A tailgate party, football fans and a Canadian

Ah, the college football experience. It's something I realized I could not escape while living here in the south. Not only are my roommates avid college "chuck the ball" fans, so are the locals, and just about anyone you might meet down here. An opportunity came up one weekend a short while ago to go and see one of these American games in action. I couldn't resist - I chalked it up to a cultural field trip and made an afternoon of it.

The Citadel versus Wofford College (one of our staff went to this school) was what we had on tap.

As I learned, one has to bring beer and be ready to tailgate pre-game. We parked the car and set up shop... I wasn't about to break the tradition. A few hours later, fans waving flags and Wofford clearly winning, I had had my fill of that football game.

Other weekend activities included turning 27 (yes, it was difficult, but it had to be done), cutting my hair short again, and romping through a corn maze. Check out the picture of me feeding a cow. This topped off our visit to the biggest corn maze I've ever seen. The children we took with us had a great time, especially when the cows came down the field to our hayride tractor to slurp up some treats.

Come back to rompwithrusnak soon and feel free to send an email to let me know what you've been up to.

Where the river meets the sea

Answer: The estuary.

Estuaries usually end where the mouth of a river meets the sea. They act as nurseries for many marine organisms. They are also important for flood control... resilient salt marsh soils and grasses absorb flood waters and dissipate storm surges. Interactions between open waters and estuaries that line the coast occur during the exchange of tidal waters and help living organisms to feed and spawn. Cool.

Well, it has been quite a while since I last typed a post. A lot has happened since the last time I wrote. I'll do my best to sum it all up. Teaching has been going very well. I just received three letters from students who took part in my classes last week. We caught a stingray in one of our seine nets and most of them were anxious to know how it was doing. I am pleased to say that our stingray is doing very well in the touch tank in our aquarium.

Some other fun things that have happened in some of my classes; dolphins swam up into the tidal creek my students and I were crabbing in and they started doing this cool thing called strand feeding (working together as a pod "group" to catch fish, one of the dolphins will actually beach itself to eat fish its group has forced onto land), my seining class had to pull nets and themselves out of the water as a school of mullet (fish - not the haircut) leaped out of the water as they tried to evade the sharks that were thrashing themselves after them, and so much more. This experience is full of surprises and a lot of fun.

In other news, Mom and Dad came to visit me last week. We had a super nice visit over six days touring around Charleston and then making our way south to Savannah, Georgia. We took in the South Carolina Aquarium, a fun Ghost Tour in Charleston, dinned at many yummy southern restaurants and had our fill of crab and shrimp, rode on a river boat and trolley (neither were the real thing, but did have a certain atmosphere), bought some art in Savannah and ate delectable sweets from the candy shops. I'm so glad that my parents were able to see this place (they even took in one of my classes at Barrier Island) and experienced the south. I already miss them a lot, but am excited to hear about how the rest of their trip up the eastern seaboard went. Here are two pics from our trip:


And finally, here is a photo of some of my fellow staff members (Jenn B. [far left], Callie, myself and Olivia) out for a night of dancing in Charleston. We did cut a rug on that dance floor. Until next time.

Photos tell the story best

Perhaps that's my excuse for being a bit lazy today, but I hope those of you who enjoy a picture or two will like these ones. Here I am with my fellow Naturalists from all parts of the eastern United States. We're learning how to run our "Let's Sea" class (all about the five ecosystems of a barrier island). It's amazing how warm and salty our estuary is.

I think I'm in love.
Our management team took the staff this past Monday to the South Carolina Aquarium. What an amazing place. My mouth nearly dropped when I rounded a corner to see a 330,000-gallon Great Ocean Tank, filled with sharks, big fish and a loggerhead sea turtle (the tank is 27ft tall). This aquarium has amazing exhibits, from a cool touch tank to a re-creation of a salt marsh. Many more trips will be required. Plus, I think the young loggerheads (second turtle pic) could use my company.


We've started teaching and it's going to be hard for me to put this whole experience into words.
Our training has been pretty great, but nothing will prepare you like jumping in feet first. Having my first class in a pond while an 8ft alligator hung out in the opposite one (was later removed) was a special treat. Yikes! There has been a lot of studying, very long days and lots of laughs. I think the Grade 5's especially enjoyed it when I strode into the "mudpit" with them and plastered stinky muck all over my face. They looked at me with big smiles and asked if they could add to the mess. How could I say no to that?

I'm very excited because, this week, I also get to run my first dance class in the evening. We do the Virginia Reel (Barrier Island style). It's going to be great. I've also been lucky to be able to make it into Charleston over the past few weeks. What an amazing city. Strolling around the streets really does feel like stepping back into history. I'm looking forward to taking in some of the more touristy stuff. Which reminds me, Momma and Poppa Rusnak will be visiting the Lowcountry in roughly a week and a half. I'm really looking forward to taking them around and dropping down to Georgia to visit another historic city, Savannah.
That's all for now, but I hope you're all well and would love to hear from you.

Kate and the Corn Snake -Tales from a Barrier Island

Barrier Island - def. Nature's speed bump.

Just five days ago, I arrived in Charleston, South Carolina, and was greeted by two of my lovely and kind supervisors, Meg and Robin. They came to pick me up from the airport and drive me back to the place I will call home for the next nine months - Seabrook Island.

As we left the airport, I stepped outside and was met by a warm and humid breeze (it must have been way over 30 degrees outside). This has taken some getting used to. My body is also taking some time adjusting to the rigorous activities we've taken part in as part of our training. To give you a taste of what we've been up to, there has been some Lifeguard training and sunburns in outdoor pools (I'm not a great swimmer, so this has been quite the experience), lessons in handling alligators (our mascot is Carolina, a four-year-old alligator, which I hope to show you shortly) and snakes (see below), practice dragging and casting nets through the ocean and pond, respectively, as well as playing some team building and challenge-based games. We did all of this in the span of four days and there is still plenty more on the way.

The days, as you can see, are just packed. But we can't complain; they are treating us very well. I am writing this post from our two-storey staff house which houses 14 naturalists, some experienced biology and marine graduates and other talented, environmentally-minded folks. We are fed three fantastic meals of fresh fruit, vegetables and the catch of the day (flounder, crab and shrimp) with grits (kind of like cream of wheat) and mac'n'cheese being a steady staple. And the beach and ocean are at our doorstep. This is truly an amazing place. Over the coming weeks and months, I will do my best to chronicle the happenings of this place and tell you a bit about it's history.

So in keeping with my last post, I will try to explain a Barrier Island to you...

These chain of islands can be found all the way from Canada to Florida. Aptly named, barrier islands act as an outer line of defense, protecting the mainland from the effects of sea storms. Reading through our very comprehensive curriculum, I found out that the many environments of barrier islands are flooded twice daily by the tide, which drastically changes the environment plants and animals inhabit. Pretty neat, heh?

Barrier Island Evironmental Education Centre first started its programs in 1980, offers an abundance of hands-on environmental education classes to elementary school students, and has nearly 300 acres of property on one of these islands, called Seabrook (a private, gated island resort, with around 1250 residents surrounded by the estuary, intertidal beach, sand dunes, salt marsh and maritime forest).


Oh, and here I am holding a corn snake. The adult usually measures between 3 and 4 feet and they feed on mice and rats by constricting their bodies. I won't lie, I was definitely nervous... but am glad to be learning more about these slithery guys.

Why do turtles and snakes sunbathe?

Okay, if you got this far, you'll notice my blog isn't quite ready yet. Everything should look a bit better in the next few weeks once I'm down in South Carolina.

For those of you who don't know, I'm going to be teaching environmental education to students on a barrier island called Seabrook. This is an amazing opportunity to learn all kinds of cool stuff about ocean and maritime forest ecology, it's a chance to meet new people and share an experience, and put my Ontario Parks interpretive skills to work.

Now let's get back to the question up at the top of this post. This is a taster of some of the things I will be teaching the students. If it goes over well, I might keep this going for those who are interested.

(From Nature Smart, a cool nature guide by Stan Tekiela and Karen Shanberg)

These critters are cold-blooded (ectothermic), which means having a a body temperature that changes with the outside temperature. Since snakes don't produce heat, they must get it from the sun. That's why you see snakes and other herps absorbing the heat of sun-warmed roads and trails, or sitting on a rock; they are basking. When they become too warm, they go underground or under leaves to cool off.

If you liked that tidbit, then you'll like this:

The word reptile is Latin, repere. Like the Greek work herpeton, it means to creep, which very well describes how these animals get around.