Galileo Coming to Concord!

Come to the Christa McAuliffe Planetarium on Friday, January 2nd and meet Galileo Galilei! 2009 has been declared the International Year of Astronomy in honor of Galileo’s first observing the heavens through a telescope in 1609. “Galileo” will be here in person to talk about his curiosities and discoveries! Celebrate as we kick off this significant astronomical year with Galileo Impersonator Paul Manning.

Following the program will be a FREE Skywatch with the New Hampshire Astronomical Society. Telescope viewing begins at dusk (weather permitting).

Recommended for ages 8+, children under 13 must be accompanied by an adult. $8 Adult, $5 Child (3-12), $7 Student/Senior. Free for Members.

Interstate 93 to exit 15E. Call (603) 271-STAR for more information.

CASA of NH Seeks Artists’ Submissions

Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) of New Hampshire invites all state artists and photographers to participate in its 2009 holiday card fundraising project by donating use of their original artwork by February 16th. Selected artwork by amateur, professional and child artists (send in your child’s winter/holiday drawings) will be part of a very popular series of cards selling 50,000 to 75,000 annually to support the mission and operating budget. While being a wonderful publishing opportunity, it provides a means whereby talented individuals can use their art to benefit a worthy cause.

CASA of NH is a statewide, private non-profit organization that recruits, trains, and supervises volunteers who speak in court on behalf of abused and neglected children. Currently, over 400 unpaid CASA guardians ad litem advocate for 1000 young victims.

For information, selection guidelines, and a full-color brochure of 2008 CASA Holiday Cards, please call Bonnie (603) 626-4600 or visit www.casanh.org. CASA of NH is also seeking citizens from around the state who want to advocate for children in District and Family Courts.

“Snow, Water, Ice”

By Suzy Martin, Master Gardener
UNH Cooperative Extension
Remember those soft little snowflakes falling from the sky, attaching to your eyelashes, mittens, and tongue during those snowy days when you were growing up? Oh, how my friends and I loved to get up and out when the announcement came, SNOW DAY. NO SCHOOL!

Remember sitting outside by yourself and listening to the snow fall, how quiet and secure it made you feel?

Growing up in the fifties and sixties, I never really understood why snowflakes were so wonderful or why the water they’re made from is so powerful. How could the substance in those delicate little flakes from my childhood float on the top of a pond, move mountains, and kill living plant tissue?

I never really made the connection between liquid water and ice until I was studying to teach Advanced Placement biology. I had a wonderful instructor whose job it was to bring all of us pre-1963 high school science teachers up to date.

This class brought me one of those “aha” moments when things suddenly come together and begin to make sense. My moment of enlightenment came when our instructor explained water and all its properties.

We began with the structure of the simple H2O molecule everyone knows by its chemical formula: two hydrogen atoms (H) and one oxygen atom (O). The way in which the hydrogen and oxygen atoms bond and by which the molecules attach to each other causes liquid water molecules to attach and break apart constantly, giving water its familiar fluid appearance.

But what about ice? How does water become ice and float?

The unique bonding properties of the water molecule also account for ice. As liquid water begins to lose its heat and freeze, the molecules attach to one another in such a way as to keep each molecule at arm’s length from its neighbors, creating the rigid lattice structure we know as ice. This ice lattice creates space between the molecules, making ice less dense than water and causing it to expand and float.

Also due to this shape, when liquid water flows between rocks and down into cracks in rocks and freezes, the ice lattice expands to nine percent more than the water’s liquid shape and exerts a tremendous force on the surrounding rock. This expansion causes fractures along the rocks’ natural weak points. Adding gravity explains why the Old Man in the Mountain was doomed to fall in spite of the valiant attempts to hold it in place.

Now as fall fades and the woods turn white with snow, what caused those maple leaves to shrivel and fall and your geraniums to turn to brown mush and begin to rot, but doesn’t damage evergreen shrubs and trees? It seems water and freezing temperatures again are the culprits.

Leaves on deciduous trees die as part of a plan.

As sunlight and temperatures decrease, photosynthesis slows and the tree begins to use more energy than its leaves produce. These are the clues for the tree to reduce its energy budget and remove all those things causing a negative draw on its energy stores. Trees drop their leaves and take a long winter’s nap.

But many of our cold-tolerant evergreen trees and shrubs have adapted to freezing temperatures by moving water out of their cells to spaces between the cells, allowing the cells to survive by lowering their freezing points. When the temperature rises, melting occurs, water moves back into the cells, and the plant resumes its growth activities, though there may be some cell damage. But not all trees survive, as the drying winds so common here in winter can kill a tree by drying out the water between its cells.

That explains how trees may (or may not) survive, but what about geraniums? Geraniums and other summer-flowering annuals, due to their genetics, don’t transport water out of their cells, so ice forms in their cells and kills the plants.

So, as daylight decreases and gardens are put to sleep, I look out my window at the frozen pond, the surrounding trees and shrubs, and the deflated, brown vegetation of the flower garden, and I think: I now understand why ice floats, snowflakes form, leaves die, and The Old Man in the Mountain fell. It’s all because of the simple structure of ice-crystal lattices created as liquid water freezes.

And, as winter advances, snowflakes fly, and the woods look dead, I know that even in winter, plant cells in my trees and shrubs are performing tiny miracles, preparing for spring.