Some Answers to Your Intelligent Questions

It was great to see you all during our video conference today. You asked some very interesting and thought-provoking questions.



Here are a few answers. I will also have more to show you when I am back at school next week.

• What have we seen other than caterpillars?
• a cypress swamp - the one in the picture
• great white egrets
• ibises
• pelicans
• red-Eared Sliders - the biggest I have ever seen in the wild!
• the armor plate of a dead armadillo - see the picture above
• stick bugs - various sizes
• spiders - lots and lots!
• wild hog scat
• deer scat
• bumble bees - again very large ones - I think things just grow bigger in the swamplands.
• mosquitoes - lots and lots!
• chiggers - Well these are too little to really see, but we sure do feel them!
• parisitoids that erupted from the stomach of a caterpillar (very gross but also quite cool)
• a skink - a much smaller variety than our friend Tile
• frogs - very tiny ones
• southeastern lubber - the biggest grasshopper I have ever seen!
• many songbirds
• fire ants
• lots of moths and butterflies (different sizes and colors)


• AND THE OTHER GROUP SAW AN ALLIGATOR WHILE I WAS BACK AT THE FIELD STATION ENTERING DATA INTO THE COMPUTER!!!!!!! I AM STILL HOPEFUL, BUT I ONLY HAVE 2 MORE DAYS TO FIND ONE.

There are many fascinating creatures here. Mrs. Nelson told me that some of the groups will be finished with your biome travel commercial scripts soon. When you are finished please choose some of the wetland or swampland creatures to research. Perhaps you could make a Power Point presentation of what you find out about these creatures to share with me when I get back. For example, you could find out about the songbirds of Louisiana or the invertebrates (insects) or snakes of the south. Maybe you can even find some fun music or bird songs etc. to add to your slide show.