a day out

we've been homebound alot lately. our days have been long and lazy and as we've entered midspring, full of light and warmth. a few days ago, however, we decided to visit our local nature sanctuary. it was a good choice. the boys led and i followed with camera in hand.

the first order of business was turning over several logs, you know, just to see what was there. we found spiders, flatworms, earthworms, skinks, slugs, snails, wood lice, centipedes and heaps more that i've surely forgotten. i mostly watched quietly while they discussed what they saw, but every now and then answered a question or two...or proposed a question or two or three or four. i love the socratic method of "teaching". it's unobtrusive and very unschooly, in my opinion :)

hitting the invertebrate jackpot!

we still can't figure out what these little creatures are above. j thinks they might be pseudo scorpions, but we can't find them in any of our nature guides. so perhaps i'll go with that. pseudo scorpions they are! and below a small skink j found and caught. it was a great day for reptiles. there were all manner of lizards and skinks great and small running to and fro. j is certain this one below is a juvenile blue tongued skink. it does look suspiciously like one, but with juveniles it's hard to tell sometimes.

i don't think it really matters anyway if he's right or wrong in the naming of this and that. he's imagining. he's wondering and wandering, hypothesizing, planting seeds for a future harvest.



this is quite possibly the largest leopard slug we have seen to date. it's really hard to identify because of the coloring, but see that small hole in it's side? that's where it breathes from. that's also the spot where reproduction happens. i won't go into detail, but j ALWAYS does. he finds mating rituals fascinating and often compares those of one species to those of another.

even though e loves exploring with this big brother and learning from and with j, mostly he just likes to run, jump and frolic over stones, logs, hills...whatever. anything to challenge him physically and give him a bit of an adrenaline rush.

on this particular day we also saw a sacred kingfisher catch and eat a large snail, a wee feather from this little lovely, and a pied cormorant diving under water, hunting for its lunch. what a day!