Preserving and protecting the water resources and natural communities of the Corkscrew Regional Ecosystem Watershed
Come out and join us for a community wide Flint Pen Clean Up
Friday, February 6th from 8-1pm
Be prepared to get your hands dirty and plan ahead by bringing/wearing the following:
Please RSVP by emailing Jessi Drummond at education@crewtrus.mystagingwebsite.com or call 239-657-2253 by February 4th 2015.
It’s often apoptosis, a term that comes from plant kingdom where the Greek apoptosis originally meant the loss of petals of leaves. Now, it can refer to both the plant and animal kingdoms and is also called Programmed Cell Death (PCD).
Cells in plants and animals can self-destruct when they are no longer needed or if they are damaged. For plants, this achieves and maintains stability within the internal environment when it is dealing with external changes.
Natural PCD (not caused by external factors) includes the timely death of petals after fertilization and the senescence of leaves. Host-controlled PCD is also a means of resistance to pathogens. Cells challenged by pathogens initiate a hypersensitive response, which is a rapid PCD process that is activated in order to inhibit the spread of invading pathogen.
PCD in plants has a number of molecular similarities to animal apoptosis, but it also has differences. The most obvious is the lack of an immune system to remove the pieces of the dead cell.
Greatly simplified, instead of an immune response, an enzyme is activated that destroys the central vacuole (a bubble-like cavity) in the plant cell, which is followed by disintegration of the rest of the cell. This creates a protective, dead “envelope” around the pathogen to limit its spread. This is what may appear on some leaves as a yellow and brown blotch.
Some examples of apoptosis in the animal kingdom include the resorption of the tadpole tail at the time of its metamorphosis into a frog, the removal of tissue between fingers and toes of the fetus as it develops, the elimination of T cells that might otherwise mount an autoimmune attack on the body, and during the pupal stage of insects that undergo a complete metamorphosis, the death of most of the cells of the larva which provide nutrients for the development of the adult structures.
For more than you would ever want to know about apoptosis, visit
http://jcmb.halic.edu.tr/pdf/
For a simpler explanation of apoptosis, visit
http://science.howstuffworks.
Like to bike? Well come out to Bird Rookery Swamp on January 9th, 2015 and join CREW Trust volunteers Peter Tomlinson and Jan Watson for a guided tour of the picturesque 12-mile loop.
View beautiful scenery, great wildlife, and enjoy the company of like-minded souls.
Activity Level: Strenuous-This is a trail ride on uneven, soft, grassy/sandy trails. Ground level with swamp on both sides of the trail.
BRING YOUR OWN BICYCLE: Mountain, hybrid or fat tire bikes are recommended. Not appropriate for road bicycles. CREW does NOT provide bikes for this tour.
Space is limited to first 20 riders that register, so use the link below and sign up fast:
http://www.eventbrite.com/e/bird-rookery-swamp-bike-tour-registration-11948031885
CREW has had an incredible 25th Anniversary Year:
* Over 38,000 visitors to CREW Trails
* Two amazing fundraisers brought in over $30,000
* CREW volunteers donated 3,906 hours
* 4,600 people participated in our environmental education programs
January 2014, the CREW Trust began its 25th anniversary, celebrating 25 years of land conservation and environmental education in southwest Florida. From the kick-off event in frigid cold weather last January to our final #GivingTuesday end-of-year fundraising campaign running through December 31st, this celebration has had something for everyone – a wine & cheese social and a BBQ for CREW members, trail events that included a variety of guided walks about everything from mushrooms to mammals, a geocaching day, a horseback ride through Flint Pen Strand, a guided bicycle ride at Bird Rookery Swamp, a Vitamin N Walk for families, a fabulous 25th anniversary concert featuring the Sarah Hadeka Band and Deb & the Dynamics, and our first #GivingTuesday fundraiser. Thank you to every one of you who volunteered, participated, sponsored, supported, and gave to CREW during 2014, making our 25th anniversary such a success! We look forward to the next 25 years…
The CREW Trust is wrapping up its 25th anniversary with a year-end giving campaign centered around #GivingTuesday.
The campaign started December 2nd, 2014 and goes through December 31st.
Help us raise $25,000 by the end of the year for our Education Fund. Donate online today at https://crewtrus.mystagingwebsite.com/donate/
Your gift is an investment in the future of southwest Florida – helping us to provide more high quality environmental education experiences for people of all ages! With over 42,000 annual visitors to the CREW trails, there is much more to be done.
Help us make a difference. Give big. Give small. But give today.
The CREW Land & Water Trust will hold its Board of Trustees meeting Friday, January 23, 2015 from 9:00 AM to noon at the Estero Community Center, 9200 Corkscrew Palms Blvd., Estero, FL 33928.
CREW Trust members and other interested parties are welcome to attend. Come out and learn more about your local community. The full CREW Trust Board only meets three times per year.
Come out an join us for CREW’s once a month Strolling Science Seminar. For January we are exploring prescribed burns. With veteran fire expert Jim Schortemeyer and CREW project leader Joe Bozzo .
Come and explore the unique interactions of fire and water that have shaped the CREW landscape for thousands of years. Learn some history, explore fire basics, and view the direct impacts of fire on wildlife habitats. Experience the basic prescribed fire techniques and how different techniques benefit different species. See the results of fire exclusion and discuss all the reasons for using prescribed fire on CREW lands.
Jim Schortemeyer is an experienced prescribed burn manager, fire instructor and wildlife biologist. His stories bring to life the very real impacts and results of working with fire. Joe Bozzo is CREW’s current land manager and project leader and together they have over 6 decades of experience managing South Florida’s wildlife and habitats.
This is an adult only hike.
What to wear/bring: Wear comfortable outdoor walking clothes and closed-toed shoes.
Please bring some water to drink and snacks for the trail walk.
If you would like to purchase tickets click the link below:
Become a CREW member before December 31st and participate in our most popular Members Only Wine & Cheese Social.
This event is in honor of our amazing CREW members and volunteers. Come meet new friends, visit with CREW Trustees and staff, and enjoy some drinks and light snacks under a gorgeous full moon sky.
To become a CREW member click the link: https://crewtrus.mystagingwebsite.com/become-a-member/
Become a member today: https://crewtrus.mystagingwebsite.com/become-a-member/
Can you identify the plant in this photo?
This plant, with its feathery foliage and towering stature, grows alongside the trail out at the CREW Marsh Trails. The trails get a lot of visitors this time of year, especially 3rd graders from Collier County as part of their field trips to CREW. Schoolchildren visit CREW with their teachers and spend half of their morning on a nature hike, guided by our very own Jessi Drummond, who leads them through stops that feature explanations about prescribed burns, how to identify poison ivy and why it’s an important food source for deer, and even, if they are lucky, investigating scat (most often Bobcat scat). The other half of their field trip is spent dip netting and identifying the different living organisms in their water samples. The kids then have lunch, and leave- hopefully- with a pretty clear idea of why the watershed is important, with discussions that focus on habitat, the water cycle, and how the marshlands help clean our water.
This plant that is pictured above is one of our sensory teaching tools. Jessi stops with the students, takes off a few leaves, and passes them around to the students. “What do you smell?” she asks as little hands eagerly shoot up in the air. The students share that they smell everything from licorice to mint, and Jessi then lets them know that she smells pickles when she smells this plant which is Dog Fennel. Tying in their senses- hearing, touch, smell, sight- is an important part of the field trip for so many kids who just don’t spend enough time outside.
Education is a very important part of our mission at CREW, and this year, we’ve got a fundraising campaign for the month of December. Our goal is to raise $25,000, and an end-of-year gift from you, our supporters and members, can make that happen. It’s part of #GivingTuesday, an effort by many non-profits nationwide to remind everyone that after Black Friday and Cyper Monday, sometimes it’s nice to find a way to give back and pay it forward. Your donation will help further our education efforts at CREW and support all of our educational programs, including our field trips.
You can find out more about our #GivingTuesday campaign on our website (https://crewtrus.mystagingwebsite.com/2014/11/10/6996/). All donors receive a link to a special set of photographs of our CREW wildlife and donors at higher levels can receive special goodies, like tickets to our Concert and Silent Eco-Auction in March.
Next time you are out on the CREW Marsh Trails, watch out for the Dog Fennel, and take a moment to appreciate how this plant on the side of the trail has such a huge impact on 3rd graders in Collier County.
– Anne Reed
