It happens

According to the Humane Society, there are 78.2 million owned dogs in the United States. Chances are you or someone you know has some dog feces that needs to be picked up! What a great chore for kids!

We usually pick up the yard once a week in the winter and everyday in the summer.  This is usually to keep down on the amount of flies, as in suburban/urban areas flies are the primary decomposers of feces. However, there are some areas where dung beetles are still plentiful and play an important part in decomposition.

In this post, we are going to investigate what happens after we pick up the waste - it's a perfect opportunity to showcase decomposers in the food web. We looked at the bag of dog food, which had lots of great pictures of the meat and vegetables that were ingredients.  Our dogs also enjoy quite a few table scraps, including many vegetables.  My children are young, so we kept as simple as plants get their energy to create food from the sun and their roots collect water and nutrients from the soil. For older children, you could elaborate on photosynthesis and nitrogen fixation.

After we collected all the dog feces we buried it in an effort to keep some of the flies off; and perhaps catch a dung beetle. It's not quite warm enough for lots of insect activity; so we'll come back after a few weeks to dig things up to see what we find.

Once things warm up, we will also be making a series of posts about arboreal carrion and dung traps, which is a great way to keep your bait out of the paws of critters like raccoon, opossums, and coyotes. 

Butterfly Garden, part I

We got our milkweed seeds today from Monarch Watch. I used them last year to purchase our tagging supplies (hope to have another post on that subject in a couple of months).

For approximately $10 plus shipping, we received three different types of milkweed: Butterfly milkweed, Swamp Milkweed and Common Milkweed. There were approximately 10 seeds in each packet.  Ideally, you should plant the seeds after collected from plants in the fall, however for spring planting you can simulate winter conditions by cold stratifying the seeds.

First, we labeled the Ziploc bags with the type of milkweed.

Then, we wet some paper towels, wrung them out until they were just damp, and dumped the seeds into the paper towels.

Finally, we gently pressed the paper towels down on the seeds and placed it inside the bag. We squeezed all the air out of the bag and laid it flat in our refrigerator. We will check for germination in 3-6 weeks.

Tools - Bug Vacuum and DIY Aspirator Collectors

Before I even had children, I had a bug vacuum. These machines are awesome for catching and observing larger insects, especially those they may bite or sting.  I really like this model and tried to get some photographs of how easy it is to operate and how it can enhance your insect collecting adventures.

This vacuum has a magnifying glass that rotates to capture or release the insect.

This model will run you between $10-$15, check on Amazon to get the best deal, and I've had mine for almost 6 years and it's still running strong.

A similar type of collection method that entomologists use for delicate or tiny insects is called aspiration collection.  Here are a couple of ideas on how you can make collection tools at home. 

First, you will need a tightly fitted jar and lid, two straws, a drill and bit, and some Goo Gone to clean the label from the jar.

First, clean your jar very well, including the outer label so you have an unobstructed view inside the jar.

Next, use the drill to make two holes in the lid of the jar. I used a scrap piece of wood to protect the surface of my table. You want the drill bit to be slightly smaller than the width of the straw.

Insert the straws into the holes. If they don't fit tightly, use cotton wool or spray foam to make a tight fit. To use this in the field, you would place the green straw next to the insect (or possibly inside a flower to gain access to very small and delicate insects), and gently inhale on the red straw. This creates a vacuum that traps the insect in your jar. Although the vacuum won't be as strong as the one created by the bug vacuum, and you will be limited to collecting insects smaller than the width of the straw, it is a free and more suited to delicate collection of small insects than the bug vacuum.

Chances are that if you have children, you may have discovered the nosefrida.  It is actually my baby shower go-to gift, and I thought of this as an indispensable baby item to help relieve a congested baby.  But, in it's off season, it makes the PERFECT insect collecting aspirator! Just gently position the larger end over the insect (or inside the flower), and suck on the red mouth piece and you will likely get lots of great insects! Don't worry about swallowing anything, because there is a removable, blue filter that will keep the insects inside the tube! Once the weather gets a bit warmer, we will have some photos demonstrating. Happy collecting!