Awaiting Autumn: Wrapping up Summer at CNC!

These past few weeks have been busy winding down our summer here at Cayuga Nature Center. We had a blast with a journey through time and focusing on how researchers reconstruct the past with help from the clues hidden in rocks, ice, and soil. We unlocked the prehistoric era by recreating fossils, exploring our gorge for signs of an ancient salty sea, and discovering what animals once walked in our backyards. While we didn’t get to go to Museum of the Earth this year due to COVID-19 restrictions, we explored different activities, including making our very own glaciers. We also learned about the changing of seasons as we prepare to enter Autumn, and explored how the woods are changing and how animal behaviors will be geared towards preparing for winter. And of course, we enjoyed the beautiful colors all around us! 

Campers got to travel back in time – back 12,000 years ago – when CNC was home to mastodons who lived near the edge of the melting glaciers of the last ice age. We measured time (with a 60-meter tape measure) to appreciate how long ago that really was. Then we re-created the ancient landscape in miniature, making paper hills and valleys covered with a glacier made of GAK (a.k.a. SLIME). Everyone made their own GAK, in personalized colors, and watched the GAK flow across the miniature landscape, following the valleys as it spread outward.

Campers got creative learning about mushroom spores and created some amazing different prints using them!

Mushroom spores are very small and can only be seen individually with a microscope. On a mature mushroom, many thousands of spores grow on just one gill or on a small piece of a mushroom. In order to see a group of spores and also the color of the spores, we can make a spore print. Spore color can range from white to many other shades, including black. Campers went on a mushroom hike and collected mushrooms around the woods at Cayuga Nature Center. They then removed the stems and set them face down on paper and waited until the next day to discover the beautiful prints they left!

And of course, we had a blast playing in the treehouse! We loved being able to welcome back campers to our grounds this summer, and are so thankful for our time together this summer. 

We can’t wait to see everyone next summer!