Pine View Weevil Watchers: Class of 2004-2005

The Pine View Weevil Watchers continue a scientific field study at Myakka River State Park that began in January 2001.

Data Sheets:

 

Dr. Margaret D. Lowman – “Canopy Meg” — Awarded $75,000 to Create Forest Canopy Exhibit

Sarasota, FL / 31 August, 2005 – Dr. Margaret D. Lowman, Director of Environmental Initiatives and Professor of Biology & Environmental Studies at the New College of Florida, was recently awarded a $75,000 grant from the National Science Foundation. The grant is for the creation of a traveling exhibit entitled “Out on a Limb – Forest Canopies,” which will provide public education about forest biodiversity, how treetops provide energy for all life, and the importance of forest conservation both locally and globally. The exhibit will also illustrate the difficulties scientists face when trying to access canopies for study.

Dr. Lowman’s exhibit will utilize a mix of media including a rain forest diorama, scaled models of scientists exploring the canopy, photographs, and activities for interactive learning and play. When complete, the “Out on a Limb – Forest Canopies” exhibit will be on display in various community venues throughout southwest Florida.

Canopy research provides a highly visual, fun and interesting, and exploratory approach to scientific inquiry that can be effectively communicated and easily comprehended by the general public and students. To learn more about inviting the exhibit into your community or school, please contact Dr. Lowman at lowman@ncf.edu.

Dr. Lowman is internationally recognized for her pioneering research in forest canopy ecology, and has explored all three major rain forests of the world — Africa, Australia/Asia, and the Neotropics (including the Amazon). She is the author of over 95 peer-reviewed publications and four books. Dr. Lowman’s recent autobiography, Life in the Treetops, received a cover review in the New York Times Sunday Book Review; she recently completed Forest Canopies – a definitive textbook for forest canopy ecology.

Known to many as “Canopy Meg,” Dr. Lowman has conducted global conservation work in Africa, Samoa, the Amazon basin, and Australia, and her education outreach has included distance learning via satellite to millions of children throughout the world. For more information about “Canopy Meg” and forest canopies, visit www.canopymeg.com

From scgovNEWS:

SARASOTA (THURSDAY, OCTOBER 13, 2005) - Thanks to an innovative partnership between Sarasota’s scientific, educational and economic communities, Sarasota County may soon have a scientific field station in the Myakka Watershed that will cultivate intellectual and financial capital and address future ecological needs.

In September, approximately 20 scientists from around the country arrived in Sarasota to assist in choosing a site for the station, which would serve as a base camp for research and education and monitor the ecological health of Southwest Florida.

The meeting was funded by the TREE Foundation, a local scientific group that built the canopy walkway in Myakka River State Park. It was coordinated in conjunction with the Economic Development Corporation, Sarasota County and New College of Florida. Scientists from around the country, including Dayna Baumeister, Ph.D., of the Biomimicry Guild in Helena, Mont., and John Fitzpatrick, Ph.D., of Cornell University, visited four sites within the Myakka Watershed for the research station. Most favored T. Mabry Carlton Jr. Memorial Reserve.

A field station in the Myakka Watershed would attract researchers and graduate students, funding an economic boon to Sarasota County through ecotourism, summer science camps and a visitors center for educational exhibits, according to Dr. Meg Lowman, director of Environmental Initiatives at New College of Florida.

Lowman says the station would attract scientists searching for unique ecosystems to explore, and cites the successful Archbold Field Station in central Florida as an example. “The Archbold offers a scrub ecosystem within walking distance of beds, a library and a kitchen,” said Lowman. “The combination has drawn researchers from throughout the county, the majority from northern universities, resulting in more than 1,100 scientific publications documenting its plants, animals and ecology.”

Lowman expects similar results with a research facility here. “Just over 50 texts have been published in Sarasota County, all limited to one species, the scrub jay,” noted Lowman. “All of these [other] systems are vastly unknown,” she added. Ecosystems provide lots of free services for human beings, such as prevention of soil erosion, nutrient cycles dependent for the quality of our health and life. To keep them working for us we need to understand how they work.”

Rob Patten, executive director for Sarasota County Environmental Services, says the field station could also fuel valuable research into the burgeoning science of biomimicry, which studies nature and then applies its designs and processes to solve human problems. “This is a unique partnership that will enable environmental decisions to be based on both economics and biology,” said Patten, who believes the station could be a model for similar collaborations in the future.

Lowman says the next step in creating the field station is to apply for funding, with eventual construction beginning by 2008.

For more information on the field station, contact the Sarasota County Call Center at (941) 861-5000