Nature Study Identifiers

I think that if I were just starting out in identifying things, and had very little experience, then I would gather up alot of resources for my area and just browse them.

For instance, I have books of wildflowers and trees of my state (these are hands down the best ID resources that I use – mine are published by a university press, so if you are looking for similar, you might have to refer to a university in your state), and I have alot of guides for my part of the country – the southeast. I have a Peterson’s guide to forest ecosystems that is very helpful, because it takes all of the things you might see and combines them – from animals, birds, and trees to plants, geology and weather patterns. I also have some little pocket field guides that are only for specific subjects – like pond life, or butterflies, or ferns. These are very suitable for study before you go out in nature because they are very brief, and have lots of pictures. You want lots of pictures.

But don’t waste time on wildflowers of New England if you live in Texas – in other words you may have to work a little to find the books for your area, but it is worth it if you are serious about nature study.

I also use the game and fish website for my state, and my state (Arkansas, by the way) has a natural heritage commission that has a great site with information for each distinct geographical region of the state. Your state may have good resources like these.

Anyway, I think reading and studying a little before you go out in nature may ease a little of your confusion, and give you a frame of reference for more detailed research. Say to yourself, I am at a pond in springtime, and I should see some plants like this and some trees like this, and look for them. Or, it is winter and these are common birds for my part of the county, let’s go outside and see if we can find a couple at our bird feeder.

And the Comstock handbook isn’t very good for making identifications, the pictures aren’t good enough and that really isn’t the function of the book. So don’t beat yourself up for not finding your “thing” in that.

Frankly I don’t always find the answer when I am trying to identify something. I have some oak leaves that have driving me crazy for about a week – I just can’t be satisfied with any ID, I know I haven’t nailed it yet. Sometimes the specimen is not representative, sometimes I don’t have the right book, sometimes I just can’t figure it out!

Does this help? I’ve gone on too long and now I am rambling! 🙂

Gem

That Botany in a Day looks like a great resource. Thanks for the tip Lauri.

I worked as a research assistant for a couple of biologists when I was in college. One very profound thing one of them told me was that, as my experience with our project grew, my “resolution would improve”. In other words, what starts out looking like a bunch of bugs, with experience and familiarity resolves into a group of different types of insects. Same with plants – a bunch of trees resolved into the different types, maybe at first just conifers and deciduous trees, then to the different types of each.

Seeing patterns is a skill that can be learned/taught. I what we are striving for, through nature study, is to help our children see some of the patterns naturally, so that they can build on their skill as they grow and mature.

So it seems that the botany in a day book is training to slowly and logically increase resolution – from the general to the specific.

I like it – I am putting the kid’s version on my wish list!

Georgiaberry