This week we took time to review a little bit about beavers since we regularly visit an area where we see evidence of them. If you read my blog regularly, you have seen photos of the beaver lodges and the trees gnawed on by beavers.
My son really enjoyed watching the YouTube videos on beavers and we read the section in the Handbook on muskrats.
Our outdoor time this week was spent exploring an area off the trail we normally take. It led us to what we are now calling Fern Gully. This area is found by following what we think is a deer trail down off the main trail and into a steep little gully. We have heard water running in this area before and we presume that when it rains hard enough there is water running down the rocks. We will test our theory the next chance we get.
Here is another photo looking the other way down the gully.
There are lots of blackberry vines. We are interested to see how this area looks in the summertime. We imagine it being a cool place to sit in the shade. It should be interesting to see how the area changes as the seasons change.
We found more fur on the side of the trail…a lot this time.
We still are puzzled by the fur mystery. I looked at it very closely and it is really fluffy and very soft. It is white…with a slight yellowish color to it. There is no blood or tracks or other signs of struggle. I have no idea where it came from but this is the third spot on the mile and a half trail that we have seen this fur. Last week we began to wonder if it was a dog’s fur but it just doesn’t feel like any dog fur that I have felt before. Someone suggested in a comment that it could be sheep’s wool but it is no way the texture of wool and there are definitely no sheep in this area. Hmmmm…still wondering.
We came across an area that has these wonderful quartz rocks. Really, really pretty.
Here is the backside.
I am so interested in studying rocks but I am nervous about being overwhelmed with trying to identify them. Any suggestions?
Well, that wraps up this post for our Outdoor Hour Challenge this week. We had some adventures and some good questions this week. Last night we had two inches of snow so we were able to complete our Winter Wednesday snow activities from a few weeks ago. I was glad that we had planned ahead of time and had the experiments in our mind as it began to snow. I will post those results soon.
So here is my biggest revelation of the week: Not all evergreens that I see in the winter are pines….some are firs. 🙂 Both pines and firs are conifers (cone-bearing) but you can tell them apart by looking at the way the needles grow. Pines have bundles of needles and firs don’t.
That is my very unscientific description and understanding. It is good enough for me right now to recognize that I shouldn’t call all evergreens “pine trees” or even all cone-bearing trees “pine trees”. Sometimes it takes me a long time to catch on to things.
We noticed that there were some branches strewn across our hiking trail this week. Here is the first one.
We think it is White Fir.
Here is the second one that we observed on the trail. There was quite a bit of it in small branches all over one section of the trail.
We think this one is the Douglas Fir.
On another note, we have some fun stuff going on at our nature shelf.
We were surprised this morning to observe that the forsythia branches and the twig from our tree study have all started to show signs of blossoming. We brought them inside last week to “force” them to grow earlier than they would outdoors. If you want to try it, here are some instructions: Forcing Forsythia (or other woody plants like p. willows)
Here is the first of the forsythia blooms.
Here is an attempt to take a photo of the complete branch showing the blossoms that are bursting out this morning in the morning sunshine.
Here is the sweet gum twig.
Isn’t that the coolest thing ever? How amazing and beautiful this twig is as it starts to bud out with the leaves…I assume these will be the leaves. I will keep you posted.
What a great week it is shaping up to be for nature study! These sorts of impromptu studies are the best. We had the field guides out and the magnifying lens at hand to observe the details. We are now deciding that we want to make a bigger space for all our nature collections. I will share what we come up with in the weeks to come.
I had an email from Dana and she has a one year old. She was asking for some tips on how to get started with nature study with very little ones who are prone to putting things in their mouth….she lives in Tanzania, Africa and is worried about bugs and poisonous plants.
I have been thinking about her situation and decided that it isn’t any different from those of us who live in other parts of the world. Having a young toddler and providing an opportunity for nature study is pretty much the same anywhere.When children are very young, it is only natural that they want to explore in a way that is meaningful to them and sometimes that means putting things in their mouth. Our job as parents is to provide a safe environment for them to explore. Just like you baby-proof your home to ensure your toddler can play and learn in a safe environment, you can baby-proof an outdoor area for your child as well. The space doesn’t need to be large. It could be a blanket on the grass or sand, a patch of grass or weeds that is near where you hang laundry or tend a garden, even a spot on the patio with a few potted plants and natural items to explore.
“As for the baby, when he is put down, he will kick and crawl and grab at the grass, loving every minute of his freedom as he takes in nature in his own way. He should be dressed in something comfortable that can handle a bit of dirt and play.” Charlotte Mason, Volume 1, page 45
Nature study at this age is something you will want to do together to spark interest and to start the process of learning to be a good observer.
“..the mother must not miss this opportunity of being outdoors to train the children to have seeing eyes, hearing ears and seeds of truth deposited into their minds to grow and blossom on their own in the secret chambers of their imaginations.” Charlotte Mason, Volume 1, page 45
What does this mean in a practical way?Our yard has lots of things to explore so many times we would just walk around our own backyard together. There were rocks to turn over and look at what was hiding underneath…..ants and spiders and crickets. There were plants to smell like roses, thyme, and lavender. There were trees to touch and leaves to gather. It is fun to have a few items that they can take on their walks like nets, buckets, pouches, binoculars, or magnifying lenses. We kept our outdoor tools in a crate outside the back door. We always had a vegetable garden so the little ones would accompany us outside to water, weed, and harvest. I tried to make sure that there were things growing that they liked to eat so they could harvest and eat the veggies right out in the garden….peas and beans were some of their favorites. They almost always had their own “garden” where they were free to dig and explore under my supervision. Most little ones have no fear worms and spiders so it is the perfect time to nurture their love for those sorts of things.
Digging in the dirt is great therapy for children and adults as well. The fragrance of damp soil and fresh earth leave imprints on our minds that last into the winter season. As we would weed, I would point out the plant parts like roots and stem. Even if all you have is a pot or two on your porch or deck, this will provide a great start to learning more about the plant world.
Once you decide you want to venture out of the yard, the stroller is a great way to get the little ones out but still let them be a part of our nature time. You can point things out to get them started but soon they will be looking for clouds and birds on their own. Be flexible. I have one child that would rather push the stroller than sit and ride so I would tell him that he had to keep a hand on the stroller as we walked along at his pace. This kept him from running too far ahead and I could interact with him as interesting things caught our eye. This gave him a little sense of freedom but I could be in close supervision.
Have you ever smelled the sulfur/rotten egg smell of a mud pot? This photo was taken in Lassen National Park and the looks on their faces tells you that it is not a pleasant smelling place….except for maybe Amanda and she has always been a smiley girl no matter what.
From a very early age, we included the little ones along on our family hikes. The baby backpack was our best friend and the boys both loved riding along on dad’s back as we hiked. We trained them to ride in the backpack and then gradually shifted them to walking on their own. From the age of three, we geared our hikes to allow the littlest ones to hike as much as possible on their own. This meant a slower pace and a shorter distance but it was very enjoyable to see the trail from their eyes and to follow their lead from time to time.
“Adults should realize that the most valuable thing children can learn is what they discover themselves about the world they live in. Once they experience first-hand the wonder of nature, they will want to make nature observation a life-long habit.” Charlotte Mason, Volume 1, page 61
Nature study at an early age is about exposure and a growing awareness of what is surrounding you at all times. Your enthusiasm is so crucial to capturing your child’s interest. Think about what interests you about the outdoors and then come up with a way to involve your children. Here are some ideas that I have used over the years:
One of our favorite daily activities when the boys were very small was to let them use a small watering can to water our deck plants each morning. We would observe the flowers and play in the water a little but they began to have an appreciate for growing things. Growing marigolds in a pot is something we did a lot when the boys were little.
The boys also have always loved helping to fill the birdfeeders. This would get us outdoors and talking about the different visitors we had that ate the seeds. Scooping seed was a favorite toddler activity as well. Collecting things to bring home and organize is a great toddler activity. I have one son that always had a pocket full of acorns every time he went outside. We collected them in a coffee can each day and he enjoyed spilling them out on the deck to count and sort through on his own.
Rocks, feathers, sticks, and shells can all be kept on a nature table. Many times these natural items were mixed in with their imaginative play. Block cities had acorn people and Hotwheel cars rode over stick bridges.This was another way to have them enjoy their time outdoors.
Two very dirty little boys having the time of their lives on a hike.
Indoor props could come outdoors to be played with in their dirt cities. I had a tub with a few things like plastic animals, toy cars, spoons, cups, scraps of fabric, and anything else that could serve as accessories to their imaginative outdoor play. They would add in leaves, cones, seeds, and other bits to make pretend villages and cities. On hot days we would include water in our play in the form of a bucket or tub.
Start to look at the outdoors as an extension of your indoor life….a really big play room. Include your little ones along with your outdoor activities. The simple act of taking a daily walk together will provide more than enough fuel to start the nature study engine. Take it slowly and enjoy seeing the world through your little one’s eyes.
Note to readers: All the photos in this entry are of my kids when they were very, very much younger than they are now. This was a great photo scanning project and it brought back so many nature related memories. Don’t waste time…get started with nature study as soon as you can with your little ones because it is a great way to build your family and your relationships.
Use the discount code NATURE5 when you checkout and receive $5 0ff an Ultimate Naturalist membership!
This time of year our Sweet Gum tree has lost all its leaves and is totally bare except for a few of the sticker balls hanging here and there.
Here are the tree’s trunk and branches.
My son used the Seasonal Tree Study page to record his observations and his sketch. He looked carefully at and drew the buds on his journal page.
Here is our tree last summer with all its leaves.
We followed the suggestion in the Handbook of Nature Study on page 624 and we took a twig with buds, put it into a vase with water, and then placed it in a warm, light place to see what happens.
I added in some forsythia branches as well to see if they will bloom inside this year.
We really enjoyed watching this tree all year long. We are thinking about choosing a different tree to watch this year.
We had another chance to take a walk up in the high country yesterday. The boys were snowboarding but we preferred to take a slower approach to our day. We took two hours to tramp around in the woods and see what we could find.
Here was something we found interesting. It looks as if an animal scratched the bark off this Jeffrey pine to get at something underneath…insects? If you look closely you can see the chunk of bark sticking out from under the snow.
Here is a close-up.
Lots of prints in the snow…..dogs and otherwise. We aren’t sure about these. They seem too close together to be a dog and there are no marks for the claws like dogs have.
We think these are squirrel tracks.
Some squirrels had a feast on this stump that we came across as we crunched through the snow. I have come to appreciate that there are animals that depend on this food source in the middle of winter. As we stopped at one point along our walk, a huge cone came crashing down just a few feet from us. As you look around the forest floor, you see cones just about everywhere in various stages of being eaten.
Somehow we lost the trail as we wandered around looking at various interesting things. Yes, that is my hubby looking for a way back to the trail. He assured me he knew which way to go. 🙂
If you have to be lost, can you imagine a more peaceful place? It was quiet and sunny and warm and we knew generally that we needed to head towards that mountain to get back to the main trail.
We eventually found our way back and it was a really good thing because I was getting tired and hungry. We saw so many other things but I will share those in another post.
We have been watching and observing all the different shapes of tree silhouettes we have in our neighborhood. We are all pointing out different shapes and patterns and I can honestly say we are loving our winter trees.
This morning we were looking out and noticed that our trees were filled with American Robins. I counted sixteen of them at one time in the trees along the side of our house.
The sunrise was just so pink and pretty and then the birds with their dark silhouettes….I couldn’t resist trying to get a photo or two or three. If you click to enlarge and look closely, you will see several bird sitting on branches.
All of the photos above were taken within minutes of each other and you can see the sky and the light changed so fast.
Here is my son’s tree silhouette of the walnut tree in our backyard.
I always think of his sketching as sort of gesture drawing. He has such a unique style all to himself.
The shapes of trees have inspired me of late to try some brush painting…don’t they just look like they should be sketched with black ink on blue paper? This particular tree is a very large oak along a new to me trail that we tried out yesterday. It is on the opposite side of the river canyon from “our” trail that we take pretty much every afternoon. This side is the sunny side of the canyon and it has a totally different feel and look about it.
This is some sort of pine and we decided we would call it the “V Tree” since it has the very distinct V in the trunk at the top. Yes, once again we got a late start and the sun was beginning to set on us. It is such a great time to be out in the woods.
This is a rather steep trail from the canyon rim down to the American River. This view is right at the top as you start descending and you can see the river’s bend at Chili Bar. There is a quarry in the background…ugly huh? But the river here at the bridge is the start for river rafting trips that descend down the river and end at Salmon Falls or Folsom Lake. As the crow flies, this is about a mile from my front door….I live on the ridge on the opposite side from where I am standing. We forgot our GPS or I would tell you exactly how far it is.
Here is a little flat section of the way down where we stopped to enjoy the view. The trail has burst out in lots of green. This particular hike my husband does a couple times a week with a co-worker on his way to his day’s work. He does it in full uniform with his heavy boots on for his morning workout. It is a tough climb out of the canyon.
Holes are all up and down the slopes and I am pretty sure they must be gophers. If you venture off the path at all, you sink down in all the holes. Kona had to stick her nose down every hole she could find so she was very busy and had a very dirty nose when we finished.
Here is the only blooming flower we saw along the trail and there was only one flower blooming…the first of the season’s buttercups. I spotted it right away and had to scurry off the trail to get a photo.
Here is the view when you get to the bottom of the canyon. Someday I would like to bring a picnic and my sketchbook and spend some time drinking in all this beauty, maybe meditate a bit on the gifts of the Creator has given us. I imagine in the summertime you do not have this clear of a view of the river once all the trees push out their leaves. We could finish the last little bit down the slope and put our toes in the water if we were hot….a welcome relief in the summertime my husband informs me. He promises to hike down here again with me in the near future when the wildflowers are blooming and the newts are out.
I will post our official tree silhouette entry later in the week.
Since we do not have groundhogs, prairie dogs, or marmots in our area, we just enjoyed reading the information from the Handbook of Nature Study, the Burgess Animal Book, and watching the videos.
After that we needed to take our outdoor time.
We didn’t feel much like going for a walk but once we were on the trail….it was refreshing and it felt good to stretch our legs. The fog was drifting in and out of the trees as we walked and there was a squirrel chattering at us from high up in the trees.
The boys remembered that we had seen a prairie dog at the Arizona-Sonoran Desert Museum and I pulled up the photos to remind us a little more.
Wow, I totally forgot that we saw prairie dogs when we were in Arizona. (We saw so many interesting things at this museum that it isn’t any wonder that I forgot.)
I thought the prairie dog was posing for us because he looked right at us as I snapped the photo. He was rather cute for a rodent. Click on the photo and then tell me….is he posing or not? That is his hole right there between us and it was really big.
Okay, back to our walk.
On our foggy day walk, we started to notice more and more muddy trails off the main trail. We are assuming these are made by animals since this area does not get many visitors this time of year….or any time of the year for that matter. This particular trail heads down into another gully and I can hear in the distance the faint sound of water so I think there must be a creek. One of these days I will convince someone to go exploring with me down one of these trails. The photo looks crooked but it really is a very steep little gully and I imagine in the spring this will not be as noticeable as the trees put back on their leaves.
After completing a little more research, we found that there are marmots in the Sierras and in Yosemite National Park. I have never seen one there but now you know that it will be a goal to see one. 🙂
This was a great challenge for us and we learned a lot about these mammals. This challenge also encouraged us to get out on a day that we would have probably not ventured out as a family and that is the best part of the whole thing.
We took advantage of a few clear nights last week to view the moon and stars. It is a good thing too because this week we have had cloudy skies every night along with a really good soaking rain which we desperately needed. It was time to complete our Winter Wednesday – Winter Sky Challenge.
I have one son that has taken an intense desire to know more about the subject of astronomy since we started these night time session.
Several trips to the library and then a really good deal on a clearance book at Borders has feed his need to know more about the universe we live in.
We are working on learning some of the constellations visible during the winter months and in addition to the Discover Nature in Winter book, we have found the Handbook of Nature Study to be very helpful. There is a section starting on page 823 on the Winter Stars. I have heard talk around nature blogs lately that many view the Handbook of Nature Study as “old fashioned” and they prefer to use more “modern” books for reference. I do not find it to be outdated in the least. The clear explanations of the constellations in the Handbook of Nature Study make it an excellent first resource for families. For example: the lessons on page 820 explaining the North Star and the Big Dipper are clearly put down for anyone to follow and are timeless. The language used in the Handbook of Nature Study makes it enjoyable to read.
“After the polar constellations are learned, we are then ready for further study in the still earlier evenings of winter, when the clear atmostphere makes the stars seem more alive, more sparkling, and more beautiful than at any other period of the year.” Handbook of Nature Study, page 823
“Orion is one of the most beautiful constellations in the heavens. It is especially marked by the three stars which form Orion’s belt, and the line of stars below the belt which form the sword.” Handbook of Nature Study page 825
Doesn’t that capture your interest? We are looking forward to a few more nights of stargazing this winter.
We decided to go for a long drive today to enjoy the very warm spring-like day. I was driving and observing as we went along that there were quite a few dead skunks along the road, more than usual. I started counting.
Here is our official count:
7 skunks
3 rabbits
2 squirrels
1 possum
1 raccoon
All dead alongside the road.
Are there usually that many mammals to count? I have never noticed that many before but maybe my mind was just thinking about mammals since it is our focus right now.
We saw lots of cattle and horses on this drive as well….very much alive and enjoying the sunny day. Happy cows come from California…or so they say.
As the afternoon sun was fading, the deer started to be seen alongside the road. I was busy driving but my husband and son counted seven deer….one really big buck. In the past, both my husband and I have hit deer with our cars….actually, he has done it twice.
My husband told me today that his friend’s daughter not so long ago hit a bear on the road that we were driving on. I slowed down after that.
Just as a note to myself about the birds we identified today as we drove along and then hiked a little along the river:
Six red tail hawks and one other hawk that I couldn’t identify.
Two turkey vultures.
Vast amounts of snow geese…too many to number.
Canadian geese as well.
We also saw one gorgeous great blue heron in a dead tree alongside the Feather River.
