We have spent quite a number of our outdooor hours observing and learning about oaks. We are blessed with many different kinds of oaks right in our own yard so they are constantly a backdrop for many of our studies. Here is a link to one of our entries that shows the variety we have: Oak Tree Study.
“The California Black Oak is strikingly unlike all other deciduous Oaks in the Golden State, for its broad thin leaves are jaggedly lobed, with the veins running out beyond the leaf margins as fine bristles.”
A Natural History of Western Trees.
We have noticed the woodpeckers that enjoy the tall branches, the Scrub jays that frequent the crown, and we are even thinking this is the tree that the bats use for shelter…not sure. It is a truly abundant food source for much of our local wildlife, including bears.
“…it has one admiring friend, the California woodpecker, who finds its acorns, bitter to our palates, exactly to his taste….This handsome redhead devours what he can hold of acorns, and lays up great stores of them, like a squirrel.”
There is always something to learn and to make note of as we revisit even a common tree to our area.
We are looking forward to observing:
The yellow leaves of autumn and then seeing the bare branches.
The dropping of acorns.
Finding a California Black Oak with acorn holes.
In the spring, pink or crimson of the new foliage.
Another successful oak tree study….thanks to our ability to see beyond the ordinary.
Printable notebook page for Extraordinary in the Ordinary.
Outdoor Hour Challenge:
This week we will be using the Tree Study Grid from the October 2012 Newsletter. Print the grid out, cut it to include in your nature journal, and then take a few minutes during your week to complete some of the suggested activities. If you haven’t subscribed to the blog yet, you can do so now and you will receive the newsletter link in the next entry.
Printable Activity Notebook Page:
This week the challenge extra is a free printable activity notebook page.
My Tree Is A Living World: Record all the living things you find in the tree you observe. Remember to look high, low, on the bark, on the leaves, in the crown, and on the branches. If you don’t know what something is, record a description and then look it up after you return home.
Getting Started Suggestion:
If you already own this ebook, this week’s challenge would be a great addition to Challenge #6: Starting a Collection. Read the challenge for simple ideas to get you started with a nature collection. You could focus this month on collecting things related to trees.
Pictured above is our very casual collection of tree related items and misc natural objects. There are seeds, acorns, nuts, peeled tree bark, galls, leaves, moss, and a few small twigs. These sit right on top of our nature table.
The best part of autumn is taking in the fruits of the season. Apples, apples, apples, and more apples. We visited the apple orchard (which has much more than apples this time of the year) and enjoyed some freshly pressed apple cider, apple doughnuts, and picking out quite a few apples to take home.
Yes, I said apple doughnuts. I don’t usually eat doughnuts but this time of year it is a tradition that I like to indulge in with my men. I eat one and they have two or three. Crumb, cinnamon sugar, glaze??? They are all delicious.
In every plant, and bird and insect there is a life-history to be learned more interesting than any story, and I would urge parents to make themselves acquainted with these life-histories by obtaining and studying some of the many admirable books on Natural History which abound in the present day. They will then be enabled to pass on the information in happy talks with their children till they become eager little naturalists, loving the book of nature and seeing in it, not only endless things to admire and wonder at, but evidences, on all sides, of the works of an all-wise and kind Creator, Who has so marvelously fitted each living thing to fill its appointed place in creation and fulfill the duties assigned to it as a part of a great harmonious whole. Parent’s Review Volume 11, 1900, pgs. 578-584
How much more do we enjoy our apples knowing their life history from twigs and buds in the winter, to leaves and blossoms in the spring, and then fulling enjoying the taste that arrives in a neat little package in the autumn.
It is a wonderful story for children to learn and appreciate.
Applesauce was next on the apple menu…homemade from apples we gleaned from a friend’s orchard. Now we have some jars to enjoy over the next few weeks. Yum!
I am submitting this entry to the Charlotte Mason Blog Carnival and if you have any entries you would like to submit, you can send them to this email address: charlottemasonblogs@gmail.com. The official blog carnival site is not working so you will need to send them directly to this email.
We are starting a new theme for the month of October – Trees!
For this whole month we will be enjoying trees in our backyards and neighborhoods during our Outdoor Hour time and then following up with some exciting activities. Make sure you are subscribed to my blog and you will get the download link for the October Newsletter in the next blog entry mailed to your inbox.
Outdoor Hour Challenge:
One of the most popular trees that we study here on the Handbook of Nature Study is the oak tree. The oak has many interesting aspects including its leaves, bark, acorns, and the habitat that it provides to animals and birds. This week you can choose one of the previous oak tree challenges to complete when you find an oak tree subject. Make sure to read the suggested pages in the Handbook of Nature Study. Keep your eyes out for oaks and acorns! Oaks and Acorns (2009 Autumn Series)
Oak and Leaf Activity Suggestion:
This week the challenge extra is a creative way to slow down and look at leaves.
This project which came from The Artful Parent (via Pinterest) is a simple activity where you collect leaves and then thread them onto a stick. I love the variety of shapes and colors and as we work our way through October there should be an opportunity for your family to collect and then make a leaf stick. We found this works best with leaves that are not too dry and brittle. Make sure to include photos of your leaf sticks in your blog entries and then submit them to the blog carnival.
Getting Started Suggestion:
If you already own this ebook, this week’s challenge would be a great addition to Challenge #10-An Outdoor Picnic. Find a majestic oak or another tall tree to spread a picnic blanket underneath and enjoy as you have a snack or meal. Bring along a book to read (see widget below for some suggestions).
You are welcome to submit any of you blog Outdoor Hour Challenge blog entries to the Outdoor Hour Challenge Blog Carnival. Entries for the current month are due on 10/30/12.
Since this month’s theme is trees, I thought it might be fun to start a new photo challenge featuring trees.
Here is the challenge:
1. Take a photo of your child (or yourself) with a tree you observe during October 2012.
2. Join my new Pinterest board: Me and My Tree. You can email me with your Pinterest name and I will add you to the board.
3. Pin your photo to the group board. Make sure to leave the tree name in the description and your state and/or country. You do not have to show your child’s face if you don’t want to…be creative.
October 2012: Trees – Year Round This month the newsletter and Friday challenges will center on a focused study of trees. Trees are a terrific topic of nature study no matter the season….there is always something interesting to observe.
This edition of the newsletter contains loads of ideas to get you started and make it fun for your family.
October Grid Study and Bookmark with the tree theme.
Two tree study notebook pages
Special nature journal idea
Book review and study plan
Three articles from contributing writers
Show and tell photos from fellow Outdoor Hour Challenge participants
Short list of my favorite tree related links
Explanation of how the Outdoor Hour Challenge works (reprint from last month for new readers)
I have attached the newsletter download link to the bottom of my blog feed so if you are a subscriber you will receive the link to the latest newsletter at the bottom of every post for the month of October. If you haven’t subscribed yet, you can still subscribe and receive the newsletter link in the next post that comes to your email box. You can subscribe to my blog by filling in your email address in the subscription box on my sidebar.
Note: You can download your newsletter from the link in two ways:
If your link is clickable, right click the link and then “save link as” to save the file on your computer.
If the link is not clickable, cut and paste the link to your browser, open, and then save your newsletter to your computer.
This week we were determined to complete our Cottonwood Tree Study as part of the Outdoor Hour Challenge. It is hard to get motivated when it is really hot outside but we persevered….most of our study was indoors anyway so we had no real excuse. Once we started it was very enjoyable, gleaning much from our reading in the Handbook of Nature Study and then direct observation.
Our neighbor had a cottonwood tree in their front yard until a few years ago when they cut it down to make room for some other landscaping. I remember there were certain times of years I did enjoy having that tree next door. It was MESSY. The “cotton” would cover our deck and yard as it blew over in our direction.
So without a specimen nearby, we had to travel across town to view another cottonwood tree that I noticed along the edge of a big field. It really is a very pretty tree with a nice shape and growing sort of tall. The trunk is easy to recognize once you know what to look for.
We had the chance to observe a cottonwood tree when we visited Anna Comstock’s cabin in New York last May. I gathered a bit of cotton to include in my nature journal. I wrapped it up in a paper towel and folded into the front of my journal for safe keeping. We took the opportunity with this challenge to examine the cotton closely.
We examined the seeds with our magnifying lens and it was truly amazing to see the structure of this catkin with its seeds.
“The little pointed pods open into two or more valves and set free the seeds, which are provided with a fluff of pappus to sail them off on the breeze; so many of the seeds develop that every object in the neighborhood is covered with their fuzz…” Handbook of Nature Study, page 656
Pappus was a new word to us so we looked it up. A pappus is the flower-like structure on the top of the akene. (Remember your dandelion study?) You can see a variety of kinds of pappus on this website: Who’s Your Pappus? I also found information at the bottom of this page on Backyard Nature. I need to add the word to my journal entry so I don’t forget it.
So here is my journal after I finished with it. I found an envelope (glassine envelopes for scrapbooks) for the cottonwood seed fluff sample and the pressed flower that I had collected from the woods. I watercolored around the edges to give it some color and used my metallic gel pens to make a title. I printed a photo of the cottonwood cotton since it is a part of the memory of that early morning walk that I will treasure for a long time to come.
We are going to go back to our local cottonwood tree and take photos for the Summer Photo Challenge and as a guide for our watercolor project for the week. Mr. B is working on his notebook page from the More Nature Study Book 4 challenge using his field guide for the cottonwood tree. We think ours is a Black Cottonwood so he is doing the research on that species for his challenge.
Another great tree challenge to add to our nature journals…hope to see some of your trees in the upcoming Outdoor Hour Challenge Blog Carnival. Remember that every entry into the June Newsletter carnival is an entry to win the Your Backyard Monarch Butterfly DVD and Study Guide. Last day to submit your entries is June 29, 2012.
Don’t forget the Great American Backyard Campout!
And my Camping With Kids link-up from yesterday.
Every reader of the Handbook of Nature Study (the book) knows who Anna Botsford Comstock is….the esteemed author of our nature study guide and lessons. She wrote the words that have touched my personal life in such a profound way, changing how we view the world in our own backyard. She may have touched your life in a similar way through the pages of the Handbook of Nature Study as you worked through the Outdoor Hour Challenges.
When the opportunity was offered to me a few years ago to visit and actually stay at her cottage in New York outside Ithaca, I wasn’t able to make the trip at that time. It was on my mind a lot through the years so when a last minute trip involved traveling in New York came up last month, I immediately contacted the family that now owns the cottage to see if it was available during our visit. It was! We made arrangements to stay for three days in the cottage that Anna and Henry Comstock built on the shore of Lake Cayuga.
” During the fall of 1906, we were making habitable The Hermitage, our summer cottage on Cayuga Lake. We put a large window in the living room which gave us a wide view of the lake. This room was given a hardwood floor and was ceiled, to make it warm. Here we set up the wood stove that had been in my mother’s parlor when I was a child. It had a grate and in the evenings we opened up its front doors; this made it as cheerful as a fireplace.” Anna Botsford Comstock
It was just like I imagined it…set in the woods, right near the water’s edge. The birds, flowers, and trees were those that Anna wrote about in her books. It was warm and cozy and somehow familiar.
We sat on the porch and enjoyed the sounds of the woods. The lake glistened as the sunset on that first day. I climbed into bed and thought how it must have been there over a hundred years ago when the Comstocks first built the cottage.
“Harry and I spent weekends there, and on each trip he would walk the mile and a half from Taughannock Station to The Hermitage, carrying on his back a basket filled with materials for fixing the house.The labor my husband performed in and about this place was remarkable.” Anna Botsford Comstock
The next morning I was up early for a walk in the woods. I ventured out alone for the first hike and as I stepped off the porch I heard birdsong and glimpsed a young deer sneaking across the road into a thicket of bushes. The woods woke up as I hiked up the trail and my eyes were trying hard to take in all the sights.
The green of the new spring leaves, the thin trunks of the trees, the rustlings of birds and the cry of the mourning doves. These were Anna’s woods. This was the place that helped inspire her to share her love of nature with teachers and children, bringing them into a relationship with common everyday things in their world.
There was teasel by the trail…new to me in person but familiar through the pages of the Handbook of Nature Study. Advanced preparation does work…I recognized it right away and remember that she had called it ” a plant in armor”.
“He added paths and built a fine wharf and a double-decked boat house, in the upper part of which we swung our hammocks, and from which we enjoyed the glory of many sunsets. The Hermitage was always a place where work was play; we dumped our cares at the Ithaca station when we left, but they were always waiting to jump at us on our return.” Anna Botsford Comstock
I made my way back to the cottage and by this time the boys were up and ready for the day. My husband and Mr. A took out the canoe onto the morning smooth water of the lake. Exploring a new place by water…leaving their cares behind as they paddled across the surface of the lake in the early morning sunrise.
Mr. B and I decided to take another hike through the woods and this time we noticed the wildflowers. These were the wildflowers of Anna’s books…the ones we don’t have in California.
The whole weekend was filled with the opening of eyes and hearts to a magical place, gently teaching us the way of the New York woods in which we found ourselves. One day it rained and we watched the drops fall from our dry spot on the porch. The fragrance of the wet woods was delightful…different than our Northern California woods. The rain stopped and we grilled dinner on the stone fire pit down by the water. We skipped rocks, sat and watched the fisherman go by on their little boats, and we shed our cares, refreshed.
At the end of the weekend, we had made many entries into our nature journals, took lots of photos, and made some memories of our own at this lakeside cottage.
We will always remember our weekend spent on Lake Cayuga at the Comstock’s beloved Hermitage Cottage. Special thanks to Christiana and Alison who graciously opened up their family cottage to our family, making this trip to New York even more special.
I hope my readers enjoyed glimpsing our weekend….we all need to remember to build in our families a rich heritage of outdoor experiences. Who knows who it will touch in the future?
Next time I will share our day at Cornell’s Lab of Ornithology and Sapsucker Woods! More connections were made to the Handbook of Nature Study.
Funny how we all have had our favorite spring Outdoor Hour Challenges. For me? This dogwood study has been about two years in the making. I have always wanted to have a dogwood tree in our front yard but it wasn’t until we did our massive front yard remodel that I was able to find a dedicated spot for the dogwood tree. We choose one with white blossoms…my favorite.
You can see our front yard transformation here in this post: Removing the Lawn.
We waited last year for it to flower but we only had leaves. This year….ta da! A dozen or so creamy white blossoms to enjoy and now study.
We read in the Handbook of Nature Study about how the flowers have been waiting inside the bracts all winter long, protected and sheltered until conditions were right. I have spent the last month or so going out almost daily to check the branches for any signs of opening. What a gift once we saw the bracts changing!
See the notched bract? This is another thing discussed in the Handbook of Nature Study that I would have never noticed if it wasn’t pointed out to me.
I had to convince Mr. B that the true flowers are the ones at the center and not the big white bracts. We counted the flowers and found there were 25+, some open and some closed.
The Handbook of Nature Study said that this was a perfect lesson to use a hand lens for so we brought ours out and took a deeper look. Amazing! If you haven’t yet done your dogwood study, I highly recommend this activity. You might note it in your ebook to do for next year as well if your dogwoods are no longer blooming.
How fun is this? Don’t the leaves look like a bird? I was busy standing on top of my retaining wall to take photos of the dogwood and looking down on the leaves….it truly looked like a bird!
Now for a few fun images from our evening study. Here is a colorful view of our front yard right now….hubby brought me home a new garden flag for the front stairs. I love it! We did have a swallowtail in the yard a few days ago so it won’t be long now until butterfly time! The Kona dog is taking a rest from helping us weed and water.
I don’t think I shared my new addition to the rock garden. We took a new hike up into the mountains and into an area where you can collect rocks, a true rockhounds paradise. We brought home this big piece of serpentine which is the California State Rock. Isn’t an amazing shade of green? Our rock garden has become its own little micro-habitat with insects and critters living around and under the rocks. In the evenings there is a very loud cricket chorus in our yard. It is a comforting sound and I stand on the deck and listen in the dark and imagine where they all are as they sing.
What a wonderful study! It all started back when we decided to remodel the front yard a few years ago and we put on paper our list of plants and trees we hoped to include. The dogwood came two years ago and this past week we added a California redbud. I am looking forward to seeing it grow and mature…maybe next year it will bloom for us.
We still have plenty of tree buds to use in our nature study this week as part of the More Nature Study Book 3 study of Buds, Catkins, and Blossoms assignment. We went out after dinner last night to observe and gather some specimens for our study. Can I just say that we were intrigued with the variety we have right in our own backyard?
Mr. B and I both sketched buds into our nature journal. There has to be no better way to really see what a bud looks like than to try to sketch it in detail. Picking the correct color and seeing the different ways that buds are shaped lead to really truly *seeing* the subject.
Advanced Study Notebook Page from More Nature Study Book 3
Mr. B used the advanced notebook page from the ebook to try his hand at sketching an enlarged bud using the grid paper. He thought this was hard…..I think he just needs a little practice.
Sweet Gum Tree Bud
What a glorious bud he chose to sketch! This is the sweet gum tree bud…it looks like it is ready to burst open at any moment. We placed it in a glass of water to see if we could get it to open up in our window sill.
The vertical twig hanging down has our string on it…still no leaves.
We also observed the birch catkins we have on our backyard tree. This was the same tree we used in our twig study and we found the branch with the string marker. Not much of a change yet so we will continue to watch our twig as the season progresses.
New leaves on this twig of the birch tree and some catkins too.
Currently there are no tree blossoms in our yard. The plum is done and the pear and apple are not yet blossoming. We found a few more interesting things to gather and bring inside for our bud study.
Walnut Tree Twig with Buds
The most interesting thing from our study is the walnut tree twig with its unusual buds…both color and shape. We had never taken the time to really examine the walnut tree bud before so it was a surprise. It was a fun exercise to try to get the sketch right in my journal. It helps to know a little bit about twig anatomy so you notice all the important parts like the leaf scars and the lenticels.
Silver Maple Buds and Key
The maple tree buds are all burst open and you can see the keys in the image above. If you are interested in doing your own Spring Maple Tree Study, you can look back to a previous study we had here on this blog. You may wish to use the free printable: Spring Maple Tree Notebook Page
Birch Tree Catkin – April 2012
So this was another wonderful study with my teen. He did a little grumbling at first about doing the study this week since he thought there wasn’t much to learn but as you see above once we got started there were many things to be interested in. If all that he gleaned from this study was that all tree buds are unique and we can identify trees from twigs and buds, then I am a happy mama.
