Those of you who have hopped aboard the museum’s U.S.S. Discovery know that different kinds of birds leave different kinds of poop! (For those of you who haven’t boarded this fine vessel, its dashboard explains the anatomy of splay—the designs made by bird droppings.)
Well, during Science Saturday on Oct. 18, we’re going to take the study of bird droppings to a whole new level. That day at 11 a.m., budding biologists will snap on some latex gloves to dissect owl pellets.
They’ll also learn about the diets of owls and other carnivorous birds of prey, such as hawks, eagles, ospreys, and vultures. According to the education website kidwings.com, carnivorous diets consist primarily of meat—typically mammals, birds, amphibians, or reptiles—that’s obtained either through hunting or scavenging.
Pellets are densely compacted forms of waste that include non-digestible material, such as bones and exoskeletons. And owls aren’t the only birds that make pellets: Almost any bird that eats animals with bones or exoskeletons will make a pellet after their meal. During Science Saturday, we’ll identify the various bones and other items found in the pellets and determine which creatures they might have belonged to
Check out Facebook.com/SMVDiscoveryMuseum to see what other cool experiments and activities we have in store for Science Saturday this month!
The Santa Maria Valley Discovery Museum is at 705 S. McClelland St. in Santa Maria. We are open Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Sunday from noon to 4 p.m.
Amy Blasco, program director for the Santa Maria Valley Discovery Museum, wrote this week’s Discovery Corner, a weekly column in the Sun highlighting events, science activities, and more. Send comments to discoverycorner@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Oct 16-23, 2014.