Mingling with Manatees








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Figuring Out the Largest Animal with NO Teeth!

Blue Whale

Blue Whale

Blue whales are the largest animals alive today and they have no teeth to eat food! Instead blue whales are filter feeders. There are a total of 15 types of whales that eat this way. These species are known as Baleen whales, because they have baleen plates instead of teeth. These plates are made up of stiff hairs that look like combs and are used to filter food from ocean water. Baleen whales filter small fish, crustaceans known as krill, and plankton from the ocean water. Baleen whales swallow large amounts of ocean water containing the food and then push the water out of their mouths through the baleen. While letting the water out of their mouths, the baleen keeps the food in their mouths. Humpback whales, gray whales, right whales, mink whales, sei whales, Byrde’s whales, and fin whales are all Baleen Whales.

Humpback Whale showing off its baleen inside its mouth!

Humpback Whale showing off its baleen inside its mouth!

Scientists in Canada estimated that a Blue Whale can consume 480 million calories of food in a single dive. The average person ONLY consumes 2,000 calories per day. In one day, this whale will consume around 12,500 pounds of food to fuel its 300,000 pound (150 ton) body! Feeding occurs eight months of the year and then these whales live off their bubbler reserves for the other four months. Most of the time they dive to a depth of 300 feet to capture their prey.

Now these numbers don’t mean much unless you compare them to numbers and amounts that are easier to picture! Compared to blue whales an average adult eats about 4.7 pounds of food in one day. Additionally, 2,000 people who each weighed 150 pounds would equal the weight of one blue whale! If 2,000 people are too hard to picture, a blue whale is roughly the weight of 25 African bull elephants!

There are a lot more numbers that can be applied to the blue whale that are just amazing- like their hearts weight roughly 1 ton and are about the size of Science Bug! There are about 12,000 blue whales swimming throughout the oceans today where there used to be around 200,000 to 300,000 whales.  Before you go off becoming a blue whale expert, try your hand at the math problems below to see what else you can “figure out” about this amazing animal!

Ariel View of Blue Whale in the Indian Ocean

Ariel View of Blue Whale in the Indian Ocean

1. If you round up the amount of food consumed by the average person, how many times more does a Blue Whale eat?

2. What percentage of its body weight does a blue whale eat in one day?

3. How many tons of food does a blue whale eat using the US short ton conversion (1 ton= 2,000 pounds)?

4. Using the numbers above, what is the average weight of a male African elephant weigh?

5. Can you convert the weight of the African elephant from pounds to tons?

6.If a small dog or large cat weighs 15 pounds, how many would you need to equal the weight of the blue whale? African elephant? And the 150-pound person?

7. If the depth that the whale dives to get its food was compared to football field with the 0 yard line (end zone) being at the surface, what yard line would the whale be diving to?

Look for the answers in an up-coming blog post! Send us your answers prior to us posting ours and get your name in the post!

Summer of the Toads

I never encountered as many toads as I did this summer. I knew they were not frogs because toads have bumps on their skin and most frogs have smooth skin. My cat, Sebastian even found an American Toad under our deck. I immediately thought something was wrong with the toad (see photo below), since it had some brown slime coming from it’s mouth!


I later learned that toads have the ability to secrete a poisonous slim when they are scared.  This toad also puffed itself up to look bigger.  This is another part of their defense strategies.

American toads also have special glands, called paratoid glands, which look like bumps on their head. These glands produce a foul-smelling, toxic chemical. This is another defense mechanism that keeps predators from trying to eat it.

Toads start their life in the water and then spend the rest of their lives on land.  Toads change from a tadpole to a toad. Some species can do this in only 12 days while others need a full year.  When a young toad grows, it’s skin does not grow, so it needs to shed its skin. Ever wonder why no one has brought in a toad skin for show and tell?  Toads actually eat their old skin!

Toads also like to bury into the dirt during the hottest parts of the day or for protection. They can dig backwards with their hind legs.  Imagine my surprise to dig up this little toad in my flower garden. The dirt was moving and then a Bufo Americanus Toad hopped into the woods. It is very well camouflaged in this picture.  Can you find it?


The Official Start of Summer



It started with the summer solstice.






Now this is where it gets very interesting….




Until then here’s to fireflies, ice cream and beach days!

Detectives in Training!



Zachary and Rowan

Thomas and Aiden

Alex and Dmitri

Adam and Cameih

Jake and Carson

Seth, Noah, and Colman

Natalie and Dylan

Honorable Mention to Maria and Rosie for an awesome picture!



Evan and Owen

Sarah and Anya

John and Caleb

Congratulations on a job well done!


Inside the forest #1


Mysterious Moving Rocks






  • Temperatures reaching below freezing the during winter nights?


Groundhog Questions and Answers








What do groundhogs do to get ready for winter?


What happens when you hibernate?


How big is a typical burrow?


What do groundhogs do when out and about all day?


Do you really look for your shadow on Groundhog Day?


Measuring Flow

Have you ever seen something that looks like this…



Or like this…











Or even like this…

These shed and boxes are  called stream gage stations. They are scattered through out the United States along river banks. Stream gages can even be silver boxes mounted to sides of bridges. The gages are part of the stream gaging network maintained by the United States Geological Survey (USGS). Yes, the USGS studies more than just rocks and volcanoes! One of the biggest responsibilities of the USGS is to study water!


Each one of these stations has equipment that can detect the height of the water and how much water is flowing in the river. 


The amount of water flowing in the river is measured in cubic feet per second* (cfs).  This type of information is especially important when designing the construction of dams and bridges, irrigation, and during stormy weather.

Next blog installment:  Check the amount of water flowing in your state at each stream gage station- right from your own computer!!! 

*What is a cubic foot?  Picture a box that is 1 foot high, 1 foot in length, and 1 foot in width to visualize a cubic foot.  Another way to visualize a cubic foot is to picture a basketball since a basketball is just about the size of a cubic foot.  So you can think of the stream gage as being able to tell you how many water “basketballs” flow past it every second.



Do raindrops get bigger as they fall from the sky?






The Beginning with Rex Trailer

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