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Highlands Today

Science Class Explores Local Lake Environment

Highlands Today photo by JASMINA MEYER

Junior Environmental Science students Erika Felix, from left, Angie Morales and Brian Cornine look for specimens with dip nets along the shoreline of Glenada Lake in Avon Park.

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By MARC VALERO

Highlands Today

Published: October 22, 2008

AVON PARK - Wading near the shoreline Tuesday morning in Lake Glenada, high school students used nets to discover what's living in the placid water.

They will likely find minnows and exotic and native grass, according to Corine Burgess, natural resource specialist, and Erin McCarta, lake management assistant, with the Highlands Soil and Water Conservation District.

Career Academy student Keria Laster thought she found something much larger than a minnow.

The 11th-grader took a step and then let out a scream.

"I found a big, old log and I thought it was a gator, and man I was scared, but it was fun though" Laster said, after the hands-on and foot-on lesson.

A three-foot gator was lurking in the lake's grass, but it moved away.

Burgess and McCarta recently presented a classroom lesson to the students on littoral zones, which are the shoreline areas of a lake or body of water. Now the environmental science students, in instructor Chet Maxcy's class, explored the lake behind the Health/Science Building at South Florida Community College.

"The idea is basically to give them the lecture in the classroom one week and then bring them out in the real world the next week so they can apply what they learn," Burgess said.

Most of the students wore shorts and Burgess and McCarta provided boots and hip waders.

Working in pairs with the larger seine nets and solo using dipping nets, the students called out when they caught something.

Rachel Reints and her classmate found a stone fish.

"It was fun," Reints said. "I liked it; it was better than class."

After the fish and insects were identified they were returned to the water.

Burgess said "we don't want to hurt anything, just see what lives here."

A student asked why the grass shrimp were so small compared to the larger shrimp from the grocery store?

McCarta said the shrimp we eat are from salt water and this is fresh water shrimp.

Grass shrimp are the sign of a good healthy ecosystem, she said. They like to live in the grass.

"Do you think we might have found a whole lot more if there were more plants here?" McCarta asked.

"Yes," the students responded.

The students found fish that were small so they need shade and protection from predators to grow, McCarta said.

"This was a lot better than dissecting a frog," a male student commented.

The next lesson from Burgess and McCarta, involving the lake, will be on water quality.

Marc Valero can be reached at 386-5826 or mvalero@highlandstoday.com

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