Jess

Spring term began this week and the BCEs hit the ground running. Okay, technically, after morning data collection and sit-spots at our micro-wildernesses… they levitated above the ground, slowly. What? We got a slack line! No injuries yet! After morning data collection, we got to work. Ruani needed to visit five plots to check his […]

We originally planned a Fire Feast Day for Bella and Gavin’s birthday back in February, but… that day didn’t go exactly as planned. I’ll save that story for another time. A month later, we still wanted to smash that piñata Terran made, and try again to bake a cake on the fire. After morning science

A couple BCEs called me out this week for not keeping the blog up. Fair enough! Sometimes I wonder if anyone’s reading along, and shift my focus to other things. If you like reading about these adventures, leave me a comment and it will encourage me to keep it up. Three weeks ago we had

We hiked through a variety of forest age classes to a snowy summit after taking a bearing with a map and compass.

It’s tax season, and one of my other jobs, a reluctant bookkeeper, is taking more time out of my week than it does the rest of the year. I should be filing 1099s right now, but I’m taking a little break to write about BCE this week. I just looked through the photos- both mine

When we arrived this week, the rain gauge was frozen solid. The pond was ice-free but crystal clear. We saw three newts swimming in the muck below. The mosture from the wet medow makes beautiful ice formations on the vegetation, something I’m always trying to photograph. We started with a little poker. (Simon doesn’t love

We had a very mild fall, but this week, our first BCE of winter and the first week back after break, Mother Nature finally gave us an authentic Oregon winter experience. But before I dive into this week, it looks like the post I wrote (and thought I published) on Dec 13th about Balderdash never

On our first field trip of the year, and our second annual visit to that beautiful piece of land just west of Bear Creek known as Balderdash, we were greeted warmly with giant doggie hugs. Okay, in truth, most of the hugs were saved for Gavin, who was clearly Laggie’s favorite. After a quick snack,

Header photo credit Annabella Waterbury. It’s been a while since we had a rough-skinned newt encounter, but we spotted a little one this week on the way to Plot #3. We were down two explorers this week due to illness, but there was plenty to do to keep the forest science projects moving. Bella had

The rain gauge had a beautiful web bejeweled with water droplets this week, and a layer of ice for the first time this season. During our morning data collection routine, we added a protocol for collecting soil temperature with our new Vernier sensor. Interestingly, we found the soil to be warmer than the air this