Outdoor Science

Last week was a fun three day field trip for Morgan and his classmates.  I got to go along as a chaperone.  We went to McCall, Idaho (south from Cottonwood about 2 hours) to the McCall Outdoor Science School (MOSS).  It's a great, hands-on, science-based camp with cabins located on the shores of Payette lake.

The program is run by University of Idaho graduate students who are working on their masters degree in Natural Resources and Environmental Education.  These students live on the MOSS campus for one school year and have students arriving every week for outdoor instruction.  So cool!  Our County Commissioners pay for our students to go every year, which is pretty awesome.  Our girls got to experience MOSS as well.

I especially loved their flag.  Go Vandals!

On day two, we had a three mile hike in the Ponderosa State Park with lots of stops for exploration and instruction.  We were in the field for over five hours.  The weather was fabulous.  I guess a lot of years that Prairie has gone, it's been super cold and rainy.  I am incredibly grateful that this was not one of those years!  (Morgan is in the blue and gray sweatshirt with the red pack on the left side of the above pictures)

The deer were obviously used to humans.  We stood and watched this mule deer eat her breakfast for quite some time.

And then found another one just a few minutes later.  I've seen plenty of deer in my life, but never so close and for so long.  They usually run away within moments of spotting a human.  It was fun to watch them, but made me think they wouldn't last long in hunting season!

We stopped at a marsh and the kids played in muddy water from identifying different creatures they could find.

I love when people use their sense of humor to get a message across.  The above sign indicates that dogs should keep their humans on a leash to keep them safe.  Great idea. :)

After stopping to eat our sack lunches that we made for ourselves before leaving camp, we went out in a HUGE canoe on Payette Lake.  So fun.

In the middle of the lake, the kids used various high-tech equipment to test the water.  Morgan is using a probe attached to a hand-held electronic device to test the pH of the water.  

Then they interpreted and discussed their results of the water testing back on shore and looked at whether the results would indicate the lake is a good home to trout.

The final activity before heading back to camp was learning about topographic maps.

The kids got to create a replication of the topographic map in the sand and learned about the watershed for that area.  

It was a great experience.  I'm so grateful I got to tag along.

It was a great group of kids (55 of them).  All the chaperones were ready to come home on day three, but the kids were sad it was over.  I just wanted my own bed.  My aging body doesn't do as well on bunkbeds like it once did!