B'ham Natural History Club- November 2015 The Self Farm

Last Friday, November 6, we ventured out to Remlap, AL to visit the Self Farm. This is a seasonal location (which means we will visit it during each season), and this was our first trip of the year.

The farm is fairly new to the Self family; they purchased it last year. I had heard it was a blueberry farm, but it was so much more!!

The main part of our visit was spent learning about chickens, petting the donkeys, and feeding fish.

We spent a few minutes talking about differences between chickens and the ducks and geese we saw in September. The conversation centered on the beaks and feet. The kids remembered how the toes on the ducks were situated (3 in front and one in back) and how the were webbed. They noticed that the chickens were similar except for the webbing. I encouraged them to look for differences in the 3 breeds of chickens that the Self's had in the flock.

Then, Chuck Self took all of us into the chicken yard, and had us observe. He taught us about the hierarchy in the flock...we found the head rooster (a beautiful Americana) and the kids kept commenting on his huge spurs, so Chuck explained how they used them in defense, and how the rooster would be willing to lay down his life for the hens (pretty amazing, huh?). The flock consisted of Golden Orpingtons, an Ameraucana rooster, Polish hens, and Barred Rock hens (I think). The kids were able to feed and hold a few of the hens, and explore the chicken yard and coop.

The Self's have 2 donkeys that attracted a lot of attention, partly because they were very vocal! I want to focus on them more in the winter when we go next. One is the offspring of two Canyon donkeys (Grand Canyon) which should make for some fun discussion.

 Some of the students have been to the Self farm before, and asked if we could feed the fish in the pond, so we spent a few minutes throwing fish food and oohing and ahhhing at the huge catfish.

The weather held off, but finally it started sprinkling. On the way out, we stopped to see the blueberry bushes. I wanted the kids to have a visual of what the bushes looked like in the off season. There is a patch of bushes near the house, so we took a quick peek and Kari explained to us how they are harvested in the summer...hopefully we can help with that this year!

Before we loaded up, some of the kids played tetherball (blast from the past- ha ha) in the rain.

It was a great day, and I am looking forward to more trips out there this year.

B'ham Natural History Club- October 2015

October outings had to contend with the weather. We have had a good bit of rain so far this fall.
Our trip to the Kicklighters had to be postponed one week, which meant I was not able to go. But, while we were visiting friends in Kentucky, Cathy (a great teacher from Crestwood Day School) led a wonderful excursion.

The Kicklighters allowed us to come explore late last spring, and the families were happy to enjoy their hospitality again. This is a place full of wonders, and I hear that Cathy was a great guide. Here is an email that she sent to the parents after the excursion.

Dear CDS Students, friends and Moms,

Thank you to all who came out today to enjoy some unspoiled nature!  I had such a good time being with you all and especially hearing the squeals and delight and the splashing of the water.  I wanted to share with you a quote from one of my heroes of nature, Rachel Carson:

"If a child is to keep alive his inborn sense of wonder ... he needs the companionship of at least one adult who can share it, rediscovering with him the joy, excitement and mystery of the world we live in."

I say, "well done", to those adults who accompanied us today and "well done" to all you parents who strive to keep alive in your children this sense of wonder that Crestwood Day School desires to provide for your students.  Enjoy the beauty right where you are this Fall.  Remember that God is drawing us to notice, see and listen to creation and in return we worship Him!

To His Glory!

Mrs. Cathy

B'ham Natural History Club- September 2015

The first Friday of September found us at Jemison Park in Mountain Brook. We spent some time reading about the history of the park and trail, and then we set off with eyes wide open.

We seemed to see spiders (and their spectacular webs) everywhere. We spent some time noticing the differences in webs and types of spiders, and had plenty of conversation about our favorite spiders at our homes.

The last part of our adventure was spent wading around in Shades Creek next to the trail.

We even found a crayfish/crawdad!

Two weeks later, we went to Georgetown Lake Park in Hoover.  This is a park that I went to often about 10-12 years ago. My boys always enjoyed the wildlife, and I remember that there were Mallards, some white ducks, and Canada geese. At first I was confused by the ducks I saw, but as the parents and I began to talk, we came upon a possible explanation. We think that the ducks have bred and created a mixed breed! Take a look and see what you think.

I started a conversation about the differences between ducks and between ducks and geese, hoping that the geese would drop by...and they did, to the delight of all the kids. Much squealing was heard, when, an hour into our time at the pond, about 6 geese flew in. That is when the conversation really took off..."their necks are so much longer"..."their feet are further back on the geese", and on and on.

Birmingham Natural History Club

Well....long time no write- ha ha!

I decided to give this blog a re-birth instead of just starting a new one.

Last year, I started organizing nature outings for a combo group of students (and siblings) from Crestwood Day School ( a local Charlotte Mason school ) and homeschoolers.

Last year, we did a once a month excursion to our local gardens, The Birmingham Botanical Gardens. I plan on posting pics here of last year's visits.

This year, we decided to increase to twice a month. We will be going on the first and third Fridays of each month.
-The first Friday of the month will be to a "seasonal spot"; by that, I mean that I have chosen three places that we will visit 3-4 times a year, once during each season. I hope to help kids see the differences between seasons. The three places we will visit are the Kicklighters land, the Jemison park/trail, and The Self's blueberry farm.
-The third Friday of the month, we will visit a variety of great outdoor spots around the Birmingham area.

I will be posting pictures from the 2 excursions during September in a separate post.

If you are following this blog to keep up with Birmingham Natural History Club, please check back often to see updates of trips we have taken, and to see what we have planned for each month. I will post the plan and directions for each month on the 1st of that month.

Anyone is welcome!!

Bird Eggs... and babies

A few weeks ago, one of the boys behind us found an egg that had hatched, so we put it in our laundry room to "keep it safe" where it quickly got smashed somehow :(

But, the boys immediately knew it was a robin's egg, so we took pictures of it smashed.



Well, last week we came out the back door one morning to find an egg smashed, no baby but some yolk...hmmm. We don't know why, but the next day, there was another one. They guessed, correctly, that it was a house sparrow egg, because there is a nest in our roof right above the found eggs. We are not sure what happened. We need to call grandaddy, our bird "expert". But, again, we took pictures, and my finger is next to it so that you can see the size.


Also, we think a cardinal nested next to one of our windows, but we can't safely see into the bush, so we will see what ventures out.

We have seen quite a few babies lately, some of them so big that we did not know they were babies. This morning, we saw 2 European starlings in the back yard with 3 similar light brown birds. Well, we pulled out the binoculars, and the lighter ones were following around the darker ones. Lo and behold, they would peck some, but open their mouth a good bit, and then one of the darker ones would feed them... some pretty big babies!! I would have never guessed, but observation shows us a lot!

Feathers...wings and tails

We sat at the back window to watch birds. I asked the boys to pay attention to tail and wing feathers; to notice the shape, color, length, etc. Also, do they flip up ever? And so on...

We were able to observe a cardinal, a dove, a robin, and a house sparrow. I did not see the cardinal, but my 6 year old noticed that when the cardinal was still, it's tail was out, but when it looked around, the tail "flicked up" for a second.

The robin we all saw for a while. They observed that the tail was narrow and rounded when walking or standing, but pretty triangular when flying. They noticed that the wing feathers where pointed and long and overlapped the tail feathers when it landed.

The dove has a tail "like a fan" in flight they remembered (we had seen it earlier that morning, and MANY times before). Josh also remembered that he could see white on its tail when it flew. They also remembered that the doves feathers were darker underneath.

The sparrow's tail was notched, but a more easily seen notch when flying. The wings were pointed and relatively short.

The boys all noticed that the tail feathers spread out during flight no matter what the shape, and wondered why... commenting that for flight they must need them spread out...hmmm. (I love nature study!)

Later, while I was typing this blog entry, we saw a cardinal again, a brown thrasher, and a finch, and my older son and I were talking about the length of the tail feathers in proportion to the wing feathers. He noticed that the robin's wings were a good bit longer than the brown thrasher's because the thrasher wing feathers did not cover the long slightly rounded tail. He placed the cardinal kinda in between.

I am looking forward to the flight patterns lesson because my boys have been commenting on that for months!

In the beginning...

I really enjoyed our small group last night. One of the guys in our group, Andrew Bolger, is leading the study right now. We are just beginning the process of looking at the Bible as a whole, as a story. Last week was Before the beginning, and last night was discussion about In the beginning. Part of our discussion focused on, or rather around, the word "good", and when it was used. It was quite interesting that "good" was not used on the second day. We talked about good's opposites... bad and evil. We concluded that good was not the opposite of evil in this case, so it could be good, as in beneficial. We then went on to talk about who was it beneficial for, and it seemed to point to man.

The way that our discussion carried us was to talk about how have we not appreciated these beneficial things, and in some cases, even harmed these "good" things. Some of the people, including myself, started thinking about all the ways we do not take care of creation, and the "list" started in my head; the list of the things I needed to change... and that is just law. So, then I asked the LORD, what??...
I immediately thought of nature study, and the thought came to me that we should take time to look at, observe, and enjoy those "good" things. That is what nature study is, and then the overflow (as opposed to law) is that we begin to want to take care of these beautiful things. The mind focused on the negative, on the law, will still be in bondage, but we want freedom, so we should focus on the good; in this case his creation that He called "good".

The other awesome thing is that nature study should point us to God; looking at his awesome creation should bring just that... Awe...