colony. Drones have no sting, do not forage for food, and cannot defend the hive. Their only purpose is to mate with the queen. There is only one queen bee in the colony. She is larger than all the other bees, and usually has a circle of worker bees around her (her “court”) that take care of her, bringing her food and cleaning her. The queen is the only individual who can lay eggs, and can lay as many as 2,000 eggs per day!

The worker bees leave the hive and may fly up to two miles away from their home to find food. They seek out flowers and collect nectar, which is a sugary solution that flowers produce in order to attract pollinators. The worker bee then returns to the hive and performs a dance to indicate to her fellow workers where she found food. The collected nectar is transformed into honey and may be consumed by any of the adult bees or fed to the young who cannot yet fly to find their own food. The honey can also be harvested by humans.

Honeybee colonies normally survive for several years, going dormant in the winter cold and then becoming active in the warmer months. During favorable conditions (an abundance of food), the hive will create “daughter queens,” and the old queen and much of her colony will relocate to make room for the new queens.

What is happening with the FCMoD colony?

Fort Collins Museum of Discovery has had a bee colony in the Animal Encounters exhibit for our visitors to watch and enjoy since the exhibit opened. However, our colony has collapsed several times since then. Each time we have obtained a new colony from our professional beekeeper.

There are a lot of environmental factors that can negatively affect a honeybee colony, and a lot of colonies around the world are struggling and collapsing right now. There are some pesticides that are worse for bees, especially the class of pesticide called neonicotinoids. There are diseases and parasites that can affect a colony. Climate change may also be playing a factor with bee colonies dying.

What our beekeeper thinks may be happening to the honeybee colony here at FCMoD is that the bees may have found a flower source in the area that has been sprayed with a certain kind of pesticide. They collect the nectar and pesticide, then carry it back to the colony and tell their sisters where to find more. The bees eat the poisoned nectar and honey, and die.

How can we stop honeybee colony collapse?

There are a lot of different pesticides that people use to control weeds and to get rid of bugs they don’t like. But since we do like the honeybees and the honey they make, we need to make sure that we use pesticides that won’t hurt the bees. Pesticide application can be done at night when bees are not foraging. Additionally, making sure not to apply pesticides to blooming plants will help prevent bee deaths.

Like all animals, bees need good quality and abundant food. We can plant native flowers at our homes so honeybees and all the native Colorado bees have healthy and nutritious food sources.

We should also look for ways to reduce our impact on the environment around us, improving the lives of all animals that we share our environment with. Find reusable products instead of single use items you throw away. Turn off the lights in empty rooms. Compost. Take shorter showers. Each of us can have a huge positive impact on the wild animals that live around us.

Learn more about how pesticides can affect bees and other wildlife:

EPA Tips for Reducing Pesticide Impacts on Wildlife

National Pesticide Information Center: Protecting Wildlife from Pesticides

Learn about native plants you can use in your garden:

Colorado Native Plant Society plant lists

Find out how to reduce your impact on the environment:

World Wildlife Fund’s Tips for Reducing Your Environmental Impact

Can you spot the queen bee in this picture? She is larger and a slightly different color.

The FCMoD honeybee colony, in Spring of 2018.

Photos courtesy of Alexa Leinaweaver

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