Hogan Institute

Over the course of the last 2 weeks I have been fortunate to be part of the Hogan Prep/Rockhurst Interdisciplinary Summer Institute. Drs. Annie Lee, Zdenka Guadarrama, Laura Salem, Rob Vigliotti and I, along with a group of wonderful Rockhurst students, hosted 18 students from Hogan Prep High School in Kansas City. We set out to give them the complete college experience by issuing them IDs, having them stay in the dorms and eat on campus the first week, and taking classes during the day, all the while working on a recycling project that they will implement at Hogan. The classes included biology, chemistry, math and philosophy; and more specifically to biology, students conducted molecular biology experiments during the first week with Dr. Salem (including isolating their own DNA!) and then conducted some organismal and field biology with me during the second week. The top picture shows the group who helped me track snakes yesterday while the bottom picture shows our small-mammal trapping team. We all had a blast and I think they learned a lot about science and philosophy, college life, and themselves along the way.

JMIH

I just returned from an outstanding conference, the Joint Meeting of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists, in Portland, OR. Aside from the informative talks - there were 10 concurrent paper sessions every 15 minutes all day for 5 days and 100s of posters - the city was fantastic and it was great to reconnect with people I hadn't seen since last year or years past. I presented a poster concerning our rattlesnake relocation project and it was very well-received. Everyone was excited to see what we were doing here in KS and MO to conserve our wildlife and to help to preserve these creatures.

Snake Surgery

On Tuesday evening my reseach student, Eric, and I packed up all of my surgical supplies and headed to Johnson Co., KS, to implant some rattlesnakes. Animal Control, supervised by my friend and colleague, Jennifer, had recovered two courting rattlesnakes from a resident's backyard after they became entangled in landscape fabric. We were asked to come out and implant radio-transmitters in these two so that they could be released and their movements tracked by radio-telemetry. This picture shows me suturing up a very large male. Actually, Timber Rattlesnakes aren't NEARLY as huge as people think - he was one of the largest males we've caught and he was only 3.2 feet long and weighed just over 2 pounds! The other snake was a big, pregnant female (rattlesnakes give live birth), so we were extremely careful with her. Both of them recovered well and are doing great. They will be released later this week.

Back from Ireland

Aric and my brother, Jeremy, and I just returned from a week in Ireland. It was AMAZING! We spent several days in Dublin seeing the sites and took the train across the beautiful countryside to the west. We rented a car in Limerick and from there my brother masterfully drove us around on the left side of incredibly narrow roads and round-abouts. We were very fortunate to be able to stay in the childhood village of Dr. Mairead Greene (of the RU Math Dept.) in her grandfather's home. Our time in the west was spent on the beach, at the breathtaking Cliffs of Moher, in picturesque Irish castles, and in the wonderful little town of Ennis. Ireland is a truly remarkable place and I only wish we'd had more time there! Pictured are Jeremy and Aric in front of the High Cross at Dysert O'Dea in Co. Clare, and me and Jeremy under the waterfall at the Guinness Storehouse in Dublin.

Buck O'Neil Legacy Seat

A while back, Aric nominated me for the honor of sitting in the great Buck O'Neil's Legacy Seat at a KC Royals game. Buck O'Neil was a Kansas City legend and a hero to baseball. He played in the Negro Leagues, was the first African-American coach of a MLB team, and established the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in KC (you should definitely see this museum!). He also performed countless other services for the Kansas City community and has been greatly missed since his death a few years ago. As a tribute to Buck, his seat at Kauffman Stadium is always filled during Royals home games, and the person with the honor of sitting in his seat must first be nominated and then selected. To my surprise I received that honor and yesterday filled his seat, the only red one in a sea of blue at the stadium. Not only did my three guests and I (left to right: Rob, Laura (Dr. Salem), me and Aric) receive VIP treatment, but we got the privilege of watching the Royals from the same spot Buck had watched them from for so many years as a scout and a fan - right behind home plate.

Back from Nicaragua...

It's been a while since my last post because my parents came into town from Texas right after we returned from Nicaragua. I love showing them around this amazing city, but I must say it was difficult to make the transition from a 2-week stay in an impoverished country to the extravagance of American life. We were without electricity or potable water, surrounded by a foreign culture and ecosystem, and quickly became immersed. To return to superfluous gadgets and luxuries was difficult to accept and made all of us feel paradoxically guilty and thankful for what we have.

This picture is of some of the Field Trip students looking out over Lake Nicaragua and Granada from the cloud forest atop Mombacho, an inactive volcano. Like every aspect of this country, it was incredible.

Nicaragua

Bright and early Memorial Day morning, Dr. Scholes, Linda Lehrbaum (of KCWildlands), 10 students and I will be boarding a plane to Nicaragua for our Biology Field Trip Class! Well, we'll actually be boarding 3 consecutive planes and spending a lot of quality time with one another in multiple airports, but by the end of it all we'll be landing in Managua. We will stay at a functional farm outside of Jinotepe, surrounded by tropical forests abounding with biology. Needless to say, we're all very excited. The picture here is from our 2007 trip to this same locality - there will be many more to add upon our return in June!