Last Sunday February 21st Paula Lambertz and I set-up camp at the Fermilab Friends for Science Education's (FFSE) Open House event in Wilson Hall. Thousands of families and folks from the community turned out to experience the busy array of tours and events offered. Paula and I stood at the FNA table set up just outside the elevators and watched as excited children stared in amazement as they entered the atrium. We spoke to hundreds of children and adults about FNA and all of the opportunities to experience nature at Fermilab. We collected email addresses, answered questions and exchanged wildlife stories. 
It was a great event overall- very well organized and good time for all the smiling faces that passed through the elevator on Sunday.Many people had questions about the wildlife at Fermilab. One family from California wanted to know if we had any large snakes on site. My best answer was the fox snakes I had seen in the prairie and woods edge. An excited group of girl scouts asked for directions to the bison pen. Another little girl from Geneva offered a detailed account of a family of coyotes that lives near her home as her family waited patiently for her through three rounds of the elevator as she finished. It was interesting to note how people were attracted to the table, just passing by the photos of wildlife at our booth seemed to inspire stories.
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Most intriguing for me were the number of people that saw "natural areas" and immediately asked about the bison. "Do you still have buffalo?" "Can we see the buffalo?"
ReplyDeleteDr. Wilson's vision of physics at the frontier stills holds the imagination of our neighbors. Although FNA "doesn't do bison", I'm glad that we can help continue the work that Robt Wilson started.
Paula