Sights And Sounds In Catawba Nature Preserve

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By: Leah Picciano

The turtle on the trail. Unfortunately for him, he was too cute to ignore.

The Environmental Summit of 2013 spent a whole morning in the preserve. We saw many things, including a turtle, many spiders, salamanders, and plenty of mosquitoes. One of our more interesting finds were the turtle, which stayed still enough for us to get a close-up of him hiding in his shell. The turtle is a Eastern Painted Turtle common from Canada to Georgia and goes as far west as the Appalachians. They are very popular as pets.

The large salamander that one of the campers caught afterwards.
The salamanders were part of the biomimicry, but once we were finished, one of the campers caught a very large salamander, and we were able to hold it and take plenty of pictures of it.

The spiders got us tangled in their webs, since they were all over the paths and in the woods. The mosquitoes were everywhere, despite all the spray that we put on.

After the biomimicry when we had some time to do what we wanted, we were able to go kayaking or canoeing on the lake in the preserve. Out on the lake, we saw many plants and flowers, as well as something that looked like bee boxes for the bees to make hives for honey. They might have been for birds, but none of us were willing to get too close.

The biomimicry was used to get the campers to think of how people try and copy the environment to make our lives easier and better. The salamanders were used, because they regenerate their limbs should they lose them, and the counselors and advisers wanted us to think of how people try and "regenerate" our limbs in terms of prostheses and research being done to regenerate cells and, therefore, limbs.

A spider's silk is the strongest material in the world. We were asked in the biomimicry how the spiders silk could be used in our lives. Spiders make silk without using any harmful material or creating harmful wastes. We were asked to think on how people could create the same material without creating so much harmful waste and materials.


A Riddle For You:

 This picture was taken in the preserve:















Do you know what it is?



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