Worms and birds. It's funny how topics flow into one another if you let them: geology leads to dirt, dirt leads to worms, and worms lead to birds . . . or maybe I've just got worms on the brain.
This is one of my favorite zoology activities. The children act as birds, hunting worms (3-inch pieces of colored yarn). (Note: Here, it is good to have crafty friends--at least one--whom you can call at nine o'clock at night to ask if they have yarns of the very specific colors you need so that you do not have to alter your recording form which was created three computers ago and somehow ceases to exist in the digital world). Prior to the lesson, Franny and I hopped around outside, distributing worms in the grass.
How many worms do YOU see?
"Today we get to put on our bird hats and hunt for worms." Hands immediately went to he
ads for the donning of imaginary bird hats."Ooo! I look like a chicken!" announced a third grader with happy surprise, as if she had just looked in the mirror and found herself to be a chicken. I should carry a tape recorder.
Given our recent foray into the wonderful world of worms (and the new-found fad of digging for worms during recess--and then proudly presenting them to unsuspecting teachers who have not gone to great lengths to cultivate this love for the non-boned), I felt the need to caution my birds not to bring back any live ones. "The worms we are hunting for are pieces of yarn." "I hope none of them are green . . . otherwise, they'll be camouflaged in the grass," quietly mused a second grader. These children are maddeningly clever sometimes, ruining all the fun of a big, dramatic reveal.
Outside, each Cooperative Science Group ran a sort of relay race, sending their front "bird" out to capture a worm and bring it back to "the nest." Boisterous, noisy, running fun for all.
Really, how often does science suggest running?
When "time" was called, our birds were back to "the lab" for analysis of their birdy booty. How many worms did your birds bring back to the nest? How many worms of each color did you find? My scientists were way ahead of me, already busy sorting and classifying . . .
and graphing. (A person could start to feel a little unnecessary.)
Next, we gathered together to share our findings. What color worms were out there? "Blue." "Red." "Yellow, brown" "Green," said a bird from one group. "Nuh, uh. There weren't any green ones out there," argued another.
But there were. One group had found one green worm.
Each group presented their tallies and graphs,
as we created a class tally. 
The real fun (if you get your jollies the way I do) comes when I reveal to the children that for each color, we carefully counted and distributed the same number of worms (20 of each) in the grass. Why did our birds find more of some colors than others? Again, the children are way ahead of me. "That's because the green ones blended into the grass. They were camouflaged." Again with the maddeningly clever.
So I pushed further. "Look at the worms our birds found. If this pattern continues, what could we expect the worm population to look like in a year?" A rich discussion of camouflage, adaptation, predators, and prey ensued. All 20 of the blue worms had been found and eaten by birds. They were not very well-adapted for their green environment. Blue worms are now extinct. When we combined the worms that Mrs. D. was able to find in a quick scan with the worms the rest of the birds found, all but one red worm was captured. "That's not enough to reproduce. That one would need a mate. They'll die out, too." Combined with Mrs. D's collection, two yellow worms survived--enough to maybe reproduce, but seriously endangered. Five browns lived another day, and eighteen green worms survived to produce more green worms. We decided that in another year, most of the worms would be green. If the environment changed, and a patch of grass died out, brown worms would be most likely to survive. Green worms would then be more easily found and eaten.
We then looked beyond our mock worms to other creatures with camouflage. Hunters and the men and women in the military wear camouflage either to protect themselves or help them be more stealthy in sneaking up on prey. Animals that live in the grasslands are often tan in order to blend in with the grasses. Polar bears and other Arctic dwellers wear white to match their snowy surroundings. Nocturnal animals are often dark. Our Monarch chrysalises are green, helping them get lost in the leaves. Our fuzzy-wuzzy brown caterpillar wrapped himself in real leaves when he made his cocoon. The shrimp we found in the pond at Armand Bayou were clear, and if I were a Saran Wrap "worm" I might be very successful at hiding in the water--perhaps less so in the sunny grass where my shiny shimmer might be a dead give-away. Brightly colored critters, those that are easily noticed, usually have some other means of protection. They might be venomous or mimic another venomous creature. We got so involved in thinking and discussing, we were late for dismissal.
What color worm would you rather be?
What We're Reading:
What Color is Camouflage? by Carolyn Otto
Flute's Journey by Lynne Cherry
An Egg is Quiet by Dianna Hutts Aston
Antarctic Antics: A Book of Penguin Poems by Judy Sierra
First the Egg by Laura Vaccaro Seeger
Regurgitate
It's been a whole hour since I ate.
Why is my dinner always late?
While you and Mom procrastinate,
I might become a featherweight.
You know what I'd appreciate?
Cough it up, Dad! Regurgitate!
--Judy Sierra, Antarctic Antics
It was several days before we noticed they had tunneled down through sand into a lower layer of dirt at opposite corners. 
(The children have hypothesized that these separate entrances are for feuding family members.) Our worms were becoming adventurous--prompted, I'm sure, by the raucous caterpillars' bad example. 
Yes, those will do quite nicely. Apparently, all the best worm eateries are serving them that way. 
Notice that the apple slices have been dragged to the corners of the bin? We never see them doing this! Are you beginning to understand my visions of 
