ECHO

"You can give a man a fish, and feed him for the day,

Teach a man to fish, and feed him for a lifetime"

(quote from the film we saw)



The ECHO field trip was very enlightening because I feel passionate about what our tour guide was speaking about. She was speaking about helping others and how spreading the concern and love for helping others is crucial to the improvement of our planet as a whole. ECHO stands for Educational Concerns for Hunger Organization. This is a Christian non-for profit organization where the mission is to bring glory to good by using science and technology to help the poor. ECHO has replica land fields to learn how to grow the best for each particular environment, including 6 different climate settings.ECHO has helped over 180 countries around the world.

The Neem Tree was the most interesting plant we saw because it can be used for almost anything. It is used to cure funguses, lice, the bark can be used as a tooth brush, or it can be soaked in water and used as a pest repellent on plants.




My mom is very into growing her own plants and having a garden. Every morning she goes outside to water her plants and keep her garden well kept. I am not as into gardening as she is but  I have noticed that when I eat vegetables from her garden it is so much more fresh then what we can get at the supermarket. This makes me want to be more into gardening but my excuse is always that I do not have enough time. But, these kinds of things I need to start making time for. It is something I need to work on.

Overall this field trip was a good experience and as the semester continues I realize how important this class. It teaches us so much about things we can do to help our living conditions and how at the same time we are helping our earth. We need to do as much as we can to preserve it for the people who are going to be here after us.

-photos taken by me-

Mantanza Pass Preserve & 20/20

                                                      MANTANZA PRESERVE



 brochure



 Showing up at the Fort Myers Beach Cottage I was in shock at how old it looked. I was under the impression that it was old and has withstood a lot of experience and history, but going inside reassured this feeling. Inside there were pictures from when this cottage was the only thing on the beach and went directly from cottage to sand to ocean. Now there are roads and another strip of stores blocking this ancient beauty from showing. A woman Josephine Hughes spoke about the history of the cottage and how so much in our society has changed. She also explained something I thought was an interesting way to look at our life. She said that every other species has learned to live with humans; we are the only species that has not learned to live among others.

The walk on the boardwalk was very interesting because we were literally walking in between mangroves and it was also very peaceful. The boardwalk is also made out of all recycled products which I thought was awesome. It shows that people are taking into consideration of reusing their trash because you can always find a use for something.          

 "Someone's trash is another persons treasure"

At one point while we were walking through the boardwalk we came across this little house that gave us a beautiful view of the bay and while we were there we saw two dolphins swim by. I thought that was amazing because I love dolphins and those are animals you do not see everyday. That was a great moment!

photo taken from
www.google.com/images

This is the first time I hear about the 20/20 program and I think this is a great idea! I think we need more awareness and to get the word out to other people about what is happening in our environment and things to improve it. This website has daily news about what is going on and also has a calender of each month and the events or projects that are happening as well. After looking at this website I am very interested in one day in the near future I would like to visit one of these preserves.

How do you feel about using tax dollars for land preservation?

I agree with using tax dollars to preserve our land because I think that if we left it up to private businesses they would not have the proper funding to preserve the land. It is up to us as citizens and the citizens money to use their money wisely and preserve the other species on our planet. (interviewed an FGCU student)

Freshwater Area

                                                 CORKSCREW SWAMP



Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary

  Corkscrew swamp was the first field trip my colloquium class took this semester. I was nervous about going on this field trip because I did not know what to expect and I had heard that in colloquium we would take swamp walks and I was not looking forward to walking through a swamp. As we began our field trip down the boardwalk I would have never imagined that their was so much history behind the land that corkscrew is preserving.  


Back in the 1900's corkscrew was a very popular location where hunters would come to shot plume birds that were very popular here in south Florida. This became such a problem that Audborn began a campaign and this campaign ended this horrid  hunting disaster for these birds.


Plume Bird

 The Cypress Logging is another important tree that is preserved in Corkscrew  Swamp Sanctuary. Back in the 1950's a man named Joe Brown wrote an article to the Miami Herald informing them about the limitation of the old-growth cypress. This article brought alot of attention to this issue about saving the old-growth cypress forest and now Corkscrew protects about 700 acres of cypress forest. Today Corkscrew is the largest preserve in the nation. They have recorded that some cypress tress are up to 700 years old.

Cypress Forest

This is just some history background that I learned about while on the field trip at Corkscrew Swamp. Their was also the extensive drainage and diversion of water in the 1960's which is still a problem today. How our world is over populating so fast and we are damaging animals natural habitats and causing them to become endangered. Another issue that caught my attention was the wet and dry season in South Florida. The wet season in South Florida is normally May through October and a good percentage of our rain falls during those months. The average rain that Corkscrew gets during those months is 46". The rain is always good for the swamp because this is when the insect population explodes and the swamp over flows. On the other hand the dry season is very dangerous for the swamp. The swamp level becomes very low and animals begin to die because they get stuck in the ponds with no water flow so then they are not able to get out. This is a continues cycle that happens all year around.


The boardwalk is home to many habitats for example; pine flatwoods, wet prairie, pond cypress, bald cypress, and lettuce lake. During the field trip we had time to just stop and take in everything we were seeing and the sounds we could hear. The night before our field trip it had rained so the swamp was very wet and the water level was high as well. During this time of reflexion I hear a noise of a pig snorting. At least I could have sworn it was a pig in the swamp. Then I learned that it was not a pig but it is called a pig frog.I found this so interesting because the noise it makes is exactly like a pig. I wish I would have been able to see the frog but we could not find it.

Pig Frog

The living machine to me was the most interesting thing at the Corkscrew Swamp. The living machine is a form of sustainability that the swamp uses. When we first arrived to the boardwalk several students used the bathroom and when we came out Adam our leader told us that we just invested into the living machine. I did not understand at first what he meant by that but then he explained it to us. The living machine uses water, sunlight, bacteria, plants and animals to treat and clean the water to make it sustainable to recycle into the toilets. I did not know something like that could happen but I found it very interesting. The process is much more complex that how I explained it but that is the way I understand it.

The process of the living machine

Overall I enjoyed this field trip and I think it was a great start to this semester and I am excited to see the other field trips we will be taking this semester!

all photes were taken from www.google.com/images