Nature Journal: Bogs

Honestly, I was pretty skeptical about the whole Nature Journal Thing when I started. I mean, Nature Study, yes, that makes a lot of sense, and I was excited. We started to do it pretty early, after a fashion: we'd go outside and look for Interesting Things. It wasn't until much later that we started to carry sketchbooks with us, and even then, there was a while where dragging them around was pretty much all we did. But I'm halfway through my second volume now: the first one filled up. And it's gradually become something that I absolutely love doing. There are so many Interesting Things, and drawing them is both fun and educational: it helps me remember what I've learned. (Bonus points for getting some watercolor on the page!)

So this past week, I went to Cub Scout daycamp with Dragon, and we had a good time. We had to drive a little way to get there, and the environment was just a little bit different from what we see closer to home. Amazing how a relatively short distance can change things! It was a little different, except for one area: they have a bog.

The bog was very different.

And so very fascinating: I could have gone in there with my nature book every day for a long time and not been done looking at All The Things.

This isn't exactly the same as the place that we visited, but it was similar: our bog was a "quaking bog": when the guide told the boys to jump, the trees and everything around us shook. It was pretty amazing.



So I took some pictures, and I've been putting the stuff that I saw in my book in the past week since I got home. I started with a page about Monarch butterflies. Didn't see those in the bog, but I did get a picture, and I'm glad I did: it was fun to paint, and very interesting to learn about their migration patterns.

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But once I'd finished learning about Monarchs, then I wanted to know more about bogs. Because that place was amazing. Turns out, I've had to work a bit to find out much about them.

National Geographic has a nice overview.

And this crazy bit of news about a "wandering bog" came up in one of my searches. I would never have guessed that was possible!




I've got some cool photos of carniverous plants to include as well: it's likely that this project of recording what I saw in our 30 minutes or so in the bog will take more than one page to get into my book, because it's just so different from "regular" ecosystems. I'm excited to see what I can learn about it all.

Out in Autumn

We are enjoying an uncommonly mild Autumn. Everybody is kind of waiting for the other shoe to drop, but we're enjoying it until then! When we were out the other day, the first thing we noticed that, although it was mid-morning, there was a lot of water (dew?) on the plants. 

Each little hair on the Mullein was decorated with its own tiny drop. 

The pictures don't really do it justice. And that was just one of the lovely things we saw. 

The kids were all about the quarry area of the park this time. We stacked rocks with the Littles for quite a while while the Bigs played in the bushes.

While we sat and played with the rocks, we found these cool leaves with deep groves in the veins. I don't know what kind of tree they came from, but the looked really cool. 

The goldenrod seeds were beautiful, though my phone struggles to do them justice. 

There were a lot of beautiful little things that it would be so easy to walk by. I love that our Nature Study days help me slow down an see some of this stuff. 

Hero had a chat with a naturalist the other day for a Webelo project, and one of the things the naturalist told us is that nests of sticks tend to be birds' nests; squirrels build with leaves, and they most prefer oak leaves because they break down much more slowly than other types. So I was excited to find a squirrel nest while we were out. 

I was amazed to find these still blooming; I guess the mild weather hasn't been cold enough to put them to sleep, even though we've had several good frosts now. 

When I was a kid, I used to think Autumn was ugly. Dull brown and nothing at all to see. Looking around now, I'm amazed at all the things I was blind to. I'm glad I've learned better; Autumn is lovely.

Almost Pets

Hero, for one of his Webelos projects, needs to have a plant. And he needs to learn about reasons why plants are good. NASA did a study on what plants filter the air most effectively, and I had him read an article on the study. Then we went to the store to see what they had.

I wanted to check out the Mother-in-law's Tongue, but it's much larger than I realized, and they wanted $80 for the one they had in stock. Wow. Probably going to be a while before I have one of those. But they had other things. Ferns and Pothos and succulents and ivys and all kinds of fun plants. I love looking through the plant section.

We set out to get Hero a plant, but it quickly became apparent that Dragon was going to be crushed if he didn't get one, too, and what the boys do, the girl must do, so Peanut wanted one, too. I wondered what this little excusrion was going to cost, but we were in luck: they had some tiny plants in pots maybe 2 inches across for $2, and I let Dragon and Peanut choose one of those. Hero, needing it for a project, got to choose one that was in a 4 inch pot for $4. Not too bad. But all those plants needed to be repotted. Happily, we found some pots that were on clearance, so each kid got to choose a colored pot. And we found trays to put under; those were more than I'd hoped for, and kind of oversided for the pots, but with kids watering, I don't think we'd be ok to do without. All total, it was just under $15, which I feel pretty good about!

So. Now we have plants. Two of the three got names. Hero has a Silver-Veined Fittonia that he's dubbed "Silvy." Dragon's is a Hypoestes. The tag didn't say, but the store people told us when he asked. Anyway, it's got green and pink leaves, so he's calling it "Grink." And Peanut chose a mini spider plant, but didn't name hers, at least not yet. Last night a friend stopped by, and he very kindly consented to introductions to all three plants; the kids were so excited about it, and he was a great sport. Upstairs to the boys' room to inspect two plant-pets there, and then down to the kitchen: I persuaded Peanut that her plant needed more light than is available on her dresser. Which means that I can also see it, and that will help me remember to help her water her plant-pet. I think the kids are almost as excited about these plants as they would have been if I'd got them a puppy or a fish!

This morning, I reminded Dragon that after he got dressed the window needed to be opened so the plants could have some light. No problem. The window was opened before he woke up, and he'd just get dressed in the bathroom so that his plant would be happy in the light.

These kids are so sweet; they crack me up.

Links Links Links

Haven't had time to collect many links lately, but it sure is fun to browse around a bit when there is time. So many good ideas out there! Got a pretty good grab-bag this time. Enjoy!

Here's a good one: Keeping Hands Busy and Minds Engaged During Read-Alouds. There's enough good stuff in this one to keep a family coming back for more and more for quite a while!

 One Obama Presser [press release] 36 Obama Lies and Deceptions. They've gone through point-by-point, sometimes several in a sentence. I love that kind of breakdown of an article. It's particularly unfortunate that it's lies our President told  us this time.

I've got a shirt that I'm going to make. Well, I'm going to make it after the mess in my home is settled, after I find my sewing machine, and after I find my fabric, and after I find my pattern. I suspect that none of those things are actually together in the same place. But one of these days I'm going to make this fun knit shirt. I haven't done very many knits. None, actually. And Burda has this article about using a toile - that's a muslin mock-up for folks like me that don't know the fancy terms - that's just in time and has some great tips.

My Grandma died last year, and one of the things my Mother brought home was the string of pearls plant Grandma had in her kitchen window. The plan was to propagate it and pass out the babies so we all could have some of Grandma's plant. Only, the poor thing went into shock over being transported 1500 miles in a car. And it's kind of been downhill from there. Now I've got one tiny little strand of pearls that I'm trying to re-root in some fresh dirt. As a result, I've been reading what little I can find about this plant. If anyone's got one and would care to offer advice, I could use it. This and this are what I've found that's useful. It's not much to go on. But the poor little plant isn't dead yet!