The Adventures of Dot and Mae

Hello Dear Readers, Dot and Mae are so excited about spring! They are seeing little buds on the branches of trees and bushes, they have even seen their first robins! We all know that when you see your first robin, you know spring is on its way! HURRAY! A fun and interesting thing to do during spring is to take a nature walk - which is really just a walk where you take some time to notice all the beautiful and interesting things around you. Dot and Mae love to go for walks - you never know what you might see! When you are walking, look down at all the habitats that are right under your feet! Look under rocks and leaves - you’ll find bugs and worms and all sorts of creatures!

While you are walking, don’t forget to stop a few times and really look and listen. Sometimes if you sit still and wait patiently shy creatures will come out and show themselves to you! You might hear a crow CAW CAW or see some squirrels as they scamper and play with each other chattering away. You could see a spider spinning a web (be careful that you don’t get bit)! Maybe you would like to keep a nature journal. A nature journal is like a diary where you write and draw about all the things you noticed on your nature walk. Many scientists keep nature journals, and explorers like Lewis and Clark kept them to show people what they saw when they were out exploring, but lots of people keep them just because they are fun and interesting to make.

There are no rules for keeping a nature journal - you can make it however you like, but here are some ideas if you would like to use them. You might want to have these supplies when you take your nature walk:

• Unlined notebooks that are large enough to record observations and yet small enough to fit in a back pack
• Colored pencils or pens
• Waterproof Ziplock bags to keep the soon-to-be-prized possessions dry
• Hand lens and binoculars for a close-up view of objects
• a watch so you know what time it is a
• digital camera if you have one or if your parents will let you borrow theirs
• It’s also a good idea to take a bottle or canteen of drinking water and maybe some handi wipes in case you get your hands really dirty.
  

Lastly, and most importantly there are two things to remember when you go on a nature walk: first, NEVER, NEVER-EVER go on a nature walk by yourself - make sure that your parents know where you are and when you will be back. Your safety is the most important thing! Don’t forget that! Dot and Mae want you to promise them you will keep yourself safe because they like you very much and they would be very sad if you got hurt!

Second, don’t forget that you are visiting someone else’s home - the birds, squirrels and bugs you see live where you are walking and just like you use your manners when you visit your friends houses, you should use your manners on a nature walk. Don’t throw trash on the ground, don’t destroy an animals home, and try your best to leave things the way you found it.

Okay!

Here are a few more suggestions:

Using as many different adjectives as you can, describe the area you are in. Adjectives are descriptive words like brown, magnificent and soft. Be sure to use more than just your sense of sight. How do things smell? What sounds do you hear?

Sit very still and close your eyes, try to stay like this for at least three minutes. Listen to all of the noises and sounds you hear around you. Open your eyes again, and write down or draw pictures of what you heard.

Using a crayon and a piece of your journal paper, make leaf and bark rubbings of different trees. Then go to your school or local library and find a book about trees. See if you can identify the trees from the rubbings you have.

Come back to the same spot at different times of the day, such as early morning, noon, dusk and night (with an adult, of course). What is different? What is the same? Write down or draw what has changed and what has remained the same. Try this again under different weather conditions. What changes and what remains the same when it is rainy, sunny, cloudy, windy, cool, warm, cold or hot outside?

How many different kinds of plants can you find? Draw them! What features do the plants have in common? How do they differ? Check out a book about local plants from your library and see if you can identify the plants you’ve seen.

Get those creative juices flowing. Sit quietly in your outdoor spot and write a poem about the natural world around you. There are many types of poetry for you to write. Remember, poetry can rhyme, but it doesn’t always have to. Who says that your words have to be in straight lines across the paper. If you’re writing a poem about a flower, try writing the words in the shape of a flower.

For some more ideas on how to write check out this website or this one

Don’t worry if you think you can’t draw - this is for your enjoyment! Make your journal look however you want - you can see by the pictures that everyone’s journal looks different. Your’s will be wonderful! We know it!

One last thing Dot and Mae thought to remind you about when you go on a nature walk is to watch out for poison ivy (and we don’t mean Batman’s foe!) a good way to remember what poison ivy looks like is to memorize this: “Leaves of three, let them be” If the plat has three leave attached - don’t mess with it because it could be poison ivy or poison oak or poison sumac - YUCK! Here are some pictures to help you out:

Here is another picture so that you won’t be worried if you see a similar type of plant:

All right! Have fun - be careful - and go observe some interesting things! Here is a place you can print off a nature journal that is very pretty - but a simple notebook works just as well if you like!

Images of field journals by
Ernest Thompson Seton and Henry Fairfield Osborn
© The American Museum of Natural History,
not to be used for commercial purposes,
and not to be placed in the public domain.