Last Day

On my last day of senior project I went through the normal routines. When I got there, I was sent to the Raptor Center to clean the bird cages. After doing that, I enriched them, by putting in newspaper balls that were either scented with peppermint, almond, or banana extract. Most of the birds were too focused on their food to acknowledge them, however Vinnie, our Turkey Vulture, did attempt to shred and eat it as if it was part of his meal. I guess he likes the smell of banana extract! After that, I returned to the animal center to clean some dishes and sweep and mop.  Once that was over it was basically lunch time! After lunch we finished up most of the chores and pretty much everything was done! So another senior project girl and I took out some popsicles that we had made a few days earlier. We gave two fish-ickles to the otters, Lucy and Linus. They got a HUGE kick out of them. They would roll around in the water trying to grab the fish out. After about 10 minutes of that the ice had melted enough that a fish was sticking out. So they grabbed the fish and dragged it out of the water so they could munch on them. It was about the cutest thing ever, so upset I didn't have a camera! We then gave some fruit-sickles to Scarlet, our red fox, the deer and the crows. Then for the last half hour of my last day, I sat and cuddled with Dora, our Virginia Opossum. It was a very nice last day!

Finishing up the Presentation

Over the last few days, I have been concentrating on finishing up my planetarium presentation on the International Space Station. Admittedly, this has been quite a bit harder than I thought it would be, mainly in coming up with a topic that I could condense into a fifteen-minute presentation appropriate for kids. It has been rewarding, though; along the way, I've learned a lot about previous space stations (namely, Skylab and Mir) as well as the research being conducted on the ISS. (A lot of it sounds really cool: for example, they've recently developed a sort of plasma germ-zapper that harms drug-resistant germs but has little effect on humans.) Hopefully, I'll  be able to assemble and code the show today; if not, I may have to come back later to finish the show.
On a separate note, we finished the slides last week. All in all, we ended up filling about two file cabinet drawers of slide sheets, as well as a foot-tall stack of miscellaneous junk slides that will probably get tossed. Curiously and coincidentally, we also found a set of slides marked "Bear Tales" that we were able to use in the identically-named show that Destiny and I had crafted at the beginning of the project.

Walking the birds

Today I got to walk birds around Perkins! This means that I have a bird sitting on my gloved hand and I take them around Perkins so that he can get enriched and become more comfortable around people.  This was the first time that I was allowed to take a bird out of their home and it was so exciting! First I walked Radar our Barn Owl. He was extremely calm and only freaked out once (freaking out entails the bird flying off your hand in an attempt to get away). Then I walked Omega our Screech Owl. Omega weighs only .14 kg which is about 1/3 of a pound. Omega loves to get little gentle noogies on her head. It is the cutest thing because she'll close her huge eyes and give the face that says "this feels good." After I walked Omega I took out Tamarack, our Great Horned Owl. After walking Omega, the whole 3 pounds that Tamarack weighs was heavy. Having her on my hand turned out to be a forearm workout! It was a very exciting day and I was so glad I was able to do so before my project ends!

Next step

At some point during this week, we will receive the shipment of stones that will be used for the bases of the front pillars on the pavilion. This job, while purely asthetic, will truly finalize the process of building the pavilion. The next step after this will be to figure out how and where a compostable restroom will be placed, needless to say i have very little insight into this subject but am keen to learn, just as i did with the pavilion, what goes into the entire planning, implicating, and finalizing of this project.

Back to the Base-ics

Progress continues at the farm. This weekend we received the necessary bricks to begin working on the floor of the pavilion. Beginning a bit on monday and finishing up today, we were able to complete the floor. The interesting thing about this process was that we did not have to install any draining systems into it. The contractor, Dwayne, intentionally purchased what are called "semi-permeable" bricks, meaning they do the job of a drain without the complex draining apparatus. The way it works, he described, is that the water is able to seep through the gaps in between each brick, and then down into the layer of sand and dirt that we had previously laid down. In this way, even if water gets into the pavilion, it will drain evenly throughout the structure without the need for drains or piping underneath the floor itself. It looks great and the structure is really getting close!

Grants and Ice Cream

Because of the rain I was not able to take pictures of the target area for the grant today as planned.  But, there is never a shortage of things to get done with three grants coming due.  On Friday, the letters from business owners about their interest in receiving funds are due.  We are currently working on a plan of action to reach out to all owners to make sure they do not have any questions pertaining to the grants. However, what might be more interesting for a blog post is our new ice cream shop Scoops! Scoops opened this Saturday in the harbor across from my project advisor’s business.  They serve hard served ice cream from a company not far from us called Marcie’s, in Meadville PA.   I am pleased that an ice store has opened, as it is something I felt the harbor had been missing for a long time.  I had even thought about opening a shop myself.   In addition to the benefits of having tasty ice cream close, a new business means jobs.  In particular, jobs for young people like me.  Because I have been in the harbor so much lately for my project, I happened to meet the owner of Scoops.  Thanks to my networking, she hired me for the summer.  Scoops is just one new business that is suppose to open this season in the harbor.  We are also looking forward to two new restaurants as well.  If you ask me, the LBCA is doing a lot of things right.  I have never see the harbor as booming as it has been recently.    

Tower City

Over the past few weeks, the staff members have tried to schedule a visit to Tower City, so we could visit a new nest of Peregrine Falcons. However, it kept being cancelled up until last Wednesday. So, we (staff and senior project members) piled into a van with Harvey Webster, the head of Perkins. We drove off to Tower City to visit the two new baby falcons sitting up on a 12th floor ledge. There is quite a bit of history that goes behind that ledge however I'll just give an overview. Back in the 90's, Peregrine falcons were declining in number. It was at first unclear why. It was found that the number of adult falcons was the same however the number of eggs that successful hatched had decreased dramatically. After quite a bit of research it was found that pesticides (I forget the exact kind) that were supposedly un-harmful to all animals and only killed insects were affecting the shell thickness of falcon eggs. After the climax of the pesticide use had passed, a crew of falcon lovers in the Cleveland area, including Harvey Webster, started to scout out locations for nests to be placed so that falcons could lay their eggs unharmed. One of the very popular locations was on the 12th floor window ledge of Tower City. This ledge has been used every year since then for falcons to lay their eggs in peace. Last week, we visited that site where a couple of falcons, SJ and Boomer, had laid 4 eggs. Unfortunately 2 eggs did not hatch, however the 2 that did are doing wonderful. In the picture below you can see that they are losing their baby fuzz and are starting to grow in their mature feathers. Once the mature feathers come in they can start learning to fly and such but until then, they are trapped on that ledge. The father, Boomer continuously flew around us and stood right outside the window where we were looking out, protecting his youngsters. The mother perched directly above her babies and did not move the entire time, but did make quite a bit of noise to try and get us to leave.