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Category: Learning Outdoors (Page 14 of 63)

International Rock Flipping Day September 9, 2012

September 10, 2012 / / 5 Comments

Did you flip a rock yesterday?

Yesterday was International Rock Flipping Day, a wonderful time to get your children outside to explore the natural world.

We chose to flip the same river rocks as we used in past years. It is actually fascinating to see how things change from year to year. Here in Arizona we had quite a bit of rain recently, and it was actually damp under the rocks. There was a definite increase in the numbers of critters we saw over the results for 2009.

As to be expected, the sowbugs and pillbugs (isopods) were abundant.

Sowbugs

Sowbugs and pillbugs tend to hide from the light, so are often found under rocks.

We found these cute, shiny beetles in two different spots. They may be the same ones we saw last year.

We also saw this little guy.

This year we saw a weevil. Some kinds of weevils hide under rocks during the summer, going into a resting phase known as aestivation.

We could tell it was a weevil because of the long snout, almost like an elephant’s trunk.

We saw some cixiid planthopper nymphs (remember the adult from Bug of the Week last week?). This one was really moving, so it is blurry. I included it because it has the waxy filaments forming a tail on the back of the abdomen.

I pulled one out for a somewhat better photograph.

We were happy to see some of the tiny snails we had seen before.

Just love those little eye stalks!

That is what I was able to catch on camera. We also saw the same ant species as we saw last year. I’ll talk about that at Wild About Ants.

Did you participate? We’d love to hear what you found.

Be sure to visit Wanderin’ Weeta for links to more participants.

Upcoming Science Fun

August 27, 2012 / / 2 Comments

Exciting opportunities to learn more about biology/nature are popping up all over this fall.

1. It is time once again to plan for

International Rock Flipping Day:  September 9, 2012.

What is International Rock Flipping Day? It is a special day to celebrate all those critters that live under rocks, as well as the naturalists who want to find out more about them.

To participate all you need to do is find some nice rocks and flip them over. Record what you see by drawing, painting, taking photographs or recording in your nature journal. (If you live where there might be poisonous creatures under there, like scorpions or snakes, you might want to use gloves and/or some sort of bar to flip the rocks.)

When you are done, be sure to carefully return the rock to its original position.

If you take photographs or write a blog article about your results, be sure to link up with Wanderin’ Weeta, who hosts the event. If you are interested in seeing what others have found, I’ll post a link to the summary post after it goes up.

We’ve been having some nice rains this summer, so I’m hoping for some interesting finds.

(What I found in 2011).

2. It’s also time for the monarch butterflies to start migrating again. Be sure to keep an eye out for butterflies in your area, and also an eye out for the

upcoming IMAX film Flight of the Butterflies.

Here’s the trailer, or as they call it “teaser”:

Look for more information and links for educational opportunities at the movie website.

3. Last, but not least, the New York Botanical Garden has a new interactive website called

Plant Hunters

It does take a bit of patience to navigate your way around, but there is a wealth of information about plants. Click on the word “Enter” on the first page, and then look up in the right hand corner. If you click on that box, it should take you to a list of the “challenges.” You can then pick the challenge that suits your interest.

Please let us know if you have any questions, or if you have any other fun fall events to share.

Seed of the Week: Ironwood Tree

July 17, 2012 / / 4 Comments

Our mystery seeds from last week came from the ironwood tree, Olneya tesota.

This unique tree gets its common name from the extreme hardness of its wood. Because there are a number of other trees with the same common name, it is sometimes called desert ironwood.

Desert ironwood is a small, shrubby tree found throughout the Sonoran Desert. The lower branches droop, giving a lovely form in its natural state.

The bark of the younger trunks and branches are pale gray to green at the tips.

It is a legume, having compound leaves of narrow, elliptical leaflets.

As with many desert plants, it is well armed, with many pairs of curved spines.

Desert ironwoods produce many lovely purplish-pink flowers in the spring. See Firefly Forest for a photograph of ironwood flowers.

The seed pods mature on the plant and then fall off.

The clue I mentioned that you might have noticed in the the mystery seed photograph last week was a drying leaf toward the bottom of the shot.

You can grow new trees from these seeds, but people often chose to purchase larger trees because desert ironwoods are very slow growing.

If you travel through the low desert you will often see dead ironwood trees. That is because the wood contains strong chemicals that prevent decay after the tree has died and the wood remains in place, sometimes for hundreds of years.

For more detail, see Natural History of the Desert Ironwood Tree (Olneya tesota) from the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum.

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