Environmental Impact Assessments

Last class we, the awesome people who were not sick, started learning about EIA's. EIA's are used to predict the possible outcomes of introducing new things to an area. EIA's can consist of observing factors such as biodiversity, water run-off, nearby plant species, and the affects on nearby animal species. These EIA's  are used to attempt to minimalize damage to an ecosystem, while still being able to introduce new plants, buildings, animals, etc. We began our first EIA last class. This EIA was about the impact of adding a pond to an area surrounding the school. We looked at 2 possible sites for the pond and got observation of the areas. Next class we will collect data on each site so we can make a more specific EIA, if the weather holds up.

- Your Friendly Neighbourhood Spider-man

november 7, wendsday

Today we begain a new unit on recession. Mr Carmicheal showed us an educational film on first world problems and how our people are suffuring and need help.

Productivity (Class on Oct 24)

Last class we discussed mainly Productivity. We learned how to determine Np, R and GPP which is Net primary productivity Respiration and Gross Primary Productivity. We also discussed at the end how should we setup our own experiment which involved a variable that we and to measure. For example my experiment I decided is going to be on the population of bugs relating to different areas around the school such as woodchip area compared to a more grassy area. My research question is what is the diversity of insect species throughout the school? In different ground surfaces such as marshland, grass, woodchips and tree stumps. Considering abiotic factors such as temperature and light intensity.

We also learned mark hates cows

-Neil

Survivorship

This class was focused around Survivorship.

Before beginning any work we first watched a video on youtube that explained a little more about carrying capacity and limiting factors in an ecosystem. we discussed it some more in class and learnt about (k) and (r) strategieising and relating it to the (J) and (S) curves we had seen in the previous class.

We then went online and looked at a powerpoint about survivorship that would help us fill in the worksheet we were given.

to finish off the class we watched part of "The end of the Line" movie, even though we did watch it I think a lot of us were still looking out the window as the first snow of the winter was falling.

As you can see this was a rather passive lesson, and the reason for this is actually because you see Mr Carmichael was supposed to be away for a first Aid course, but he loves our class so much that he would rather come do ESS with us
:D

October 23,

During this day we worked on how one might come about to find productivity of and object in the environment  During the lesson we had received a few tips about the usage of the equations, and also that if there are ever any cows in this said environment; they will trample the land and eat it, thus causing uncertainties in your data. this all can come to one conclusion about thus cows, under any circumstance should one go about trusting these masterminds of uncertainty causingness. so for all you kiddos and some adults that are reading this I am Mark Denney and i approve this message. Oh and during thus said class time we received the exqisite lab report the class did before the break. So once again this is Mark Denney signing off, "you stay classy San Diego" Ron Burgundy :D

9/10 leaf photosythesis experiment

9th of October. Today we continued are experiment involving the effect of several different variables on the photosynthesis of leafs. several member of are class had difficulties getting the leafs to begain to float such a Laura and Kim. but at the end of the day most of us finished collecting the data we needed and began working on are lab reports.  

Fun With Paperclips!

This is the short explanation of last E.S.S. class: Laura can't count, Neil should not leave things unattended, Mark really needs ADHD medicine, and Leon took the red pill...

The longer explanation:
We used a jar of paperclips to study techinques for identifying the number of individuals in a set area. We would take a handfull of paperclips and then swap them out for colored paperclips so that they could now be considered marked. We then took a second handfull and counted the amount in our second grab and how many of them were the marked(colored) paperclips. This technique is called the Lincoln Index. To get the Lincoln index we multiplied the total of grab one time the total of grab 2 then divided by the amount of marked paperclips in grab number 2. It took us a while but we finally got the hang of things and then watched a short video called the meatrix. This was a parody of the matrix exposing the hidden truths about food production industries. Last class was fully of new information but also very entertaining!!

 <---We all remember this guy hopefully!!