Explore Outdoors ~ Lichens!

 Lichens are small and easy to overlook, but they are amazing. These tiny symbiotic communities of fungi and algae and cyanobacteria can weather the cold temperatures and dry air of winter. How do they do it?

 

 

 

They go dormant. Some have anti-freeze chemicals in their cells to keep from - well, freezing and bursting open. Their superpower: they can pick up with photosynthesis once the weather warms up and the moisture returns. Find out more about lichens here. 

 

Go Lichen Looking around your neighborhood. 

Check tree trunks and branches, rocks, stone walls - I've even found lichens growing on park benches! 

 

Explore Outdoors ~ Fungi from the tree tops

 

 

 

Last month the wind blew lots of branches down from the trees. I'm always curious to see what's growing up in the sky... so I look at them all before tossing them into the brush pile. And one branch had this very bright and sunny lichen. It's got a bright and sunny name: sunburst lichen! I love the little cups. They are the fruiting bodies, and release spores.

 

What's growing on trees in your neighborhood? 

Explore Outdoors ~ Treetop Fungi

 During an early spring storm, a couple of small branches blew down from the oaks lining the driveway. I always enjoy looking at what's growing on them - usually a fun selection of lichens and other fungi that are too high to see. They resemble the sorts of things one might find clinging to driftwood at the ocean's edge. Sometimes the treetop fungi look just as surprised to see me as I am to see them.

Next time the wind blows down branches from a tree, check out what's growing on them!

Explore Outdoors ~ Lichens

 One of my favorite winter activities is Lichen Looking. That's because trees don't have leaves during this season - or if they do, the leaves are dried and rattly. And they don't have flowers. But they do sport lichens and other fungi. And, in this case, it was neat to observe how the snow gathered on the curls of lichen and bark.

I found this tree at a city park. What sort of lichen can you find in your neighborhood?

Explore Outdoors ~ Lichens and Moss

 There's something about lichens that enchants me. I love the idea of cooperative housing (fungi and algae living together) and how they are such pioneers. Lichens grow on rocks and tombstones and old picnic tables and even trunks and limbs of trees. Here are some I saw over the past week. Granted, the moss is pretty cool, too!

What kinds of lichen have you found lately?

Explore Outdoors ~ Funky Winter Fungi

 Welcome Back to a New Year of nature breaks, seasonal observations, and outdoor exploration. I now have a macro-lens that clips onto my mobile phone! And that allows me to see things "up close and personal"  - it's like having a hand-lens attached to the camera. So of course I took it out for a walk!

I love lichen, so of course I just had to take some photos! Some lichens look crusty and tough, but it's not until you look closer that they look a bit ... scaly, like tiny dragons raising their heads above the field of leafy fronds.

Others look sharp and dangerous - like deer antlers!

There are all kinds of soft fungi growing on old logs. These looked like someone had pushed a bunch of yellow trumpet-shaped tacks into the wood. Hey look! you can even see the mycelium network spreading across the log.

What tiny natural wonders will you discover this week?

Explore Outdoors ~ Lichen Looking

 There is a large rock that sticks out of my yard. In the summer it’s an obstacle to mow around, a background for calendula flowers. In the winter, you can walk right by it – unless you happen to be looking at squirrel tracks. Which I was the other week. That’s when I noticed the lovely lichens, framed by snow and ice.

 

Lichens in these parts are adapted to survive the cold. Some go dormant when it’s cold and dry, others have antifreeze in their tissues.

This week, do some Winter Lichen Looking.

• Where do you find your lichens growing? On tree trunks? On branches? On rocks?
• What kind of lichens do you see? Are they leafy? Crusty? Branchy?
• What colors are your lichens?
• Are they loners, or do they share their space with other kinds of lichen?
• Draw pictures of your lichens, or take photos, and share them with other lichen lookers.

 

Explore Outdoors ~ Textures

 

There are so many things to see on trees: leaves, insects, bark, and lichens! The thing I like about lichens - aside from the fact that they are funky fungi - is the diversity of textures. You can touch them gently and feel that some are bumpy and crusty, some are bristly, and some are smooth and leafy.

This week take a closer peek at the trees in your neighborhood. Do they have lichens growing on their bark? If so:

• What kinds of lichens do you see? Write notes or draw them in your nature notebook.
• What colors are the lichens?
• How would you describe their texture?
  
• Are there two (or more) kinds growing together?
• Take a closer look with a hand lens or magnifying glass.
• What do you suppose ants think about as they walk through a lichen patch?
   

Explore Outdoors ~ look closely

 

This week, take a closer look at the trees and rocks you pass by on your walks. Many of the trees ringing my back yard have lichen-covered bark. What do you see this week?

Explore Summer!

Archimedes Notebook is taking a break from book reviews for a few weeks so I can spend this summer being a curious naturalist. I'll be counting bees, watching bugs, and searching out cool fungi ~ indulging in non-digital exploration of my world. I invite you to turn off your computer for a few hours each week so you can explore the world around you.

Need ideas? Check out the "things to do" list, revisit Wednesday explorer posts, or find a citizen science project to help out with (links in the "Get Involved in Real Science" list to the right). Write haiku, draw pictures, paint, put that sidewalk chalk to use, make slime, watch the stars - and remember to make s'mores. 

See you in August!

Explore Summer!

Archimedes Notebook is taking a break from book reviews for a few weeks so I can spend this summer being a curious naturalist. I'll be counting bees, watching bugs, and searching out cool fungi ~ indulging in non-digital exploration of my world. I invite you to turn off your computer for a few hours each week so you can explore the world around you.

Need ideas? Check out the "things to do" list, revisit Wednesday explorer posts, or find a citizen science project to help out with (links in the "Get Involved in Real Science" list to the right). Write haiku, draw pictures, paint, put that sidewalk chalk to use, make slime, watch the stars - and remember to make s'mores. 

See you in August!

Wednesday Explorers Club ~ ecological succession

Years ago a large tree fell down at the bottom of our hill. It was too big to cut with a chainsaw, so it sat. Through wind and rain and snow and hot summer days - soaking up moisture - and now it is getting hard to recognize. Mosses cover much of the top. Leaves fallen and composted year after year have created compost that now provide a place for grasses to root.

Over time the tree is going through phases of decay. Mosses, lichens, and fungi push into the bark, furthering the process of decomposition. Later, other plants will take their place. As the wood rots and cracks, small animals will move in, carving their homes and nests.

Each group of occupants changes the log - making it suitable for the next plant and animal inhabitants. The process is called ecological succession.

What will our neighborhood tree trunk look like in two years? In five? In another decade?

Do you have a fallen tree, old patch of cement,  or patch of crumbling pavement that is undergoing succession?

What's growing on and in it? Can you see lichens? Fungi? Mosses? Are their plant stems stretching across the surface? Stems and leaves sprouting from the cracks?

What kinds of insects and other animals are using it?

How does it change over the next year? Document what you observe using photos, drawings, and notes.

Wild Outdoor Wednesday

How many kinds of lichens can you find growing on trees and rocks and old logs? Capture their colors and shapes in words and images.  

Remember to take your sketchbook or journal with unlined pages, something to draw and write with, and something to add color ~ watercolors, colored pencils, crayons, or markers.

Wordless Wednesday

Lichen-looking leaves me liking lichens

Foliose lichens

Lichens are an odd lot. They look sort of greenish and make their own food using sunlight, but they don't have flowers or leaves or roots. So they're not plants. They are a composite of two organisms: fungi and algae. Usually the algae is sandwiched in between layers of the fungi. They have a symbiotic relationship - both organisms benefit. The algae make food, and the fungi provide the structure and help retain moisture.

Fruticose lichen - bushy appearance

You'll find them everywhere - from the highest rocky tops of mountains to the rainiest rainforest. You may have seen crusty lichens clinging to rocks - they are the first colonists and secrete acids that gradually break down the rock surface, helping soil development. But it takes time; lichens grow really really slowly. A fast-growing lichen may add 1/2 inch a year.

Trumpet lichens

 Lichens will grow on just about anything that holds still long enough for it to attach to: tree trunks and branches, gravestones, old farm equipment, wooden picnic tables ... even sand dunes. If the sand is stable for a long enough period of time, a soil crust of lichens can form. That allows other communities of plants to move in and establish themselves over the top.

British Soldier lichen

Lichens do more than help the soil; they provide food for animals and insects, and birds use them in nest-building. People use lichens, too. Some lichens are used in dyes. When mixed with pine sap or urine, or burned to ash, they produce a range of colors from yellow to purple and reds. Some lichens are edible, used as food or to flavor food.

You might find lichens in your bathroom cabinets; lichens are used in toothpaste, salves, perfumes and deodorants. Some lichens produce chemicals that inhibit the growth of neighboring lichens - and scientists have found uses of lichen chemicals in herbicides as well as medical applications.

So what's not to like about lichens?

Today is STEM Friday. Drop by the STEM Friday blog for book reviews and other STEM resources.

Wordless Wednesday

Archimedes Notebook is off for a few weeks of field exploration: in the back yard, in the garden, in the woods...  Wordless Wednesday will still be here, and look for Friday posts to resume in late summer.

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday