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Im the guy on the right.

Journal Entry 8

The downtown Fort Myers trip was perhaps the best field trip I have ever been on. The scavenger hunt at first I thought would not be that much fun, but once we ate and started it, it got really fun. I think that it showed us things we hadn’t thought about. Personally I only go there to go to the bars, so to see how it is during the day and all the history that is involved within the area was awesome to me. There was a lot of stuff within that area that I liked and the list we had to find allowed us to see more stuff than I think I would have ever looked for. I liked how it was away from the customary trip so it felt like a break from class and there was no real pressure on what to do or not to do. We all got to have fun as a class. I think that the trip was placed in the perfect spot for class, right before a large paper, and after we just got done with a lot of other work so it took a lot of pressure off. I think that the trip should be mocked as much as possible in other trips, allowing groups to go find things on our own sometimes allows us to learn more and have more fun. I think that the location is great because it is the historic district and the fact that the water is right there it made it fun trying to compete with people finding stuff there.

Journal Entry 7

It doesn’t seem like a lot to me that just one degree can affect the entire climate with devastating effects. It’s very hard to wrap my mind around that. It’s not the first time I have heard about it happening but this video showed the caribou population dropping and that it’s getting harder and harder for them to eat, and migrate because they are not adapting to the change in weather. I had not thought about the change in wildlife just a temperature change, so that was an eye opener. At this point though I really don’t think there is much we can do about it though, the way our lifestyles are, it will be very difficult to change those so that the total temperature goes down. It showed a lot of how the water temperature also affects the way plankton lives which keep numerous other things alive, this is all stuff we do not think off when we do things. I feel climate change will happen with or without us, but that we are contributing in ways to it, and it will be very hard to find the balance of what we can do and cannot do. I’m not sure if there really is a tipping point though, I think the environment is tougher than us and will survive, it has its ways to deal with things, as it did in the first Ice Ages, so I think we need to really focus on trying to save these species in the ways we can and hope that is enough to keep the populations up.

Journal Entry 6

I had been to corkscrew sanctuary once before in my Environmental Biology of Southwest Florida Class so I knew what to expect but it was still fun. I had forgotten about the water purifying method they use for the drinking water, and it would be nice to see that utilized on a larger scale. What I really enjoyed was seeing how healthy the area is, when most areas seem to be struggling this natural habitat is doing quite well, it was reinforced by seeing the alligator by the boardwalk, and all the grass that had signs of alligators swimming in it. As we were walking our tour guide would stop and explain things that I didn’t notice, for instance he picked up a lizard and showed us how it was an invasive species and explained how it populates much faster than the native one. To me I always thought they were native so I learned something important there. I also liked how our tour guide brought up the question about using wood to build an unnecessary boardwalk and how is that being green, and explained it, so he acknowledged a legitimate question and answered it with a very good answer. It was good to see the different white and red things growing on the boardwalk and it was explained that only the red ones grow in very clean air and that a cigarette could kill it. So it was nice to see an area that is almost perfectly untouched by people. I think the great thing about Corkscrew is that they have preserved something that my kids would not of been able to see, if it wasn’t for that sanctuary.

Journal Entry 5

When I was growing up in Indiana I began to spend a lot of time in our woods, there was a particular spot where my brother and I built a fort that we would always go to with our friends. As we got older we stopped hanging out there so much but I would still go back there from time to time. It was away from everything and you could do pretty much whatever you wanted without being noticed. At the time I would try and watch birds and it was a perfect spot, since we put up bird feeders it attracted almost everything and I would watch them and it really made me zone out and forget about stuff going on. When I moved down here I never found an area like that, where I could just go and relax, so when I would go back to Indiana I would go there and see what was happening to the fort we built the woods around it. The last time I was home I went to see it and some of the neighbors kids had started to fix what we had started to build. It was a good feeling, and I sat there and hung out the area is not as lively with animals anymore because of a new house in the area but it was still nice to sit there and relax. It made me remember when I was a kid the fun I had there and I was glad to see that other kids were getting that same experience.

Journal 4

After reading the segment in the book it does open my eyes to things. Yet I can also see where some things I still find hard to believe. The cultural norms are something that will be nearly impossible to get over. Yes the things we do are using earth’s resources are depleting them, and we do need to find alternative methods, but the people who run these experiments are not using primitive methods that save resources, they are using the top of the line equipment to run these experiments, so without us depleting these resources they could not do their experiments, so even the critics are adding to the problem.
I do agree we need to find a way to conserve resources and cut our carbon footprint, which is something though that will be a hard sell to people when you tell them they must reduce what they are used to. It would be like asking someone to go back in time. Many things have come from this and health care being a major thing, what would happen if we stopped developing technology and using these resources? Yes the earth will begin to regenerate these, but people will still die from the possible lack of health care technology, or from not using daily conveniences which keep us safe. So this is a catch 22 do we reduce our usage and consumption of things and allow the earth to slowly regenerate or do we live in comfort. I think a great way to cut our usage would be education, instead of slowing technology teach people the small and large things. Show them how yes recycling is something small when done by one person but if millions of people recycle we will cut a lot of waste out, or show people that alternative fuels exist and promote those. Give options to people so that they see they can still live a comfortable lifestyle but they learn how to do their part. It is like they say every vote counts, if every person did one thing each day to help the environment we would be on the way to recovery.
If the media pushed these things I think that would really help people for some reason believe things entirely too easily and don’t do their own research, so I think if the media was pushing to do this more people would since they trust what they see on television. If all these things would go on the earth would start to recover, it would be to drastic of a change to ask people to change their lifestyle completely, so yes it may not be what is right for the earth, but it may be what makes people happy, most people would rather live a comfortable life and die happy then change their lifestyle from what they know. That is our problem and when that mindset is changed I feel people will start to do more to protect the environment.

Journal 3

Of all the places on campus, the place I enjoy most is the lake by Everglades Hall. Within the lake there are two platforms where turtles lay during the day and sun bathe, as well as sometimes you see birds wading to feed. The reason I really like this though is there is a small alligator that lives in the lake. I like to watch him float across the water; the alligator will come to the edge of the lake and just stay there. His favorite spot is near the handrails which are close to South Village Dining (SOVI), he will sit there most of the day and not move. I think the reason he does this though is because people are giving him food and since it is easy food he stays in the same spot. This is bad though since he has lost his fear of people, they have brought people out to look at having him removed. This is something I don’t like because without the alligator in the lake it will lose a lot of its appeal, and it will not be as enjoyable to look at. The turtles sometimes stay on the same platform with the alligator which I think is really cool and it shows me that even the top predators are gentle when they are not feeding. If the alligator is removed I am afraid he will be killed, and the lake will be missing its top predator, which may allow for more fish and turtles to breed but it will also allow other things to come in the lake that shouldn’t be there. So I would hate to see the lake go bad without the alligator.

Journal Entry 2

My current sense of place is I am very aware of what I do to the environment. I love the outdoors and want my grandkids to be able to enjoy what I can enjoy now. I feel though that human presence is not the only reason why the world is changing, I feel we have some part in it, but I think the world will change and there is really nothing we can do to stop that. That does not change what I do in the outdoors though. Personally the way I was raised was not to kill or harm anything unless it was for food or survival; I still have that same philosophy now and when I am in the wilderness or outdoors I am very conscious of the things I do. Being that way I feel it makes me enjoy the outdoors much more, it allows me to go camping and just sit and listen to the outdoors or go on a hike and be able to take in what I see without damaging it or bothering it in any way. That is where my education lies, I feel that my sense of place tells me that to see something nice or to enjoy something doesn’t mean you have to touch it, or destroy it to take a souvenir, sometimes just looking at is all you have to do and by saving it for other people they can see that same beauty. By not tampering with it in any way also allows that thing to have a chance to reproduce more, or provide a shelter for other animals, it will allow so much more to thrive, but just seeing it and leaving it be.

Journal entry 1

In this class, like any other class I take I would like to get as much out of it as possible. Colloquium though is a class I have mixed feelings on and I would like to hopefully learn in this class ways I can meet in the middle on my thoughts. Personally I see the world is changing, but I feel it is a natural occurrence, yet I can see where human influence has an addition to this occurrence. I think that by seeing things from a different point of view than mine for the semester will either make me become more aware of what is going on and make me feel more inclined to do more than I already do, or it may harden my beliefs. Either way I would like to see the facts presented from as many points of view as possible. Something I am looking forward to the trips we are going on, I do agree that we should not be destroying nature and I am excited to see the preserves and what people are doing to recover and help to rebuild some of this natural land. So getting to go to these places and learn about all the wildlife within the area and how it all works together is something I am very excited to learn about. I hope that when we are at these places, they teach us about how hard it is for these things to recover, so that we do understand the effect we are having, if I could see that at the places we go I think the overall point of the class would come through much more.