An invaluable informational and active resource that the Environmental Protection Agency could initiate would provide online naturalist study opportunities for library and at-home/homebound users. Specifically, stationary and mobile web cameras situated in various "places" on planet earth could be accessed electronically at the user's convenience. The net result would be a common experience and the educational treasure of natural observations. The cameras should have real-time streaming video and audio transmitting capabilities as well as be non-intrusive in their immediate environment.
Examples of "places" that a webcam could be installed for amateur naturalist study opportunities are the observation of:
a garden of flowers attracting feeding indigenous or migrating butterflies;
the thermal water outfall of a nuclear power plant where manatees congregate to avoid the winter's chilly seawater;
microscopic plankton as they pass through a tube with the force of the tides into and out of an estuary;
the imposing winters and the apparent genesis of life emerging with the spring and summer seasons on the Arctic tundra ;
an African savanna;
one knoll of the Antarctic icecap;
colorful creatures of the coral reef;
a thermal vent;
the edge of an active volcano;
a colony of insects;
the view from a released weather balloon;
the highest heights - with the cacophony of birds and nocturnal adventures of mammals - in a tropical rain forest;
a pasture;
a vine in a jungle;
a deer path;
a waterfall;
a frog pond.
Well-placed webcams situated in the extreme and commonplace mini-biomes of our planet would empower anyone with access to the internet as a naturalist observer; our sitting chair, binoculars or microscope, pencil, and notebook would be replaced with a webcam and an internet-linked computer. The learning community would be a global us.
Science Is Fun. Thanks for reading.
Don Deresz
Science Teacher
Miami-Dade County Public Schools
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