Here are some of Discovery Club members the first day of the fall field season. Each week we will set eighteen Sherman traps and 8 drops traps to monitor for small mammals. We will also take water quality observations of the big lake.(the frog pond was completely dry this fall)

This fall we are starting our fourth year on monitoring small mammal activity by the small pond. Here we are tagging a white-footed mouse before we release it.

Just like last year we found puff ball mushrooms growing under the old oak trees on the hill the borders east side of the pond.

Here we are using our newly purchased pH meter to test the water at the big lake. The reading was 9.3, very alkaline.

Here we are taking a Secci Distance measurement. Notice the reading was about 7 inches, compared to 25 inches last spring. That's a lot of algae.!!

On September 27, Todd Miller from UW Arboretum came out to show us how to start a research project on invasive plants in the prairie outside our school. We are going to try different methods of controlling Canadian Thistle and see which one works the best. Check back next year and find out what happened.

We celebrated the end of the fall field season with a Pizza Party and a visit from Dick Bautz from the DNR research station. He shared with us the latest in small mammal monitoring technique and brought a special guest....a red-backed vole (shown here)