Swimming with Otters

Last night, Rob and the kids were swimming in the pond and a river otter swam right past Princess Rose. You should have seen all the kids running up to the house to tell me. They were so excited.

They've actually seen an otter before -- in our creek at the old city house. But this was different. It wasn't a distant sighting, but a close encounter.
I uploaded the picture so you could see what the kids saw. However, I didn't take it and it's not our otter. I found it via Google Images. Here's the photo credit. Click on the picture to learn more about otters at Wikipedia.

As a side note, I still haven't found the cord to the camera. I've found 8,000 other cords, many of which I have no idea what they belong to, but not the one to charge my camera and upload pictures to the computer. So, I buckled and ordered a new one.

FYI, if you own a Kodak Share digital camera and go to four different stores you won't find a replacement cord. You'll be told it's only available directly from Kodak. Sigh. I did find it at amazon.com for $10 cheaper than kodak.com. It should be here any day and I can start sharing real life pictures from the Wittmann adventures.

Regional Field Guides

I went to the MSU Extension office this week and picked up a bunch of Michigan field guides. If you're going to be doing nature studies, it's good to supply the kids with regional field guides. As my friend and naturalist MacBeth says, "That's really your best bet. This way, what you see is most likely to be easy to find in the guide."

When you go for walks take a field guide or two with you. Then when the kids spot a really neat butterfly or bird or frog, you can identify it. It makes the nature walk all the more exciting and it'll remind the kids to open their eyes and observe what is around them.

Environmental and Outdoor Education

Our new home is a Charlotte Mason enthusiast's dream. Our 2008/2009 school studies will be heavy on nature studies. This week I've begun laying out my plan for the year.

One place I turned for help was 4-H. They have a lot of resources available for education in the out of doors. For example, I found an 80-page guide titled The Walk: Taking Your Youth Outdoors for Environmental Stewardship and Learning. After clicking on the hyperlink, scroll down to find it. You can print it off on your home computer for free. You can three-hole punch the paper or get fancy and comb bind it. If you live in Michigan it's very possible your 4-H office offers the bound book for free, so it'd be worth a phone call to save on printing costs.

Also helpful were these study sheets to be used in wildlife identification. These I printed off on three-hole punch paper for the kids to put in their nature notebooks.
Tree Study Sheets
Wildflower Study Sheets
Rock and Mineral Study Sheets

I hope to share more with you as we move forward with this study.

ADDENDUM: The Walk is not available free from the extension office after all. It's a $14 book. So, it is cheaper to download and print.

Sly Sighting

Sitting at my computer, sipping tea in the wee hours this morning, a fox strode by my window. What an absolutely beautiful and graceful animal.

The kids and their friends have sighted foxes before, but this was my first.

I so don't miss living in the city. This place is just way too cool.

I didn't take this picture, but this is what it looked like walking in front of my pond. Photo credit. Though this is a fall picture. Our fox's coat didn't appear so full.