|
 |
Frontiers Summer 1999A history in memoriesWe collected Itasca memories from students, faculty, researchers, and others who spent time at the station to create the book, Itasca at 90: A History in Memories. Here are some excerpts. Although [the Botany instructor] could
identify and name many plants, he was no good in the
bush. He was always getting lost. We solved this problem
by designating one guy in our group to be our return
man. He would not pay any attention to what our Botany
friend was telling us, he would just keep track of where
we were and how to get back to camp. After we got back,
we would pool our notes and make sure that our return
man got the whole story. Introduction to Entomology required
that we each have a bug collection: catch, mount, and
identify as many specimens as possible. The prize catch
was the nocturnal cecropia and luna moths. A car full
of guys would drive the park roads after dark, two riding
on the front fenders ready to jump off, swinging nets
wildly in the headlights, hoping to add one of those
rare beauties to their collection. More than eight weeks were devoted to
the "stalking" of the wily plasmodial slime molds (Myxomycetes)--especially
collecting the beautiful fruiting bodies. During this
period I made over 1,000 collections--enough to last
for teaching and research for the last 40 years. More
importantly, I got a chance to see the Itasca region
from morning to dusk as I learned to negotiate my way
over fallen logs and through streams and wetlands. I
became one with a nature so different from my South
Minneapolis haunts. One time my field biology partners and
I were sleeping under the stars somewhere out in the
south end of the park. I was awakened suddenly by the
loudest snorting sound ever RIGHT above my face! Terrified,
I jumped up, scaring away the deer that had snorted
in fear just seconds before! One night a couple of people in the
[parasite] class happened upon a fresh porcupine road
kill. They brought it into the lab and opened it up.
When the class arrived in the morning, there was a battery
jar of saline solution full of living, moving, flat
noodles. That porky was full of tape worms and we all
got a chance to have a scolex and various stages of
proglottids to mount for our permanent collections.
My students have seen the resulting slides for many
years! After a morning of clambering over treefalls
for my Ph.D. project, I rested alone on the shores of
Whipple Lake, nodding off on the pine needles in a patch
of sun. The sun burnt off my cloud of mosquitoes, and
the deerflies moved on as I sat quietly and rested.
Suddenly, I heard a loon cry as an osprey dove for a
fish not 10 feet from my perch. Only at Itasca! The best memories are walking into Building
40 at 10 p.m. and finding students busily working on
an experiment, engrossed in the lab and enjoying themselves.
The pie fight in the mess hall wasn't too bad either.
The bait site we set up to lure in the
raccoons and observe their behavior is [an] experience
I'll never forget. For bait we used dog food, fish remains,
sunflower seeds, and shelled peanuts. The fish remains
came from the Itasca State Park fish cleaning house.
We received a lot of strange looks collecting that bait
and discovered just how interesting and smelly research
can be. After all that work to get the fish, the raccoons
preferred the peanuts! "By the last night of my summer at Itasca,
most of the students had already left. I had tucked
myself into the photo lab for many hours, frantically
working to complete a project by morning, when a classmate
called me outside. I looked up and saw the aurora borealis
for the first time in my life. Mysterious green patches
danced across the sky. I stood and marveled, losing
myself in the vastness of the wilderness that surrounded
me. Time seemed to slow while I gazed, and finally the
blackness very slowly and gently overwhelmed the sky
as the lights faded away." To receive a copy of the book, send a check for $9, made out to University of Minnesota, to Itasca Biology Program, 123 Snyder Hall, 1475 Gortner Ave., St. Paul, MN 55108. Note in the memo line that it's for "Itasca at 90." Back to Frontiers Summer 1999 |