Group+4+Ecopuppet

(Sandeep, Jasmine, Mike, Erin)
 * EcoPuppet Script**

Narrator: The stage is set for our two organisms here in the northern tundra to act out their dance of predator and prey. The winter is long here with temperatures reaching minus sixty – and although there appears to be water all around (in the form of snow) this is one of the driest climates on earth. Nutrients are scarce because there is not much time in the year when carbon and nitrogen can warm up enough to breakdown and continue their cycles through the biosphere. You might think that hardly anything could live up here – well, you’re right… But even humans, the Inuit, can make a living up here in the tundra by using all the resources that are available to them. It’s a tough life in the tundra but our creatures are have made it easier on themselves by being well adapted to these harsh abiotic conditions… but I’ll let them introduce themselves…

//Arctic Cat sneaks up on Dancing Jellyfish. Right as Cat is about to pounce, Jellyfish turns with an ‘AHA’! //

JF: Thought you could sneak up on me, huh Arctic Cat?

AC: I’m hungry! What did you expect, looking all yummy like that - who are you anyway?

JF: The Inuit call me kanguyak momerpok - the plant that dances but I’m known more commonly as the dancing jellyfish.

AC: Are you related to the Jellyfish? Why are you on land?

JF: No, I’m not at all - I’m actually a species of grass... but I look a little bit like a jelly fish because of my shape. I’ve adapted my shape to trap water in the springtime and harness the wind to move around and disperse my seeds... some people thought it looked like I was dancing. But anyways, leave me alone - there is only so much sun that I can absorb and you are getting in the way.

AC: *huff* The sun’s almost always up this time of year! It’s the arctic tundra!

JF: Do you know what I have to deal with up here as a grass in the cold? I’ve had to rely on a fungus as my source of nitrogen! How pathetic is that...

AC: You? What about me? This white camouflage isn’t coming in fast enough – it’s already started snowing and those arctic foxes are all over me! How can I hide from them if I don’t blend in with my environment!

JF: Whine whine whine. The sun is getting closer and closer to the horizon and soon it’s going to be permanent night for like six months. I am just going to sit under the snow and wait until next spring. And if some Reindeer or Arctic Cat like you finds me, I’m a goner!

AC: Oh please. You developed that white top to help you hide... and you aren’t exactly good eats. Stop being so full of yourself, I would barely try to eat you if I was starving in the middle of winter.

JF: Hah! You guys dig into the ice and snow with those evil-looking claws of yours and rip right into us poor plants. And you think that my camoflauge is going to protect me from some half-starved vegetarian cat?

AC: What are you talking about? We can barely get through all the layers of ice because of the melting and re-freezing that’s going on all the time. Remember the good-old-days, when snow was snow and the winters were cold?

JF: It has seemed warmer up here.

AC: Of course it has! This Global Warming will be the death of us! I was hiding from Polar Bear earlier and she was complaining about how all those ice floes keep melting on her. Not that I’m overly sympathetic considering she’d eat me in a second, but still!

<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">JF: Well, I heard from a couple of birds that there’s been another oil leak from that pipeline a few miles from here. And that stuff lasts longer up here ‘cause with the cold there’s no evaporation and without the sun, oil breaks down more slowly. Some of my cousins live over there! They’ve probably been contaminated!

<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">AC: Heard of bio-accumulation? That contamination of chemicals gets worse and worse the higher up the food chain you go! I’ve probably got tons of PCBs sitting in my fat stores – but I have to accumulate the fat, or how will I survive out the winter?

<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">JF: Well at least you don’t eat fish like the Polar Bear. She’s got it way worse than you do with all those heavy metals.

<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">AC: *huff* Whatever. … (pause) Hey, do you actually like to dance, or did you just get named by humans?

<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">JF: What kind of dumb question is that? I’m a plant! Of course I like to dance!

<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">AC: No need to get testy! I was just curious.

<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">JF: Well go be curious somewhere else. I’m busy photosynthesizing here.

<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">AC: Alright, alright.

//<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">AC leaves. //