Back to School after Thanksgiving ... and the golden mouse!

Over Thanksgiving, Rachel and Kyle were in from Champaign, Illinois.  John and Claire were in for a couple of days too.  After hosting Sue's family for Thanksgiving, we had a chance to visit with our children.  Rachel and I went through all the hives again and fed light hives one more time.  We also put in the bottom boards getting ready for the winter to come!  One of Rachel's high school friends, Elizabeth brought her daughter, Evelyn over for a while and she put on a show! Evelyn is two. We got in a couple of walks in unusually nice weather.

Rachel and Kyle left before Sunday school.  After church, Sue Neal and I went into to school and worked for a while.  I wrote a recommendation ... it is that time of the year ... many students applying to GSP or colleges.  Back to the house now getting some things ready for school tomorrow.  Only 15 school days until Christmas vacation, we have a lot to do before then.

In Genetics tomorrow we will finish our lab on the properties of water and test water for oxygen content using our LaMotte kits / Winkler test.  We will be looking at the amount of dissolved oxygen in cool water compared to warm water.  Later in AP Biology we have a lab using these kits and we will make sure the kits are ready to go.

In Selected Topics, we will finish their water lab and finish our look at evolution / population genetics.

In Computer Programming, we will check our first five Visual BASIC problems before entering into some problems of intermediate difficulty.  Students will start on their exit project.

We start back into softball practice on Tuesday and our basketball teams start their seasons on Tuesday also!

I have been thinking about getting some small animal traps to see if we have any golden mice on our farm. Maybe get a couple of Sherman Traps ... http://www.shermantraps.com/

The habitat on our farm with is perfect but since they are mostly nocturnal, would be hard to locate on a walk.  An interesting small mammal that I did not know existed before having a conversation with Coach Hahus at the AP Session a couple of weeks ago ...  prehensile tail and arboreal!

Golden Mouse - Ochrotomys nuttalli

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_mouse

 


http://www.wildflorida.com/wildlife/mammals/GoldenMouse-FloridaEcotravelGuide.php