Day 4, Seedlings and Pizza

Today we went to the Wild Animal Park to help plant some seedlings to restore the areas that were damaged by the 2007 October wildfires.

When we arrived, we took a small hike to a cabin where some bird curators, I believe, showed us some presentations showing the fires extent and damage. We learned that, how ever big the Witch Creek fire was, only 2 out of 3,500 animals died. Though Unfortunately, they were both endangered. After the presentations, we took a safari ride around an enclosed area where deer, rhino and all kinds of exotic animals lived. It was there I learned that rhinos were Territorial like a dog(So that's why they always charge at people). When we arrived at the planting site, we start to plant. The instructors pointed out some neon-orange, hair looking parasite called witch's hair. It blocked whatever-plant-it-was-on's sunlight so it became weak. Then the plant basically devoured it. Just then, when I started to dig a hole, I came to a close encounter with an irritating plant(I don't remember the exact name but I believe it was called a needler plant). Then my hand started to itch terribly. Panicked, I quickly told an instructor what had happened and showed him the plant. With a sigh of relief he said,"Oh, that's just a needler". Then he ripped off a leaf and showed me what made it itch. He said that there were little syringe-like spikes on the leaf that, when you touched it, injected an irritant into your skin with causes the prickly sensation. Then he gave me the new job to go around and tell everyone what the plant looked like, and what would happen if you touched it. After planting the seedlings we moved on to enjoy the rest of the safari ride. We saw ostriches, elephants, giraffes, deer, more rhinos and a lot of birds. Then we got off and left the park.

When we got back to the school, we had PIZZA! And discussed what we learned about.

David Ramirez
-mrp