Georgia's Nature Class....Raptors!

Georgia had her nature class on Saturday. This month's topic was Raptors. Here's Georgia to tell about the class.....

In the Raptor family there are owl, eagles, vultures, and hawks. But they did not talk about the owls because we had an owl class before.

The Slide-Show Presentation

When the class started, Rhonda had a book about eagles and hawks. Then they turned off the lights and they had a screen and the laptop was on something that made it go on the screen to make a slide show presentation. First they did hawks and they said that Buteos were the hawks that like to soar more. And the Accipiters were fast flying forest birds. They hunted the tinier birds, like sparrows and finches. And then they showed Falcons. The Peregrine Falcon they showed had some special nest boxes on sky scrapers but they were just flat. They have them up high so they can dive fast and put their feet in front and then punch pigeons with their feet to knock them out completely. They were almost extinct and then they discovered that they liked the nest boxes on sky scrapers. And then they showed vultures. They showed only the Turkey Vulture. And they asked why they had bald heads and I said, "So they wouldn't get germs from their meat because it was hard to wash off." Rob said it was right. And then it was Eagle time. It showed the Osprey had poles with a four square foot platform on top so they could make their nests on top of it. And then they said that the Osprey was a bird that hunted fish by swooping down and had their feet with their talons and grabbed the fish out of the water...and then ate it.

The Game

And then we all went to the binocular box and grabbed some binoculars. We went to sit down and focused it right. We went outside and played a game before we walked, though. The game was where someone was the Hawk. They had a picture of a hawk with yarn attached for a necklace. The person that was the Hawk wore the Hawk necklace. And there were two people who were bunnies with the bunny necklaces. And three people were plants with flower necklaces. I was a plant. Then Rob got little poker chips, white and red. White chips were the nutrients, and red ones were the pesticides. And everyone took a cup and we had to pretend it was our stomachs. The plants had to collect the chips, as much as they could, in 30 seconds. And then the bunnies came out for 30 seconds. They ate the plants by tagging people. If a plant was tagged then they had to dump all their chips into the bunny's cup. And then the Hawk was released for 30 seconds. The Hawk caught the bunnies by tagging them. Then the bunnies had to dump their chips into the hawk's cup if they were tagged. But when the hawks were released, the plants stood still then. Any bunny that bumped into a plant had to dump their chips into the hawks cup anyway because they fell down and the hawks found something to scavenge. This game was called Food Chain and showed the transfer of nutrients, energy, and even pesticides along the chain. We played the game twice, two rounds.

The Walk

Next we went on a walk up the hill and looked for raptors. A few people found some. They didn't identify them because they couldn't tell. Then it got too hot, so we moved into the shade of the Buckeye Tree and a bunch of people noticed the buckeyes. Everyone wanted to collect them so everyone was allowed to bring one home. But one person cheated and got two. We saw a bunch of migrating birds and there was a hawk that they were chasing it because it was bothering them. We saw it through the telescope and then we didn't find anything else.

The Ending

And then we went in the bathroom to wash our hands for snack time. We put our binoculars away and then we went outside to the picnic tables. We had fruit snacks that were shaped like fruits and some juice. Rob gave us each a paper on raptors to take home, and an invitation for a party. He also told us about a show on PBS about Raptors. Then mom came to pick me up and we went to the gift shop in the Nature Center where I used some of my birthday money to buy an Audubon American Goldfinch plush doll that makes the song of the bird when squeezed. (an actual recording) and a Killdeer on, too. I also got a desert rose rock.

On Sunday we watched the show. http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/episodes/raptor-force/introduction/1109/