Arachnid BioBlitz a Success

 Great Basin National Park recently held an Arachnid BioBlitz to learn more about the spiders, scorpions, mites, and ticks that live in the park. The three-day event attracted scientists, naturalists, and a few arachnophobes. However, even those scared of spiders gained a new appreciation for them.

Some Snake Valley residents even tried holding a spider!

For more on the BioBlitz and what was learned, check out this Ely Times article.

Junior Paleontologists

Over the past year, the kids at Garrison Elementary School have been working on their Junior Paleontologist badge from the National Park Service. (You can download the book here.) This is a free program, but it takes a bit of work. So about every month, the kids did different activities from the booklet and learned about how fossils are made, what paleontologists do and what kind of tools they use, different creatures that lived in different times, and more.

 For one activity, they made fake fossils by creating impressions in some home-made playdough. They had a chance to be creative and decide what they would make.


For the last session, a real paleontologist came to the class. He did a great explanation of geologic time by having the kids envisioning that the room was filling with water. As he raised his hand to show where the water was, the kids raised their hands.

 The water kept getting deeper and deeper as the earth aged, but even at the height above their heads, there were no fossils. The fossil record didn't start until just a couple feet from the ceiling. Now that's a different time scale!

 Once we got into the fossil record, Gorden had some fossils to show, and the kids loved taking a look.

Then came the fun part: all the kids received their Junior Paleontologist badges, complete with a dinosaur on it.

Most national park units have their own Junior Ranger program, but this is one that is nationwide and can be done anywhere. We have great paleontological resources in Snake Valley, and now the kids know a little more about what used to live here and how it has been preserved.

What's That Insect?

With spring in full swing (along with those temperature swings!), I'm seeing more insects, which reminded me I had never gotten around to posting these photos from last fall. Ken Kingsley, a volunteer entomologist at Great Basin National Park, volunteered to lead the Baker School's weekly science class. Their assignment? Bring an insect to class.

The kids brought all sorts of insects (and some non-insects), and Ken helped them figure out what they were and gave them some life history about them.

This tarantula hawk certainly made a huge impression. It's a wasp that captures a tarantula, takes it back to its burrow, then lays an egg on the abdomen. When the wasp larva hatches, it makes a hole in the tarantula's abdomen and feeds voraciously, avoiding internal organs to keep it alive as long as possible. 

Wow, it's a whole another life out there in the wilds of Snake Valley! I've never seen a tarantula in the southern part of the valley, so I thought it was very interesting that a tarantula hawk was found--the tarantulas are around somewhere. Tarantula hawks can also eat nectar, sometimes getting so drunk on it that it affects their flight.

Everyone got a good look at the tarantula hawk.

Melanie brought it to class.

 Here's a grasshopper.


A related insect is this very strange looking one, a Jerusalem cricket. They are native to the western U.S. and Mexico, but aren't seen too often because they're nocturnal. They've got really cool feet so they can burrow underground to eat dead organic material like tubers. They also can eat other insects.

 I think the kids really enjoyed the session.

Daisy looks like she doesn't quite believe what she's hearing.

 

I was very excited to see this wind scorpion or sun spider. It's an Arachnid, so related to spiders, and it's what the lead taxonomist for the 2013 Arachnid BioBlitz at Great Basin National Park specializes in. She will be delighted to see more of these when she comes out July 8-10. The BioBlitz is a great citizen scientist project open to everyone, so if you'd like to learn more about Arachnids and insects, click on the link!

 We have such a wonderful diversity of wildlife in Snake Valley, and it was really cool to learn more about some of the smallest creatures. Thanks, Ken!

Great Basin Paleoenvironmental Database

Snake Valley is in the Great Basin, a huge geographic area where water doesn't drain out to the seas. As a result, it was one of the last places in the U.S. to be explored. Due to its remoteness and lack of water, it also has been an area of much lower population concentration than many other areas in the U.S. This has resulted in a paucity of information about the Great Basin. Fortunately, over the years, a number of researchers have studied the Great Basin, including what it used to look like. What they've found has been fascinating--huge lakes, very different wildlife than today (imagine relatives of camels, saber-toothed tigers, and more), and a variety of ethnic groups that used the lands in various ways.

Desert Research Institute just announced a new tool where you can look for all that information in one place: the Great Basin Paleoenvironmental Database. From their website you can download a kml file to use on Google Earth to see where different studies were done. They also have an Excel spreadsheet listing the different studies focusing on the paleoenvironment of the Great Basin, plus additional information about the project.

Scientists Use Stalagmites to Learn about Past

Here's another story from The Salt Lake Tribune that relates to Snake Valley, particularly how cave stalagmites can record climate history.

You can find out about a couple active studies being done using Lehman Caves stalagmites in this pdf of The Midden, winter 2011 edition. This is the resource management newsletter for Great Basin National Park that is published twice a year.

Astronomy Festival

Great Basin National Park is holding an astronomy festival this weekend, and we went to the kickoff concert. Although it was sunny down in the valley, a big storm cloud had parked itself over the visitor center area, with light rain falling over the concert venue.

Folks pulled out their rain gear and sweatshirts and we eventually got started, with some very pleasant temperatures.

A variety of performers sang and played star- and sky-related songs.

We were also treated to some cowboy poetry.

The rain returned, so we moved under shelter and some kids performed "Twinkle, twinkle little star."

The evening flew by with all the great performances.

And the crowd really seemed to enjoy themselves.

I didn't know we had so many talented musicians in the valley!

After the final songs, it was time to meander over to the picnic area to take a look through one (or two or three) of the 40 telescopes that were set up. The telescopes ranged from fairly simple to hooked up to computers and TV screens. It was fascinating, and fortunately the clouds blew over, leaving the mighty Milky Way galaxy brightening the sky.

If you have a chance to go up to the festival, there are events all day today and tomorrow. Call the park for more details, 775-234-7331.

press release RE letter to governors of Utah and Nevada

Read a press release at
http://greatbasinwaternetwork.org/news/news_display.php?id=201
It talks about a letter sent by a group of scientists to the governors
of Utah and Nevada which you can read at
http://greatbasinwaternetwork.org/pubs/ScientistsLetterAgainstPumpingProject03-09.pdf

(if the links above wrap, just cobble them together or go to the Great Basin
Water Network site -- the story is very prominently displayed there
http://greatbasinwaternetwork.org/)

Feel free to pass around the press release and the letter.

This is a great job and all involved are to be greatly congratulated and thanked.

-ken