TIC/SIC Quilt Project Here's a message from Trout Unlimited's TIC national coordinator Tara Granke about this year's quilt project. Hello Educators and Coordinators, It's that moment you've been waiting for: it's time for the S/TIC Quilt Square Exchange! Coordinators, please pass this information to your teachers. Or, click here to sign up and read more about the Quilt Exchange. Contact me, Tara Granke, if you have any questions. Have fun! Each class joining the project has a simple and fun task: decorate about 25 quilt squares – 8” x 8” pieces of fabric – and send them to the other participating schools! In return, you’ll receive squares from around the country, which you can sew together into a quilt of your own (examples below). This year’s theme is AMAZING ADAPTATIONS: how animals, ecosystems, humans, and communities adapt in and around a stream ecosystem. Really, any type of watershed-, human-, or fish-related adaptation you can think of that relates to water! Use of imagination is highly encouraged and required. :) If you’re interested, fill out the sign-up form by January 26. Then: 1. An email confirming your participation will be sent to the email you provide on this form on January 29. 2. Once everyone confirms, instructions will be sent via email. Please confirm by Thursday Feb. 1! 3. Signing up is a commitment to make and send out the ~25 squares. 4. You’ll have a little over a month to decorate the squares and write letters to your fellow TIC/SIC classes; squares will be due out to the other schools by March 9th. This means postmarked by March 9. New this year: We'll be posting a Quilt Gallery on the National S/TIC Facebook page, so please share your classroom's finished quilt or its squares with Tara Granke. Happy creating! Each year several Vermont TIC classes have participated in this excellent project. The project has many benefits. These include giving students :
Here are some examples of past quilts. At what temperature should you keep your tank this winter? As we've said in the past, one of the two greatest challenges in the TIC program is noticing and responding positively to the swim-up stage. We expect that the temperature at the hatchery to be about 43 or 44 degrees on the day your eggs leave the hatchery. Your water temperature should be close to that. The temperature of your tank will determine how quickly your fish mature. That includes how quickly the eggs hatch, how quickly the alevin swim up to feed, how rapidly the alevin grow, and how big the fry ultimately become. There are two principal mathematical systems for calculating rate of development. We use Development Index or DI. This involves a table of constants to determine how much each degree-day (of temperature to a tenth of a degree) contributes toward egg/alevin/fry development. Here's what that table looks like. As you can see, for every day that the tank temperature is at 43.5 degrees (find 43 in the left-most column and 0.5 in the top row of numbers), a constant of 0.720 is added to the alevin's cumulative development (DI). On the other hand, when the temperature is 52.0, the constant 1.401 is added to cumulative DI to date. You may also notice that the rate of change among steps, e.g., the difference between 43.5 and 43.6 (0.006) versus the difference between 52.0 and 52.1 (0.010) grows as temperature increases (as a function of a quadratic equation). Fortunately, you don't have to do the math. With help from SWVTTU volunteer Lorena Schwarz and Castleton University statistics professor Abbess Rajia, we have built this formula into the Temp and DI record and swim-up calculator available here. As described in the 12/17/17 blog, you should use the tab "B. Temp. entry and DI record" worksheet of that spreadsheet to track cumulative development from the first day you receive your eggs. It's critically important that you're around to notice and respond to the swim-up stage. If you miss it because, say, your school is on break at that time--which has happened more than once in the past--you may find that your alevin never feed, become "pinheads," and die. For that reason this year we're recommending that you choose one of three approaches to temperature management, depending on when your school gets its eggs and whether your school starts its winter break on Friday, February 16, (Option 1) or Friday February 23, (Option 2 or Option 3). Many northern schools have the later break. Just about all schools in the southern part of the state seem to have the earlier break. (If your school's break falls at an entirely different time or if your egg delivery is significantly different than the two dates identified below, you should either use tab "C. Swim-up calculator" of the "Temp and DI record and swim-up calculator" Excel spreadsheet or consult with your regional TIC liaison.) Option 1: Cool and slow (especially for southern Vermont schools receiving eggs on 1/12) The goal of this approach is to prevent your fish from swimming up while you're away on your (comparatively early) break and to have them swim up after you and your students are back in school. Here's what you should do:
Option 2: Cool and slow (especially for north-central and northwestern Vermont schools receiving eggs on 1/4) The goal of this approach is to prevent your fish from swimming up while you're away on your February break and to have them swim up after you and your students are back in school. Here's what you should do:
Option 3: Warm and quick (especially for north-central and northwestern Vermont schools receiving eggs on 1/4) The goal of this approach is to get your fish swimming up before your February break. Here's what you should do:
What does trout habitat look like this week? Winter's cold and its snow and ice are starting to cover over our rivers. Here's a photo I took this week of nearby Breton Brook, which starts in Hubbardton and flows south before feeding into the Castleton River, of which it is the largest tributary. Have a wonderful holiday break! I hope you find the time relaxing and restorative.
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Joe Mark is Lead Facilitator of Vermont's Trout in the Classroom program.In June 2012, I retired after 40 years in higher education, having spent the last 32 years of my career as dean at Castleton. One of the first things I volunteered to do in retirement was to work with a parent-friend to help the Dorset School, where his kids and my Vermont grandkids attend, start a TIC program. Gradually that commitment grew into my current role, which is both demanding and highly rewarding. Archives
December 2019
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