Pollen, Nests and the Next Generation

Making the Next Generation

1On a class trip to the natural history museum, Priya Nair's sixth-grade group walked past the dinosaur skeletons to a newer hall called Making the Next Generation. Its panels describe studies by museum scientists on how living things in the region produce offspring that survive.

2The first panel shows a field study of a purple wildflower in a restored meadow. In June, a museum botanist chose 40 flower heads of the same kind of plant, all growing in the same part of the meadow. Before the flowers opened, she slipped fine mesh bags over 20 of them. The mesh let sunlight, air and rain through but kept insects out. The other 20 flower heads were left uncovered. From a bench nearby, she counted bees and butterflies landing on the open flowers. Many of them pushed deep into the flowers to sip sweet nectar and flew off with yellow pollen dusted on their bodies. In August, she collected all 40 flower heads and counted their seeds.

3The second panel is about a songbird that often nests in city parks. In most nests, both parents carry insects to the chicks many times an hour, and the adults dive at crows and squirrels that come close. One spring, museum volunteers watched 40 nests. In 20 nests, both parents stayed to feed and guard the young. In the other 20, one parent had disappeared early, so a single adult did all the work. The volunteers counted the eggs laid and the chicks that fledged, which means they grew big enough to leave the nest.

4A third panel plays recordings of male songbirds singing from high branches in early spring. A video beside it shows a male turkey fanning his tail and strutting in front of females, and a male firefly flashing a light pattern at night. The last display case holds acorns, seeds covered in hooked burrs, and a cluster of red berries.