The Big, the Bad, and the Ugly

Fantastic Flora: The World’s Biggest, Baddest, and Smelliest Plants

by Ann McCallum Staats; illus. by Zoë Ingram 

144 pages; ages 8-12

‎ MIT Kids Press, 2025  

When plants face a problem, they can’t get up and move. Rooted to the ground, they have to find nutrition, fend off predators, and survive whatever conditions the environment throws at them. They thrive, writes Ann McCallum Staats, by “using brilliant – and bizarre – adaptations.” Some have thorns, others entice insects through the use of chemical signals.

With that in mind, Ann divides her book into four sections, focusing on The Big, The Bad, The Smelly, and The Exceptionally Strange. You probably know at least one really big plant: the giant sequoia. And you may have seen photos of cars driving through one, or many people holding hands to circle a tree. You may have even heard of the biggest of them all, General Sherman which stretches 275 feet into the sky. But did you know that a sequoia’s roots can stretch more than 150 feet from the base? 

Trees aren’t the only huge plants. There’s a water lily whose leaf is so big that you could use it for a raft!

What makes a plant “bad?” How about those that kill off animals nibbling their berries, roots, and leaves? Or those that, by simply touching their sap, could blind you. Certainly there are plenty more bad actors, and I’m sure we can each think of our “most despicable plant” (my vote goes to cholla cactus).

Then there are the smelly ones… the ginkgo which looks lovely but stinks up a storm! And skunk cabbage, one of the earliest plants to emerge in our snow-covered northeast, but carries a certain perfume. Of all the stinkers, the corpse plant whose name may be the most honest. It really does smell like a rotting carcass, and all for the sake of attracting flies to carry its pollen to another flower.

The plant kingdom is so diverse that you’re bound to find a few oddballs, and Ann shares three. One is a plant that’s turned the tables in a bug-bite-leaf world and dines on insects. Another disguises itself as a stone, and a third is a dainty orchid with flowers that look like flying ducks. Orchids are notorious tricksters, and have co-evolved some intricate partnerships with pollinators.

This is a fun book to read, and I wanted to know more. Ann graciously answered a couple of questions.

Me: How did you come across this idea for presenting a book about plants: the biggest, baddest, smelliest? 

 

Ann: I was staring out my office window one day and noticing the pattern of browns and golds (it was winter so no leaves). I decided to write about plants as a kind of challenge to myself. As a former teacher, I was often given a curriculum that could be boring--it was my job to make it engaging for kids and I enjoyed that task. I had low expectations for plants, but once I started a little research, I was astonished by some of the incredible adaptations plants use to survive. Seriously, some of the plants I showcase have seeds that explode, anti-fish armor, and berries so toxic that eating just a few is fatal. I was hooked. As for the structure of the book--the big, the bad, the smelly, and the exceptionally strange, that took some thought. I knew that the organization scheme was key. It couldn't be chronological or based on who, what, where. When I was brainstorming and finding fun facts, it came to me that this structure would work well for the topic. I wanted to highlight how amazing plants really are, once you ‘dig’ in.

Me: I love the "Be-Leaf it or not" features. How did those develop? Because I notice there are plenty of longer sidebars.

Ann: These recurring features focus on some cool fact that I wanted to include but that didn’t quite fit into the text of the chapter. I guess I'd call them breakout boxes. They provide an extension of the chapter and fun additional factoids. They are a little different from the sidebars which are more scientific in nature or offer a more in-depth explanation of something. The “Be-LEAF it or Not” pullouts ask a question and then share a little, fun tidbit that goes beyond the chapter. I really like the way they designed the book with these breakout boxes highlighted. 

Ann is a member of #STEAMTeam2025. You can find out more about her at her website, annmccallumbooks.com

Thanks for dropping by today. On Monday we'll be hanging out at Marvelous Middle Grade Monday with other  bloggers. It's over at Greg Pattridge's blog, Always in the Middle, so hop over to see what other people are reading. Review copy provided by the publishers.

Explore Outdoors ~ Who's hanging out on the dandelions?

 Last week my garden was filled with bright yellow dandelions. My first thought was ... hey! I wonder if any pollinators are visiting them?

 

There were! I spent a bit more than 10 minutes walking around the garden counting the bees, wasps, and flies visiting dandelions.

 

Three tiny coppery bees, two flies, one bumblebee, and 45 wasps. Of those wasps, most (41) were small, not even a centimeter long, and four were paper wasps, like this one from nearly a dozen years ago. Check out that pollen smeared all over her face and thorax!

 

 

This week look for pollinators on the dandelions in your neighborhood.

 

Animals with Jobs

Animals lead busy lives: finding food, building nests, taking care of their families. And some animals have jobs, helping other animals – or even people. Today’s books, released back in February, feature fish that provide cleaning services and conservation dogs.

themes: animals, nature, nonfiction

Don't Eat the Cleaners! Tiny Fish with a Big Job 

by Susan Stockdale 

32 pages; ages 4-8

‎Peachtree, 2025 

Ocean animals never have to take a bath like you do, right? They live in water! But they still become dirty, so they still have to get clean.

Fish don’t use scrub brushes and sponges. Instead, they go to the cleaners – a station where cleaner wrasse and cleaner shrimp hang out, ready to nibble dead skin and parasites of their fishy customers. These cleaner fish also slip between sharp teeth, pulling out bits of food, and nibble algae from sea turtle shells.

What I like about this book: the illustrations are bold and bright, full of patterns that will delight the eye. The text describes how cleaning fish and shrimp advertise their availability, and do their jobs. Susan Stockdale points out that cleaning wrasse may remember up to 100 different “customers”, and notes that sometimes the cleaning stations are so busy that reef animals have to line up like cars at a car wash! Everything works well, as long as the big fish remember the one rule: Don’t eat the cleaners!

Dogs take on many different kinds of jobs, from rescue animals to service animals. Here’s a story about a different career path…

Trouble Dog: From Shelter Dog to Conservation Hero 

by Carol A. Foote; illus. by Larry Day 

48 pages; ages 5-9

‎ Eerdmans Books for Young Readers, 2025

Tucker never meant to be trouble. He just loved to play.

But all that romping and chasing and chewing and crashing meant a trip back to the animal shelter. Until one day Laura stopped by. “Maybe he’s the right kind of trouble,” she said and took him home. She thought that a dog with lots of energy might just be the perfect sort of partner, so she played “find the smell” games and tug-of-war. And when he was finally ready, Laura took him … snail hunting (for invasive species), beetle detecting, and turtle egg-finding.

What I like about this book: I like the way Carol Foote shows the patience and training that goes into developing the skills a conservation dog needs. I like seeing the conservation cases that Tucker solves. And I like the extensive back matter, where Carol explains how conservation dogs help biologists. There’s also a section about other jobs dogs do, too, as not all dogs have the temperament to work in the field. This is a heartwarming tale for anyone who has wondered what their place in the world is.

After reading about Trouble, I had One Question for Carol: 

Me: When did the idea for this story start germinating in your heart? And when did you know you had to turn it into a book for kids?

Carol and Lily

Carol: Like many people, I had never heard of conservation dogs until I saw one demonstrating its talents at a Wildlife Conservation Expo a few years ago. The dog’s handler, Megan Parker, who later became one of my main sources for the book, was hiding things for the dog, Pepin, to find. She explained how conservation dogs help conservationists by finding rare or invasive plants and animals and the scat of elusive or endangered species. 

But what touched my heart and made me want to write the story was hearing that great conservation dogs are often so exuberant and rambunctious that they’re rejected as pets and abandoned in shelters where they’re marked as “trouble.” Fortunately, conservationists have learned to search shelters for such dogs and put their energy and intensity to work helping wildlife. They give these dogs a second chance at life—a home, love and a purpose they enjoy. I instantly knew I wanted to write that story, and I immediately saw it as a picture book.

Carol Foote is a member of #STEAMTeam2025. You can find out more about her at her website, www.carolafoote.com.

Beyond the Books:

Create a “help wanted” ad or poster for a job that needs to be done. In our house it’s usually a tall stack of dirty dishes that needs washing! What sort of animals might apply for the job? And how would they do the job?

Check out how manta rays get cleaned by cleaner wrasse in this video.

Meet a conservation dog in this video

Today we’re joining Perfect Picture Book Friday. It’s a wonderful gathering where bloggers share great picture books at Susanna Leonard Hill's website. Review copies provided by the publishers.

Explore Outdoors ~ Violets and their Kin

 What do you notice about the flowers below? 

  

They look like they might be related, right? And they are! The first one is a violet growing in my yard, and the others are pansies, growing in pots at a nursery. 

Sometimes I think pansies look like giant violets - and they do share the same genus: Viola. They also have five petals, just like violets. But look at the violet petals: it looks like three go in one direction and two in the other. The pansies have four petals going up, and one going down (like the smile on a face). 

I've seen violets in my yard ranging in color from nearly white to pink, magenta, and deep purple. And some of the violets even have little faces, like these pansies do.

Look for violets and pansies growing near you. 

What things do you notice about them?

 

If you Save a Pelican...

Plight of the Pelican: How Science Saved a Species (Books for a Better Earth) 

by Jessica Stremer; illus. by Gordy Wright 

40 pages; ages 5-8

Holiday House, 2025   

theme: birds, endangered species, conservation

 For millions of years, pelicans have flown over Earth, skimming the salty sea breeze…

… then diving down to scoop and gulp the fish in the ocean. But in the 1950’s something started happening. Fewer pelican chicks were born – and pelicans weren’t the only birds with declining birth rates. The problem: thin eggshells caused by bioaccumulation of a pesticide, DDT. This book shows how action by scientists and farmers and just regular folks helped save the pelicans. And the eagles.

What I like about this book: What begins as a lyrical flight of words across a page grows into a call for action. Author Jessica Stremer shows how scientists began questioning the role of – and fate of – DDT as it spread from fields to streams and the ocean, from insects to fish to pelicans. I like how she asks questions on the page – even as laws prohibited the use of certain chemicals, could pelicans be saved? And now, even the list of plants and animals threatened by environmental risks grows, Stremer shows that we know what to do.

Back matter focuses on the history of the environmental movement, the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency, and passage of the endangered species act. There’s more information about the pelicans and about how DDT harms birds. And there’s a short – but important – list of ways kids can “be the change.”

After finishing this book, I knew I had to ask Jessica One Question!

Me: How can adults best support their children’s work to make the world a better place for pelicans and other animals?

Jessica: I think one of the best things adults can do to support their kids is to find out what activities most interest them and enable that interest. If they have a child who likes to tinker, maybe they can build some type of wildlife habitat together. If they have a child who likes to explore the outdoors, take a hike somewhere new. Bring a bag for picking up trash and a journal for some quiet time of observation. The more we invite children to be part of the natural world, the more they'll feel a sense of duty to care for it.

Thank you, Jessica! Jessica is a member of #STEAMTeam2025. She’s talked about her books a couple of times here on the blog: Great Carrier Reef and Fire Escape . You can find out more about her at her website, www.jessicastremer.com

Beyond the Books:

Make a pelican – or an entire flock of them – out of paper plates. Here’s how. 

Test how strong eggs are. The dome shape of eggs is what lends them their strength (at least when they’re not affected by DDT). If you’ve got some eggs, a few bottle caps and a pile of books, you can test how strong an egg is. This video shows how. 

Read more about threats to birds and meet some of the birds on the brink of extinction (here’s an article to get you started). What can you do to bring awareness to the need for bird conservation?

Today we’re joining Perfect Picture Book Friday. It’s a wonderful gathering where bloggers share great picture books at Susanna Leonard Hill's website. Review copies provided by the publishers.

Explore outdoors ~ No Mowing Yet

 We have not mowed yet ... because the lawn is filled with flowers. And some of those flowers provide pollen for the bees. And because, frankly, we just haven't gotten around to it. Here are a couple shots from my lawn last week. What do you notice?

 Do you have flowers growing in your yard? 

Take a close look - sometimes the flowers are hidden.

• What color are the flowers growing amongst your grass?
• How many petals do they have?
• Are there any bumble bees or other insects visiting them? 
  

Tiny Birds, Long Flight

 

Tiny Tern Takes Flight 

by Donna B. McKinney; illus by Fiona Osbaldstone 

40 pages; ages 4-6

‎Science, Naturally!, 2024 

theme: birds, migration, nonfiction

Arctic terns live in shivering cold lands near the North Pole.

They may be tiny, but they are mighty birds who dive into icy water for food, and scoop out nests on the rocky tundra. They may be small, but they are fierce protectors of their nests and hatchlings. They may look puny, but when summer light fades and seasons change, they take off on the longest migration journey of any bird – flying all the way from the Arctic to the Antarctic. A wonderful story about an ordinary tern making an extraordinary flight.

What I like about this book: Sure, this book is filled with facts, but the language is so lyrical you don’t even notice. As seasons change, “sunlight creeps toward darkness as the Earth turns on its axis…” Air currents carry the terns “higher, further, southward.” Back matter shows details of the tern and their feathers, tells more about migration, and describes how they live in the Arctic and Antarctic. And there's the alliterative title, too!

Beyond the Books:

Arctic terns are migrating, and right now are close to the midpoint in their migration from the Antarctic to the Arctic. You can look at their migration map, and find out more about these tiny terns at All About Birds.

Join a scientific expedition to monitor arctic tern migration via this video

For deeper study of arctic terns, check out this hands-on unit from author and teacher, Jessica Fries Gaither

Fly like a tern. In the book, the terns rise and glide on air currents. They twirl and soar. Can you move like a tern?

Today we’re joining Perfect Picture Book Friday. It’s a wonderful gathering where bloggers share great picture books at Susanna Leonard Hill's website. Review copy provided by the author.