Packing up and Coming Home!

Packing Up
On Tuesday we had many things do to:
1) Identify and process all the caterpillars we'd found on Monday
2) Zoo - feed, clean, and check the status of all the caterpillars in the collection
3) Pack all of our clothes for the trip to New Orleans and then home
4) Pack up the caterpillars and clean the bunkhouse
5) Drive to New Orleans and transfer the caterpillars to the Chemical Ecology lab at Tulane
6) Go out to dinner to celebrate the success of the expedition
7) Follow the results of the election

Identifying the caterpillars and gathering data was one of my favorite parts of the expedition. We divided the tasks to make sure everything got done. Here I am trying to find all those darn tortridiidae. You can see my bed in the background, I slept on the bottom bunk.














While I finished processing and doing zoo, others were cleaning the bunkhouse behind my back. I was so focused I didn't even notice them tidying up, so imagine how surprised I was when I turned around and the bunkhouse looked like this!

















Do you even recognize it with the equipment gone and when it is so neat?










While doing zoo this AM, someone noticed that the wasp had emerged from the pupae that was stuck to the webworm I showed you during the conference on Monday. In this picture you can see the webworm on the leaf with the pupae case still stuck to it, to the right of the leaf and a little lower down, you can see the brochonidae wasp adult. It died in the bag, but that is OK because the data is complete.














Here's a video showing what happened when we separated the pupae case from the caterpillar!

Rebecca put the live caterpillar in it's bag back on the rack so that it will be cared for properly, but she doesn't think it's very likely that it will successfully undergo metamorphosis and emerge as a moth. The parasite really sapped a lot of its strength.

Here is the lab rack from the field, all set up in the Chemical Ecology lab at Tulane. We were worried about what would happen to the caterpillars, but Rebecca has a student who takes care of them all.


















After finishing the lab work at Tulane, we all returned to the Park View Guest house - our home away from home in New Orleans. The people there were so kind to us - it was a wonderful place to stay!









This is the view Ms. Lewis and I had from our room - can you guess why the guest house is called the "Parkview?"














After washing up, we went out for a nice meal to celebrate the expedition. I had the gumbo sampler, of course. It turns out there are three kinds of gumbo - creole, okra, and filet (made with sassafrass leaves). They were all great - but I think I liked the okra the best. Tara is a vegetarian, so the chef said he'd whip something up for her - check out this awesome vegetarian edifice! Doesn't it look like food architecture?


















During the meal, we were all anxious to get news of the election results. Here is Katie on the phone getting an update from her husband in Vermont.














When we finished dinner, we went to the place where Mike - one of our research leaders - had a gig - he is also a musician. Here we are with Mike playing in the background.














We stayed up pretty late watching the election results. We were so proud to hear about how many people voted in this election! Did you know that more African Americans voted in early voting in North Carolina, then voted in the whole election of 2004? Isn't that awesome? What a great social studies lesson in participatory democracy!
On Wednesday, it was time for us to say good bye and go our separate ways. It was hard because we had all become a very close team while we were together - but I also missed my class and my family and was ready to come home.
Here we are - all packed up and waiting for our taxis to the airport - Katie had a very early flight, so she had already left by the time we took this picture.















Home at last!
Here I am at home with my daughter and my doggies - we were all so happy to be together again!

Even More comments!

Hi Paula,


I just wanted to let you know how much I enjoyed reading your blogs! How neat! Have a safe trip home.

: ) Sarah Cannon
__________________________________________________________________________
Do any caterpillers try to disguise that they are poisonous by not showing certain characteristics [bright colors]?

-Patti Kruy

Hi, Patti -

Thanks for your great question! The poisonous strategy depends on two things:
1)Being poisonous
2)predators knowing you are poisonous

The bright colors are developed as warning signs to the predators, if they don't recognize you, they might eat you anyway. Some non-poisonous species have a survival strategy called mimicry – they make themselves appear to be something else – for example, a leaf or a twig. Some of these actually mimic their poisonous cousins so the predators think they are poisonous when really they are quite a satisfying meal!
That said – I certainly do not possess exhaustive knowledge on this subject. If you and Victoria want to poke around a bit, I'd be happy to offer some extra credit!

See you soon!

Mrs. Feynman

___________________________________________________________________________________
Hi Mrs. Feynman

This is Ali's mom Jennifer I would like to know if you have identified any of the parasites yet?

Jennifer Stahr

Hi, Jennifer and Ali!

Wow! I'm so psyched about this question! During the conference on Monday I explained to the kids that when we found parasitized caterpillars we move them to their own ziploc back and watch them until the parasites emerge. Yesterday we found two bags with parasites in them. One was a Braconidae Wasp, and the other was a fly that we couldn't identify without a fly expert. When we transported the bags to Tulane from the field I guess s/he got a little smushed and decapitated! We know it is a fly, though, because all other flying insects have two pairs of wings and flies only have one pair. The other set are truncated knubs that they use for balance – like a tightrope walker uses a pole.

There was another scientist working in the Tulane lab who let us look at the parasites through his dissecting microscope. They looked so cool! He was able to take pictures of them, and I'm hoping that he'll e-mail me the images when they are ready for release.

Rock on!

Mrs. F
__________________________________________________________________________________

Hello Mrs. Feynman!

During dinner tonight we were discussing your trip to New Orleans and we talked about what you were doing there. I had a couple of questions for you since Kevin and Scott didn't know the answers. What are the main adaptations a caterpillar has to make to survive in that environment and how do they differ from the adaptations needed to survive in this area(Sudbury)? Also, do caterpillars communicate? If so, in what ways?

Enjoy your stay. Thank you.

Susan Henderson

Hi, Susan, Kevin and Scott,

Glad to hear your dinner conversation is so intellectual! At my house we usually make stupid jokes or try to figure out who needs to go where and when they need to be there!
To answer your FABOO question, any organism needs to do three things to survive:
1)maintain itself – eat, stay hydrated (drink), etc.
2)reproduce
3)not die – don't get diseases, don't fry, don't freeze, avoid predation/parasitism (not get eaten), etc

Most adaptations are around these three themes.
1)Most caterpillars get their hydration (liquid) from the leaves they eat, though they can drink water directly if there are raindrops on the leaves they crawl on, so that would be the same in any environment. In the North, we have different plants than they have in the South, so we would see some variation (differences) in the adaptations of the caterpillars to eating those plants. Many of the caterpillars I identified were generalists, that means that they eat whatever they can get their mandibles (jaws) on. They tend to have a wide range, and many of them can be found as far north as Canada and then south to Texas and Florida. Some caterpillars that have adapted to eat only one plant, would only be where that plant grows, so if it grows up north, you won't find those guys in the south and visa versa.
2)Caterpillars don't reproduce – only when they are adult moths or butterflies, so you won't see differences here.
3)The big difference here is the weather. In the North it is colder, obviously, so the caterpillars have to have a strategy for making it through the winter. I thought most of them died, and only eggs made it through the winter, but I recently learned that the caterpillars themselves spin a little netlike thing around them and kind of hybernate until spring. The warm weather wakes them up and then they make a real chrysalis and metamorphose into butterflies. In New Orleans, they also do this, but it's easier to make it because winter isn't as harsh.
Thanks for the questions!

Mrs. Feynman
___________________________________________________________________________________


__________________________________________________________________________________
Krystal and I were looking at the blog and have been very fascinated by all the intricacies of these little creatures. I have a couple of questions: Would the study of these caterpillars yield any potential scientific evidences/clues to Global Warming ? If so, what would be your hypothesis on this cause and effect and your method to demonstrate it within your study?
Hi, Phillip and Krystal -

Wow – you guys are really thinking! Yes, there are clues to global warming. One of them is that we were finding caterpillars and lots of them. Rebecca was worried that it might be too late in the season to find caterpillars. There were certain ones that seemed to be done, but overall we found a lot of them. My hypothesis would be that the effects of climate change – earlier springs and later winters – allow some caterpillars to fit in an extra generation.
To test this you would have to compare old caterpillar hunting data to current and future data and figure out if the increased numbers are consistent and statistically significant.

Go Krystal!

Mrs. Feynman
__________________________________________________________________________________

Hi Ms. Feynman,

It sounds like you have had a great experience in New Orleans. Can you please explain if there is a difference in the life cycles of catipillars in New England and southern areas, like New Orleans, due to the climate?
Hayley is looking forward to your return to Curtis!

Robin Graff

Hi, Hayley and Robin!

The big difference I know of is that the winters are harsher in New England, so the caterpillars don't have as much time in the summer to have as many generations as their southern counterparts. (See answer to Krystal above) I'm sure there are other differences, too, so I forwarded your question to Rebecca and I will let you know what she answers!
I am also looking forward to returning to Curtis – I had a great time and learned SO much, but I miss you guys a lot!

Mrs. Feynman
___________________________________________________________________________________
hi mrs feynman! I miss you so much!
from jess L

I miss you, too Jess! The good news is that I will probably be back by the time you read this! Thanks for letting me know that you miss me. I was afraid that you'd have so much fun with Mr. Griffin that you'd want him to teach forever!

See you soon!

Mrs. Feynman
___________________________________________________________________________________

do you try to find spacific kind of catipillers in new orleans
from lee
Hi, Lee!

For this study it is really important to collect whatever we find because one of the goals is to find out who's crawling around out there. That said, there are some caterpillars that were really cool, and we were very excited to find those. I especially liked the ones that look like they are wearing helmets, and the limacodiidae – the slug like ones with the sucker feet!

Great question! Can't wait to see you!

Mrs. Feynman
__________________________________________________________________________

Tony Nevelli this is for Did you really want to go on this trip or not so much?

Tony says “I felt mixed. I wanted to go, it was a great adventure, but I felt guilty leaving my little one.” (Tony has an eight year old son)
Tony sums it up really well – it is hard to leave everyone behind – but it makes it so nice to come back home!

Mrs. F
__________________________________________________________________________

Hi Mrs Feynman! I think what you are doing is great! It's nice how the kids can see you over the video conference! Marissa thinks you are a great teacher and can not wait to see you on thursday!
Marissa and I are very excited to hear all about your adventure.
Marjie Brockman

Hi, Marjie -

I was so happy to get all of Marissa's e-mails and to see her sitting in the front for all of the conferences – how nice to see her big smile all the way from New Orleans!
I will probably get a slide show together when I have a chance to catch my breath – I would certainly love to have parents come in and see it with us.

Thanks for your enthusiasm and support!

Mrs. Feynman
___________________________________________________________________________________

Hi,Mrs.Feynman this is Susan and I have a question for you

Where do you find caterpillers?

Hi, Susan,

Good for you for asking so many questions – you are thinking like a scientist!
Thanks for asking this – at first, when we went out in the field, I didn't really know where to look for caterpillars. I was really lucky, though, because Kevin had found one on our field trip before we left so I got to see him do it! After you do it a while, you start to figure out where the different kinds like to hide. For example, if you see leaves that are folded or stuck together like a sandwich, it's likely there is a leaf tying caterpillar in there. Geometrids (the inchworms) like to pretend to be sticks, or the veins of leaves. They are wicked hard to find. The limacodidae look like dried out or rotting spots on leaves, so you have to look at all of those really carefully.
This is the part of the study that I was best at – I was not as good at counting leaves. Tony Novelli and Lisa Espro are really good leaf counters! We worked together – like the meerkats! In fact, as the caterpillar numbers increased and it got really time consuming to care for them, I think people were a little annoyed with me that I kept finding so many!

I hope we can go out and look for caterpillars together in the spring!

Mrs. Feynman
___________________________________________________________________________________



How long does it take for a caterpilliar to die after it's been parasitized?

Linda Rhodes

Great question – the answer is that it varies depending on how many eggs were laid, the type of parasite, and the type of caterpillar. In the conference on Monday I showed the kids a picture of a Fall Web Worm with a Brachonidae wasp pupae stuck to it. There's a picture on my blog – it looks like a caterpillar laying an egg. Yesterday when we were at Tulane, we were preserving the wasp in alcohol and wanted to put the pupae in with it. When Rebecca used a tweezer to separate the web worm from the pupea, the web worm started crawling around. We all started screaming – we were so startled!
So that one actually survived parasitism. Rebecca thinks it is unlikely, however, that it will make it to adulthood.

Rock on!

Mrs. F
­___________________________________________________________________________________
Hi Ms. Feynman,

Sam asked me to write you a question regarding your field work with caterpillars and your blog.
I was curious about the caterpillar shown with the parasites moving around inside it. Do the parasites eventually kill the caterpillar? If the caterpillar dies, do the parasites die also or do they make their way out of the caterpillar and into a nearby caterpillar? Do they perform a positive function for the caterpillar, and if so, what?

I'm glad you enjoyed your research trip to New Orleans and look forward to hearing more about your learnings.

-Rachael Robiner

Hooray for Sam and Rachel – Wow – you guys came up with a bunch of great questions.
Wasn't that video incredible? I thought it might make a great horror movie!
Usually the parasites do kill the caterpillar, but not always (see answer to Linda's question above). This is the difference between a parasite, and a parasitoid. Parasites are animals like ticks, or intestinal worms, whose continuing nutritional needs depend on the host. If the animal died, so would they. Parasitoids, however, only use the host for part of their lifecycle, in this case the larval stage. They need the caterpillar meat to eat when they hatch out of their eggs, and then, when they are big enough, they pupate themselves. The parisitoids can keep going even if the caterpillar dies – they just keep on munching, but eventually they make their way out so they can metamorphose into adults.
They do not benefit the caterpillar in any way.

Thanks for your kind words – I look forward to sharing with you!

Mrs. Feynman
____________________________________________________________________________

How does a caterpilliar get parasitized?

Robin

Wow – the Rhodes family sure are busy thinking about caterpillars – good for you!
The caterpillars get parasitized in two different ways. Parasitoids like wasps have a body part called an ovipositor that is like a needle. They land on the caterpillar, stick their ovipositor into it, and inject their eggs into it's body.
But Parisitoid flies don't have ovipositors, so they have another strategy. They lay their eggs on a leaf hoping that a hungry caterpillar will come along and eat the eggs for lunch along with the leaf.
Great question!

Mrs. Feynman
___________________________________________________________________________________

did you find any catipillars that are endangered or extint?

this question is for anybody

-christina

Hi, Christina -

Great question – I only kind of know how to answer, so I'm also going to forward it to Rebecca. I'm not sure how the issue of endangerment plays out with caterpillars. I know that there are some butterfly species that scientists are worried about because deforestation and habitat destruction threaten their food sources. I'm not sure if we found any of those.
We did find one that we are hoping is a rare type Geometrid. It has a cousin that is common up North, but the Southern variety is very uncommon.

Good job!

Mrs. Feynman
___________________________________________________________________________________

this is a question for any teacher can a parisite lay eggs in another type of bug or animal

by:noveen

Hi, Noveen,

Wonderful question, but I need some clarification.I know there are lots of other organisms that get parasitized. Do you mean to ask if the parasites that lay eggs on caterpillars also lay eggs on other organisms?
Let's talk when I get back!

Mrs. F
___________________________________________________________________________________
Hola Mrs.Feynman what species of caterpillar seems to be the most attracted to parasites?


-Jake !@#$%^&*()_+<>?":}{

Hi, Jake
The parisitoids are really attracted to the Fall Web Worms – Rebecca explains that since they live in colonies they have a really strong smell that makes them easy to find.

Keep thinking!

Mrs. Feynman
___________________________________________________________________________________

Rebecca Lewis-
Do yuo find alot of caterpillars in the Spanish Moss? Please answer!
Sincerly,
Adriana

Hi, Adriana,

Mrs. Feynman, Mr. Novelli, Ms. Espros and I all sat around discussing this and none of us collected any caterpillars from Spanish Moss. It mostly grows high up in trees and we couldn't reach it, so we're not sure if there are caterpillars in there or not.

Thanks for looking at my blog and asking me a question!

____________________________________________________________________________
Hi!

Ok I couldn't pick which question so I did 3 :

What does zoo mean?
What is your favorite part when you go out to the field?
and What did you want to be when you were our age?

You can answer 1 of the three

See you Thursday -Ali

Oh, Ali! I love your questions so much I'm going to answer all of them.
“Zoo” is when we take care of all the caterpillars we collected. When we find them in the field, we throw them into ziplock bags with leaves for them to eat. Then , every morning, we have to open the bags, check the caterpillars to see if they've pupaeted or died, dump the frass (poop) and add more leaves. If there are any changes, we add that to the data base so Rebecca can keep track of them.
My favorite part of going out to the field is getting to the field! I really enjoyed the kayaking, the hiking, the walking over logs, the sloshing through the mud, and the looking for animals as we went. One team saw alligator tracks and a water moccasin skin!
When I was 11 I wanted to be a large animal veterinarian because my sister's horse's foot was injured and I saw the vet who took care of her and I thought that was really cool. As I got older, though, I learned about smaller animals and got more and more interested in very tiny things indeed!

Mrs. Feynman
____________________________________________________________________________

Music and Food of New Orleans

SWAMPFEST

Remember last week when I wanted to go to a Jazz/Blues festival, but I ended up at a Nine Inch Nails concert by accident? Well, on Saturday everyone said "There's a big music festival in the park, let's go!" I was a little skeptical, but they promised it would be regional music, and it was daytime, and near the zoo, so I figured I could always bail and visit my animal friends if the concert didn't work out.

I was so happy, though, when I got there and found out it was a zydeco festival! Zydeco is really upbeat music featuring the accordian, fiddle, and a washboard that you wear like a vest. It makes you so happy when you listen, and everyone gets up and dances. Some people just boogie on their own, but a lot of people couple dance. Some of the songs are waltzes, so they go very well with couple dances.

This year the Grammy Awards added a Zydeco/Cajun music category, and we were lucky enough to hear the winners of the Grammy for this year - Terrance Simien and the Zydeco Experience. Here they are playing a really famous song called "Iko Iko".

One really cool thing that happens here is bead necklace throwing! Here is Terrance Simien's "little coozan" throwing beads to the audience -

My friend Brenda was really good at catching necklaces. Here we are wearing all the beads we caught!














Of course no New Orleans music experience would be complete without hearing "When the saints come marching in"


At the end of the day, we went to the Gumbo Shop and enjoyed a New Orleans Specialty - Chicken Andoullie Gumbo!! It is like a thick stew with meat, rice, vegetables and yummy spices.














Another kind of music that New Orleans is famous for is jazz. On Halloween we saw this brass band just jamming on the corner of Canal Street and St. Charles...





Homework Challenge: Choose one of the following:
1) Find out the origin of either Zydeco or Cajun music - what is the difference between them?
2) I am really sad about leaving New Orleans and not being able to find good Gumbo in our area. Please find a good Gumbo recipe we can try when I come back.

Last Day -

Hi, everyone -

Well, I can't believe we did our last plot today - what an adventure that was! First, when we got out of the van, we had to cross a really long and shaky log over a deep creek. I love crossing logs - so I was really psyched! Ms. Lewis took this video of me crossing the log.

Then we had to whack our way through the underbrush....


On the way we saw these sawflies. Rebecca said you can always recognize them because they hold their tails up like question marks. They remind me of helmet head Lucy, what do you guys think?














In the end we found a LOT of caterpillars. Here I am with today's catch....


















We found a really cool one from the Notodontidae family - we haven't found one from this family before - its complete name is:
Symmerista Canicosta














Do you remember at the beginning of the expedition, when the lab rack looked like this?


















Now it looks like this! We have done an awesome job - here's how many we've done so far -





Homework Challenge: Choose one of the following:

1) Are sawflies caterpillars - (try googleing "Sawflies")?
Write down three ways to know if they are or are not caterpillars.

2) Look up Symmerista Canicosta
Write down at least 3 really cool characteristices, behaviors, or adaptations you find

Answers:
1) Hi Mrs.Feynman,
About the homework challange, Sawflies are mistaken for caterpillars because their larve resembales that of a moth or butterfly. But sawflies in adult stage look more like a wasp or bee.Yuo can tell the difference between larve because the sawflies have 2 stemmata instead of caterpillar's 6, also they have 6 or more prolegs rather than 5 or less on a caterpillar.
Sincerly,
Adriana

Mark Tentarelli wins first HW pass!!

Mark and I have been enjoying your blog greatly. I was in New Orleans a couple years ago to spend a week rebuilding homes damaged by Katrina. It's nice to hear that the city is getting closer to normal, like that the streetcars are running again. Have they got stoplights at major intersections fixed?

I didn't see any caterpillars while I was there though. Maybe they don't thrive in toxic mold. Or maybe I was too distracted by everything else!

Sharon

Hi, Sharon - thanks for checking out my blog and asking such a great question. The streetcars are indeed running, and major streets have stoplights......in the areas that tourists visit and those whose elevations are high enough not to present a major repeat flood risk. Certain neighborhoods (mostly lower income) still have a lot of windows boarded up, covered with tarps, etc.
The caterpillars definitely took an initial hit with the storm - but the storm didn't actually hit New Orleans nearly as badly as it hit the Wildlife Management Area. New Orleans would have been damaged by the storm in any case, but the majority of the really bad damage was caused by the failure of the levees and the flooding that caused. The caterpillars would suffer the same fate as their host plants - so if they got blown away, drowned, etc. the caterpillars would also suffer.
However, the caterpillars are so robust that they have really bounced back - we saw a lot of them in Audobon park on Saturday, and Rebecca and Tara report that they do collections in the city sometimes just to see what's there- they call it urban ecology.

I'm glad you and Mark are enjoying the site - please tell all your friends!

See you soon!

PaulaF

Really Cool Processing

Hi, Guys - The caterpillar on the left has a dark spot towards the back - can you see it? Not the very back, but about 1/3 or the way towards the front. (I know it's a little blurry - sorry) That is actually two parasites - you can see them moving around inside the caterpillar - EWWWW!!









This is a cool caterpillar I found yesterday - doesn't it look like it's wearing a helmet? It's the first one we've found from the Hesperiidae (skipper) family - I could only identify it to the genus level - it is an Erynnis (something)

Where are they now?

Before: A Tortricidae













After: Parasitized Tortricidae!









Hi, everyone!

Every day we do "zoo". We open up all the ziplock bags replace dried up leaves, dump frass, and look at the caterpillars to see what is happening to them. If they are dead or have pupaeted, we record it in the data base. I thought you might be interested in seeing what happened to some of the ones I have shown you while I've
been here....



This is the Bomolocha baltimoralis that I showed you in our conference - remember? Now it's a pupae!















Remember when I showed you this cool guy? The Purple crested slug...


















This is how it looks now! It has 13 parasite pupae coming out.... EWWW!














This is one we call "Brown head" that is about to pupate!














This is a fall web worm (Hyphantria cunea) that we collected on the first day we were here.












We found it dead when we came back from New Orleans and it has a big parasite coming out of it's abdomen.


Bummer!

It makes us sad when this happens, or the caterpillars die, but really it shouldn't. We can't take sides for or against the caterpillars or the parasitoids, what we really want is to find out how the populations interact by collecting good data. So, the data is the data - it's all good!

Rock on Ivy scientists!

Mrs. Feynman



HW Challenge: Find a scientist to interview. Today you heard from two women who decided to go into science. I would like for you each to find someone who is a scientist - it can be a parent or a relative or a friend. Doctors are scientists, as long as they participate in research. We will interview them later, but for now, just ask around and see if you can find someone who would be willing to talk to you about his/her work and why they went into science. Bring in a sheet for Mr. Griffin with a couple of names of people, and contact information if you have any. This is preliminary, you do not have to actually talk to them. If you can't think of anyone, you can look for scientists on the internet - BUT you cannot use any scientist who is dead, or whose name you have heard before EG Albert Einstein, Marie Curie, etc.