Pines and Cones

We are living in a different land now, and so much is new that sometimes it's hard to know where to start with the discovering.

So we're starting with whatever comes up whenever it comes up, and we'll see where that leads us.

When we first arrived in South America we were immediately aware of the importance of the pine cone in daily life.  First of all, pine cones were everywhere.  The most obvious ones lay on the roads and in the yards. But then we also saw bags of them for sale at the neighbourhood supermarkets and gas stations. And at the firewood sale-lots. Quickly we learned that, in a country where homes don't have central heat, fires play a key role in staying warm in winter, and pine cones themselves are the items used as kindling!

Brown Eyed Boy gathering pine cones for our family

Seeing how key they were going to be to our life here, when I saw an Outdoor Hour Challenge on pine cones on the Handbook of Nature Study blog, I thought it might be interesting to take a closer look.


I read the background information on pines and pine cones in Anna Botsford Comstock's book, Handbook of Nature Study, and gathered the family. Even My Dear Man came along on this one!  We walked three blocks to the woods that have become a shortcut for us when we go visit friends, for we knew that there we would find an abundance of pines.  I asked each person to gather one open and one closed cone as well as a bundle of needles.

Did you know that the topmost branch of a pine, the one that points straight up, is called the 'leader'? And did you know that the new branches form below the leader, in clusters of 3 or more, depending on the variety? That in itself didn't intrigue the children too much, but then I asked them to look for trees that had more than one leader, either two or three.  When a certain insect lays its eggs at the top of the tree, in a little hole it has burrowed, the developing and hatching process kills the leader branch. But to compensate, the tree establishes a new leader from the new-growing branches at the top. Usually only one steps into the role, giving a new, off-centre leader, but occasionally two (and sometimes even three) will share the role. 

After hearing that information, the children and I began seeing trees with lopsided or multiple leaders! This forest was filled with trees that gave evidence of a storied past!


The pine cones we took home, sketched in our nature journals, and then each child and I narrated about the walk and the cones.  I was very pleased with the resulting drawings, especially since it has been many weeks since we've brought out our nature journals.

Outdoor Hour Challenge - Dandelions

We had to leave our for-sale house for an hour again today so people could go through it, and before we left I let the children choose if they wanted to do an Outdoor Hour Challenge on maple trees or dandelions.  They chose dandelions, so I loaded up my bag with supplies and we headed out.


As we walked to the park, Little Man and Brown-Eyed Boy picked dandelions for me, pulling them from their host plants and proudly carrying them to me.  I gathered them together and laid them beside me on the bench once we arrived at the park.

I let The Ones I Love play while I read the Handbook of Nature Study, pages 531-536, and obtained some background information about dandelions.  (Did you know that their name comes not from their lion's-mane-like blossoms, but from their leaves which look like lion's teeth in profile "dents de lion"? Well, you do now!)

The play was going so well, and I was so intrigued by my study of the dandelions the boys had brought to me, that our hour passed quickly.  

It wasn't until we were home that we continued the dandelion study.  While we ate our snacks, I read a few highlights from the Handbook:

One spring when all the vegetables in my garden were callow weaklings, I found there, in their midst, a dandelion rosette with ten great leaves spreading out and completely shading a circle ten inches in diameter; I said, "Look here, Madam, this is my garden!" and I pulled up the squatter.  But I could not help paying admiring tribute to the taproot, which lacked only an inch of being a foot in length.  It was smooth, whitish, and fleshy, and, when cut, bled a milky juice; it was as strong from the end-pull as a whipcord; it also had a bunch of rather fine rootlets about an inch below the surface of the soil and an occasional rootlet farther down; and then I said, "Madam, I beg your pardon; I think this was your garden and not mine."

HNS p.532

I sent My Girl and Little Man outside to gather some specific specimens. My Girl brought in a dandelion plant, complete with root intact. 

 Little Man was brought five dandelion buds at various stages of development.

We then began our observations.  My Girl and I sketched and described the leaves of a plant, while Little Man dictated his description to me and I wrote it in his nature journal.  Then we investigated the root, noting the things about it that make it such a hardy little plant, so resistant to removal.


I described to the children some of what I'd read earlier about the buds and blossom heads, one particularly interesting point being that a dandelion is a composite flower - each yellow head is actually hundreds of small florets tightly packed together.


Out came the paring knife and cutting board, and the intricate examination of the buds and roots began. 

The children enjoyed looking at the tiny internal parts of the flower heads and buds, and My Girl's nature journal drawings are quite satisfactory. 

I, too, completed my journal entry, and included the exerpt from a poem by Lowell about this "dear common flower" --

'Tis the Spring's largess, which she scatters now
To rich and poor alike, with lavish hand,
Though most hearts never understand
To take it at God's value, but pass by
The offered wealth with unrewarded eye

HNS p. 531

Spring Weather Observation - Outdoor Hour Challenge

We haven't been particularly consistent with our Outdoor Hour Challenges, or even Nature Study in general, over the winter. But now we're starting to feel the blood warming within us and we're getting out more and observing more.

This week we did the Seasonal Weather Observation that Barb set up at the Handbook Of Nature Study blog. We began with looking at the clouds using the cloud finder she linked to, and then completed the seasonal weather observation page.

Little Man's observation page.

My Girl's observation page.

My Nature Journal entry.

What began as a grey, overcast morning has now brightened somewhat, and, while the sky is still grey, the sun is beginning to win the battle. The light drizzle has ended, a gentle breeze has begun, and it looks like it's going to be another lovely day!


Little Man balked (or should I say BALKED) at drawing anything on his observation sheet, but was eventually convinced that I wasn't looking for great art, just a quick and easy representation of what he saw: buds on branches, drizzle, etc. He has a lot of insecurity about drawing in any subject area, so I try to encourage him to just do a little bit, hoping that he'll build some success into his efforts.

Square-Foot Challenge

or 

What To Do When You Have To Be Out Of The House For An Hour On Short Notice

It's not how I like to live, having to vacate the house on short notice so that someone else can look at it and decide if they'd like it to be home.

But it's what we're in right now, and, last week it was bright (but cold) out, so we grabbed our nature journals, lenses, pencils, and string, and walked to the park to pass that hour.

We were following Barb's Square Foot Challenge from her Handbook of Nature Study blog, which you can read in detail if you'd like.

We start by marking off 12" x 12" areas with string, and then make ourselves comfortable, sitting on jackets discarded in the sunshine.

It's still very early spring, here in our diamond between the lakes, so there isn't a lot to see, but here's what I find in my square foot:

Lots of dry leaves, twigs, and grass.

Small shoots of grass beginning to peek from the centre of existing leaves.

Stubby grass, barely tinting the ground green above the damp, packed earth.

Bare black patches remaining when dead leaves are lifted away.

Dry keys of life, abandoned on the ground.  No future for this once-twirling blade.

New growth of unknown plants, oblong leaved, coloured in green to deep red.

Tightly wound, yet to uncurl, more new growth buried in the blackness.

More remains from last year's plenteous greens, now brown.

And clover.  Soon this park-land will be covered in clover.  This is one of the first of many that will crowd out the grass.

Using the Handbook of Nature Study

Barb at the Handbook of Nature Study blog, has just posted an excellent piece on Nature Study in Home Education and making use of Anna Botsford Comstock's wonderful resource, Handbook of Nature Study.

Fall is a great time of year to give nature study a try if you haven't already been doing it, and a wonderful season to explore more deeply if nature study is part of your family's identity already.

Comstock's book is full of narrative descriptions of plants, animals, and insects, but did you know that she even has chapters on soil, minerals, and climate?

You can find Handbook of Nature Study through most home education retailers, on Amazon, and, for those of you who want to take a look but aren't ready to buy, you can get a free download of entire book from Internet Archive, including the diagrams and illustrations!

Combining High School Biology and Nature Study

Barb at Handbook of Nature Study has a new post offering suggestions for working both Nature Study and Biology into a High School year. She shows one option of using Nature Study as the core, the other using a HS Biology curriculum as the core (in this case, Apologia).