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Gold Country: Some Random Things to Share

Our part of the world is best known for being the place that gold was discovered in California back in 1848. We live very close to the South Fork of the American River and in fact, we spend much of our outdoor time in or around the water of this river. My parents live even closer to the actual gold discovery spot and have remains of an old town where the Chinese workers came to work in the mines and along the river.

The river was used for hydraulic mining which destroyed much of the habitat and you can still see remains of ditches dug for diverting water and piles of river rock where the soil was washed away looking for gold. The scars remain even today.

So much history left behind for us to explore and experience today.

This is an abandoned mine that we discovered on our regular hiking trail. This was taken a month or so ago and we were just there yesterday and it looks very different. The water level has dropped inside the mine and you can step inside a little to check it out. The water is not raining down inside as heavily either. The plants around the opening are getting green and somewhat covering up the entrance.

We took a hike to a different part of the river two weeks ago and it had lots of rocks that looked like this with the quartz encased in the other rocks.

This short video gives you an idea of what the rock and the river is like where we are. In the beginning of the video you will hear my husband’s narrative….please know he was trying to be silly. Don’t miss me almost falling into the river at one point… the rocks are hard to walk on especially when you are taking a video.


We had packed along our gold pans and the boys tried their hand at finding some gold. No luck this day.

The water was really cold and they decided there is a definite skill to panning. We wondered about the gold miners back in the 1800’s and how they must have remained motivated by either their success or the success of others around them. It is back breaking work.

On another hike, we saw this guy alongside the river on the North Fork getting ready to start using his sluice box for gold mining. Here is an easy explanation of how a sluice box works. My husband has used one before and he says it just is an easier way to sift through the gravel looking for flakes of gold. He took a geology class where they actually did gold dredging in this river and he was surprised that there still is quite a bit of gold if you take the time to look for it.


I bet you don’t see this very often. We have one place that we like to hike to along the river because it has a perfect spot for skipping rocks when the water is low. We went there the other day and for the first time we saw these signs posted everywhere. I have to do some research because as far as I know, this place is on Bureau of Land Management land which seems like an unlikely place for someone to post a mining claim. Anyone know how that works?
Edit: Here is a link to answer my questions: BLM FAQ

Well, I hope you enjoyed my little glimpse into the gold country around our house. It is something that interests my boys so we might just need to tackle a geology course and use mining as the basis for our study. We already have a ton of rocks that we have collected over the years to study and identify. I should look at it as a project.

Quartz samples

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Walk into the Woods and a Picnic at the River

I am so far behind in recording our hikes. I haven’t even touched the photos from two weeks ago when we did twenty-six miles of hiking. I am sort of in a slump about posting for some reason.

Here are a few photos from today’s hike with the two older boys.

The trail in this section has grown over with greenery. You can still find a narrow path through the woods but it is just about covered up with grasses and flowers. Now that spring is here the trail is a whole different world.

Here is the view at the one end of the trail. The river is really running fast and high. The sound as you round the corner is amazing. Soon there will be whitewater rafters and kayakers on the water. Right now the water temperature is pretty cold. The other day we had a glimpse of a boat full of rafters but they were wearing drysuits.

This is about the only new flower blooming along the trail that I noticed today. I think it is some sort of caterpillar flower.

Monday we went on a picnic lunch…boxed up some sandwiches and bottles of water and took an hour or so to enjoy the opportunity.

The view from my picnic spot on a rock was very peaceful and I soaked up the sun. The sound of the water flowing by was relaxing and I could have sat there for a very long time but the men were anxious to move along. This is the same river that is in the photo above but this time we were down at the shore and down about ten miles.

I gathered a few rocks from my sitting spot and realized when I looked at the photo that the white rock looks like a heart.

The trail here is overgrown too….gorgeous.

Here is a photo I tried to take of the rafters as they floated by. If you look closely, you can see their blue raft behind the bushes.

The fairy lanterns are blooming thickly along this part of the river.

One last photo from yesterday’s hike….lupine like I have never seen it before. It is a banner year for the lupine in our area.

The amazing thing about wildflowers that I have come to appreciate is that although they are randomly planted and grow pretty much wherever the conditions are right, they look just perfect. Better than any garden planting that I have every seen.

What a time of year for getting outdoors every day.

https://naturestudyhomeschool.com/2009/02/announcing-outdoor-hour-challenge-ebook.html

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Buttercups: Wednesday Flower Study

The Common or Field Buttercup-Handbook of Nature Study, pages 516-518

“The buttercups, bright-eyed and bold,
Held up their chalices of gold
To catch the sunshine and the dew.”

“Common buttercups and daisies are always associated in the minds of the children, because they grow in the same fields’ yet the two are so widely different in structure that they may reveal to the child something of the marvelous differences between common flowers; the buttercup is a single flower, while the single daisy is a large group of tiny flowers.”

This sounds like a great way to learn about some common flowers in the garden.

We have a spot that we hike to that has a whole hillside of buttercups.

We didn’t complete an in depth study this week but we did complete our observations and then a journal entry. I know you all must think that we spend oodles of time each week in nature study but in all honesty, some weeks we just *enjoy* getting outdoors without much preparation or follow-up.

I would rather we aim for making our outdoor time as regular as possible, have some focus to start off with, and leave things open and flexible if something happens to catch our attention.

Here is something we found on the trail that caught our eye this week. Butterflies!

I know this one is dead but it did give us an excellent opportunity to examine this creature up close.

The blue is iridescent in this swallowtail…so pretty.

This painted lady let me come very close and get a good photo. She was very busy sipping nectar from the wildflowers in this sunny spot alongside the trail.

We were watching these swallowtails for a very long time. I love to watch them flutter around in the sunshine as they gather their meal. Click to see this one better. 🙂

Our garden is coming alive with colors. I am not sure what we will study for next week yet.

Now is your chance to go outside and pick a flower to study from your yard. It does not have to be a buttercup but something that you can observe from your neighborhood. Pick your flower and then look it up in the Handbook of Nature Study.

https://naturestudyhomeschool.com/2009/02/announcing-outdoor-hour-challenge-ebook.html

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Spring Wildflowers #9: Catch-Up Post

I have been feeling sort of guilty about all the wildflower posts on this blog but after much deliberation, I came to the conclusion that recording things that are important to me is at the heart of why I keep a blog. My goal this spring has been to observe as many of the local wildflowers as I can and try to keep a record of when they started blooming and then identify them as I can with my field guide. This blog is part of my nature journal…a digital version of my paper journal.

In addition to recording my wildflowers on the blog, I have tried to keep current with our Wednesday Flower Study posts and the Outdoor Hour bird challenges. I slipped in a post about our great natural bridge hike last week and I have a backlog of posts to make about our other hikes.

Even though every post doesn’t exactly reference the Handbook of Nature Study, I still feel like I am staying “on topic” and helping to encourage other families to get outdoors and explore their own neighborhood. With the exception of the first photo of me taking photos of flowers, all the other photos are within a 25 minute driving distance from my house.

“It may not be practical for every family, but when mothers understand the good that a measure can do, they will often work miracles to provide it. A twenty minute trip with a picnic lunch can make a day in the country accessible to almost anyone, but why do it just one day? Why not do it lots of days? Or even every nice day?”
Charlotte Mason in Modern English, volume one, page 44

So here are April 14th’s flowers from our regular hiking trail.


Sweet fennel


I have decided that yellow sunflower shaped flowers are really hard to identify. I need to start carrying my book with me on hikes and not relying on my photos to help make an identification.


This is something rather beautiful and we only have seen it one place in all our travels. I can’t find a identification for it but it sort of looks like Purple fritillary…not quite sure.


We think this is a Woodland star.

April 15th’s flowers from Cronan Ranch and the American River Confluence
(These are both new hikes to our family and we ended up going back to both places over the next few days to explore some more.)

Lupine. This is the year of lupine in our area. It is glorious and abundant everywhere you go. In a lot of places it is a mix of lupine and poppies and the blue and gold combination is stunning.


White fairy lanterns


Mustard


Purple dead nettle

April 16th at Cronan Ranch again…

Lupines…right alongside the river. Yellow bush lupine and blue pod lupine.


Baby blue eyes

Back to the American River Confluence on 4/17/09

The plant and flower look like Miner’s lettuce but I have never seen the heart shaped buds before. Anyone know what this is?


We think these are Ground iris. We saw quite a few of them along the slope on the river side of the trail.

I think that is all of the outstanding new wildflowers that we observed and enjoyed over the last week’s hikes. I have a few more to share but I will post about those when I write about each individual hike.

I have developed a huge case of spring allergies. I have not been out for my usual walk in three days and I am getting antsy to break out and enjoy the spring. I am hoping that my allergy medicine kicks in soon and I can get out and explore some more of our local area.

 

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Wednesday Flower Study #5-Pink Petunias

Confession: My petunias are from the garden nursery. I don’t really much like petunias but they are a happy spring flower that has brightened up our front and back decks with their cheerful blooms. My eldest son helped me pick the color and I am surprised that he picked pink because he usually picks much richer primary colors in flowers.

I don’t blog much about my oldest son because he is a very busy twenty-one year old young man who has a full-time job as a computer programmer and goes to college in the evenings. When he isn’t working or at school, he is sequestered away working on complicated homework or his various artistic ventures. Usually on the weekends, he spends his Sundays with us and for our family that means worshiping together and then spending some family time at home in the yard or outside hiking or walking the dog. My oldest is always up for a little time on the trail. He lives and works in a very technological world but he is still connected to the outdoors and feels the need to be refreshed by the sky, trees, and birds. We have some of our best talks as we share our outdoor time.

Anyway, back to our weekly flower study.

As always, we found something interesting in the Handbook of Nature Study about our subject. The story of our modern petunias is interesting and we talked about colors of petunias that we have seen in our area. We also learned that petunias are in the nightshade family. The petunia gives off its perfume at nightfall, perhaps to attract the hummingbird moths to feast on its nectar.

“With their long feeding tubes the hummingbird moths have little difficulty in securing the nectar, but bees also will work industriously in the petunias. They will scramble into the blossoms and, apparently complaining with high-pitched buzzing because of the tight fit, rifle the nectar-wells, that seem to be better adapted to insects of quite different build.”
Handbook of Nature Study, page 583


The lesson suggests that each child have their own flower for observation and that they have access to a petunia bed to observe the habits of the plant. We will be adding a few more petunias to our flower garden so we can observe all the interesting tidbits contained in the Handbook of Nature Study.

There are lots of suggestions for sketches in this lesson. We will be adding to our journals as the spring and summer go by. I found a coloring page for petunias if you would like one for your nature journal.

So now it is your turn to pick a garden flower and pull out the Handbook of Nature Study and see what you can learn this week. We will be moving on to buttercups this week. We have been observing them on our hikes for a few weeks now and it is high time that we take a few minutes to really study them. You can pick any flower you have in your yard or that you have access to and can observe up close. Even if you don’t do a formal study…take a few minutes this week to share a flower with your child. After all, it is spring now!

https://naturestudyhomeschool.com/2009/07/new-outdoor-hour-challenge-ebook-garden_27.html

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Spring Wildflowers-Part 8 Natural Bridge

We had the opportunity to take a drive to a new hiking spot. We live in a pretty special area of California and we can drive an hour or so and find the best adventures. We live in what people affectionately call Gold Country……our house is about 8 miles from where they discovered gold in California and the Gold Rush began.

This time though, we headed about fifty miles south of our house to a place in Calaveras County where there is a natural rock bridge over the river. This well-kept secret location was shared with me by a fellow homeschooler. I tried to Google it and came up with very vague directions but we were determined to try to find this spot.

During that Google search, I found this wonderful account of the place from 1862, complete with illustrations.
Scenes of Wonder and Curiosity in California

Back to the wildflowers…..

We finally found the parking area for the trail and we filled the backpack up with water and a few snacks. Immediately I knew this was going to be a great wildflower hike because the first stretch bordered a little meadow with this view. Purple/blue flowers are Harvest brodiaea. (click to see the flowers better)

Here is the trail as it cuts across a fairly steep section of the hillside. The trail is the dirt path on the top right of the photo. Do you see my boys on the trail? They left us in the dust in a hurry to see the destination. We could hear the river rushing down below but instead of hurrying, my husband and I took our time and also a few photographs. Well, maybe a lot of photos!

It was a fairly easy three quarters of a mile hike down the hillside to the water and along the way it wound through buckeye, red bud, and oaks. On each sunny hillside, we found an abundance of wildflowers. Breathtaking beauty like this doesn’t come along everyday and we found ourselves marveling at the vivid colors of the flowers. It is at times like these that you feel impelled to stop and say a little prayer of thanks to our loving Creator….what a garden he has made for us to enjoy.

Purple Chinese Houses

Poppies and Goldfields

Once down to the bottom of the ravine, we found what we had come to see….the natural bridge which looked more like a cave or a tunnel.

The boys decided to wade out into the middle of the mouth of the tunnel and see if they could see the light at the other end. The water was really cold and they moved rather quickly through the shallow water.

It is nearly impossible to give you a really good idea of what the natural bridge is like but this photo shows you a little of the stalactite formations on the ceiling of the bridge. There was water raining down inside and in one area it looked like a cascading waterfall inside.

Here is a close-up of the ceiling showing the stalactite formations. All those lessons in geology paid off and we had some great conversation about how we think this bridge was formed. We talked about limestone and calcium carbonate and springs. We talked about erosion and ground water and water tables. We talked about the difference between stalactites and stalagmites.

We made plans to come back this summer with a headlamp and perhaps a little inflatable raft.

My husband and I had a very relaxing time at the river and the boys had fun exploring the limestone/marble pools and trying to jump across the watery stretches. They were already wet from wading in the tunnel so a little more water fun was okay by me.

Here is another pretty flower we found as we hiked back up the trail. I don’t know what it is called yet but I am going to keep on working on identifying it.

Here is one that was blooming along one whole section of the trail. Mustang clover.

Isn’t this the best photo? I love how it shows the shape of the plant growing. I am pretty sure this is Caterpillar scorpionweed….what a name!

This is a white variety of lupine growing at the parking spot.

Okay….this one makes me laugh. It is called Pineapple weed. The description says that this plant is not a native plant to California but I see it just about everywhere right now.

I know….how many wildflowers can I cram into this one post? Believe me, there are plenty more but they will have to wait for another time.

I hope you enjoyed viewing some glimpses into our day. I started this post on Monday….we have had some new adventures since this one and I can’t wait to share those too.

https://naturestudyhomeschool.com/2009/02/announcing-outdoor-hour-challenge-ebook.html

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Birds Everywhere: Family Outdoor Hour Challenge

We have been trying to observe birds and their wing shapes and tail shapes over the last few days. The weather has been sunny and cool so the hiking has been fantastic.

We watched two turkey vultures soaring right over our head yesterday…we say their wingtips and the way their feathers spread out as they glide on the wind.

We had the chance to see this pair of barn swallows at the flower farm and even though you can’t see it very well in the photos, their tails are very unique.

As we are working through these challenges, our family is starting to be able to notice more quickly the shapes and sizes of birds and I am sure it is because we are paying closer attention and we now have more vocabulary to express what we are seeing.

We also had a chance to observe some red-winged blackbirdsand to see their beautiful colors as they flew near us. This one has his back to the camera but you can see his pretty red spots.

Yesterday we had a chance to observe goldfinches in a thistle feeder. They are such pretty birds.

“Goldfinches are seen at their best in late summer or September, when they appear in flocks wherever the thistle seeds are found in abundance.”
Handbook of Nature Study, page 57

We had quite a few goldfinches in our garden last fall because we left our huge sunflower plants intact until just about all the seeds had been eaten. It amazed us that they could land on the head of a sunflower and it wouldn’t even bend over in the least. They must be light birds. They also are fun to watch when they hang upside down in the feeders.

This was a finch at the Living Desert Museum in Palm Springs, CA from February.

My son pointed out the beautiful clouds overhead as we wandered around the local flower farm. There is a vineyard next the the farm and it was a perfect picture looking out in the distance.

Here is the pretty sky over the vineyard and it made the lilacs ever so purple….sigh.

Another pretty sky photo from our week….this time you can see that this big oak has not put on its leaves for the season yet.

We also had a chance to observe some crab apple blossoms. These must be drawn in the nature journal!

So even though we didn’t see many goldfinches or a single meadowlark, we were happy to see some birds to check out their wing and tail shapes. The barn swallow was also a new bird for us so that was exciting too.

We have done the reading up on yellow birds so the next time we are out and the opportunity arises, we will be ready for the challenge.

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Wednesday Flower Study #4 Pretty Pink Hearts

“The flowers of the bleeding heart are beautiful jewel-like pendants arranged along the stem according to their age; the mature flower, ready to shed its petals, is near the main stem, while the tiny unopened bud is hung at the very tip where new buds are constantly being formed during a long season of bloom.”
Handbook of Nature Study, page 559

We chose the bleeding heart this week to take a closer look at during our afternoon outdoor time. We have one side of our house that is pretty much left in a wild state and it is full of bleeding hearts that bloom in the spring time. The mower comes close to this area but I have given strict orders that this particular stretch of the yard be left alone to do as it wishes.

We brought inside a vase full of flowers to examine up close just as the book suggested. Do you know what? We have never cut any of these flowers to bring indoors before this study. The other amazing thing is that we didn’t even know that they had a fragrance until we had the vase on the table and we were observing the flowers parts.

Once we pulled the petals back to look inside, the fragrance was almost overwhelmingly sweet….too sweet. My daughter thought they smelled like honey and I think that is a pretty accurate comparison.

The Handbook of Nature Study has a great explanation of the way this flower works and how the bees pollinate it by pushing apart the spoon-bowl shaped outer petals, pushing against the hinge works, then probing the nectar pitcher inside.

Here is the flower with the outer petals removed, exposing the inner petals and the heart shaped base of the stamen.

We would love to watch a bee gathering nectar so the next warm day we will be out and trying to catch that process happening.

Now you can pick your flower and join the Wednesday Flower Study. Choose a flower from your garden and look it up in the Handbook of Nature Study. Here is more information on how to get started. Join in during any week you have time. Wednesday Flower Study
Here is my original list and the flowers we are going to cover in our study.

Flowers Blooming Already or That We Can Study Right Now
Violet (page 476) Finished 3/18/09. Here is a LINK.
Buttercup (page 516)
Tulip (page 552) Finished 4/1/09. Here is a LINK.
California Poppy (page 531) Finished 4/8/09. Here is a LINK.
Petunias (page 581)
Mullein (page 537)
Dandelion (page 531) Finished 3/25/09. Here is a LINK.

Flowers that Will Study in Addition to Those Above
Bleeding Heart (page 558) Finished 4/15/09.
Bachelor’s Buttons (page 578)
Sweet Peas (page 588)
Queen Anne’s Lace (page 542)

We will be moving on to petunias next week. We have some really nice white and pink ones to study up close and to record in our nature journals.

https://naturestudyhomeschool.com/2009/02/announcing-outdoor-hour-challenge-ebook.html

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Spring Wildflowers-Part 7

Just another entry to share what is along the trail this week as we hike along……I have not captured them all but I am working diligently to document the majority of the flowers. It was a rainy day but when a break in the clouds came we struck out for a long walk in the woods.

Purple Chinese Houses are starting to bloom along the trail on the hilly sides and in the sun. My favorite….purple.

Here are some more Indian Pinks. These are one flower you can’t miss because of their brilliant color.

I did not get a good photo of this one but I will try again next time. This is blue larkspur.

This was an unidentified flower on a vine last week but now that I can see the fruit forming….I know what it is! Wild cucumber! I saw these at the Channel Islands National Park and we examined the dried fruits and seeds. I will be watching this one develop over the summer.

This yellow flower is blanketing the area right now. I am working on its identification.

Is this interesting or what? I was taking photos of some poppies and I noticed this unusual looking plant. Any ideas?

That is it for this entry. I am happy to report that we seem to be slowly identifying most of the wildflowers we find along the trail. This is a huge project but one that I am totally and completely enjoying and it doesn’t seem like work at all.

Spring Book collage

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Transcendent Moments

“Nature is imperfectly perfect, filled with loose parts and possibilities, with mud and dust, nettles and sky, transcendent hands-on moments and skinned knees.”
Last Child in the Woods, page 96

Once again I had a moment while reading this book. I know exactly what he is talking about when he says “transcendent hands-on moments”. I have had those moments. My kids have had those moments. They are still possible in this modern, technological world.

Whether it is standing on top of a giant granite dome or swimming under the crystal clear waters of the Hawaiian Islands, it is the same. It is a spark, a racing of the heart, a moment that lasts forever but not really.

Those moments are times that stick with you long after the physical experience.