Flowers & Fruit

Today we hiked 7.5 miles up a mountain and back to collect plant specimens. There were all kinds of interesting plants and trees, but the only specimens we were allowed to gather had fruit or flowers on them.

Why? We learned that flowers & fruit help a botanist identify plants. Specimens have to be in flower or fruit form in order to be accepted into an herbarium.

I never thought about this before, but it makes sense. Try picking four leaves from four different plants. Put them away. Look at them the next day. Could you tell what plants the leaves came from? Probably not. So many plants have similar leaves.

Now look at the flowers or fruit. As soon as you see either one, you know what plant it came from or else you can go find a picture of it and identify what plant it came from.

Try it at home or on the schoolyard and see!

Here's today's slideshow:

Collecting & Pressing Plants

Today, we went up to about 4,000 feet above the desert floor and photographed, collected, and pressed plants. We saw some remarkable specimens (hmmm, what does that word mean?). This week I want all of you to try doing what we did.

1. First, break off part of a plant that's big enough to fill up a sheet of paper (about 8 inches long).
2. Next, put a paper towel on each side of it.
3. Finally, put it inside a big, fat book so that it gets pressed flat.

You can use a telephone directory or a big dictionary or even your Open Court Reader. Then you're going to LEAVE IT ALONE until I get back. You can pick a flowering plant, or one that's woody, or one that soft and green.

When you're done, you will have pressed a plant, just like a real botanist.


Meanwhile, here's a slideshow of where we hiked today and what we saw. These are just some of the pix I took!