Nature Center
2009
Home Nature Center home How it came to be Summer 2009 Summer 2010
   
Naturalist Alan Berman
Naturalist Mike Rowinsky ready to dissect a shark
At the touch tank with summer interns.
The tank was purchased with the help of a grant from Touch Tanks for Kids.
 

Summer Interns

Greens Farms Academy
Miguel Silvestri - Angad-Raj Singh

Staples High School
Annie Harnick - AJ Kieffer
Erica Mayer - Matt Wormser
Weston High School
Emma Gunuey

The new Nature Center was open during the 2009 summer season. This page is a glimpse of what went on there. The Center will open again in spring 2010.

The naturalists were Alan Berman and Mike Rowinsky. Together with summer interns and volunteer docents they offered morning and afternoon activities every day: Birding walks, nature trail walks, arts and crafts, talks about marine biology, avian ecology, more ...
An end-of-season letter from Alan Berman
 
 
 
Live critters Nature Trail
In aquariums, terrariums, intertidal tanks and a touch tank, Lobsters, crabs, fish, starfish, frogs, turtles, snakes, mussels, oysters, clams .. The salt-marsh nature trail behind the Nature Center was restored. Commentary by Alan Berman is on the signs at each station, and more documentation is available inside the Center.
Trail map  More about the marsh
Arts and crafts Dissections
Birdhouses - kitemaking
On July 9, about 50 people, mostly kids, made 22 birdhouses for the park.
See slide show
Owl pellets
Marine life: shark, squid, octopus, more ...
A chance for children to learn about marine biology and ask questions.
Photo: raised hands

2009 Thursday evening lectures
The Nature Center hosted a series of free lectures on Thursday evenings, 6:30 pm.
Horseshoe-crab tagging. Dr. Jennifer Mattei, Chair of the Department of Biology at Sacred Heart University, on Project Limulus, a long-term horseshoe-crab tagging project.
Tree and shrub care. Arborist Doug Williams on Integrated Pest Management (IPM) and best practices for tree and shrub care.
The Basics of Bird Photography. A.J. Hand on the techniques he uses to capture photos of sometimes-elusive birds in the wild.
Plastics debris in our oceans. Nature Center naturalist Mike Rowinsky on his work with the Algalita Marine Research Foundation and the North Pacific Sub-tropical Gyre (NPSG).
Sea turtles. Nature Center naturalist Alan Berman on his coordination of a sea turtle project in Costa Rica to help save these ancient and endangered species from extinction.
"Taking Flight and Getting Your Wings"-How to be a birdwatcher!
Tina Green on why, where and how she got into bird watching. Tips on how to get started.
Aldo Leopold, Environmental Ethics and Salt Marshes.David R. Brown Sc.D. on the ideas of Aldo Leopold, the father of wildlife conservation, who introduced the idea of Environmental Ethics in his 1949 landmark book “A Sand County Almanac.”
Buried Resources Under Sherwood Island: How Archaeology Reveals History
Cece Saunders, Historical Perspectives.

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