Gehrig and I joined a few other families from our co-op for a 3day/2night field trip at the Jekyll Island 4H Educational Center. Although I've been to that area many times, I've never actually been to the part of the island where the 4H center is or heard much about what they do there. It is quite the impressive, cool, full-o-learning, scheduled-out production they have going on. Their team was great with our kids and had backgrounds in biology, marine and environmental sciences that equipped them well to teach about whatever we happened to encounter.
Our first stop on day 1 was Beach Ecology. Brittany was one of our favorites and taught us so much. Here she explained about the wrack that washes up, the creation of sand dunes and sea oats and their importance.
Seriously beautiful. So good for the soul to breathe in that sea air :)
Finding creatures and learning about them
The southern end of Jekyll has actually gotten bigger instead of eroding like the northern end. This mast is all that is left to see of a ship that has slowly been covered by the sand. So interesting!
Happiness :)
Next: Marsh Ecology
Another favorite, Christa, showed us a plant that is edible...tasted pretty good :)
Next she showed us how snails come out of their shells when you put them close to vibration...pretty cool! Everyone hummed to watch it work...
Oh, the fiddler crabs!
Walking through the five zones of marshland
We played a variation of hopscotch to learn how important marshes can be for migrating birds
Biggest fiddler crab I've ever seen! We learned that the males have one large claw and one regular claw, while the females just have two regular ones. The males use the large claw to impress the lady crabs and find their mates. :)
Some good marsh mud that serves as a skin cream
Beautiful walking back to the bus
Oh my...so HOT and SWEATY and STINKY and OILY!! Suncreen plus bug spray plus sweat plus a hot bus ride back...not for those who mind getting dirty!
Breaktime...they have a really great setup there. The accommodations were a little sparse but air-conditioned and on the beach, so not much to complain about :)
Campfire time...roasting marshmallows for our smores :)
And getting ready for Night Walk. We couldn't use flash after this so I don't have any more pics, but it was great fun. We walked on the beach and in the forest a little in the dark to get our eyes used to it and learn about nocturnal animals. We also found planets and constellations in the beautiful clear sky while we were on the beach and played a funny game called "bat/moth." If not for all the bugs, I could've stayed out there forever :)
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