Carpenter Nature Center

Woo hoo for another field trip! It wasn't too exciting today, but there was actually hands-on with some reptiles. It's the first place we have been able to hold some of the wild creatures. When we first got there, the building looked somewhat lame. There was a painter turtle and a green frog, so not very exciting. Turns out, we were in the wrong building. The next building over was the one we were supposed to be in, aka the building with all the exciting stuff. We gathered our chairs in an arc while the naturalist talked for a little bit about phenology. For my ecology class, we are supposed to be doing phenological calenders for February and March. After hearing the naturalist talk about different phenological events, the project made a lot more sense. Then the hands-on experience came into play.

We started with the amphibians: salamandars, frogs and toads. The tiger salamandar was the first one. He was so cute! But he was pretty shy. He just stood in the middle of the group not really knowing what to do. Granted, when he was only as big as our hand, it made sense for him to be scared. Next was the grey tree frog. They are so sticky! It would be so much fun if we were sticky too. No more being stuck in traffic, because we could start climbing buildings. Imagine all the gas we would save!

The reptiles were next in line: turtles and snakes. The painter turtle was the first for the reptile group. They are pretty common in the area, and are very easy to pick out with the bright orange stripes. Next was the wood turlte, which isn't so common. It's a land turtle with a shell that has rings similar to a freshly cut tree. And of course the shell is brown. He was really heavy too. The last one was the leopard tortoise, which has a really pretty green shell. The snakes came out next, which most people wanted nothing to do with. I was the first person to hold each snake after the teacher. The bullsnake was first. He was pretty calm, but sudden movements made him very uneasy. The other snake to come out was the corn snake. It was very fast-moving. It ended up tangling itself between my arm and another student's arm. I guess it didn't know which arm was it's favorite to entwine haha

Oh, btw...I'm down to 11 days :)