When you find an interesting plant that you do not know, look it up in your fieldbook. If you have no fieldbook with you, write a brief description and draw a simple picture of the plant in your notebook. Later at home or in school you can look in a nature book for the name of the plant.

Keep a calendar of one or more trees that you see often, with a record of these dates:

• When leaf buds appear.
• When flower buds appear (if it is a flowering tree).
• When its flowers bloom.
• When the fruit ripens.
• When the seeds are mature.
• When the leaves start to fall. (Some trees, such as pines, do not shed their leaves each year.)

If you have a camera, you can take pictures of the trees at each stage.

Many books on nature study tell how to prepare leaves, flowers, and mosses so that they can be kept for years. They are usually prepared by pressing them between absorbent paper to dry them. Leaves may also be waxed, either as they come from the plant, or after drying.

Plant specimens may be mounted on separate pieces of paper (with glue or transparent tape) and framed, or mounted on pages of a notebook. The name of the plant may be written below it.

If you have the space, you may raise a small outdoor garden of flowers, vegetables, or both. Some plants can be raised in window boxes, or indoors in wooden boxes, dishes, or jars. Some plants grow from seeds, others from bulbs or roots. Most plants need soil to grow in, but some will grow in water.

You will have to rely to a great extent on your books to help you identify wild animals. They are usually shy, and will run or fly away if you get close enough to sketch or photograph them. To study most birds you will need a pair of binoculars.

Many animals can be identified by the tracks they make in mud, snow, or sand. Sometimes, the tracks will reveal whether the animal had been walking or running or will show that it had been injured.

Bird calls and songs, and frog calls make an interesting study. There are a number of bird and frog calls, and by learning their voices, you can identify the animals without seeing them. Listening to tape recordings of these calls can help you learn them.

Collecting and identifying shells can help you learn about water animals. The shells of mollusks such as clams, oysters, and mussels are especially beautiful. Most of these shells are found on seashores, but some kinds may be found on lake shores and river banks.

For help in identifying shells,

You may wish to keep a list of the kinds of birds and the numbers of each kind that you see. Some birds migrate, traveling at certain seasons from one part of the world to another. In North America, migrating birds usually go north in summer, south in winter. You can keep a calendar showing the date each kind of bird arrives in your neighborhood, and the date it disappears.

If you have a yard, there are several ways you can get birds to visit it. A birdbath is especially attractive to songbirds. Food—such as bread crumbs, nuts, grain, and suet—is welcome to birds, especially in winter when it is hard for them to find fruits and insects. Birdhouses are attractive to birds as places to build nests in. Different types of birdhouses attract different types of birds.

The bodies of some animals—including frogs and butterflies—change greatly in form during their lives. You may be able to collect some of these animals in their early stages and watch them change into other shapes. Tadpoles, for example, turn into frogs; caterpillars turn into moths or butterflies.

A caterpillar, chrysalis, or cocoon (all immature stages of moths or butterflies) maybe kept in a wire cage. Caterpillars must be supplied with fresh leaves from the plant on which they were found. Tadpoles should be kept in an aquarium (a glass tank with water in it) with algae for food. It takes from a few days to a few months for a tadpole to become a frog. When this happens it must have something to climb out on above the water, such as a large rock or pile of smaller rocks. Frogs must be fed live insects or worms.

Some living organisms are so small they cannot be seen with the unaided eye. Some are visible with a low-powered microscope or a magnifying glass; others can be seen only with a high-powered microscope.

Under a microscope or through a magnifying glass look at a drop of water from a pond, lake, or stream. Among the living things you may see in it are the amoeba, the planarian, and the water flea (or daphnia). You may be able to see the individual algae, organisms that form the scum on certain bodies of water, or even colonies of some of the larger of the one-celled organisms known as bacteria.