Pocantico Hills Students Capture Wildlife On Cameras For Study

SLEEPY HOLLOW, N.Y. -- Seventh grade students will be learning about local ecosystems and biomes this year by studying the footage captured by the cameras that will be placed around the school and the Rockefeller State Park Preserve thanks to a grant from the Pocantico Hills School Foundation.

Pocantico Hills Central School District
Photo Credit: *File*

Jason Bisnoff

03/16/2016 12:30 p.m.

Science teacher Vincent Cook wrote the grant and is directing the project. With guidance from Teatown Lake Reservation, the group will have first-hand experience observing forests and wildlife. This supports the seventh-grade science curriculum unit of ecosystems and biomes.

The HC500 Hyperfire cameras will be placed around and near the school by the group, and will record animal traffic for two weeks and then be taken down. The digital data will be recorded, and students will be assigned images. They will then categorize the number and type of animals recorded. Finally, the data will be aggregated and analyzed by students to determine the species and populations of the indigenous species in the Rockefeller State Park Preserve.

The information will be shared with the Teatown Lake Reservation.

“This study creates a relevant real world connection to concepts in the Biomes, Ecosystems and Food Webs unit,” said Cook. “It also will inform the local residents, and we hope will be integrated into a larger data base via Teatown.”

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