Journal 5

Going into Colloquium the very first day I'm not going to lie I though this class was going to be boring and a waste of my time, and I was going to drop it, but I gave it a shot and I am glad that I did. I learned so many cool things about the environment in Southwest Florida and the history behind it.


The field trips that we went on made the class a whole lot easier too because it wasn’t like we were stuck in a class room every time. It felt good to get out and see what was going on around the Fort Myers area.

The first field trip that we went on was to Echo and that was an awesome trip, because we got to see actual gardens being set up in all different types of environments. What we learned about there that I though was cool was that they have this thing that I believe is called "Intern weekend" if I’m not mistaken and what they do is for a weekend the people working on the property can only eat the food they have grown and the meat from the goats for the whole weekend, which I thought was awesome because you are eating your own product that you worked hard on growing.

Another trip that I liked was when we went to Downtown Fort Myers. I really liked this trip because I was like a history lesson and I was locked in and focused for the whole trip. We were able to learn about some history about Thomas Edison and Henry Ford, we were able to see replica ships of the Nina and Pinta, and also to finish the day we had some really awesome pizza at the Downtown House of Pizza.

To wrap it up this class was more than I expected it to be and I am really glad that I took it with Professor Borden. She is hands down one of the best teachers that I have had at this University. She is caring and wants you to have fun and makes learning in this class very interesting and fun. I can honestly say that I have learned a lot in this class, because of the way Professor Borden has thought it and I would recommend for everyone to take here for Colloquium.

Word Count: 391

Journal 4

In this Colloquium class I learned a lot about different types of species in Southwest Florida, some of them I knew a good amount about, and some other species were new to me. However the two things that I wanted to talk about are the American Alligator or "All-igator" and Alligator flags.

Even though I am scared of them the American Alligator are very special animals. They have been around for a very long time and are very dangerous animals. It is a known fact that alligators use an incredible amount of force to clamp their jaws on their prey, but however even though they can clamp down really hard they are extremely weak when it comes to opening up their mouths. A person could hold the jaws closed of an alligator with no problem; that is how weak the alligator is when it comes to opening their mouth. Besides from have a killer bite another thing to be aware about with the alligator is its vicious tail. Many people underestimate the alligator think its bite is the only thing to worry about, but its tail is also strong, strong enough to break bones with a single whip. They are also very after and could run up to 30 MPH in short bursts, which makes these animals very dangerous.

Earlier settlers had to deal with this problem when first arriving to this southern area of Florida, but luckily they had an advantage on their side which came in the form of "alligator flags". These flags were swamp plants and let people know how deep the water was and also if there were any predators like the alligator nearby. All they had to do was look and listen and if there was movement in the swamp and the flags were going than they knew that there was probably and alligator on the move. If these "warning" flags were not available to early settlers than I believe that it would have been hard for them to survive.


                                                              Word Count: 335