{"id":291,"date":"2008-04-16T12:33:17","date_gmt":"2008-04-16T17:33:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.kabt.org\/2008\/04\/16\/kansas-herpetological-society-field-trips\/"},"modified":"2008-04-16T12:33:17","modified_gmt":"2008-04-16T17:33:17","slug":"kansas-herpetological-society-field-trips","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kabt.org\/?p=291","title":{"rendered":"Kansas Herpetological Society Field Trips"},"content":{"rendered":"

Neosho County or Bust (April 25-27)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Outdoor experiences have and continue to inspire\u00a0and\u00a0enhance our interest in the\u00a0biological sciences.\u00a0 Unlike many of you I grew up in\u00a0Kansas City\u00a0without access to a diverse fauna and flora.\u00a0 I do remember playing in a neighborhood creek and collecting crinoid fossils from behind\u00a0what was Milgram’s Groceries\u00a0at state line and 103rd.\u00a0\u00a0My most memorable\u00a0natural experiences\u00a0derive from our\u00a0annual family canoe trips in the pristine and protected waters of southern Missouri.\u00a0 I would hound my father to\u00a0canoe ahead of everyone else and steer me from\u00a0one bank to the other\u00a0so that I\u00a0would have the best chance of observing and capturing the\u00a0common map turtles that are frequently found\u00a0basking on logs along the shore.\u00a0<\/p>\n

If we want to inspire and motivate our students, we need to facilitate similar experiences (even James Watson began with an interest in ornithology).\u00a0\u00a0 Participation in the Kansas Herpetological Societies annual spring and fall field trips can provide an avenue for providing such experiences.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

I\u00a0became aware of\u00a0the Kansas Herpetological Society in the mid-1990’s, after being told about the society by Dr. David Edds, an Emporia State ecology professor.\u00a0 After spending a few years getting acquainted with the society, I began drumming up interest among my students, and by the end of the decade I was checking out one of our school’s nine passenger vans and taking students on the societies annual spring and fall\u00a0herp trips.\u00a0 For those less familiar with the\u00a0activity of ‘herping’, the process is simple and requires two basic physical skills; walking<\/strong> <\/em>and flipping rocks<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

You can find out about the society at the KHS website<\/a>.\u00a0 The trips are held in one particular county each spring or fall, have historically ranged all over the state’s biogeographic regions, and are open to\u00a0interested individuals\u00a0(you don’t have to be a member of the society).\u00a0 I have taken students as far as away as Morton County in the\u00a0southwest and a nearby as Miami County\u00a0directly to my south (I\u00a0teach in JO).\u00a0 You can view\u00a0the pictoral history of\u00a0my student’s\u00a0experiences<\/a> through pdf slideshows made with the free Adobe Photoshop Album Starter.\u00a0 This year’s trip is to the lovely\u00a0lands of Neosho County<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The typical trip proceeds something like the following:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Drive to an interesting county in Kansas on a Friday after school<\/li>\n
  2. Set up camp and meet the camping KHS membership<\/li>\n
  3. Meet KHS and local community members usually by 9 am Saturday morning for the Field Trip Coordinators briefing on the days plans<\/li>\n
  4. Herp on site or caravan to site(s) and Herp until lunchtime<\/li>\n
  5. Eat lunch at camp<\/li>\n
  6. Return to Herping at a new site until dinner time<\/li>\n
  7. Eat dinner at an interesting local establishment<\/li>\n
  8. Road cruise whether permitting<\/li>\n
  9. Hang out around a camp fire<\/li>\n
  10. Wake up and complete steps 3 and 4 again until noon on Sunday<\/li>\n
  11. Drive home<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Well, I must stay that the experiences\u00a0we have had on these trip is unforgetable, and students learn a great deal of\u00a0authentic biology as well as general life skills.\u00a0 Students may find and handle their first snake, become aware of the biological and geological diversity of this supposedly boring state, learn some basic camping skills, learn map orientation skills when we road cruise until the wee hours of the morning, and meet a group of other students and a society of people with similar interests.\u00a0 They might even get lucky\u00a0enough\u00a0to practice extracting keys from inside a locked van, listen to and discuss the variety of opinions on whether or not turtles should be classified in their own order, and observe me\u00a0trying\u00a0to\u00a0capture\u00a0an armadillo by hand.\u00a0 I still haven’t been successful\u00a0but its fun when they jump up and race away.\u00a0 If only I had more time in the field with\u00a0one of\u00a0our most distinguished and knowledgeable members\u00a0(see\u00a0him<\/em> capturing a porcupine<\/a> by hand).<\/p>\n

    Two\u00a0concerns\u00a0that you might have and that I have had over the years involve collecting specimens and the safety of my students.\u00a0 I personally\u00a0don’t\u00a0allow students to collect pets on the trip, even if they legally can (I maintain enough live specimens in my class to help\u00a0fulfill their desires indirectly).\u00a0\u00a0If you need more information, you\u00a0should\u00a0familiarize yourself\u00a0with the Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks rules and regulations<\/a>\u00a0for collecting non-game wildlife.\u00a0<\/p>\n

    With regard to safety, which obviously involves perparing\u00a0students for the possibility of coming in contact with\u00a0venomous snakes,\u00a0I\u00a0required students to remain within verbal and visual distance\u00a0of me and they are restricted from picking up any brown snake or snakes that they\u00a0can’t identified with confidence.\u00a0 I do not allow students to handle venomous snakes (even with appropriate equipment and knowledge), and tend not to handle them myself.\u00a0 There are plenty of experienced snake handlers\u00a0who will undoubtedly find venomous snakes (if they are to be found) and show them to those interested in a safe manner.<\/p>\n

    If this kind of opportunity sounds interesting to you\u00a0but you\u00a0still have questions feel free to\u00a0contact me.\u00a0 I am the current treasurer\u00a0for the society and\u00a0my contact information is publicized\u00a0on their website<\/font><\/u>.\u00a0 Furthermore, students are welcome whether or not they are accompanied by a teacher.\u00a0 So if you aren’t interested but you have students that are interested please make them aware of this opportunity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Neosho County or Bust (April 25-27) Outdoor experiences have and continue to inspire\u00a0and\u00a0enhance our interest in the\u00a0biological sciences.\u00a0 Unlike many of you I grew up in\u00a0Kansas City\u00a0without access to a diverse fauna and flora.\u00a0 I do remember playing in a neighborhood creek and collecting crinoid fossils from behind\u00a0what was Milgram’s Groceries\u00a0at state line and 103rd.\u00a0\u00a0My
    + Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_s2mail":"","_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,1,8],"tags":[24,628,23,22,26,25],"class_list":["post-291","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-field-trips","category-kabt-news","category-teaching-resources","tag-amphibians","tag-field-trips","tag-herpetology","tag-kansas-herpetological-society","tag-outdoors","tag-reptiles"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kabt.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/291","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kabt.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kabt.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kabt.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kabt.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=291"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kabt.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/291\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kabt.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=291"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kabt.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=291"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kabt.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=291"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}