AMNH Trip

The New York metropolitan region offers the chance to observe many different natural habitats, ranging from valleys, streams, and rivers to the Atlantic Oceans.  In addition, you can observe organisms and learn about environments from around the world (and across millennia) through local collections (zoos, museum, etc.).  During the semester you will take advantage of these local resources to visit:

·         A botanical garden (the New York Botanical Garden Trip) 

·         A living animal collection (Bronx Zoo)

·         A historic collection (American Museum of Natural History) – these instructions!

Overview

Students will explore the concept of diversity and relate it to local environments by visiting a museum.

Objectives

Students should be able to

• Discuss major issues facing global diversity and critique commonly offered solutions

• Discuss how diversity has changed in New York due to major changes (glacial cycles, land use, European colonization)

Directions and Ticket Information (http://www.amnh.org/)

The Museum is located at 79th Street and Central Park West and is easily reached by public transportation. The main entrance to the Rose Center for Earth and Space is located at 81st Street between Central Park West and Columbus Avenue.  For more information, please check http://www.amnh.org/plan-your-visit/admissions-ticketing.  Admission is a suggested donation of $19, but you can pay what you can. However, you do need to reserve a ticket time. Visit https://www.amnh.org/plan-your-visit to do so.  

Assignment Instructions

You will be visiting three exhibits in the AMNH for this assignment, two that I am making you go to and one of your own choice.  I encourage you to spend the whole day at the AMNH and look at as many exhibits as you want.

Take a picture of yourself at each exhibit and include it with your report.  

The first exhibit is the Hall of Biodiversity on the first floor.  Follow the directions below to work your way through the exhibit.

Begin your visit to the hall by watching the Introductory Video (8).  To get a picture of diversity, observed the Spectrum of Life Wall (1). Note it’s in the form of a cladogram, representing evolutionary relationships among the 28 living groups.  Also check out the Crisis Zone (5), embedded in the floor in front of the Spectrum of Life Wall.  It is a time line of the five previous major extinction events—periods of unusually high levels of extinction—with fossils from these periods. Two columns flanking the time line provide an overview of the causes of the present, or sixth, extinction, an event different from previous extinctions because it is caused by human activity. A display case nearby contains examples of and information about endangered and extinct animals.

Next, check out the Habitat Video Wall (2) and learn more about some of the biomes we discussed in class, including threats.  The rain forest diorama is another way to experience diversity.  The Transformations of the Biosphere Wall (7) and Solutions Wall (3) further explore the threats (and solutions) biomes face.  

 Answer the following questions on what you encountered in the Hall of Biodiversity.

1.      What crucial life support functions do healthy natural ecosystems provide?  What happens when these systems are degraded or destroyed?  What is the evidence that these systems are in danger now, and do you believe it and that our quality of life is suffering because of it?                               

2.      Why – according to the information in the exhibit -- is protecting biodiversity important?  Do you agree or disagree?  Why?

 3.      Choose your favorite biome. List three concerns you have about the health and future of the biome.  Find a piece of the Solutions Wall that relates to these issues and explain how they may address issues in your chosen biome.  Do you think it will work?

The next (smaller) exhibit you should head to is the Felix M. Warburg Hall of New York State Environment, also on the first floor.  This exhibit focuses on the environment of New York, specifically Dutchess County (upstate) over the ~12,000 years since the last Ice Age.  Tour the exhibit and learn about the ecology of New York State and answer the following questions.

4.      When you think of the New York City Environment, what comes to mind?

5.      Describe what Manhattan and the other 4 boroughs of New York City might have looked like about 15,000 years ago.

6.      What resources did indigenous native forests offer to early Algonquins?

7.      When did settled agriculture become common in New York? Why did agriculture decline around 1870?

8.      What did you learn about NY state that you didn’t know before?

9.      This exhibit is quite old, as you might be able to tell.  Since it was installed, much of the land of NYS has gone from abandoned farmlands back to forest, perhaps even more forest than there was in Algonquin times.  Given what you have learned about the changes in NYS’s landscape for the past 10,000 years or so, write a few sentences about what it means to “preserve nature”.  Is there really a “natural” or “correct” state of a landscape or is it more reasonable to think that ecosystems constantly change?  If the latter, then what should people do if they want to “protect land”? 

Your last assignment is to choose one additional exhibit to go to.  I suggest the 4th floor vertebrate evolution exhibit (the exhibit is huge and takes up most of the entire floor and is one of the best evolution and fossil (including dinosaurs) exhibits in the world), but just go see anything you think will be fun.

10.  Describe what exhibit you went to see.  Was there any particular reason why you chose this exhibit?  What did you learn there that you did not know before? 

11.  Did you enjoy your trip?  Do you think you would come back to the museum again?