[NMScience] Sandia Mountain Natural History Center field research project

[Amelia White]

Want to participate in real ecology research at 
the Sandia Mountain Natural History Centernext year?

This project can be used to meet Life Science and Scientific Thinking and Practice standards for any grade level. The close 
observation and analysis involved in this type of long-term study can 
really help students form a meaningful connection to the land. The procedures 
are simple enough to be done with elementary students, yet the data can be 
analyzed at any level from elementary to high school. Your students will be 
doing investigative, hands-on, place-based science, and having fun at the same time! 


Teachers may apply for the State Parks outdoor classroom grant, for transportation to the SMNHC site! The deadline is August 27, and the application can be accessed at www.nmparks.com. It is a pretty simple form. If you are not selected for one of these grants, contact us to see if other funding sources may be available.
We will be studying two 50x100 ft sites on our property in Cedar Crest. 
One is located in a grassy meadow; the other is located in what is now a dense 
pinon-juniper forest. The forest site will be thinned to reduce fire danger this 
summer, so we also want to see how the area changes as it recovers from the 
thinning. Our basic research questions are: What populations of 
plants, insects and small mammals do we have at different times of year? What 
are the differences between our meadow and piñon-juniper ecosystems? How will 
the piñon-juniper forest change as it recovers from thinning? We will be setting 
live traps for small mammals and pitfall traps for arthropods, taking inventory 
of plants on transects, as well as keeping a record of weather data that may 
correlate to these populations. We would like to have groups come out a few 
times over the course of the school year to collect data and observe what's 
going on in the ecosystem. How many times and what you study is up to you; just 
contact us to set up a program that works for you.


There are several 
different ways to approach this project. Your group could focus on plants or 
arthropods and compare data from the two different sites. Or you could look at 
both plants and arthropods to see how they relate to each other in just one of 
the sites. Or... come up with your own question! The rich data set we will 
collect can be used to answer many different questions. Possible topics include: 
soil health, native vs. invasive plants (such as cheatgrass, toadflax, sweet 
clover), or how the weather influences what wildflowers we see each year. We 
have all the books and equipment you'll need here for collecting and 
identifying, and our knowledgeable staff is available to help.


Please 
forward this to any other teachers you think may be interested in participating. 
Thanks!

Amy  White
Sandia  Mountain Natural  History  Center
(505)281-5259
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