Lakes are usually part of an ecosystem, but in Alex Lake’s case he was building one. Lake is in sophomore biology, and the class had a project to make a functioning ecosystem that a living organism could survive in.  

“We built self-contained ecosystems, and we basically did dirt, water, and some living thing such as a snail, fish, or plant. Some kids even brought in mealworms and crickets as their living creature. Then we see how well it does in the environment,” Lake said.

He explains that they built their ecosystems out of empty soda bottles, such as the ones found in vending machines. They then filled the bottles with dirt and put water in them for their living organism . His group happened to have a cactus named George.

“My group didn’t do too well because our cap was broken and we just kept forgetting to get a new one,” he said.

He said George lived for awhile, but not nearly as long as some other students’ projects.