Planting trees

 The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago.  The second best time is today.  We hope to do it until we can no longer hold a shovel.

Distinguishing Common Oak Tree Species

 More on distinguishing tree species after the leaves fall.  Identifying oak tree species: 

 

1. Northern Red Oak (Quercus rubra). Key Features: The bark appears striped on older trees due to these shiny ridges, especially noticeable in sunlight.

2. White Oak (Quercus alba). Key Features: The overall appearance is lighter and ashier compared to other oak species.

3. Scarlet Oak (Quercus coccinea). Key Features: The inner bark is reddish, visible when cut or scratched, and the furrows are not as deep as in other oaks.

4. Black Oak (Quercus velutina). Key Features: The deep ridges and orange inner bark are diagnostic. Bark becomes almost furrowed like an alligator’s skin with age.

5. Chestnut Oak (Quercus montana). Key Features: The deep furrows and thick, rugged plates make it one of the most textured oak barks.

6. Swamp White Oak (Quercus bicolor). Key Features: The two-tone bark (lighter, peeling upper bark, and darker, furrowed lower bark) is a defining characteristic.

7. Pin Oak (Quercus palustris). Key Features: The smoother appearance of mature bark distinguishes it from more deeply furrowed species like black or chestnut oak.

Predicting Insect Emergence

by Bridget Baron

Introduction

From the grass you walk on to the food you eat, and even the clothes you wear, your daily life relies upon insects. Urban life often feels disconnected from nature, but that could not be further from the truth as urban life relies upon the global ecosystem. Because the global ecosystem is propped up by insects, it is not an exaggeration to say that human beings are reliant on insects for our survival. As such, scientists spend significant time tracking insect populations.

This report discusses the reasons why tracking insect populations is important, as well as summarizes my exploration of using one example of software scientists predicting insect emergence, the Degree-Days, Risk, and Phenological event mapping (DDRP) program created by Brittany S Barker, Leonard Coop, Tyson Wepprich, Fritzi Grevstad, and Gericke Cook.

Insects and Agriculture

75% of all crop plants depend on insects for pollination (National Geographic). This includes food crops as well as plants like cotton that are used to produce textiles. Insects maintain healthy soils, as well. Dung beetles, among others, are insects that specialize in the decomposition of decaying organic matter. They return nutrients to the soils, which allow more plants to grow and keep the circle of life turning. There have even been some cases where introducing termites into arid fields made them fertile again within less than a year (National Geographic). Termites and other ground-burrowing insects (like ants!) aerate soils with their tunnels. This allows water, oxygen, and nutrients to reach deeper down and protects soil quality (National Geographic).

However, not all insects are beneficial to agriculture. Pests are insects that consume or destroy beneficial or domesticated plants. In the United States, several of the most harmful pests are invasive species, such as the Emerald Ash Borer Beetle and the Asian Longhorned Beetle (USDA). Invasive species come from other ecosystems and are often generalists. Generalists are not reliant upon a single source of food and adapt well to competition and new environments (i.e. raccoons). Conversely, many native species are specialists. These are species that have evolved to rely on a small number of food sources to avoid competition (i.e. pandas). These species often play vital roles in their native ecosystems but are very vulnerable to competition when an aggressive invasive species arrives to eat their food and use their habitats.

(Photo by the Author: New York Carpenter Ant Camponotus novaeboracensis)

My Project

After becoming interested in insect tracking, I stumbled across an open-source program called DDRP (Degree-Days, Risk, and Phenological event mapping). It uses weather data to calculate degree-days (measures of heating-cooling within a single day) and temperature stress to insects. DDRP then uses that information to predict the emergence, number of generations, and present life stages of various invasive insects. 

I decided to learn how the program worked and try running it for myself by following these detailed instructions. While attempting to run the program on my home PC, I encountered various challenges:

• I knew very little about programming and had no knowledge of R, the language used to create DDRP. To learn,  I followed beginner tutorials such as Codecademy’s R lesson series and utilized ChatGPT to interpret sections of code I was unfamiliar with over the course of six weeks. 

• I also faced various issues with my setup. One issue was that the program could not create a template file of the specified region. The reason for this was that some of the optional sets of instructions of code (called packages), like Rgdal, that DDRP relies on are no longer supported in R. I had to uninstall R and RStudio and download an older version that ran all of the packages I needed. 

• I then had some difficulties regarding the permissions for my file system. Something was preventing my files and folders from being taken off of “read-only” status. I spent several hours troubleshooting this via Google, ChatGPT, and Perplexity.ai, but was not able to completely resolve the issue without risking damage to my computer by changing its operational code.

• There was one other major issue I was unable to resolve completely. For some reason, after changing to an older instance of R, the inputs were being nullified. This prevented the program from actually running the calculations that it needed to in order to operate. In order to diagnose the issue, I edited the code to have the computer print the values of the “year” variable as well as the “keep_leap” variable. These were the two values that were being nullified. Their purposes are to specify the start year for the calculations, and to specify whether the 366th day in leap years should be factored into the calculations. 

A screenshot of the program crashing while attempting to create the template.

A screenshot of the variable nullification issue.

Conclusion

Ultimately, I wasn't able to get the program successfully and completely running on my device, but I learned a lot. I strongly encourage others with an interest in data science – especially as it relates to environmental science – to conduct research and leverage programs like DDRP. It might or might not end up working as expected, but it’s the process of trying things and learning from mistakes that creates the toolset to advocate for change. It’s our world. We all have a part to play in taking care of it.

About Me

Hello! My name is Bridget Baron and I’m an upcoming first year at Barnard College in New York City. As a Senior at Alexandria City High School in Alexandria, VA, I worked as an intern at the Virginia Tech Thinkabit Lab. My major scientific interests are climate change and insects, and working with the VT Thinkabit Lab gave me the opportunity to explore one of the cross-sections between those two: insect phenology. My research into the phenological cycles of insects, and how they’re impacted by climate change, is what led me to this particular research project. 

Bringing Animals Back from Extinction

 

Bringing Animals Back From Extinction. Science or Fiction? 

by Zhihan Shi

The famous movie franchise Jurassic Park is all about bringing dinosaurs and other famous extinct animals back from the dead. The first movie was made in 1993, and bringing extinct animals back in just three decades is a bigger possibility than ever. While scientists are not bringing extinct animals back just yet, biotechnology has made significant progress in de-extinction. De-extinction is a field of science involved in resurrecting species that have gone extinct (Carrington). 

The Science Behind De-extinction

How exactly does de-extinction work? A paraphrased definition of de-extinction by The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) is that it is the ecological replacement of an extinct species by adapting a living organism to serve the ecological function of that species through various means. Essentially, bringing back an extinct organism requires an existing living organism, preferably one closely related (Neuman).

Cloning, also known as somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT), is one of the main techniques utilized in de-extinction. This procedure involves inserting the nucleus of a somatic cell from the extinct species into an egg cell whose nucleus has been removed. After that, the egg is encouraged to grow into an embryo that can be placed inside the body of a closely related species' surrogate mother (Neuman). The famed Pyrenean ibex, an extinct subspecies of the Spanish ibex, was used to test this technique; however, the cloned animal died shortly after due to a lung defect (Brian). 

Another technique is genetic engineering, in which researchers modify the DNA of a closely related extinct species by inserting genes from the extinct species, producing an organism that is strikingly similar to the original. Tools such as CRISPR-Cas9 are used in this process. As Dr, Carina Schlebusch puts it, “The genome editing approach is the most viable and, with the availability of DNA-editing techniques such as CRISPR–Cas9, it may be feasible in the near future.” By altering the genome of the Asian elephant, the woolly mammoth's closest living relative, it may be possible to revive the mammoth (Schlebusch). 

A proposed outline of bringing back the mammoth using biotechnology. 

Source: https://www.worldwildlife.org/

Current Examples of De-extinction

Many companies and researchers are trying to be the first to perform de-extinction. A notable example of de-extinction is the endeavor to bring back the woolly mammoth. To produce a hybrid with the mammoth's cold-resistant features, such as thick fur and subcutaneous fat, scientists are attempting to insert mammoth genes into the Asian elephant's genome. By promoting grassland ecosystems in the Arctic tundra, this initiative, headed by Harvard scientist George Church, aims to create a mammoth-elephant hybrid that may be released into the wild to aid in the fight against climate change. A similar project was done by the company VOW, where they created a mammoth meatball using extinct animal DNA (Carrington). 

Another example is the attempt to bring back the passenger pigeon, a species that was once abundant in North America but went extinct in the early 20th century due to overhunting and habitat destruction. Scientists are using genetic material from preserved specimens to attempt to recreate the species by editing the genome of the band-tailed pigeon, a close relative of the passenger pigeon (Novak). 

Figure 1: A depiction of the woolly mammoth

Source: www.NPR.org

Conclusion

De-extinction is a promising new field that may see success in the upcoming years due to biotechnological breakthroughs. Different scientific methods have been proposed for de-extinction and it is only a matter of time before one succeeds. As new projects arise for bringing back extinct animals, the ethics of these experiments may need to be called into question. In my next blog post, I will cover more on the future of de-extinction, including new technology like AI and ethical dilemmas. Stay tuned! 

Citation:

Brian, Thomas. “Extinct Ibex Clone Dies at Birth.” ICR, https://www.icr.org/article/extinct-ibex-clone-dies-at-birth/. Accessed 4 Sept. 2024

Carrington, D., & editor, D. C. E. (2023, March 28). Meatball from long-extinct mammoth created by food firm. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/mar/28/meatball-mammoth-created-cultivated-meat-firm. Accessed 4 Sept. 2024

Martinelli, L., Oksanen, M., & Siipi, H. (2014). De-extinction: a novel and remarkable case of bio-objectification. Croatian Medical Journal, 55(4), 423–427. https://doi.org/10.3325/cmj.2014.55.423. Accessed 4 Sept. 2024

Neuman, S. (2021, September 15). Scientists say they could bring back woolly mammoths. But maybe they shouldn’t. NPR. https://www.npr.org/2021/09/14/1036884561/dna-resurrection-jurassic-park-woolly-mammoth. Accessed 4 Sept. 2024

Novak, B. J. (2018). De-extinction. Genes, 9(11), 548. https://doi.org/10.3390/genes9110548. Accessed 4 Sept. 2024

Schlebusch, C. M. (2022). Genomics: Testing the limits of de-extinction. Current Biology, 32(7), R324–R327. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2022.03.023. Accessed 4 Sept. 2024

About the Author

My name is Zhihan Shi and I’m a senior at Innovation Academy. I’m interested in biotechnology and I’ve been learning about it through classes at my school. Inside of biotechnology, I’m interested in microbiology and molecular biology. 

Zhihan Shi | He/Him

https://www.linkedin.com/in/zhihan-shi-01aa85271/

zhihankshi@gmail.com

Identifying Common Potomac Tree Species in Winter

adapted from the Potowmack Chapter of the Virginia Native Plant Society:

Even when the leaves are not on the trees, you can still identify them by their bark. Here are some common trees in our region that can be identified by their bark. All of these are alternate-branched. For opposite-branched trees, memorize the acronym "MAD-Cap-Horse Buck" for Maple, Ash, Dogwood, the family Caprifoliaceae (honeysuckles and viburnums, mostly shrubs), and the Horse chestnut or Buckeye (Genus Aesculus).

Energy Education in Virginia

 

Innovations in fishing lures

 So realistic it seems unfair.

Here comes the water!

 

Saturday morning will likely reach the Action Stage. 

Drought throughout the Potomac Watershed

from the ICPRB:

 Regional Drought Watch declaration, algae blooms, putting blue catfish on the menu, and more, in this week’s Potomac News Reservoir – August 1, 2024 >>>

River Report – Drought Watch declared for DC Metro Area

On Monday, the Drought Coordination Committee of the Metropolitan Council of Governments (COG) declared a Drought Watch for the DC Metro area which calls for voluntary water conservation measures by the region’s residents and businesses. This is the second level in COG’s four-stage regional drought response plan.

Read ICPRB’s News Release about the Drought Watch >>>

The most recent U.S. Drought Monitor map shows almost 90% of the watershed is experiencing moderate to extreme drought conditions. The extreme drought conditions are concentrated in the western part of the watershed.

Governor Justice of West Virginia declared a state-wide State of Emergency due to impacts from drought.

At least 92 counties and cities in Virginia are in either Drought Watch or Drought Warning status.

The Maryland Department of the Environment declared a Drought Watch for the western part of the state.

Most smaller jurisdictions across the Potomac watershed are a asking folks to voluntarily minimize their water use to reduce the stress on local streams and groundwater. Some cities are imposing mandatory water restrictions.

A Comprehensive Look at Water Use in the Potomac Basin

When the Potomac Basin Comprehensive Water Resources Plan identified a possible inadequacy in the understanding of water-use on a watershed-wide level, ICPRB staff looked into it. The resulting paper, recently published in the Journal of the American Water Resources Association, investigated if the full spectrum of water uses is known —  and needed — in order for sustainable management of water resources.

Read the report: Evaluation of reported and unreported water uses in various sectors of the Potomac basin for the year 2017 >>>

Registration Open for the 2024 Potomac Conference

 **Registration is Open**

2024 Potomac River Conference: Reeling in the Challenge of Aquatic Invasive Species. 

8:30 am – 3:30 pm

October 17, 2024

River View at Occoquan in Lorton, VA.

Join the Interstate Commission on the Potomac River Basin for a conference that will expound on the science, policy, and management of invasive fishes and other aquatic species in the Potomac River basin.

Click here for a PDF of the agenda >>>

Click here for more information and registration details >>>

Our relationship with invasive, non-native aquatic species in the Potomac River basin is complicated. Alarms are sounded and eradication efforts mobilized for some species (zebra mussels, blue catfish), while concerns about other non-native species fade as they fill empty ecological niches (Asiatic clams) or become prized fisheries (smallmouth bass). The goal of this effort is to convene a one-day, in-person conference to enhance awareness of the ecological roles that aquatic invasive species have or could assume in the Potomac River basin and the adverse impacts they impart when natural controls are missing.

The day will start out with an invasive species case study of blue catfish and lead into research on other invasive species in the Potomac River.

We have extended the deadline for poster presentations. Please submit an abstract if you are interested in having a poster at the event.

Invasive cattail leaf rockets

 Invasive cattails, especially Narrow-leaved Cattail (Typha angustifolia)

 grow rapidly and crowd other plants species, and also provide poor habitat.  But they can make great leaf rockets.  Click on the image (right) or on this link: 
facebook.com/share/r/iM4tsnTwPHX9h9Ui/ 

to see the simple trick.

Guest Blogger Amelia Keng: How can technology-research reduce droughts in California?

How can technology-research reduce droughts in California?

By: Amelia Keng

Photo Source: World Atlas

For many years, California has not had an abundance of water. Climate change is only making conditions worse for farmers, city dwellers, and nature as they continue to have a lack of water. According to drought.gov, as of 2022, the state of California is experiencing 99.77% of moderate to exceptional drought. This means that around 37,243,577 of Californians are in drought, due to the significant lack of precipitation and groundwater. Although in the past years, California has seen a

Sealed Terrariums

In 1960, David Latimer planted a spiderwort sprout inside of a large glass jar, added a quarter pint of water, and then sealed it shut. He opened the bottle for the first time only 12 years later, in 1972, to add some water and then sealed it for good. 

The self-contained ecosystem flourished for more than 60 years as a perfectly balanced garden and self-sufficient ecosystem. 

The bacteria in the compost ate the dead plants and broke down the oxygen released, turning it into carbon dioxide, essentially forming a microcosm of Earth. 

For teachers:  This is a great project at the end of the year. It doesn't have to be this big, and it can even be a sealed aquarium (terrarium).  Next Fall you can invite your former students to stop in to see it.  To add a little more excitement, many types of insects, spiders, worms, snails and even flies can survive in a closed terrarium. Springtails, earthworms and woodlice are found in most closed terrariums.

April 13 high water exceeds forecast

 For all those times the prediction forecasts seem exaggerated.

Downstream in Arlington - April 25

 Upcoming event from Arlington/Alexandria Cooperative Extension:

Topic: Ticks and Tickborne Illnesses

Time: Apr 25, 2024 11:30 AM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

https://virginiatech.zoom.us/j/89803672672

“Ticks and Tickborne Diseases of importance in Virginia” is presented by Dr. David Gaines, State Public Health Entomologist who will discuss the different tick species, their geographic distribution, and describe the specific tickborne diseases associated with each tick species. He will also cover the topic of the best methods of personal protection from tick bites. This presentation is being offered by the Virginia Department of Health, Office of Epidemiology, Division of Surveillance and Investigation.

This free program is being presented via Zoom and will be recorded and made available in about 2 weeks, but the speaker has requested that as many attend in-person as possible so that he can answer your questions. Pre-registration is not required. For more information contact the Extension Master Gardener Help Desk at 703 228 6414

High water this Wednesday?

 

Upskilling your Green Skills (free programs for Educators)

 For more information, go to www.gto.eco/gup24 

Students Using Wikipedia for Research

 from Edutopia:

Teaching Students How to Use Wikipedia as a Tool for Research

Wikipedia has moved far beyond its initial limitations, and is a helpful—and reputable—source for conducting research.

By Mike Caulfield, Sam Wineburg
January 24, 2024

Your middle school teacher threatened to give you an F if you cited it. A reminder hung menacingly in the computer lab: a thick black line slashing the word in two. Even now, you can find blanket dismissals bellowing from college websites: Wikipedia “isn’t a credible resource because anyone is allowed to be a contributor.”

In its early days, Wikipedia had no shortage of problems. Errors propagated like fruit flies. People used the site to spoof their friends and exact revenge on their enemies. The site’s flaws were legendary, sometimes scandalous. A 2006 article accused John Seigenthaler, an assistant to Robert Kennedy in the 1960s, of having a hand in Kennedy’s assassination. The false charge stayed on the site for 132 days before it was finally removed. But not before

Plant Hardiness Map

 Starting to think about spring planting season? Remember that USDA plant hardiness zones changed last year. The South Branch Valley in Hampshire County is now in Zone 7a, where it was previously in 6b (-5 to 0°F/ -20 to -17°C). The average lowest temperature has changed by 3 to 4 °F, even those places in Hardy County and that stayed in 6a or 6b.

https://planthardiness.ars.usda.gov/

(Type in your zip code for detailed results.)