Goldenrod was the topic from last week’s Outdoor Hour Challenge. Who knew that such a common yellow flower could not only be prettier up close, but also fascinating as a wildflower? Using Lesson 132 in the Handbook of Nature Study, I gleaned a few new interesting facts that helped me appreciate our local goldenrod so much more.
In the Handbook of Nature Study, Anna Botsford Comstock says not to worry about identifying a particular goldenrod if you do observe some in your neighborhood because there are just so many different varieties. I attempted to nail down our goldenrod and decided it’s probably Western goldenrod or Euthamia occidentalis.
The problem here in my local area is that the rabbitbrush is blooming at the same time and it’s also a very yellow low growing plant that you could easily mistake for goldenrod. (See this entry from a few years ago where I made the same mistake: Goldenrod Afternoon.)
But now I know to look for the different leaves and flower shapes, but I do have to look carefully when I’m driving by a field to decide which flower it is that’s blooming.
I’m lucky enough right now to have a goldenrod plant growing in my front rock garden. I almost weeded it out earlier in the summer but now I’m glad I left it to grow! I enjoy seeing it from the window and I hope that it spreads a little to add some yellow flashes of color to my landscape.
The Handbook of Nature Study encourages us in our nature study to look for insects that can be found on the goldenrod. So far, I’ve only seen a few stray bees.
Look for the free notebooking page for this nature study linked in that entry!
I used these field guides in addition to the Handbook of Nature Study to learn more about my goldenrod.
I’ve written two wildflower nature study ebooks that you may be interested in using with your family. They are both in the Ultimate and Journey level memberships here on the Handbook of Nature Study.
Join us each Friday for a different nature study idea!
Like much of the West Coast, we’ve been plagued with wildfire smoke off and on for the last month. It rolls in thickly, making it impossible to truly enjoy being outdoors for very long. But, the minute it clears out, we are trying to squeeze in the last of the late summer activities.
Creating memories of a summer spent outside with family and friends is high on our priority.
Sometimes we plan an outing and sometimes we get invited on a spur of the moment trip. This was the case with a day trip to Crater Lake National Park. Our son unexpectedly had the day off and he phoned us up and asked if we wanted to accompany him to see Crater Lake on a day that the skies were blue and clear. It took us about ½ a second to respond, “Yes!”
We try to eat outside on our patio as much as possible. The last Outdoor Hour Challenge in August was to have a late summer picnic. We’ve had several in the past few weeks but I haven’t taken a photo. The image above is our typical summer meal with a little grilled chicken, salad, and some beans. I’ve actually perfected my baked beans recipe this summer as the perfect accompaniment to any grilled dish.
We have a place we discovered this summer that’s very close to our house that offers a variety of nature experiences. It’s along the Fall River where we can hike, picnic, and just sit and enjoy an afternoon in the sunshine among the wildflowers. There’s also a nearby fish hatchery with amazing rainbow trout of all sizes to observe. These will be summer memories that will warm my heart during the long winter.
We are nearly finished building our bbq shed with the help of our sons. It’s the perfect spot to enjoy a summer evening playing cornhole or just watching the dark descend on the mountains in the distance.
Our main focus this summer was to landscape our backyard, or at least get the hardscape down and build a few berms. My husband has worked his little heart out creating a beautiful space for us to enjoy that far exceeded our summer goals. He surprised me at how much he has accomplished and even got an aspen planted in the far corner of the property. I’m going to love watching it change colors with the season.
There is so much more to share but I will end there in the hope that you will be inspired to get outside with your family during the next month. I invite you to follow me on Instagram to see more of our outdoor experiences here in Central Oregon.
Follow me here:Instagram – outdoorhourchallenge.If you would like me to take a look at one of your images on Instagram, use the hashtag #outdoorhourchallenge.
Want to join in the Outdoor Mom post?
Answer all or just one of the prompts in a blog entry on your own blog or right here on my blog in a comment. If you answer on your blog, make sure to leave me a link in a comment so that I can pop over and read your responses.
During our outdoor time this month we went…
The most inspiring thing we experienced was…
Our outdoor time made us ask (or wonder about)…
In the garden, we are planning/planting/harvesting…
Archive Outdoor Hour Challenge – Click the link above to take you to the original challenge.
Goldenrod is a showy yellow wildflower that is included in the Handbook of Nature Study. There are many varieties of goldenrod all over North America, so you may have some in your local area. This is the perfect beginner’s nature study that starts with a pretty flower and a super interesting lesson in the Handbook of Nature Study.
Anna Botsford Comstock encourages us to engage our child’s imagination as we hunt for “golden cities” in our neighborhoods and to look for insects. This makes it a subject that appeals to a wide range of children as they take a look to see if they can discover this flower and possibly some creatures to observe. Make sure to read the pages in the Handbook of Nature Study that will help you build an interest for this week’s topic.
Make sure to click the link below to read the entire Outdoor Hour Challenge with links, ideas, free notebooking pages, and suggested follow-up activities.
This Outdoor Hour Challenge is part of the 2018-2019 Plan here on the Handbook of Nature Study. We will be using the Handbook of Nature Study by Anna Botsford Comstock to discover new things about the world around us. Join us each Friday for a different nature study topic. Make sure to subscribe to this blog to receive the weekly challenge right in your email box.
Note this is an Amazon affiliate link to a product that I have used and loved for many,many years.
Nature Journal Project: Nature Observer August 2018
Wondering what we have been up to this month and what nature journal pages I have created? August has been very laid back as far as getting outdoors and experiencing nature. We’ve done some trail and campground exploring within a twenty mile radius of our house and found an abundance of awesome places to investigate further. I’m keeping a list in my nature journal of possible places to use for outings in the future. Yes, I know I’m spoiled to have so many things so close at hand, but that’s part of the reason we moved to Central Oregon. It’s a fantastic place for nature nerds to live!
Here are my pages from the past few weeks.
We planted a new aspen tree this month back in our far corner. It’s visible from our living room windows so I’m already anticipating the change of the season and the leaf color. I created a page in my journal with a few interesting facts about aspens, some of my observations, and then a leaf rubbing.
Here’s a two page spread in my Nature Observer journal (see the link and cover below). I LOVE this journal and every day I’m eager to record a few thoughts, facts, and/or nature observations. It has become a great record of when things bloom, appear, disappear, etc.
This page is a record of a magical afternoon spent sitting by Fall River with my husband. The weather was perfect and we found a secluded spot along the bank to watch the birds, enjoy the wildflowers, and the sound of the rippling water.
I tackled a sketch of our resident toad. I used a photograph as a reference and then water-colored it in for my nature page. I learned some new facts about the toad and I can now appreciate his comings and goings as part of his life cycle. My friend named the toad “Geraldine”. I’m not sure how to tell if it’s a boy or girl toad, but we’re going with Geraldine for now.
I’m still going strong with this Nature Observer Guided Journal that I started back at the beginning of the year. There are so many positive things I could say about it but the most important thing is the flexible nature of the calendars and the prompts. I make every page work for me in my habitat. Plus it has a built in habit trainer…in the form of a bullet-style journal section for each month’s goals. So helpful!
If you’re looking for a pre-printed nature journal for yourself, take a look at this one on Amazon.com. I highly recommend it! Please note that I am an affiliate for Amazon.com.
Do you want some more specific nature journal ideas? Click over to my nature journal page and scroll down for the Once-a-Month Nature Journal Project idea buttons. There’s a lot there to keep you busy!
Don’t forget that I’m sharing a nature journal page each week on my Instagram account if you want to see the pages as they unfold. Follow me here:Instagram – outdoorhourchallenge.And, if you want to create a page and share it on your Instagram for me to see, use the hashtag #OHCnaturejournal.
Autumn Nature Study with the Outdoor Hour Challenge
We’re facing a change of the season here in a few weeks.
I realize many of you have purchased some of the past autumn nature study ebooks here on the Handbook of Nature Study. Have you thought of working through a series again starting next month? My family has completed many of these challenges more than once and we always learn something new!
If you’re new to the Outdoor Hour Challenge, you can find all five of the ebooks in the Ultimate Naturalist Library membership.
I’ll list the autumn themed ebooks below and if you want to click over to see the specific topics covered, you can easily do that by clicking the book title.
I’d love for you to find something here to inspire a whole lot of autumn nature study. Last week in my giveaway, I think the vast majority of people who entered responded that they LOVE autumn nature study the best. Well, use the Outdoor Hour Challenges to take your nature study to the next level with easy to follow ideas and simple follow-up activities.
This simple Outdoor Hour Challenge has always been a favorite in our family. We had a small square study in our own yard and another one going on over in my dad’s yard. My science loving boys looked forward to visiting their squares and most of the time they were eager to record their observations.
Give the option for a nature journal page or just take some photos!
Here are two entries from our past square studies:
Start a small square study in your yard. After you finish, leave the markers up and revisit the square in a few months during the autumn season. Look for new items or any changes that might have occurred in your small square. You could even keep this going into the winter and then on to spring for a full year’s cycle. Mark your calendar as a reminder to look at your square each season.
If you have access to the Getting Started ebook, there’s a custom notebook page that you can use alongside Outdoor Hour Challenge #9 if you wish, or a number of blank pages you can print and use instead.
The Getting Started ebook is included in all levels of membership here on the Handbook of Nature Study, including the Discover Level.
Have you ever seen the One Small Square books from Donald Silver? I own the whole series and we have used them numerous times in our nature study. My boys loved the illustrations and I appreciated the simple activities suggested in each book. Check them out at your local public library or online at Amazon. Click the link above to go to Amazon….please note that I am an affiliate for Amazon.com and will receive a small commission if you make a purchase. I own and highly recommend this series of books.
The theme of the link-up for August is Water – River, Stream, Pond. I decided to share one of the books that we used for our study of local ponds. This compact book is a terrific source of information for all ages. It’s detailed enough for an older student to use as a reference and it has colorful illustrations that will capture the interest of younger students.
You can look for it at your public library or it’s available from Amazon (note that I’m an Amazon affiliate and there are affiliate links in this entry).
You can use this as a reference book or field guide during your pond study. Or, read a few pages a week over a longer period and learn about pond life in preparation for a future pond study. There are sections for plant life and animal life in this book, including birds, reptiles, fish, and mammals. In addition, there are simple illustrations for really small things you might collect in pond water, looking at them up close with a magnifying lens or microscope.
We have owned and read this book several times during our homeschool studies. I’ve kept it in our nature library even now as a quick way to learn more about things we see in our own pond/stream.
“Almost any of the fishes found in a brook or pond may be kept in an aquarium for a few days of observation in the schoolroom. A large water pail or a bucket does very well if there is no glass aquarium. ” Handbook of Nature Study, page 145
Seasonal Pond Study with Printables
Use this notebook page to record your pond study observations and then revisit your pond in each season to compare plants, insects, birds, fish, reptiles, and amphibians. Printable Seasonal Pond Study Notebook Page
Make sure to subscribe to my blog to follow along with our weekly nature study activities.
Note: This post is part of a monthly series of posts I’m writing as part of a fantastic group of nature loving women who I’m linking up with on the 20th of each month. There’s a topic of the month and we’ll all share a book and activity that goes along with that theme. Use the linky tool below to share your own nature walk related links this month too.
Check out these other links for more nature walk ideas from Nature Book Club Co-Hosts!
One of the most important aims in offering nature study to our children is to increase their curiosity in the world around them. In our family, every time we got out the magnifying lenses, the kids would immediately be looking for things outside to see up close. The magnifying lens brings your children in close contact with things they might not otherwise notice! Suddenly, they can see tiny insects in detail, pollen on a flower petal, or the texture of bark on a tree.
Summer Nature Study Tip
This Outdoor Hour Challenge is a favorite “go to” activity whether you take the magnifying lens outside or add it to your nature table. Give your children unlimited access to this simple tool and see where their interests take them.
Additional Ideas for Using a Magnifying Lens during Nature Study
Rock Study With Magnifying Lens: I love a good rock study and using the magnifying lens will take your investigation a step further! There’s a free printable activity in this entry too!
If you have access to the Getting Started ebook, there’s a custom notebook page that you can use alongside Outdoor Hour Challenge #8 if you wish, or a number of blank pages you can print and use instead.
The Getting Started ebook is included in all levels of membership here on the Handbook of Nature Study, including the Discover Level.
See this page for all of the benefits of membership.
We have pretty much enjoyed a “staycation” this past month as we explored a few new places and found refreshment in just being at HOME. We moved here because we used to vacation here, so why not just stay home, sleep in my own bed and take time to get to know the local area?
Works for us!
We had the added joy of having our daughter home from New York for a little over a week. We ended up spending a lot of time outdoors doing fun stuff with her and our boys too.
The very first day she was here we pulled the kayaks and canoe down to the river behind our house for a good long float. This is the Little Deschutes River, so it’s a slow moving and meandering experience. It was a perfect afternoon and we took a stop midway to swim in the refreshingly clear, cool water.
One of my favorite destinations here in Central Oregon is Sparks Lake on the Cascade Lakes Scenic Byway. It’s a long narrow lake with lots of coves along its volcanic rock shore. We paddled all the way to the end and back. The bonus to this lake is the spectacular views of South Sister and Mt. Bachelor.
We’ve been building a shelter for our Traeger smoker out of local materials. We have a friend who has a portable lumber mill and he made us a large beam and live edge siding from trees he had on his property. The paver patio is finished but the structure is still a work in progress. We’ve already spent lots of evenings sitting on the patio watching the moon rise and the stars come out.
Our daughter wanted to see the Lava River Cave which is close to our town. It’s a long, dry, volcanic rock cave. You take your own flashlights and explore at your own pace. It was a chilly 42 degrees in there so we all got pretty cold…should have been better prepared!
My son had some friends up from California and they wanted to float the Deschutes River…a VERY Oregon thing to do. It was a very hot day and the water was COLD. I opted to kayak but they all enjoyed their lazy river float. Ah, to be young!
My sister and brother-in-law came for a visit and they wanted to try floating too, but we went on the much warmer Little Deschutes River. Another hot day, another great float down the river!
(Do you see a theme to our summer activities?)
Another activity we’ve been trying to squeeze in each week is to go listen to live music whether it’s here in La Pine, in Sunriver, or up in Bend. This time of year there are lots of options for music so that makes it easy. When my daughter was here, we had dinner at Sunriver and then listened to music out on the lawn behind the lodge….so much fun!
We’ve been working on our backyard landscaping since June and we’re finally seeing it come together. It’s still a challenge to know what the deer will eat and what they leave alone. The night after I took this photo of the heliotrope with the swallowtail on it, the deer ate it down to the roots. It has since grown back but I’m sure they’ll be eager to eat the blooms as soon as it blossoms again.
We’ve had a month of hot, dry weather until a few days ago when a thunderstorm rolled in very slowly. I could see it off in the distance when we started our walk down to the river after dinner. You could see the rain but the sun was shining over our heads. Then a rainbow appeared as the light shifted to a pinkish-orange glow. We could hear lots of thunder rumbling. In the end, we didn’t even get a drop of rain because the clouds just sort of dematerialized and blew away. It made for a great show as we had our daily walk.
I’ve slowed down with my hiking this summer because of my arthritis. I’m facing a double hip replacement in the fall….which will put me out of commission for a period of time, but then I’m hoping to be able to hit the trail without pain for the first time in years. My doctor assures me that it will be “rainbows and unicorns” after the surgery and then 4-6 weeks of recovery. I’m nervous about the actual surgery, but the hope of being much more able to get out and do things again motivates me to get it DONE!
The anticipation of surgery inspired me to get a whole year’s worth of nature study planned and up on the blog now. You can see the plan and find out more about a membership in this post:
Follow me here:Instagram – outdoorhourchallenge.If you’d like me to take a look at one of your images on Instagram, use the hashtag #outdoorhourchallenge.
Want to join in the Outdoor Mom post?
Answer all or just one of the prompts in a blog entry on your own blog or right here on my blog in a comment. If you answer on your blog, make sure to leave me a link in a comment so that I can pop over and read your responses.
During our outdoor time this month we went…
The most inspiring thing we experienced was…
Our outdoor time made us ask (or wonder about)…
In the garden, we are planning/planting/harvesting…
If you’ve been following along with the Outdoor Hour Challenge Getting Started series this summer, you’ve no doubt enjoyed getting outside each week with your children. Hopefully, there are some nature journal pages in your notebook, recording some of your discoveries. You may have even started a collection after last week’s challenge.
Now, you can use Outdoor Hour Challenge #7 to create a few pages in a custom field guide for your home with birds, wildflowers, or any other area of interest. We started off with birds and the free printable in the archived post linked above.
This is a long term project that your family can work on as you find new topics or interests!
Summer Nature Study Tip
Outdoor Hour Challenge #7 is a perfect summer afternoon activity. Print out a few copies of the bird field guide printable and have each family member tackle a different bird. Take advantage of the hot afternoons to be inside creating your field guide.
If you have access to the Getting Started ebook, there’s a custom notebook page that you can use alongside Outdoor Hour Challenge #7 if you wish, or a number of blank pages you can print and use instead.
The Getting Started ebook is included in all levels of membership here on the Handbook of Nature Study, including the Discover Level.
Still a little time to enter the giveaway for an Ultimate Naturalist Membership!
