Underground Railroad Field Trip!

We took a field trip to Belmont Mansion with our homeschool co-op this week to learn more about the Underground Railroad.  This house first belonged to the Peters family, who purchased the property from William Penn in 1742.  The original owner was a loyalist and so headed back to Britain prior to the war.  His son, a patriot, lived here and eventually became a judge and served as George Washington's Secretary of War.  His son became the president of the Pennsylvania Society for the Abolition of Slavery and was actively involved int eh underground railroad.  Runaway slaves would leave boxcars from a train near the house, hide in the attic and then be taken further along by Quakers. 

 

 There was a wonderful display of pictures and narrations from former slaves, often in their 90's, telling about daily slave life. 

 

 It says: "Pennsylvania became the firs stop for enslaved people on the way north to freedom after the Act for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery passed in 1780.  Their helpers, called conductors, made a network of escape routes, called the Underground Railroad, along which runaways hid in houses, barns, caves and churches, called stations.  Most runaways did not stay in Pennsylvania because they risked recapture under the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793."

Wonderful moulding from the main drawing room of the house: 

 Monkey wrench, wagon wheel, crossroads and bear claw quilt patterns, part of Harriet Tubman's 13 quilt code. 

 African dolls from that time period.

 It would be a wonderful view of the city if the fog was not there.  As it is, Katy commented that it actually gave us a much more realistic view of what the Peters family would have seen from their lawn. 

 Side views of the house.

I also found some nifty websites to complement our trip, so the day after we looked through these sites and did some creative writing.  

National Geographic Education

Scholastic

Explorers!

We finished our regular history book a few weeks ago, so I decided to find a "fun" unit to end the school year.  Since our history ended up with the Age of Exploration, I thought we would enjoy learning more about explorers, and I found the perfect study here!  The kids have been enjoying making maps and newspaper, among other parts of our study. 
Earlier this week, we learned about different navigational tools and then made a quadrant, which was used to find latitude (angles from the equator).  The kids had fun trying it out. 

More Herons!

 An update on our herons:
Apparently, Great Horned Owls are predators of herons (and hawks, too!).  There have been two nighttime owl attacks so far, and both times the dad has fought it off valiantly.  I would be afraid of a heron after hearing how it sounds when fighting!  So far, four of the five eggs have hatched.  They are cute fuzzy things, much longer and skinnier than the hawks, and they have such funny tufts of down on their heads!  Looks like a really bad hair day.  :) 

Today dad fed them while we were eating lunch and watching.  It was fascinating to watch the dad cough up entire fish for them!  And they seem to like fish quite well! 

When the dad id getting ready to sit back down and cover them up (really, he is squatting), he shuffles around, shifting his weight from one foot to another until he is ready to go down.  The funny thing is, he keeps stepping on the babies or knocking them over as he does so, and they look quite comical wiggling around on their backs trying to right themselves. 

 Lunch time!

Just thought this was s cool profile of dad - nifty bent knees and long feathers waving around. 

Herons

Here's the first shot we got of the baby herons this morning.  They have the same wispy-looking feathers as the adults - very fun!  We are waiting to see them more zoomed in (not sure if this camera can do that?) and to hopefully watch them eat so we can compare them to the hawks. 

Eagles, Too!

We have been hearing about a bald eagle nest, too, so today we googled it and found it.  These eagle babies are a month old now and quite large compared to our hawk eyas!  Fun to watch! 
Click here to watch the bald eagles!

 How fun that we have actually been studying zoology (specifically birds) in science right now, too!  

More Bird News!!

To update on the red-tailed hawks, we have three beautiful fuzzy eyas now.  It's amazing that they can eat meat right after birth! 

And the herons are developing, too!  This morning we got a picture of two eggs with pips in them, and then this evening we could se their beaks moving around in much larger holes.  Tonight I saw on their facebook page that the first two babies are completely hatched!  Very fun!  We are curious as to what baby herons look like, compared to baby hawks.  And apparently they don't eat meat right away but are fed regurgitated food from their parents for a while, so we'll see! 

This morning...

 This evening...

"Our" Hawks

I am sure everyone has been waiting with baited breath for a hawk update.....so, here it is.  :) 

We have been enjoying watching the red-tailed hawk nest at Cornell, as well as the Great Blue Herons, and trying to guess when they will hatch.  On Sunday the 22nd, the first pips were confirmed, and by Monday morning, amidst a lot of snow (!!!), the first baby hatched!!  The male and female fed it off and on throughout the day, so we were able to get some glimpses of it!

Waiting....

Why, hello baby!!

Here are mom and dad hanging out in the nest....

And eyas number 1 is hungry....

 But look, there's a second eyas hanging out in there (as of Tuesday afternoon)! 

 And number three is working away in here!
 (Apparently it takes about 50 hours from the first pip for an eyas to emerge, so we 're thinking maybe Thursday afternoon?)

See the red-tailed hawk family for yourself here!