Slow Melt into Spring

This is the season of snow melting, rain and slush, freeze-thaw, cold nights and sap-running days. It is the time when things start to move.

So, how does the snow melt in your backyard? Where does it melt first? Last?

Where do the puddles collect? Where are the squooshy spots in the lawn?

When the snow melts, where does the water go? Can you follow it? Draw a map?

The snow in my yard melts into tiny rivulets that, if there's too much to percolate into the soil, runs into a gully. More water collects until, half a mile away, it joins a creek with no name. That wanders along the base of a hill and eventually winds up in Catatonk Creek, which eventually joins the Susquehanna which winds through the hills of southern New York and northern Pennsylvania and then finally heads towards the Chesapeake Bay.

Where does your water go?
This post is part of STEM Friday. Check out more science, technology, engineering and math resources here.

Wordless Wednesday

Cabin Fever Cure- Cool Animal Names

Cool Animal Names

By Dawn Cusick

80 pages; ages 8 and up

Imagine Publishing, 2011

 

You’ve probably heard of catfish and zebrafish, but have you hears about rabbitfish and lizardfish? What about catbirds and rat owls, or giraffe beetles and goat moths? And peacock frog? How do animals get these crazy names, anyhow?

That’s what Dawn Cusick wondered when she started collecting weird animal names. She’d be reading along and up would pop an interesting name: porcupinefish, or tiger moth for example. So she’d scribble the name on a slip of paper and toss it in a file. That file grew, and grew, and after 20 years she knew she’d have to do something with all those names – like make a book.

There are more than 250 animal names in this book – including lions (tamarins) and tigers (salamanders) and bears (cat bears), oh my! There are parrot snakes, which don’t talk, and snake-birds that do. It’s a fun romp through pages filled with photos and stories about how the animals got their names.

Check out other cool science resources at STEM Friday. Review copy from publisher.