OAS has 102nd Technical Meeting

The Oklahoma Academy of Science met at Cameron University in Lawton for its 102^nd Annual Technical Meeting on November 8 and 9, 2013. Think about that. Oklahoma is not a very old state, yet its Academy of Science has had 102 technical meetings. (Technical meetings are for presentations and posters, as opposed to the spring and fall field meetings.) According to Executive Director David Bass, OAS is one of the most active state academies in the United States.

The Executive Council met on Thursday evening, November 8. The Executive Council consists of the Executive Director, the officers, and section chairs. The Council reviewed the (very good) financial condition of OAS, locations of future meetings (watch the OAS website and this blog for updates), participation in the Collegiate Academy (undergraduate papers), and the Junior Academy of Sciences (high school posters in conjunction with the state science fair). The Council also unanimously approved a statement affirming global climate change, which was based on the most recent IPCC report and which affirmed the right and responsibility of Oklahoma scientists to speak out and to teach about global climate change. The Council also agreed to sponsor (in name) another Oklahoma Evolution Road Trip in the summer of 2014. (You can read here about the 2013 road trip, organized by Oklahomans for Excellence in Science Education and sponsored in name by OAS. The permalink is in reverse chronological order; scroll down to the five road trip entries.)

Most of the presentations were on Friday morning, November 9. There were 264 registrants, of which about 240 were present, plus Cameron University undergraduates. Out of the 81 presentations and posters, there were at least 26 undergraduate oral presentations and at least nine undergraduate posters, and five graduate student presentations. There was also a presentation by a high school student.

Since each section independently scheduled presentations, some of us discovered that almost everything happened between 10:00 and 11:00, which included not only presentations but judging. This may explain why some of the sections had very small audiences. As the new president, I would like to consider ways in which this intense concentration of riches into one time period could be spread out a little. If you have ideas, send them to me (srice@se.edu) or to the Executive Director (dbass@uco.edu).

In particular, there were very few participants in the Science Communication and Education section, which should be of interest to everyone in the Academy, since we all teach students and communicate with the public even if we do not have education degrees. One possible reason was that this section conflicted with all the others. This section sponsored a discussion about online courses. The participants agreed that online courses for credit and MOOCs are two very different things, but we need to have a coordinated response to how to use them constructively. Administrators may be open to our ideas rather than just imposing them on us, but we need to present these ideas to them; and what better way to do this than for our statewide Academy of generate these ideas rather than individual faculty or institutions? I would like to have this conversation continue, since the four of us who discussed them represent only a tiny slice of the Academy.

At the Academy business meeting, updates from the Executive Council were announced, and the membership unanimously approved the same statement on global climate change as the Executive Council had approved. This statement will be on the Academy web page soon, and is expected to be endorsed by Oklahomans for Excellence in Science Education (OESE). OESE is more of an activist organization and will be promoting the awareness of global climate change; OAS, as an academy of scientists, has simply gone on record regarding the scientific reality of global climate change.

After the noon banquet, the new president of Cameron University, Dr. John McArthur (a former colleague of mine at Southeastern Oklahoma State University), welcomed the academy. The symbolic gavel of presidency was transferred from outgoing president Craig Clifford to new president Stan Rice; Terry Conley, dean at Cameron, was announced as the president-elect. Left to right: Craig Clifford, Terry Conley, John McArthur.

Terry will take over as president after fall 2015. Dr. Darrin Akin of the University of Oklahoma College of Medicine, told the Academy about the work of INBRE and the importance of Individual Development Plans for student success at every level, including medical school.

Dr. Terry Conley organized a day-long symposium in which eleven speakers examined the Wichita Mountains from many different academic perspectives, whether scientific, social, or artistic. The OAS leadership hopes that such symposia will become a regular part of OAS Technical Meetings. I have organized cross-disciplinary symposia for the national meeting of the Botanical Society of America twice, both times with qualified success: cross-disciplinary symposia are not necessarily the best things for narrowly disciplinary society meetings. But OAS should be the perfect place to have symposia that draw interest from across the sciences and beyond.

Every year, the OAS Technical Meeting is an important event for all of us. For many students, it provides an opportunity to jump into the world of scientific presentations. For many professionals, it provides an opportunity to exchange ideas and hear new perspectives. I know that is what I look forward to most at OAS meetings, including the field meetings. (In photo above, left to right: Ken Hobson, Bill Caire, Gloria Caddell.)

If you missed the meeting, there's always next year, at the Broken Arrow campus of Northeastern Oklahoma State University!

Stan Rice, president

Climate Change Workshop blog

I hope as many of you as possible will be able to participate in the Field Meeting. Beavers Bend is a wonderful place and you will love seeing colleagues new and old. I won't be there because I an participating in a workshop this weekend. The Climate Change Workshop this weekend at the University of Oklahoma Biological Station. Sponsored by Oklahomans for Excellence in Science Education (OESE) and the Oklahoma Climatological Survey, this workshop will acquaint high school teachers with the basic facts about climate change and introduce active learning experiences they can use with their students. For many years OESE has held evolution workshops, but we recognized that climate change is just as controversial a topic as evolution, if not more so, and teachers really want some help in approaching this topic. I plan to "live-blog" from the event on my science blog. Last year I "live-blogged" from the OESE evolution workshop; see here. Want some straight and clear information about climate change? Check us out starting Friday evening September 20. Or, for those of you at the field meeting, check us out afterward--or during the meeting, if the sound of the frogs keeps you awake at night and you can find a connection. Stan Rice, president-elect

Great weather forecast for Fall Field Meeting this weekend

The Fall Field Meeting of the OAS is this weekend, at Beaver's Bend State Park in McCurtain County. Many of you have preregistered. But some of you may not have, deciding to hold off until you know what the weather would be. Well, the forecast is for great weather!

Here is what weather.com is predicting:
http://www.weather.com/weather/weekend/Beavers+Bend+State+Park+OK+814:19:US

It is too late to preregister, but make plans to come down on Friday regardless. The on-site registration is only $5 more. Meal tickets are available on a first-come, first-served basis, so it is best to arrive as early Friday evening as possible.

Need help navigating? This link http://goo.gl/maps/Hx7Yp gets you to the Google Maps pin for the park, and from the site you can click on "Get Directions" and enter your starting point.

Slide Show for Fall Field Meeting of the OAS

At the Spring Field meeting at Lake Eufala, Dr. Erik Terdal from Northeastern State University gave a slide show to build excitement for the Fall Field Meeting. That meeting is September 20-22 at Beaver's Bend State Park. Here is that slideshow. Note his emphasis on the new air conditioning units in Group Camp 1, where will be staying, in case this heat lasts that long. The photos we all taken over Spring Break, in March, so the plant life will be more luxuriant now. Hope to see you there!
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http://www.slideshare.net/drterdal/fall-2013-field-meeting

2013 Fall Field Meeting set for Beavers Bend State Park

It is that time of year again.  Time to begin planning to attend the OAS Fall Field Meeting.  This year we’ll be traveling to the far southeast part of the state to explore the natural beauty of Beavers Bend State Park September 20-22.  Established in the 1930’s, Beavers Bend is one of Oklahoma’s oldest and original state parks.  It is a bit of a drive for most in the state; four hours from Oklahoma City, three and a half hours from Tulsa. 

Check out the OAS webpage for registration information and directions Group Camp #1.  Contact Dr. Erik Terdal, (Department of Natural Sciences, Northeastern Oklahoma State University, Broken Arrow, OK 74014, 918-444-3850, terdal@nsuok.edu) for more information.

First Annual Oklahoma Evolution Road Trip a Success

The First Annual Oklahoma Evolution Road Trip was a success! By just about any measure. There were lots of tornadoes and thunderstorms but they all missed us. The participants enjoyed it and learned a lot. And we saw some really interesting things that are unknown even to most educated people, including myself until just the last couple of years before leading this trip. The trip was based at the University of Oklahoma Biological Station. The University of Oklahoma Foundation handled the finances, but the trip paid for itself (just barely). The main sponsor was Oklahomans for Excellence in Science Education. OAS sponsored in name only and so you all deserve to hear how it went.

A detailed account as well as several photos of the trip can be found in the June 6-10 entries on my evolution blog.

We found a lot of fossils from the Paleozoic and Mesozoic eras. Geologic forces in what is now the Arbuckle Mountains pushed up Paleozoic deposits, which then eroded, with the result that the oldest layers are at the top of the Arbuckles and younger ones on the slopes. We saw everything from Cambrian stromatolites to Ordovician crinoids. During the Pennsylvanian period, a big chunk of crust collapsed and was filled in with rubble, resulting in an abrupt change from Ordovician limestone to Pennsylvanian conglomerate. And then lots of Cretaceous marine sediments were laid down. The Kiamichi limestone, for example, had more fossils than matrix, and most of the fossils were just one species, a bivalve named Texigryphaea navia. In other Cretaceous limestones we saw sand dollars, ammonoids, etc. Oklahoma is renowned for creationism, yet the fossils that confirm evolution are literally washing out of the hills. We also visited Goddard Youth Camp, where the museum contains a cast of the most complete Acrocanthosaurus skeleton ever found (it was found in eastern Oklahoma).

Dr. Gordon Eggleton, retired physical sciences professor from Southeastern, led the geology part of the trip. I showed the participants different species of trees that had different life cycle adaptations. So between the two of us, Gordon and I covered both the living and the dead world.

We also drove down into Texas to see dinosaur footprints in the bed of the Paluxy River and visit a creationist museum that is infamous even among creationists.

Notice that, according to the creationist museum, the acrocanthosaur with razor sharp teeth (and which is attacking Mary Kay Johnston, a professor from Austin, TX) was herbivorous.

One could not hope for a better group of participants: high school teachers, both new and retired; college professors, both current and retired; and other interested people. There were ten participants and two instructors, a total of 12 crammed into what we were told was supposed to be a 15 person van.

You can bet that I will be trying to organize more such trips in the future.

I hope you all have as interesting a summer as I am having. And please do not hesitate to post things on this blog that you think we would be interested in hearing.

Stanley Rice
President-elect

Spring Field Meeting at Lake Eufala State Park

The Spring Field Meeting was April 19-21 at Lake Eufala. Except for a couple of cold nights for campers, the weather was excellent, just warm enough to be comfortable but cool enough to make hiking around a pleasure, with gentle breezes. It was a late spring, but the buds were open enough to allow botanists to identify trees and shrubs.

On the morning botany field trip, we worked our way downhill from the group camp toward the lake. We spent the better part of an hour looking at the lawn. To many people, it would come as a complete surprise how many species of plants a spring lawn contains. You can walk across an incredible amount of biodiversity in just a step or two. Gloria Caddell helped us to identify these species. Down in the forest, Gloria helped us recognize tristyly in Oxalis violacea, which promotes outcrossing between individual plants.

On the morning and afternoon botany trips, we explored forests, and learned to recognize many species of trees. Thanks to Bruce Smith for helping us to recognize important traits of trees and shrubs and, of course, a few ferns. There were several oak species (we couldn't always distinguish them on the basis of immature leaves). Some tree species have immediately recognizable features such as the horizontal lenticels of black cherry bark and the multiple leaf shapes of sassafras:

In addition to Gloria Caddell and Bruce Smith:

we had contributions from another botanist, Stan Rice, but also from plant pathologist Steve Marek, who helped us find an orange rust fungus that alternates between cedar and crabapple hosts, and a conk mushroom growing out of a dead black locust. We also saw lots of lichens. At least three species are visible in this photo:

The botany field trips were joined by numerous high school and middle school students brought by Russell Hudgens of Tahlequah and Bruce Smith of McLoud, as well as college students such as Amber Fisher from UCO and Nick Owens from Southeastern:

It was two Southeastern students (Tyler Titsworth and Ben Singleton) who noticed that most of the tent caterpillars on a cherry tree were safe and snug inside their tent but that a few of them sat conspicuously outside; and as if they were not conspicuous enough, the caterpillars were twitching wildly! We speculated that this was due to a parasite in the caterpillars that would attract a bird as an alternate host:

There were other wonderful field trips, but I will invite leaders or participants of those trips to post their experiences on this blog, or if you do not have access, send text and photos to srice@se.edu. We also had a wonderful Friday evening presentation by Warren Booth of TU, about parthenogenetic snakes. I had to miss Adam Ryburn's Saturday evening presentation, but he is welcome to tell us about it.

Stanley Rice
President-elect

Oklahoma Evolution Road Trip!

Time is running short to register for the Oklahoma Evolution Road Trip! It is May 30 through June 2 and costs $350 which includes travel, accommodations, and most meals. (The cost is $400 if you prefer single accommodations.) This is a real bargain; a recent Big Bend ecotour of similar length cost almost $3000. Home base is the University of Oklahoma Biological Station on beautiful Lake Texoma. We will see fossil deposits, dinosaur footprints, and living trees, and visit creationist museums. There will be plenty of time for discussion. Dr. Stanley Rice and Dr. Gordon Eggleton, both of Southeastern Oklahoma State University, will lead the trip. The tentative deadline is May 3, though we may extend this upon request. Pre-college teachers will receive professional development credit. More information, and registration information, is available at http://www.ou.edu/uobs/evolution.html as well as at Dr. Rice’s blog (http://www.honest-ab.blogspot.com) and website (http://www.stanleyrice.com). If necessary you may attend for just part of the trip, although registration costs remain the same. We’ve talked about evolution; now let’s go see some stunning evidence for it!

The trip is organized by Oklahomans for Excellence in Science Education and is an activity endorsed by OAS. It should be especially valuable for science educators. As always in OESE and OAS events, there will be wonderful people to talk with.

This will not be a creation vs. evolution debate event. When we visit creationist museums, we will listen to them and ask questions, which we will discuss by ourselves later.

Help spread the word to people you know who may be interested. Tax-deductible donations are accepted by the University of Oklahoma Foundation (see the registration website) to help pre-college science teachers.

See you at the Field Meeting! Let's post photos and information about what we see at Lake Eufala after we get home. If you are a board member who has misplaced the login information, contact me (srice@se.edu) and I will send it to you.

Oklahoma Scientist on Talk of the Nation!

I have just finished listening to a Talk of the Nation Science Friday interview of Dr. Charles Brown, a professor at the University of Tulsa. Scientists in Oklahoma can be proud to be well represented by Brown's creative and valuable work.

The immediate subject of the interview was an example of rapid evolutionary change. It appears likely that populations of cliff swallows have evolved over recent decades as a result of roadkills. Swallows killed by vehicles around the bridges where they live had wings that were, on average, longer than the population average of the survivors. Short wings allow greater maneuverability. The apparent conclusion is that vehicles were a selective force that caused the evolution of shorter wings in cliff swallows. Though not surprising to most of us, it probably came as a surprise to many listeners that evolution happens fast enough that we can measure it.

Charles Brown's study are an excellent illustration of something else. He first began collecting roadkill birds without any clear idea of what he would use them for. Once the hypothesis emerged in his mind, however, he had a couple of hundred specimens on which he could make measurements. Scientific research has a certain amount of serendipity. Also, this hypothesis would never have occurred to Charles Brown had he not studied these animals for decades and come to understand nearly every aspect of the social and ecological lives of these animals. A narrow focus, driven by a single answer to a single question, is a process that many scientists use but would never have led Dr. Brown to make this discovery.

Charles Brown spoke in straightforward, friendly language (with an Oklahoma accent). Immediately after his interview, the host interviewed some scientists regarding Gulf War Syndrome. One of the scientists used the term sequelae. I think we all know what this means but it made me wonder how many non-scientists think that scientists speak a different language and live in a different world. They would not have gotten this impression from Brown and his stories about the curious lives of cliff swallows.

Stanley Rice, President-Elect

The Spring Field Meeting at Lake Eufala is coming up! We always have lots of good field trips and it is always good to see our colleagues again. All information, and the registration form, is available at the OAS homepage, in particular at this link for information and this one for registration.

In recent field meetings, we have noticed that spring budburst has been coming earlier and earlier. We had spring field meetings at Sequoyah State Park about 2003 and again in 2012. In 2003, the buds were just opening; in 2012, the leaves were already fully expanded. I have found, in my own database, that buds of many tree species opened 1-2 days earlier every year from 2006 to 2012. I presented these results last fall at the Phenology 2012 conference in Milwaukee. This year has seen a reversal, but not (thus far) a complete one: the buds are still opening earlier this year than in 2008, and much earlier than a decade ago. Whatever happens, there will be plenty of biological activity going on at the field meeting.

Consider offering extra credit for your students to participate. They will have to register, of course. I am offering quite a bit of extra credit to my students in botany courses, but to make sure they pay attention I am requiring that they turn in a brief summary, including the major species that they see.

See you there!
Stan Rice
President-elect