Clouds

By Coggin Heeringa, Interpretive Naturalist, Crossroads at Big Creek, Inc.

At Crossroads at Big Creek, we and many of our friends, find ourselves obsessing about clouds. Appropriately, “Clouds” will be the topic for the weekly “Science Saturday” program. But clouds—the presence or absence of clouds—will affect most of the programs and projects we have planned.

For example, on Friday, September 27, the fifth grade from Sunrise School will celebrate Astronomy Day at Crossroads, and will we host the event with assistance from the Door Peninsula Astronomical Society.

Despite the fact DPAS is a science-based organization, their members are (in jest, we hope) superstitious about clouds, joking that that the more they pay for a new piece of astronomical equipment, the longer they will experience cloud cover. And a fabulous new astronomical camera (purchased with funds from the Wisconsin Space Grant Consortium matched by member donations) will arrive just about then. Weather or not, the Sunshine School (and with luck, sunshine) will be with us on Friday.

Then on Saturday morning, the Door County Mushroom Club will hold their Fall Fungi Fest at Crossroads from 9:00AM to 12:00 noon and that event will include a mushroom hike at 11:45. These people are yearning  for clouds—rain clouds!– because mushrooms foraging tends to be best a couple days following significant rainfall.

This is not superstition. It is fungi survival. [And just saying, human survival depends on fungi survival].  A fungus is not a plant nor is it an animal, but it is a living organism classified in Kingdom Fungi.

Some, but certainly not all, species of fungi  produce fleshy fruiting bodies which we call mushrooms. Mushrooms rarely appear during a dry spell. But they do seem to pop up almost overnight to disperse their tiny spores when the moisture and temperature are adequate for spore germination.

The mushroom hike be far more productive if rain clouds dump on us soon. And for that matter, when our Junior Nature Club [we still have a few openings—see our website for information and to register a child] has their lesson on fungus, we hope there will be more mushrooms than we find now.

 We do not anticipate a salmon run in Big Creek this year. The water in the creek is just too low. And in the same vein, our restoration team is hoping for a few good drenchings so we go into winter with moisture in the soil.

But whatever the weather, our free weekly kids program “Science Saturday,” will include a video, “states of matter” demonstrations using dry ice, and several experiments about clouds. While this program is geared for kids—we encourage learners of all ages to take part.

Even our Nature Exploration After School program  on Monday will be sun/cloud dependent. The colors of autumn leaves are determined, in part, by the amount of sunshine they receive in late summer and early fall.