Nature Study

I was told that nature study brings a breath of fresh air to your day (no pun intended). I always thought.... yes, yes when I get done this important stuff I'll get to it. Well I finally got to it, and I don't ever want to give it up.

After covering the different kingdoms and how the major eight taxonomic ranks work. We headed off to the great outdoors. The following pictures are from our first week of nature study. I do not apologize for the amount of photos in this blog, for I have cut many great pictures out. We have gone out twice this week, and each time we discover something new.

This is first Fungi spotted by Evan. He found two types. We have not yet found out what kind of fungi he discovered, but we will next week.

I believe that this is common green shield lichen. Lichen is not a plant. All lichens are a combination of two very different organisms, a fungus and either an alga or a photosynthetic bacterium. Just in case you wanted to know ; )

After much deliberation we discovered that this was a female Downey Woodpecker, at first we thought that it might be a White Breasted Nut Hatch. We did spot the Whited Breasted Nut Hatch yesterday though. Along with the bird below. We think it is a female Dark Eyed Junco.


We saw many galls on the leaves of one tree. Evan looked inside a few to check for bugs. Here he is showing his brother the bug inside.




Here are the kids after the first day out. Back home with their treasures and a treat for the birds.