National Park Scouts

This is part 4 of our Congaree National Park podcast series. Check out our other episodes on Congaree National Park for kids:
Part 1: The Forest that Floods on Purpose
Part 2: The Race for the Light
Part 3: Lights Out in the Swamp
Part 4: War Zone on the Mosquito Meter

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Why does Congaree National Park have a meter with a setting called "War Zone"? Unpack the mystery behind the park's famous Mosquito Meter and discover why the forest intentionally leaves the bugs alone. Then, venture inside standing dead trees (aka "tree apartments") to meet squeaking beetles, hole-carving pileated woodpeckers, and the decomposer heroes that turn rotten wood back into soil for giant trees.

This small park leads us on one of our buzziest adventures yet!

🎒Scout mission included! Experience our fun mission thats great for trips or the backyard with your family.

🏕️ If you could be a bug for a day, which one would you be?

Visit nationalparkscouts.com for coloring pages, word searches, and bingo cards that go along with this kids podcast.

Hey Scouts! Review & subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. It's the best way for others to find the show too. Thank you for supporting National Park Scouts! 🌲⛺

https://nationalparkscouts.com/

Amazing music from Sheb3ar

Find National Park Scouts on Instagram

This is part 3 of our Congaree National Park podcast series. Check out our other episodes on Congaree National Park for kids:
Part 1: The Forest that Floods on Purpose
Part 2: The Race for the Light
Part 3: Lights Out in the Swamp
Part 4: War Zone on the Mosquito Meter

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Deep in the swampy, pitch-black forest of Congaree National Park, thousands of fireflies are blinking against the dark, and a scientist is crouched in the mud holding up a tiny LED light. Today, we go into the night to discover how fireflies nudge their internal clocks to lock into a single rhythm. But here's the best part: while scientists have figured out how these bugs flash together, nobody on Earth fully knows why they do it! Grab your red-light flashlights and get ready for a swamp showdown, a hidden animal call, and a dark-room family Scout Mission!

🎒Scout mission included! Experience our fun mission thats great for trips or the backyard with your family.

🏕️ If you could build a fake signal to communicate with any animal: a light, a sound, a smell, anything. Which animal would you pick, and what would your signal say?

Thank you Laura Erickson for providing the mystery park sound today!

Visit nationalparkscouts.com for coloring pages, word searches, and bingo cards that go along with this kids podcast.

Hey Scouts! Review & subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. It's the best way for others to find the show too. Thank you for supporting National Park Scouts! 🌲⛺

https://nationalparkscouts.com/

Amazing music from Sheb3ar

Find National Park Scouts on Instagram

This is part 2 of our Congaree National Park podcast series. Check out our other episodes on Congaree National Park for kids:
Part 1: The Forest that Floods on Purpose
Part 2: The Race for the Light
Part 3: Lights Out in the Swamp
Part 4: War Zone on the Mosquito Meter

Imagine starting your life deep in the dark, muddy shade of a swamp, racing thousands of tiny neighbors for a single patch of sunlight way up high! Welcome to Congaree National Park, home to the Tree Olympics and more record-breaking champion trees than anywhere else in North America. Today, we meet a pine with the best name growing in the mud, learn the unsolved mystery of Bald Cypress "knees," and find out why Sweetgum wood is actually tougher than pure gold. Plus, discover how muddy swamp water stopped loggers in their tracks and saved this incredible forest twice! 

🎒Scout mission included! Experience our fun mission thats great for trips or the backyard with your family.

🏕️ Say Loblolly three times fast!

Visit nationalparkscouts.com for coloring pages, word searches, and bingo cards that go along with this kids podcast.

Hey Scouts! Review & subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. It's the best way for others to find the show too. Thank you for supporting National Park Scouts! 🌲⛺

https://nationalparkscouts.com/

Amazing music from Sheb3ar

Find National Park Scouts on Instagram

This is part 1 of our Congaree National Park podcast series. Check out our other episodes on Congaree National Park for kids:
Part 1: The Forest that Floods on Purpose
Part 2: The Race for the Light
Part 3: Lights Out in the Swamp
Part 4: War Zone on the Mosquito Meter

How does a forest flood on a warm, sunny day without a single drop of rain nearby? In this episode, we solve the mystery of the disappearing forest floor. Kids get to venture deep into South Carolina’s wild floodplain forest to learn how rain falling over a hundred miles away travels down mountains to trigger a slow-motion flood. Along the way, we'll chat about the many animals that have adapted to this wet and swampy lifestyle.

🎒Scout mission included! Experience our fun mission thats great for trips or the backyard with your family.

🏕️ What animal would you like to be to escape a flood? 

Visit nationalparkscouts.com for coloring pages, word searches, and bingo cards that go along with this kids podcast.

Hey Scouts! Review & subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. It's the best way for others to find the show too. Thank you for supporting National Park Scouts! 🌲⛺

https://nationalparkscouts.com/

Amazing music from Sheb3ar

Find National Park Scouts on Instagram

This is part 4 of our Yosemite National Park podcast series. Check out our other episodes on Yosemite National Park for kids:
Part 1: The Waterfall That Turns to Fire
Part 2: El Capitan's Impossible Climb
Part 3: Half Dome's Crazy Crack
Part 4: The Great Gray Owl

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What wears a giant winter coat, has lopsided ears, and dives headfirst into two feet of snow? Meet the Great Gray Owl, Yosemite’s quietest and rarest resident.🦉

While the landscape gets a lot of the attention in Yosemite, an incredible owl that lives no where else on Earth hides in the shadows. The Great Gray Owl is the tallest owl in North America AND one of the rarest. 

Discover how lopsided ears turn this featherweight bird into a snow-diving super-hunter, test your ears with a game of Guess Who's Hunting, and think about what it would be like to see this elusive bird swoop silently by.

Thank you to the Institute of Bird Populations for providing us with our park sound today. Visit IBP to learn about their work protecting and researching the Great Gray Owl. 🦉

🎒Scout mission included! Experience our fun mission thats great for trips or the backyard with your family.

🏕️ Have you heard an owl hoot before? What do you think it would be like to fly silently in the dark? 

Visit nationalparkscouts.com for coloring pages, word searches, and bingo cards that go along with this kids podcast.

Hey Scouts! Review & subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. It's the best way for others to find the show too. Thank you for supporting National Park Scouts! 🌲⛺

https://nationalparkscouts.com/

Amazing music from Sheb3ar

Find National Park Scouts on Instagram

This is part 3 of our Yosemite National Park podcast series. Check out our other episodes on Yosemite National Park for kids:
Part 1: The Waterfall That Turns to Fire
Part 2: El Capitan's Impossible Climb
Part 3: Half Dome's Crazy Crack
Part 4: The Great Gray Owl

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Think you know how Yosemite’s most famous landmark was made? Think again! Almost everyone (including many grown ups!) think a massive glacier sliced Half Dome clean in half like an apple. We love busting myths around here, so join us while we discover what ACTUALLY HAPPENED to Half Dome!

Discover how a single underground crack, a glacier "ice bulldozer," and a process called "onion-peeling" shaped this iconic mountain. Plus, play a game of "Guess That Park Sound" and see who wins the ultimate face-off: El Capitan or Half Dome!

🎒Scout mission included! Experience our fun mission thats great for trips or the backyard with your family.

🏕️ What would you take with you on a hike up Half Dome? 

Visit nationalparkscouts.com for coloring pages, word searches, and bingo cards that go along with this kids podcast.

Hey Scouts! Review & subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. It's the best way for others to find the show too. Thank you for supporting National Park Scouts! 🌲⛺

https://nationalparkscouts.com/

Amazing music from Sheb3ar

Find National Park Scouts on Instagram

This is part 2 of our Yosemite National Park podcast series. Check out our other episodes on Yosemite National Park for kids:
Part 1: The Waterfall That Turns to Fire
Part 2: El Capitan's Impossible Climb
Part 3: Half Dome's Crazy Crack
Part 4: The Great Gray Owl

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Imagine holding on to the side of a rock wall, with no ropes to catch you! Today, we scale the side of El Capitan, the most famous rock wall on the planet.⛰️

From the original climbers who took 45 days to reach the top, to Alex Honnold's unbelievable four hour climb, discover why this massive vertical cliff has captured the imagination of adventurers for generations. 🧗‍♂️

Kids will learn how a process that took over a hundred million years deep underground created a giant, unbroken block of granite with almost no cracks or weak spots. 

Thank you to Lauren Harter for providing us with our park sound today.

🎒Scout mission included! Experience our fun mission thats great for trips or the backyard with your family.

🏕️ How do you feel about heights? Would you like to try rock climbing yourself one day? 

Visit nationalparkscouts.com for coloring pages, word searches, and bingo cards that go along with this kids podcast.

Hey Scouts! Review & subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. It's the best way for others to find the show too. Thank you for supporting National Park Scouts! 🌲⛺

https://nationalparkscouts.com/

Amazing music from Sheb3ar

Find National Park Scouts on Instagram

This is part 1 of our Yosemite National Park podcast series. Check out our other episodes on Yosemite National Park for kids:
Part 1: The Waterfall That Turns to Fire
Part 2: El Capitan's Impossible Climb
Part 3: Half Dome's Crazy Crack
Part 4: The Great Gray Owl

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Yosemite National Park is one of the most iconic and famous parks in the whole park system. Today, we dive right in to the science behind the legendary Horsetail Fall Firefall. It's a mind-blowing 10-minute phenomenon that requires snow melt, clear skies, and precise sunlight to pull off. From there, we take a look at the "waterfall neighborhood" of Yosemite Valley. Why are there so many here? And what makes them special? 

Parents, buckle up because we are doing all the 'ology's. Hydrology, Glacieology Geology are all required to make a valley of amazing waterfalls. We make it fun and break it down in a kid friendly way so that when you visit Yosemite, you know exactly how all these amazing places got there!

🎒Scout mission included! Experience our fun mission thats great for trips or the backyard with your family.

🏕️ Would you rather see Yosemite Falls while it's a roaring monster? Or a quiet trickle? 

Visit nationalparkscouts.com for coloring pages, word searches, and bingo cards that go along with this kids podcast.

Hey Scouts! Review & subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. It's the best way for others to find the show too. Thank you for supporting National Park Scouts! 🌲⛺

https://nationalparkscouts.com/

Amazing music from Sheb3ar

Find National Park Scouts on Instagram

This is part 4 of our Sequoia National Park podcast series. Check out our other episodes on Sequoia National Park for kids:
Part 1: General Sherman - The Largest Living Thing on Earth
Part 2: Giant Caves Beneath the Giant Trees
Part 3: The High-Flying Frog Rescue
Part 4: Higher than High - Mount Whitney

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Can a mountain spend millions of years hiding underground before it ever sees the sky? 🏔️✨

In our Sequoia National Park series finale, we go 14,505 feet up to the peak of Mount Whitney, the highest point in the lower 48 states! 

Discover how ancient heat, tectonic plates, and ice-age glaciers worked to reveal this massive mountain. Along the way, we’ll learn why the top of the mountain is exploding in slow motion and hear the funny true story of the three local fishermen who beat a team of famous scientists to the summit!

Thank you to Michael Morris; Cornell Lab of O​rnithology | Macaulay Library for providing us with our park sound today.

🎒Scout mission included! Experience our fun mission thats great for trips or the backyard with your family.

🏕️ What would you look for from the top of Mt. Whitney? 

Visit nationalparkscouts.com for coloring pages, word searches, and bingo cards that go along with this kids podcast.

Hey Scouts! Review & subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. It's the best way for others to find the show too. Thank you for supporting National Park Scouts! 🌲⛺

https://nationalparkscouts.com/

Amazing music from Sheb3ar

Find National Park Scouts on Instagram

This is part 3 of our Sequoia National Park podcast series. Check out our other episodes on Sequoia National Park for kids:
Part 1: General Sherman - The Largest Living Thing on Earth
Part 2: Giant Caves Beneath the Giant Trees
Part 3: The High-Flying Frog Rescue
Part 4: Higher than High - Mount Whitney

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Get ready to climb way up into the high mountain lakes of Sequoia National Park!🏔️ Today, we meet an extreme animal: the mountain yellow-legged frog.🐸 This tiny creature can survive under the freezing ice for nine months out of the year.

But when two sneaky villains; a hungry non-native fish and a mysterious microscopic fungus threaten to wipe them out completely, a team of superhero scientists step in. Discover how national parks and local zoos teamed up for an epic rescue mission that involves special frog baths and an actual helicopter 🚁 !

Thank you to Carlos Davidson and Tim Ziesmer for their research on the Southern Mountain Yellow Legged Frog and sharing their call with us today.

🎒Scout mission included! Experience our fun mission thats great for trips or the backyard with your family.

🏕️ Have you seen a frog in the wild? Talk about it! 

Visit nationalparkscouts.com for coloring pages, word searches, and bingo cards that go along with this kids podcast.

Hey Scouts! Review & subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. It's the best way for others to find the show too. Thank you for supporting National Park Scouts! 🌲⛺

https://nationalparkscouts.com/

Amazing music from Sheb3ar

Find National Park Scouts on Instagram