Wild Times (Wildlife on Halls' Homestead)

We are blessed with lots of animals from the wild kingdom at Halls' Homestead.  An otter lives in our pond, a great blue heron likes to aggravate our dogs, various ducks stop in throughout the year, and then there's the normal gambit of coyotes, foxes, raccoon, moles, gophers, armadillo, squirrels, frogs, toads, turtles, snakes, rabbits, wild hogs, deer, fish, lizards, salamanders, turkeys, and opossum.  Not long after moving here, I found myself wanting to know more and wanting to be able to teach the kids more about the things we found on our nature walks.  I searched Amazon.com for a field guide and came across this one:

It's a handy little guide the kids and I use to identify the things we find on the farm.  One night, I found a dead moth in the house.  We immediately pulled out the guide and began looking for the exact species of moth we had found.  As we find and identify species, we place a check in our book next to the entry.  My goal is that the kids and I both learn more about our surroundings and that the kids learn to look for books for answers in addition to the internet.  I also want to increase their ability to notice details, and looking at the slight variations between species seems to be great practice.

There is also more excitement and general interest when we find things in the yard than there would be without the field guide.

This particular guide is "a mile wide and an inch deep" as one reviewer stated, since the book does cover the entire Southeast including coastal regions and sea life.  There are more extensive field guides available, but the kids and I are suckers for glossy, full-color photos.  It is a good fit for us as beginners.

Great Blue Heron

08/12/2014 Update: The other day I called my mother to excitedly tell her that I had discovered Butterfly Pea on our property using the field guide.  She must have thought I had been in the sun too long or really fancied myself as an expert with my field guide, because she thought I believed that I had found and identified butterfly urine.  After a brief "Who's on First?" style conversation, she finally realized that I had found a flower that is featured on the cover of our field guide.

09/02/2015 Update: Check out this Great Horned Owl that landed in our front yard this evening.

Great Horned Owl