In the Poveda Lab we see outreach as a valuable public service tool to promote science awareness and education in our community. Here are a few science outreach projects our members have taken on:
Our graduate student Diana Obregon participated in this year’s Agricultural Literacy Week carried out by New York Agricultural in the Classroom by reading “Tales of the Dairy Godmother: Chuck’s Ice Cream Wish” by Viola Butler in Spanish.
During our 2019 tomato field season, we investigated if different species of bees produced varying tomato sizes. One of our field sites was located on a Cornell owned farm plot that got lots of foot traffic from those passing through who often asked us what we were researching. In response to this we created an interactive poster asking passing folks which bee species they thought would produce larger tomatoes after a single visit! Participants could vote by placing a blue glass stone in one of five bowls corresponding to honey bees, bumble bees, green sweat bees, Lasioglossum bees, or mining bees. Bumble bees were the overwhelming winner by the end of our field season, receiving over half of all votes!
We believe maintaining strong relationships with the growers that allow us to use their farms for sampling as well as providing information to them on what we are doing and how their farms play an important role. During our 2019 field season, we also created informational handouts for the growers we collaborated with outlining the impact of pollinators on their farms. You can check them out below: