Home

Requirements September 1970 until January 1975

1. Study one typical wildlife community, approved by your counselor. Take two hikes within the area and do the following:

(a) List the most commonly found plants and animals.
(b) List the kinds of soils and most commonly found rocks.
(c) Describe the springs, streams, lakes, and other waters found.

2. Tell how temperature, wind, rainfall, altitude, geology, tide, wild or domestic animals, or man help make the selected area what it is. Tell what is meant by "plant succession." Tell what successions have taken place in the selected area in the last hundred years. Tell what will probably happen in the next hundred years if the area is undisturbed by man.

3. Do ALL the requirements in TWO of the following fields:

Birds

(a) Identify in the field 20 species.
(b) Recognize 10 species by calls, songs, or signs.
(c) Make and set out three birdhouses or two feeding stations, and tell what birds used them; or photograph nests of four species of birds.

Mammals

(a) Identify in the field six species of wild mammals.
(b) Find in the field the signs of six species of wild mammals.
(c) Make plaster casts of the tracks of three wild mammals; or photograph two species of wild mammals.

Reptiles or Amphibians

(a) Identify the poisonous snakes in your area. Identify in the field six species of reptiles or amphibians.

(b) Recognize three species of toads or frogs by their voices; or identify three reptiles or amphibians by their eggs, dens, burrows, or other signs.

(c) Raise tadpoles from eggs or adults from tadpoles; or keep an adult reptile or amphibian under conditions that keep it healthy for 1 month.

Insects or Spiders

(a) Catch, identify, and mount 30 species.
(b) Raise an insect from the pupa or cocoon or raise adults from nymphs or keep larvae until they form pupae or cocoons; or keep a colony of ants or bees through one season.

Fish

(a) Catch and identify four species of fish.
(b) Collect four kinds of natural food eaten by fish; or make an artificial lure and catch a fish on it.
(c) Make an aquarium containing fish and plant life and keep it successfully balanced for 1 month.

Mollusks and Crustaceans

(a) Identify five species of mollusks and crustaceans.
(b) Mount six shells.
(c) Make an aquarium and keep in it two species of mollusks or crustaceans under such conditions that they stay healthy for a month.

Plants

(a) Identify in the field fifteen species of wild plants.
(b) Collect and label seeds of 6 plants; or collect, mount, and label leaves of 12 plants.
(c) Build a terrarium of at least three species of plants and keep it successfully for one month.

Soils and Rocks

(a) Collect and identify soils found in three soil profiles; or 10 rocks representative of the area.
(b) Find six species of animals that live in soil.
(c) Grow seeds for 1 month in two kinds of soil and describe the difference in rate of growth.

4. Pick one species of plant, mammal, bird, fish, reptile, or amphibian. Write a detailed life history of it.