Nature Walk - Wildflowers

[science_spot]

Taking the baby for a stroller walk down our street is a favorite evening activity my 5 year old and I share just about everyday.  It's an easy way to build in a little exercise, some talking time and science education, while keeping the baby a little hushed.

Some of you may know I live on a dead end street in a nice, little, suburban town in the northeast.  Here, in mid-June, the temperature is really nice most of the time, and the trees and flowers are all filling in nicely.  My daughter has seen the very noticeable progression of organic growth the past few weeks.  Our daily nature walk is not fancy.  We walk up and down our street, inspecting the grass and weeds on the the side of the road, the ditches in the few spots where the neighbors don't have them covered, and the little swamp at the dead-end.  It's amazing how much there is so see and learn about in that 1/8th mile trek.

My friend Goodwoman614 had the idea to list or photograph all the "like" things you could find on a nature walk, such as all the types of trees or bugs you find.  This is a great activity for kids, and you can even make a contest out of it, or a scavenger hunt.  My daughter has been finding new wildflowers each time we walk, and some of them are a challenge for me to identify (so of course I looked them up with my handy Google PhD, lol, and STILL have trouble).  I love this website for wildflower information!  Below is a picture of our collection from yesterday's walk.  I'll identify what I can (this site helped alot), and maybe others can help fill in the rest.  I was surprised we found about 26 different  kinds!  Abby loved sorting them by color.

 

The yellows, from the left: a buttercup (these are very plentiful now), I THINK a yellow wood sorel (a tiny little flower - closed when we got them home), dandelions (hard to come by now,this one is pretty shriveled up), wild lettuce, bird-footed trefoile, and yellow hawkweed.

 

 

 

The purples, from the top, working clockwise: unknown, bittersweet (deadly) nightshade, unknown, unknown, heal-all, and unknown.

 

 

The whites, from the left: shasta daisy (my favorites in this post), unknown, unknown, unknown, penny cress, white clover, wild blackberry and English plaintain on the bottom.

 

 

The other colors, from left:  forget-me-nots (grow in masses in the ditch), a color difference seen in white clover, unknown, I THINK an orande/peach wood sorel, unknown (tiny little flower, closed when we got it home, and orange hawkweed.

 

Now that we have found some larger size flowers, I was able to show my daughter a little flower anatomy (after brushing up, of course).  We also found one morning glory (white, wild) npt pictured above, that we disected easily.  The picture below, from Shane Eubanks provides a nice, quick refresher course!

Of course, a walk and collection such as this can easily lead into related questions about plants.  If you could use more help with basic botany, Joye's group Earth Rain Sun and Seed has a nice section I highly recommend.  This is the only gardening group I have found on Cafemom that goes over all these basics (other group owners, please correct me if I am wrong and I will happily add your link).

What flowers would you find on your nature walk?  It doesn't matter if they are only cultivated flowers and not wild.  The concepts are still the same - you can see so many different types, they change with the months, and the basic anatomy is the same.  I would love to see your collection, particularly if you live in another state!

 

Tonya

AKA sunmoonstars

The Science Spot

 

 

[clairandamjones]

Jun. 14, 2009 at 1:20 PM

Thanks for the refresher on flower anatomy!  I'm thinking a nature walk sounds like a good idea today.

[JoyeAustin]

Jun. 14, 2009 at 8:32 PM

Beautiful journal! I love it!

[Goodwoman614]

Jun. 15, 2009 at 3:06 AM

Really cool post, thanks!