Nature Study: Our One Year Pond Study Week 9: Spring Tree Study

Welcome to week 9 of our one year pond study. For the rest of the posts in this series please see here.

This week I am determined to post about all the activities we did around our tree study. It was touch and go for a while, because in our enthusiasm we have been to the pond twice this week, once for the tree study and the second time we drove past and saw our heron. Now our heron has been with us for years but each time we visit the pond for our nature study it has been conspicuous only by its absence! So when we caught a glimpse of him, we raced home, grabbed the camera and snapped away. This was in the evening time as the sun was gradually going down so the lighting was just wonderful. I think this pond study has given me a hobby, because I LOVE taking photos of nature! The first set of photos will be our night-time visit and the second set our tree study. Enjoy!

We journeyed closer for a better look — Isn’t he gorgeous?

He must have spotted us for he flew off a few meters away... — He must have spotted us for he flew off a few meters away…

...to land on a nearby rock — …to land on a nearby rock

This time landing on the 'No Fishing' sign situated near to our tree — Then on the ‘No Fishing’ sign situated near to our tree

Where he proceeded to, yes you guessed it, fish!

Giving himself a good shake, whilst swallowing the fish. We could see the lump in his throat as he was swallowing it!

Whilst we were their we snapped some Canada geese

One last picture, before the sun went down.

For our tree study my aims this week were simple and all to do with the Lichen:

Read about the Ash tree
Learn about the different types of Lichen
Take some home with us and look at it under a magnifying glass
Learn about the implication of the presence of Lichen on a tree with regards to the surrounding air pollution
Attempt to draw a branch with Lichen
Complete our note booking page for April using the dried Lichen

First we read about the Ash tree using this book:

Then we visited our pond for some pictures and to gather the bits and pieces we needed to do our activities at home:

There it is, our Ash tree in all it's glory — There it is, our Ash tree in all it’s glory

Here you can see the purple flowers which come out before the leaves

And a close up. The flowers have no petals, but will form into bunches of winged fruits, which are green at first and then turn brown

We collected a small branch with a good amount of Lichen on it and went home. On returning I had the children learn a bit more about the different types of lichen:

This was I simple but useful page of information — This was a simple but useful page of information

We learn that the type of Lichen present indicates the level of air pollution. Our branch contained three different types of Lichen, indicating that air pollution was very low. We studied the Lichen under a magnifying glass:

Isn’t nature just magnificent?

Our lictures of the branch with the Lichen on. We used these pictures to create the note booking page for this month — Our pictures of the branch with the Lichen on. We used these pictures to create the note booking page for this month

We decided to make our journal page for April all about the ecosystem. We made the tree out of our drawings and stuck dried on Lichen on the truck. The rest was drawn or sketched and we added notes to remind us of the components of an ecosystem:

So enjoying the pond study!

Share this: