Tag: CREW trails

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Wild File Q&A: Why do turtles spread their legs and feet out when they rest on logs?

Q: Why do turtles spread their legs and feet out when they rest on logs?

turtle on a log
A Red-bellied Turtle basks in Bird Rookery Swamp.

 

A:      Turtles are cold-blooded animals, so they cannot control their body temperature internally. The only way they have to raise their body temperature is to bask to absorb warmth and vital UV rays. While heat is radiated to their bodies from their shells, they often stretch out their legs to collect additional heat.

Usually, their feet completely widen out at the same time to increase the surface area even more. They are able to engage in thermoregulation and their metabolism functions become elevated. As a result, the efficiency of their immune and digestive systems increases. Another benefit is that they absorb important UVB rays in sunlight. UVB rays become metabolized into vitamin D3 which is necessary to process calcium.

– Dick Brewer

www.dickbrewer.org/CREW.html.

 

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Bike the Bird Rookery Swamp Loop

Like to bike? Well come out to Bird Rookery Swamp on January 9th, 2015 and  join CREW Trust volunteers Peter Tomlinson and Jan Watson for a guided  tour of the picturesque 12-mile loop. 

View beautiful scenery, great wildlife, and enjoy the company of like-minded souls.

Activity Level: Strenuous-This is a trail ride on uneven, soft, grassy/sandy trails. Ground level with swamp on both sides of the trail.

BRING YOUR OWN BICYCLE: Mountain, hybrid or fat tire bikes are recommended. Not appropriate for road bicycles. CREW does NOT provide bikes for this tour. 

Space is limited to first 20 riders that register, so use the link below and sign up fast:

http://www.eventbrite.com/e/bird-rookery-swamp-bike-tour-registration-11948031885

 

 

 

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Identify the Plant and Give the Gift of Education

Can you identify the plant in this photo?

dog fennel

This plant, with its feathery foliage and towering stature, grows alongside the trail out at the CREW Marsh Trails. The trails get a lot of visitors this time of year, especially 3rd graders from Collier County as part of their field trips to CREW. Schoolchildren visit CREW with their teachers and spend half of their morning on a nature hike, guided by our very own Jessi Drummond, who leads them through stops that feature explanations about prescribed burns, how to identify poison ivy and why it’s an important food source for deer, and even, if they are lucky, investigating scat (most often Bobcat scat). The other half of their field trip is spent dip netting and identifying the different living organisms in their water samples. The kids then have lunch, and leave- hopefully- with a pretty clear idea of why the watershed is important, with discussions that focus on habitat, the water cycle, and how the marshlands help clean our water.

This plant that is pictured above is one of our sensory teaching tools. Jessi stops with the students, takes off a few leaves, and passes them around to the students. “What do you smell?” she asks as little hands eagerly shoot up in the air. The students share that they smell everything from licorice to mint, and Jessi then lets them know that she smells pickles when she smells this plant which is Dog Fennel. Tying in their senses- hearing, touch, smell, sight- is an important part of the field trip for so many kids who just don’t spend enough time outside.

Education is a very important part of our mission at CREW, and this year, we’ve got a fundraising campaign for the month of December. Our goal is to raise $25,000, and an end-of-year gift from you, our supporters and members, can make that happen. It’s part of #GivingTuesday, an effort by many non-profits nationwide to remind everyone that after Black Friday and Cyper Monday, sometimes it’s nice to find a way to give back and pay it forward. Your donation will help further our education efforts at CREW and support all of our educational programs, including our field trips.

You can find out more about our #GivingTuesday campaign on our website (https://crewtrus.mystagingwebsite.com/2014/11/10/6996/). All donors receive a link to a special set of photographs of our CREW wildlife and donors at higher levels can receive special goodies, like tickets to our Concert and Silent Eco-Auction in March.

Next time you are out on the CREW Marsh Trails, watch out for the Dog Fennel, and take a moment to appreciate how this plant on the side of the trail has such a huge impact on 3rd graders in Collier County.

– Anne Reed

group of students on the CREW trails

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Wild File Q&A: If raccoons are out in the daytime, are they dangerous?

Q: If raccoons are out in the daytime, are they dangerous?

Racccon climbing a tree
Raccoons are destructive little creatures whose only saving grace is that they can be cute. They are wild animals and should be treated as such. Photo and caption by Dick Brewer.

 

A: Raccoons are often seen during the day, causing some people to ask, “I thought raccoons here only active at night and the only ones out in the day were rabid. Is it safe here?”

Raccoons are wild animals, and like all wild animals, from small snakes to big bears, they  should be regarded with caution and treated with respect. But they are not inherently dangerous. It’s all about predator avoidance.

Raccoons, like all animals, want to survive. They want to get food rather than to be food, so they must minimize the chances of being killed by predators while foraging.

In the more peopled areas, raccoons tend to be more active at night because that’s when they encounter fewer predators and obstacles to getting food such as people, cars, big dogs, and more.

In Florida’s wild areas, their most dangerous predators — alligators, panthers, and bobcats — are most active and most efficient at night. In those habitats, the best chance for a raccoon to survive is to hunt during the day.

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Teachers & Parents: October is National “Go on a Field Trip” Month

October is National “Go on a Field Trip Month”, and there’s no better way for kids to learn science than outdoors in nature. Just look at all the new research that shows the benefits of getting kids outdoors to learn.

CREW Marsh Trail - Field Trip invite

So, grab your students, kids, friends, loved ones, and come to CREW to take a walk, explore the wetlands, find frogs and bugs, watch the fall migrating birds fly through and just enjoy the calming, healing world that is CREW!

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Fall Wildflower Walk Scheduled for October 18th

Pine lily
Pine lily

On October 18th, Brenda Thomas – FGCU instructor and former EE Specialist for CREW – will be leading a fall wildflower walk at the CREW Trails. Fall blooms are special because they include such rarities as the endangered Pine Lily (also known as the Catesby’s Lily) and many grasses which seed out only during the autumn months. Come learn from an expert, enjoy a cooler fall day on the trails, and feel the magic of the seasons changing.

To register for the fall wildflower walk, go to http://crewfallflowers.eventbrite.com

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Wild File Q & A: How can snakes climb trees?

This month’s Q & A post by CREW volunteer naturalist Dick Brewer

 

Q: How can snakes climb up trees?

A: Snakes use “concertina locomotion” to climb trees – the act of gripping with some parts of the body while pulling or pushing with other parts of the body in the general direction of movement. Ripples of muscle travel along the snake’s length while the spaces in between
inch forward.

Concertina locomotion is very irregular and appears to be quite strenuous. So, it takes snakes much longer to climb a tree than they could move on the ground or in the water.

This push/pull motion is made possible by scales that are keeled, or ridged. Think of the keel on the bottom of a boat. Unlike smooth scales, keeled scales have raised ridges on the center of each scale which enables the snake to get a grip on rough surfaces, much like a tire with a good tread grips the road better than a bald tire.

Snakes cannot stick to smooth walls the way insects and lizards often do; the snake must have something for the keel to rest on in order to push up. So working in concert with the body  muscles, the keeled scales lodged in bark crevices help the snake push against the bark on the tree and inch upward. And yes, sometimes snakes do lose their grip and fall out of a tree.

All snakes either have smooth or keeled scales, and one way to distinguish is that smooth scales typically reflect light, making the color pattern of these snakes shiny, glossy, or iridescent, whereas keeled scales tend to make snakes appear dull and non-reflective because of the raised ridge. Because snakes climb with their bellies to the tree trunk, the scales on their undersides of some snakes may be keeled while the scales on the topside may not be.

snake climbing tree
The Yellow Rat Snake is the best tree climbing snake in Florida. (Photo by Dick Brewer)
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Sneak Peek: CREW Fall Schedule of Events

Sunflowers at Cypress Dome Trails

Fall is right around the corner and that means cooler weather (we hope) and more trail activity, including visitors and school groups coming to CREW to learn and play. We’ve got some fabulous programs planned for you this year. Here’s a sneak peek at our fall schedule. For full details and/or to register for CREW programs, check out our list of events on Eventbrite (or use the calendar on the CREW homepage to scroll through the months and see what’s coming).

September 2014

  • September 24 – 30 – National Take a Child Outside Week (why not bring them the CREW?)
  • September 26 – CREW Board of Trustees Meeting at Estero Community Center
  • September 27 – Mushroom Walk w/ Ben Dion (SOLD OUT – waiting list)

October 2014

  • October 4 – Sunflower Festival – Pepper Ranch (CREW will have a table there)
  • October 4 – Field Trip Specialist Teacher Training (for Collier 3rd grade teachers)
  • October 18 – Fall Wildflower Walk with Brenda Thomas
  • October 19 – Ding Darling Days – Family Fun Day (CREW will have a table there)
  • All month long – Lots of elementary, high school and college field trips 

November 2014

Raccoon (photo by George Luther)
Raccoon (photo by George Luther)

December 2014 – Bicycle tour at Bird Rookery, Geocaching, and more….

See you on the trails – let’s do this!

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Summer Rains Mean Wet Trails

Wet trailhead CDT June 30 2014As the rainy season picks up and we get rain events bringing 3 or 4 or more inches at a time, the CREW Trails, as you can imagine, begin to get wet. As of this week (July 1, 2014) trail conditions are as follows:

At the CREW Marsh Trails:

  • Marsh Trail and Alternative Marsh Trail – Some dry spots, but puddles and stretches of several inches of water to a foot deep in places along the marsh edge.
  • Oak Hammock Trail – One to 4 inches deep in places.
  • Pine Flatwoods Trail – One to four inches deep in places.
  • Campsite Gate 3 – needs 4-WD vehicle to access.

At the Cypress Dome Trails:

  • Green and White Loops – completely under water, depth from one to 6 inches.
  • Blue shortcut from Yellow to Green Loop – inundated with 3 to 6 inches of water.
  • Yellow Loop – some dry patches, wet in low areas near seasonal ponds.
  • All trails mowed on June 26th.
  • Campsite – dry and accessible.

At Bird Rookery Swamp:

  • Most of the trail is still dry. A few soft and wetter spots between map points 3 and 6.
  • Water rising fast.
  • Grass getting tall.

Of course, how wet the trails are depends on the frequency and amount of rain. A few days without and it’ll dry down. But as the ground gets saturated, even small rain events will fill the low spots with water.

Either way – wet or dry, summer is abuzz with life on the trails. So , come get your feet wet and enjoy the essence of summer in the swamps and marshes of CREW!

 

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Bear Sighted at Bird Rookery Swamp

A Florida black bear was sighted at Bird Rookery Swamp today by CREW volunteer George Luther as he worked to remove some downed trees off the trails. The bear was seen twice within 30 minutes along the grassy tram trail.

Bear at BRS

So next time you are there, be on the look out for these magnificent creatures who make their home in Bird Rookery Swamp.

Have you seen a bear on the CREW Trails? Tell us when and where.