Who Eats Whom Exhibit
A new. interactive nature exhibit has been installed in the Wetlands Room of the Nature Museum - be sure to visit and explore the intricacies of the food chain within the Caleb Smith Preserve
A new. interactive nature exhibit has been installed in the Wetlands Room of the Nature Museum - be sure to visit and explore the intricacies of the food chain within the Caleb Smith Preserve
WHO EATS WHOM - the food chain
A diverse group of plants and animals are lucky enough to share a protected environment within Caleb Smith Preserve. It’s not that they all get along well! Some of them eat each other, but they do so within a complex balance which ensures a biotic continuity – unless trampled upon or developed by human encroachers. It is important for visitors to see a bigger picture of the Preserve and the world at large in order to better understand our impact on all the other plants and animals that share our planet. All living things get energy from their food so that they can move and grow. A food chain shows the relationships between organisms and draws a simple path describing the source of their food. Most animals are part of more than one food chain and eat more than one kind of food in order to meet their food and energy requirements. These interconnected food chains form a food web.
This exhibit povides a hands-on sense of the relationships between living things and makes it visually clear that interference on one part of a food chain or web has repercussions throughout. A set of software puzzles with several levels of complexity pose a challenge for visitors of all ages to sort out who eats whom among the animals at the Preserve. The interlocking pieces of the puzzles graphically describe the relationships of "eater" and "eaten." Clicking and moving a piece will also open an INFO panel describing the selected animal and its various predator / prey place in a chain. The software tracks a user's solution time and rewards the solution with various comments, bells and fanfares.
A diverse group of plants and animals are lucky enough to share a protected environment within Caleb Smith Preserve. It’s not that they all get along well! Some of them eat each other, but they do so within a complex balance which ensures a biotic continuity – unless trampled upon or developed by human encroachers. It is important for visitors to see a bigger picture of the Preserve and the world at large in order to better understand our impact on all the other plants and animals that share our planet. All living things get energy from their food so that they can move and grow. A food chain shows the relationships between organisms and draws a simple path describing the source of their food. Most animals are part of more than one food chain and eat more than one kind of food in order to meet their food and energy requirements. These interconnected food chains form a food web.
This exhibit povides a hands-on sense of the relationships between living things and makes it visually clear that interference on one part of a food chain or web has repercussions throughout. A set of software puzzles with several levels of complexity pose a challenge for visitors of all ages to sort out who eats whom among the animals at the Preserve. The interlocking pieces of the puzzles graphically describe the relationships of "eater" and "eaten." Clicking and moving a piece will also open an INFO panel describing the selected animal and its various predator / prey place in a chain. The software tracks a user's solution time and rewards the solution with various comments, bells and fanfares.