When Team Paleo began volunteering at the museum, several employees took interest. Normally the kids work behind the scenes in collections, but the Curator of Education saw potential in the team as well. She recently asked if Team Paleo would volunteer for some public events. Several members of the team, along with younger siblings recently volunteered for a day long Eagle Days Festival- an event that includes half a dozen nature organizations near Lewistown and Havana in Illinois, on February 8, 2014.
I (Jen McDaniel) was asked to help out in my capacity as a Master Naturalist. The kids with Team Paleo and I, along with many other volunteers, pulled off a pretty fun day!
Gwen created an Eagle Trivia Game with 25 facts about eagles set up on poster board. She gave away colored feathers as prizes. She also helped with a push pin punch work of the eagle constellation, and an Eagle Vision project where participants could unfurl a 40 foot ribbon to see just how far an eagle can see an object the size of standard book print. She and Katie personally manned the Eagle Eye project, asking visitors if they wanted to test their 'eagle vision'. It was great fun and the visitors loved it.
Included is an article I authored for the Master Naturalist newsletter after the event.
Master
Naturalists Weave an Ecology of Community at Eagle Days Festival
Ecology, that dynamic interplay between life and its environment, is an oft heard buzzword in Illinois River Valley Master Naturalist circles. So it is no wonder that several Master Naturalists volunteered their talents celebrating local ecology during the Eagle Days Festival at Lewiston's Dickson Mounds Museum this February.
Master Naturalists facilitated ticket reservations, ran craft stations, and crated in crows and raptors, all to keep the day running smoothly.
Over 150 visitors attended, enjoying an energizing native raptor presentation by World Bird Sanctuary of Missouri where eagles, or hawks and owls at least, literally soared overhead. Attendees also tested their vision at an Eagle Eye display, viewed feathers under a microscope with the staff of the UIS Therkildsen Field Station, crafted eagle hats with Master Naturalists, and played wildlife bingo with Chautauqua Wildlife Refuge. Many other local groups contributed as well.
In the fluvial ecology of eagles, a triangle of waterways, feathers, and sky form an environment unique to the river valleys of Illinois. Also drawn to this rich crux of river bottoms and bluffs is the culture of humans. Like those who gathered for Eagle Days in our new century, cultures of long ago also celebrated the eagle's valley. They utilized resources such as river mussels and reeds, cultivated nut trees and goosefoot seeds, all while birthing and burying their community in the loess-filled hills where Dickson Mounds and Emiquon are now sited. At Eagle Days we came together as a living culture while our land's Mississippian forebears slept silently interred just yards away in the foundations of a building that is no moribund museum of bones but a thriving, living community center for the diverse cultures who gather today.
Master Naturalists take on many roles in ecology, often connecting humans with their environment. During the Eagle Days Festival, diverse peoples past and present, near and far also connected; all like fibers woven into an ecological fabric of community.
