Echo Field Trip

Lauren Jump -

The derivation of water from the banana plant intrigued me the most. That will be a very useful tidbit if I ever get stranded on an island.  I thought I would have to find rocks or bamboo to make plates to eat off of on a deserted island but now I know banana plants are great for that.  Banana plants not being trees but instead the largest herbaceous flowering plant was mind boggling.  The field trip was very enriching.  It was a very nice change of pace to have a wonderfully knowledgeable field guide like Vic.






Kapok Ingrove - used to float boats

Alexandra MacLean -

The cranberry hibiscus and the root beer  plant are my favorite i think. The scent that they give off is amazing. The leaves of the root beer plant are used for the spicy scent and flavor that the drink has. the cranberry hibiscus was interesting because it really tasted like cranberry. i really liked learning about the water and how we can sterilize it by putting the water in plastic bottles and letting them sit in the sun for six hours.

Cranberry Hibiscus

Ishadeen Abreu -

I had a good time during my visit to ECHO ( Educational Concerns for Hunger Organizations). I learned how easy it is to grow a garden in a tire.  All you need is to lay down some plastic in a tire and place a cut out tire rim upside down on the plastic to keep it in place.  Place bottles and empty soda cans in the empty tire then place soil on top.  Now there is no excuse if you may not have enough garden space you can make one. Here is a picture of the example shown on the trip below.

Anna Dyson - 

The field trip to ECHO has been my favorite school trip yet! We were greeted with smiling faces and fresh fruits ( grown on site of course) as soon as we got off the bus. I indulged in a few pieces of strawberry and many pieces of prickly pear! I never knew how amazing prickly pear cactus was, that is why it is important to try everything. ECHO gave us all lots of opportunities to try many different plants. The cranberry hibiscus tasted more like raspberries to me, but it was so delicious i thought about it the whole day. I never knew that leaves could taste like a tangy dessert. I like how ECHO was protecting its soil with cypress needles and pine cones. ECHO also taught us how to reuse old tires and kiddie swimming pools (well almost anything actually ) and turn them into potted plants. It felt the garden of Eden out there and i would love to go back again to get a closer look at the plants, animals, machines, and growing techniques.  

Class Presentations & Urban Homestead Video

Alex MacLean -

What I really liked about today’s class was the many different ways that we can water our plants. The simplest one is one that I like best, collecting water in a container and then watering the plants. when I was volunteering at the Naples Botanical Garden there were many different ones some were painted and some not. Also I did not know that when saving seeds they should be in a container and in something like a fridge.

Lauren Jump-

I was shocked to hear that a chemical found in solar panels is damaging our ozone.  A classmate said that nitrogen triflouride is toxic because it releases too much heat and hurts the ozone.  It is found in solar panels, LCD TVS and computer chips.  After doing some research online I found that …”Elemental fluorine has been introduced as an environmentally friendly replacement for nitrogen trifluoride in the manufacture of flat panel displays and thin film solar cells.[3]” Luckily nitrogen triflouride is not the only option for solar panels.   I like to think that products which are made to help the environment usually do, for the most part.

<J. Oshinowo, A. Riva, M Pittroff, T. Schwarze and R. Wieland (2009). "Etch performance of Ar/N2/F2 for CVD/ALD chamber clean". Solid State Technology 52 (2): 20–24.> & <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nitrogen_trifluoride#cite_note-Oshinowo-3>



Ishadeen Abreu -

During this week I participated in spreading the word of the importance of recycling by doing the morning wave with all our signs promoting recycling.  Although it was very early in the morning it was really reassuring by all the honks and waves back that we had showing support.  The new plan/experiment for FGCU is to take out all the trash cans out of the classrooms in hopes that students will recycle more and not just throw recyclables away in the waste. It is easier and more affordable for the school to take out trash cans in the classrooms instead of putting a recycling bin in each classroom. This scares me just because I see students being lazy and just leaving trash right on the floor of the classrooms. I hoping that I am proven wrong and that this experiment is successful.  Picture below is the little group of us doing the morning wave. That is me in the hoodie.

Anna Dyson -

I enjoyed the movie we watched in class this week about "the danger of becoming free". I have always been an independent person and i believe it is important to know how to take care of oneself. The building blocks of knowing how to take care of oneself is knowing how to survive. Not knowing how to survive in a city, or survive the dating scene, or survive college....nature. Knowing how to grow and tending to planets should be something taught in schools as regular as algebra. It is completely okay to rely on your community or businesses to support one's needs, but if that wasn't an option....most people would fall by the wayside. Knowing how to grow food and maintain a few animals, collect rain water, and cook are skills than can and do set one free.

Reader Discussion

Alex MacLean -

Before this last class i thought that i know a little about lake Okeechobee but i guess not. i don't know about the waterways and how big it really was. The questions that were asked by some of the groups that got people talking  was asked more than once, was how does one species effect another species. And it is interesting to think that humans could go away tomorrow and all other animals would live on.  

Lauren Jump - 

I was pretty impressed that we made it through a whole book in one day.  The Lake Okeechobee information blew me away.  I’m embarrassed I didn't know about the way this body of water previously moved and how it does now and how it is hurting our state so immensely.  The Everglades restoration is a great project that I hope will be carried out completely.  




Ishadeen Abreu - 

During last week’s class a lot of good class discussions arose  from the presentations.  One that really sparked my interest was the question about if  a certain species became  extinct what would it affect.  Right away we determined if all the humans were to become extinct no other animals would be affected. If anything I think the world will go back into the natural order of things just as it was before we were even present on the earth. The popular answer was something as simple as the bee. If the bee became extinct, humans would cease to exist.  That’s crazy to think that a little bee affects so much.





Calvin Thornton - 

I always knew that this was not a land in which people were supposed to live, but I've never had that belief confirmed quite so firmly. If an entire region has to be drained of water, plant life, and animals, and if the entire time swarms of angry insects are attacking the people draining it, people probably shouldn't live there. I am not exaggerating when I say that I truly hope the everglades (swamp) reclaims itself all the way back to where it was before. Something about living in a place where the environment will reclaim your entire neighborhood if left alone for two years makes me want to move away. And I do hold the same opinion as other classmates that if people were to go extinct, the only animals that would mourn would probably be dogs, for maybe a couple of years.





Anna Dyson - 

I thought it was interesting learning about the origin of the name "Everglades". I can not imagine the Everglades being called the "River Glades". The fact that a decent amount of the Florida everglades has not been explored is awesome to me. It makes it so mysterious and wondrous. Man tends to think they know everything and have it all figured out, but they still don't know how the Everglades, and its ecosystems, fully work.This wet and tropical climate is not just a swamp, but a beautiful place to still be explored. 

FGCU Canoeing Trip

Ishadeen Abreu-

I had a blast canoeing last Tuesday! I wasn't able to take pictures because I left my camera in my car just in case we had the misfortune of tipping over. It was definitely a little workout with it being extra windy that day but all in all the weather was nice and it was peaceful. I felt like I was back at home in Iowa at my grandparents house.  I would always take out the paddle boat and paddle to the middle of Lake MacBride (picture below) with a good book and just be in the most peaceful setting you can imagine. Being out in nature as a real soothing effect. I love it!

Lauren Jump-

I really enjoyed the Fort Myers Beach woman’s presentation.  The red mangroves and the oysters’ benefits to cleaning the water interested me the most.  “Mangroves produce 3.6 tons per acre of leaf litter per year which benefit estuarine food chains.  An estimated 75% of the game fish and 90% of the commercial species in south Florida depend on the mangrove system... They also trap mud and silt that flows with the tide, thus gradually increasing the soil around them” (SFRC).  I could not find anything online about red mangroves assisting with cleaning water besides that it prefers brackish water to seawater for nutrition.  It was news to me that we have oysters in the Gulf of Mexico.  I am quite impressed that Crassostrea virginica can filter 50 gallons of water per day (Eastern Oyster).  I had a lot of fun canoeing!  Kayaking is a lot easier.  But, I always love being on the water.  I did not take my camera out on the canoe because I do not have a waterproof case for it.

Florida Forest Trees.  Red Mangroves.  SFRC.  <http://www.sfrc.ufl.edu/4h/Red_mangrove/redmangr.htm>Eastern Oyster.  <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_oyster>  

Alexandra Maclean - 

Last Tuesdays class way lots of fun; I really enjoyed learning all about Fort Myers beach. The oysters I have heard of once in a presentation but did not know how beneficial they were.  Canoeing was fun though It would have been even better if the wind was not so strong it was a really work out trying to keep the canoe going where you want. When I was young I went canoeing all the time in the summers up in Maine with family I have always enjoyed anything that takes place in water. For this trip i did not bring my camera so i did not get any pitchers unfortunately. Overall I really enjoyed this last Tuesday's class.


Anna Dyson -

As blog master i took on the roll of photographer. This turned out to be difficult to do because of the strong wind that day. Whenever Alex and i would stop to take a picture the wind would blow us straight into the mangroves! The current was as strong as the wind sometimes, and it gave us a great workout. The canoeing experience just goes to show, that it must have been tough to travel primarily by canoe! Due to the weather i did not see large amounts of wild life. I did snap a picture of an osprey nest with a mama bird in it. I heard two large fish jump, but when i turned around to see all i saw were ripples. I saw one other bird, but it was too far away to identify.

Pictures from field trip below: