With the help of a State Farm Youth Advisory Board grant and the Museum’s Reclamation Project, students participating in the Museum’s Upward Bound program are serving as Eco-Ambassadors to south Florida’s unique environments. We have all seen the PSAs (public service announcements) that make you stop and think, like NBC’s “The More You Know…” series. Now, our student Eco-Ambassadors are creating their own PSAs in a 5-day One Water Workshop. They’re learning about the whole process of creating a PSA, from scripting to filming to editing, and doing it all themselves in small groups of 4 or 5. The teamwork and creativity brought out in a project like this represents the same kind of effort that we need to apply to involving our communities in environmental conservation. These students are taking a first step towards that goal, by creating their PSAs on topics ranging from natural resource exploitation to restoration to environmental economics. The final films will be finished on January 7, and will be posted to the Miami Science Museum and State Farm Youth Advisory Board websites. So be sure to check back! Because the more you know…

A lone mangrove seedling

On Saturday, December 8^th, 60 Upward Bound Eco-Ambassadors joined a group of volunteers from Miami-Dade College in replanting almost 1,000 mangrove propagules at R. Hardy Matheson Preserve. The Preserve is undergoing a major management effort by Miami-Dade County to remove exotic plants, replant native habitats such as mangroves, and create a multi-use protected area for recreational activities.

In all, over 100 volunteers participated in planting mangrove seedlings that had been exhibited on a wall at Miami Science Museum since November 2011, as part of the Museum’s Reclamation Project.  Specifically, they planted young mangrove plants along the banks of the Snapper Creek, a historical waterway. Not only does Snapper Creek have historical significance, as evidenced by a 500 B.C. Tequesta Indian habitation mound, but it is also one of the largest tracts of coastal native habitat in Miami-Dade County. Until recently, the banks of the creek where the volunteers planted were covered in large mounds of landfill which were dumped there as part of periodic dredging of the creek for the purpose of recreational navigation. These mounds were also, until recently, covered in invasive plants such as Australian pine and Brazilian pepper, and devoid of any native vegetation. Thanks to the efforts of these Eco-Ambassadors, this area will once again be covered in mangroves and associated plants which will provide food and shelter for native birds, mammals and reptiles, such as the endangered American crocodile and the West Indian manatee.

This effort is being funded by a State Farm Youth Advisory Board grant to engage local teenagers in restoring local habitat, outdoor learning and telling their own stories about South Florida’s natural areas through film. Click here for more information on the Reclamation Project, the Eco-Ambassadors, and the State Farm Youth Advisory Board.

The eco-ambassadors gather to start the day

The group wades into the water to replant mangroves

In recent times, it seems more and more difficult for humans to avoid negatively impacting nature. But that does not mean that we can’t make a positive impact. The Museum’s eco-art Reclamation Project works to help restore our coastal environments. You can see these efforts every day, on an exterior wall by the Museum’s Wildlife Center. More than 1,100 mangrove seedlings are lined up in biodegradable cups, waiting to be replanted at several restoration sites scattered throughout Miami. Each year, when all the seedlings are taken to be planted, 1,100 more seedlings are brought in to replace the ones that were taken out. This year, as part of a grant from State Farm Youth Advisory Board, students from the Miami Science Museum’s Upward Bound Math and Science program replaced the 1,100 red mangrove seedlings on the wall with new ones they had collected in September from Bear Cut Preserve on Key Biscayne and Matheson Hammock County Park. The seedlings taken down off the wall will be replanted by the Upward Bound students over the next couple weeks at R. Hardy Matheson Preserve, a Miami-Dade County Park, and on Virginia Key. As part of the same grant, students also visited a restoration site at  Oleta River State Park that is currently covered in invasive species. In the spring, students will help restore the site by replanting 1.5 acres. Through these activities, students begin to have a first-hand understand of the importance of nature – because humans and animals need nature in order to survive, and nature certainly needs our help to survive as well.

Have you ever been to a Museum and wondered how the exhibits are created? How do they decide what the interactive exhibit experiences should be? Who designs them? Do exhibits get tested before they officially open? Young people participating in the Museum’s Environmental Explorers Summer Camp program not only found out the answers, they even gave their opinions on a game prototype for an upcoming hurricane exhibit. These 6^th, 7^th, and 8^th graders tested a Hurricane Preparedness Game that allows players, through interactive touchscreen technology, to choose different hurricane scenarios and try to get all the supplies they need to survive the storm and its aftermath – before time runs out (in other words, before the storm arrives). After the storm passes, players get to see how well they were prepared. When the participants were finished trying out the game, they gave Museum exhibit designers lots of creative ideas for improving the game design and experience, and some of their ideas have even been incorporated into the game! As a thank you for their help, participants were then offered the unique opportunity to visit the Aplysia (Sea Slug) Facility at the University of Miami’s Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science. And when these young people come back to the Museum to see the upcoming Hurricane exhibit, they will know that the exhibit would not have been the same without them.

There are only so many hours in the day, but still, students in the second session of Digital WAVE this summer managed to build an entire 3D house in a virtual world in just 2 weeks. The goal was to show all the ways that we can use “green energy” in our houses, schools, and communities, with solar panels, wind turbines, energy-saving appliances, and lots more. During the program, they also went on a field trip to Oleta River State Park with the Museum’s Reclamation Project Director Fernando Bretos, put together electrical circuits powered by water, wind, and solar power, built and tested remotely operated vehicles, and even climbed into a real OceanGate submarine in the Museum. They also met with Mark Spalding, CEO of the Ocean Foundation, from within the virtual world. Mark (through his avatar) talked about the importance of blue carbon, which is the atmospheric carbon absorbed by coastal environments like mangroves and seagrass beds.  Students even met with a Museum employee who lives “off-the-grid” without electricity or running water – proving it can still be done! All of these experiences, along with their own research, helped students design our energy efficient virtual house. So instead of reading a lot of words to describe what Digital WAVE students did over their summer vacation, enjoy the slideshow of pictures below.  After all, a picture is worth a thousand words.

Testing solar powered circuits in the sunlight outside the Museum

Operating their own ROV design in a tank in the Museum's Sea Lab

Measuring trees at Oleta to determine the carbon they absorb from the air

Climbing into a real OceanGate submarine at the Museum

Designing an energy-efficient, environmentally friendly 3D virtual house

The house has a green roof, solar panels, CFL bulbs, and energy efficient appliances

Solar chimneys provide power by heating air which then rises and powers the turbine

The bathroom has CFL bulbs, a ceiling fan for cooling without AC, and a water efficient toilet

Presenting virtual 3D projects, like this wind turbine, at the Digital WAVE Family Event

The Digital WAVE students have learned a lot this summer – building their own circuits powered by wind, water, and the Sun… following through the Energy Tracker exhibits at the Museum… meeting Martin Keeley, Education Director of the Mangrove Action Project via a virtual world… going on a field trip with Fernando Bretos of the Museum’s Reclamation Project to plant mangrove seedlings… researching energy efficient and environmentally friendly technologies. All of this helped inform student projects, with the big goal to create a 3D virtual exhibit of the “greenest house in Miami.” In the virtual world, students built virtual wind turbines, attenuator buoys to harness wave energy, and solar panels, and they built a virtual house with energy efficient appliances, a green roof, and water recycling abilities. On the last day of the program, students presented their projects to family and friends at the Family Event, held at the Museum. They shared what they had created and what they had learned, and left inspired to suggest or make whatever changes they could in their homes, schools, and lives. Take a tour of our virtual house below!

Digital WAVE house, with green roof

Wind Turbine

Solar panels, compost bins, and recycling containers

CFL light bulbs and ceiling fans

Presenting student projects at the Digital WAVE Family Event

Being in south Florida, we are literally surrounded by precious natural environments – the ocean, the coral reefs, mangroves, the Everglades, to name a few. That means we are in a position to negatively affect our surroundings if we don’t pay attention, but we are also in a position to make a positive difference if we are willing to try. Thanks to Fernando Bretos and the Museum’s Reclamation Project, which works to restore mangrove environments in south Florida, Digital WAVE students were able to contribute to the restoration effort. After learning about the Reclamation Project in the morning, students saw just how interconnected everything in the world really is. Everyone was assigned to be a plant or animal in a mangrove habitat (i.e. fish, seagrass, humans, mangroves, etc), and stood in a circle. One student started out with a ball of string, and that person threw it to another person who represented a plant or animal directly connected to them by the food chain. The second person threw it to the third, and so on, until we had a literally interconnected web, showing that if one thing is in trouble, we are all in trouble. With this inspiration in mind, Fernando took the students to a mangrove restoration site on Virginia Key. Students stepped into the ankle-deep muddy water (sometimes knee-deep when you least expected it), and planted mangrove seedlings, doing their part to help all of us.

Art. Science. Mangroves. These three words are not usually put in the same sentence. But they are the core ideas behind the Museum’s Reclamation Project, which has a singular goal to help reclaim south Florida environments for nature. As part of the project, over 1,100 red mangrove seedlings growing in clear cups of water cover one exterior wall of the Museum, in a thought-provoking exhibit showing that we can all make a difference in the world. Fernando Bretos, Reclamation Project Director, Audubon TogetherGreen Fellow, and Kinship Conservation Fellow, wrote an article about the project which was recently published by Care2, the largest online community in the world for environmental activism. With over 19 million members, Care2 is a great place to help spread the word that even though the world is a big place, every person, and every little mangrove seedling, can make a difference. Click here to check out the article on Care2!

All you need to change the world is time, effort, and caring. In other words, you need volunteers. On Saturday, April 7th, The Reclamation Project, Miami Science Museum’s eco-art based restoration project, completed the first phase of restoration of the headwaters of the Oleta River. Over 70 volunteers planted more than 400 native plants and shrubs along the freshwater section of the river at Highland Oaks County Park in northeast Miami-Dade County. The Oleta River is one of South Florida’s most important rivers, and Highland Oaks is home to the vast wetland system that forms this important waterway. Why is it so important? This waterway not only supports a wide diversity of native habitats, it is also an important part of the ecology and history of South Florida. Used regularly by Tequesta Indians, it serves as the only fresh water tributary to Biscayne Bay that has not been altered by flood control systems. This means it flows naturally and unimpeded from the source to the sea. With the habitats restored, the Highland Oaks region will provide the low salinity environment necessary for commercial and recreational fisheries, and will also provide a critical nesting and foraging area for native birds, reptiles, amphibians and mammals. Looking at the pictures below, you can imagine all of the plants and animals that will really appreciate this effort to restore their home.

Calling all volunteers! Phase II of the restoration at Highland Oaks County Park will take place on Saturday April 21st. The Museum invites you to volunteer your time to this important restoration activity. Please contact Danielle Romero at dromero@miamisci.org for more information.

Last week, Museum staff and Upward Bound students helped restore the Reclamation Project wall at the Wildlife Center for another year.

Each of the 1,111 seedlings that spent a year germinating on the wall were removed and replaced with new seedlings collected by volunteers at Virginia Key. This marks the fourth year the mangrove wall has been replanted. The seedlings that were replaced will be planted next week by a similar group of Museum volunteers at Virginia Key. This annual activity brings Museum staff together to celebrate our environmental resources and help restore mangrove wetlands and urban habitats.

“The effort from Museum staff epitomizes the heart and soul of the Project; to engage Miami residents to reclaim land for nature” said Reclamation Project Director, Fernando Bretos. “As humans are the primary cause for coastal wetland deforestation, the act of restoration allows us to be the solution as well”

The Reclamation Project is a participatory eco-art based restoration project that engages Miami residents to reclaim land for nature, one seedling at a time. The 1,111 Red mangrove seedlings on the wall at the Wildlife Center are metaphorically reclaiming a concrete structure for what once thrived there; a mangrove forest. The Reclamation Project is the brainchild of local Miami artist Xavier Cortada.

To support the Reclamation Project, please visit: http://www.miamisci.org/www/reclamation-project-form.php