survival skills Friday 4-25-08

mink footprint



me learning to make a fire during survial skills practice


Friday was a wrap up day. We checked the images on our camera traps and found nothing. :(
All of the food that we put out as bait was gone but there were no images. All we can figure is that there were some very smart animals out there.

Survival skills was fun. First Chris instructed us on how to survive if you are lost or stranded away from people--PLAN (acronym). Protect yourself, know your location, acquisition (obtain water & food if necessary), finally navigation (find your way to a stream if possible since that is where most civilizations are built).



The latter part of the afternoon was spent walking along the beach. We were given an environmental impact assessment assignment enabling us to utilize the information we had gained in the previous two weeks. This had been done recently by a team of professionals but the data was not in yet so this allowed us to draw our own conclusions.
Our assignment was to transecting skills to cover the area and look for evidence of animals (mammals mostly). Evidence would be burrows (where the sleep or hide), footprints, feeding signs (for example: shells in a pile or carcasses), scat, skulls, or an actual sighting on an animal.
The area was quite large--bigger than the entire MMS campus (including the baseball field and the grassy areas near the car dealership). Composed of grassland, ocean, beach, lagoon, pond, and rocks, the area was a little overwhelming for the five of us. The wind made the temperature feel even colder. Without the wind, it was in the 30s. With the big gusts of wind provided by the ocean, we were freezing (and nearly falling over).


We spent about 2 1/2 hours combing the area and found several burrows, feeding signs, and scat (fox and coyote mostly).


The assessment was to determine if building an oil refinery would impact wildlife in the immediate area. Because we found many signs of wildlife, we determined that it would be detrimental (harmful).

I have really enjoyed my fellowship and am amazed at the amount of information I learned. Details, so small, really filled in gaps and formed connections for me. I can't wait to share more with you guys!!!