Urban Naturalists at Nathan Bishop Middle School: Watersheds and Pollution Clean Ups

Today, the Urban Naturalists explored the concept of watersheds. A watershed, as defined by the US EPA, is an "area of land where all of the water that is under it or drains off of it goes to the same place." We talked about how throwing chemicals or using fertilizers in our gardens affects the bodies of water that may not always be right in our backyard. We tested out this idea by creating our very own watershed areas in the classroom. we drew houses and gardens and even created a landfill and watched what happened when a rainstorm came. The urban naturalists noted that, though the landfills they created were far apart from the lakes, gravity pulled the rainwater all the way down into the lakes, polluting the water.

Next, we considered what would happen to the lakes if they became polluted. We experimented with various ways to try to clean up oil out of buckets of water. We tested sponges, paper towels, gauze, cotton balls, face clothes, dryer lint, and spoons. We decided that the spoons and cotton balls worked best to remove the oil. We talked about the difficulties of oil spills and the importance of preventing pollution problems rather than constantly trying to clean them up.

Testing out dryer lint to see if it picks up oil!

Finally, we had a very special presentation by two of our 8th grade Urban Naturalists who have spent many sessions over the past 3 years in this program. Kash and Emeril did research on Eastern Box Turtles and Spotted Turtles and gave a presentation to the fellow Urban Naturalists.