Educators

May 12, 2020 by wpengine

Draw a Flower

This is the season of colorful flowers and we can truly appreciate their vibrance after a typical grey and chilly winter. One way to make the beauty last and keep a reminder of springtime all year-round is to draw a flower.

Andrey Avinoff was an entomologist and Director of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History from 1926 to 1946. But he was also an illustrator and painter in his free time! Many of his beautiful illustrations can be found in “Wild Flowers of Western Pennsylvania and the Upper Ohio Basin,” a botanical guide authored by the botanist Otto E Jennings, and later Director of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History.

One of the most ubiquitous flowers of the season, for me, is the violet. I love the way they sprout up through lawns and in the forest alike. They come in a dazzling array of colors—pink, white, yellow, blue, and purple—and the detail when you look closely is inspiring. There are about 600 species in the Viola genus, so there are plenty to choose from.

Before we get started you might need to gather some supplies. Use a pencil and eraser, just in case you make some mistakes (it’s okay to make a mistake). Get some paper and a comfy spot to draw—make sure you cover your table to avoid making marks on it. Don’t forget the colors! I like colored pencils, but you can use markers, crayons, paint, or anything else to color with.

Here’s a tip: try out some ideas on scrap paper so that you know what works best for you. Practice makes perfect!

Step 1: Shapes

circles and lines drawn in pencil to show the basic shapes to begin drawing flowers

Use some basic shapes—circles, triangles, squares, and lines—to make up the general shape of your flower. You can draw little lollipops or popsicles for now and we’ll add more details as we go. Use light pencil strokes so that they’ll be easy to erase later.

Try to keep all of your flower shapes the same size—you want all your flowers to be similar in size.

I also draw some leaf shapes. Make sure your leaves are balanced to your flowers and don’t worry about how they overlap just yet.

I also like to have a photo that I’ve taken or found online to use as a reference for what I’m drawing. I even picked some flowers to get a good idea of what they look like—just make sure you leave some flowers for the wildlife.

If you want to take it to the next level, you can also check out some botanical illustrations (like Andrey Avinoff’s) where individual flower parts, seeds, leaves, and roots are sometimes drawn to help with identification.

Step 2: Silhouette

Next let’s draw individual flower petals. It’s good to know how many petals your flower has and how they look—violets have five that look a little like a butterfly. Flowers come in a lot of shapes, so take some time studying the flower and practice drawing the shape. If you haven’t already, you can also draw the flower stalks, or petioles.

The leaf shape is important too, leaves come in lots of shapes like the violet’s heart-shaped leaves.

Step 3: Details

Add more details. Mark where colors might change on flower petals and if there are any veins on the leaves or petals. You can add details to the leaf edges to make them wavy, scalloped, or toothed.

It’s also important in this step to know how detailed you want to be. Remember: a smaller sketch doesn’t need as much detail, but a bigger sketch can have more. Whatever you think looks best.

Step 4: Color

colored drawing of flowers with purple petals, yellow centers, and green stems and leaves

This step is optional, sometimes a black and white sketch can tell a great story. However, if you have some time, then adding color to your drawing can also really bring it to life.

You can use crayons, markers, paint, or any other color tool you want. It’s always a good idea to test your colors on a separate piece of paper to see if they’re right for you or to try out a mix of colors. Flowers are many colors, so you can be really creative!

Be proud of your sketches! No one else could have made it the same way that you did. By drawing and coloring plants, animals, and other nature you can sharpen your observation skills and gain a better appreciation for the beauty and uniqueness of all life.

Aaron Young is a museum educator on Carnegie Museum of Natural History’s Outreach team. Museum staff, volunteers, and interns are encouraged to blog about their unique experiences and knowledge gained from working at the museum.

May 8, 2020 by wpengine

City Nature Challenge Recap

photo of black and red bug on white flowers

With the COVID-19 pandemic hitting, the entire world had to adapt how we participated in this year’s City Nature Challenge. This year we focused on a global collaboration instead of a competition, and physical distancing over public events. We are amazed at the creativity and resilience that we saw – and 2020’s City Nature Challenge results show just how important it was both globally and in the Pittsburgh region.

City Nature Challenge Results

graphic of Pittsburgh City Nature Challenge 2020 Results: 8281 total observation, 1225 total species, and 487 total observers

This year, over 40,000 people around the world came together virtually to participate in the City Nature Challenge. Collectively we shared over 800,000 observations of nature near our homes, and documented 135,435 different species of fungi, plants, and animals. Want to see what was found in any of the more than 200 cities that participated? You can explore at this link.

Pittsburgh’s numbers are incredible too. At the end of the challenge, the Pittsburgh region ended up having 487 observers, 8,281 observations, and 1,225 different species. We almost doubled the number of observers from last year!

The identification phase was a success as well with 419 users helping identify 13,446 different observations. You can explore all the Pittsburgh Region’s observations from this year at this link.

photo of candle flame lichen — Pete Peng has 1,310 observations and these Candleflame Lichens are beautiful.

Don’t Stop Observing!

We can’t put into words how thankful we are for everyone’s resilience and hard work. The results from this year’s City Nature Challenge prove that even though we have to distance from each other right now, we can still come together to accomplish something awesome.

closeup photo of a fly — Check out this observation of a fly from Julia Schwierking!

The City Nature Challenge may be over, but the observations don’t have to end here. Nature is around you 24/7 and waiting to be observed. You can use the iNaturalist app anytime to share what you find!

We’d love to see your observations. Email them to nature360@carnegiemnh.org or tag us on social media @CarnegieMNH.

Get more nature activity ideas from Nature Lab!

May 7, 2020 by wpengine

The City Nature Challenge Family Experience

photograph of a boy with a camera in a field

In these unprecedented times, it can be the simplest acts of normalcy that are most welcome.

It had been a while since we piled the entire family, including my wife, son, daughter, and myself, into the family minivan and headed off on an adventure.

The past six weeks consisted of self quarantine, at-home work, at-home schoolwork, neighborhood walks and riding bikes in the alley behind our house. The occasional trip to the grocery store, a most routine act any other time that I would probably have put off, had become a welcome escape.

Enter the City Nature Challenge. This worldwide event provided everything we needed: Fresh air. New experiences. Wonder. An opportunity to explore new worlds and use new technology.

Each previous year was an awesome event. This year’s felt more like a necessary one.

The drive over started off a little rough, with choruses of “I’m bored” and “My toe hurts.” As I passed the exit off Route 28 for St. Margaret’s Hospital, I made the tough decision not to pull off for the supposedly injured toe and keep the hospital bed free for another patient.

As we pulled into the parking lot of Beechwood Farms Nature Reserve in Fox Chapel, the gravel crunching beneath our tires was like a wakeup call. The kids shot up in their carseats and bobbed their heads as they desperately tried to get a view of the nature reserve. Once it was safe, they bounded through the lot and onto the trail with a relentless energy and optimism. My wife and I took a more leisurely stroll and joked how they looked like a couple of labradors let off their leashes.

The main idea of the City Nature Challenge is to collect images of plant and animal specimens and upload them through the iNaturalist app. This allows others to identify your collection and thus help researchers around the globe better understand the ecosystem of your hometown. The simplest way to do this is by taking an image on your phone and uploading it to the app. Easy. Because I am a writer and photographer by trade, I had several DSLRs on hand for the family to use. I think it is important to note that you can also use a camera of your choice. There is a huge contingency of DSLR, and now mirrorless, camera buyers who love wildlife and nature photography. In fact, the flagship models of every major camera brand, and many of their lower tier models, specifically mention wildlife photography in their product descriptions. If you are like me and prefer this method of shooting, chances are you don’t mind going back home, finding a few keepers, and uploading those images from your computer. That is what we did. I feel like it’s good to know that iNaturalist is versatile and can be more than an app on your phone if you would like it to be.

Beechwood Farms did not disappoint. Our first stop was a pond teeming with life. American Toads leaped off the trail and into the grass as we approached. The closer we got to the water, we could hear the “sploosh!” and catch a quick glimpse of hind legs as the toads jumped into the water.

The pond was filled with those toads, numerous species of fish and Canada geese. We just kept snapping away and asking each other, “Did you see that?”

From there, we hiked a loop of trail that took us through sunny meadows and patches of forest where we spotted mayapple, violets, numerous blooming trees and more. I am always interested in what catches the kids’ attention. My son, who is 7 and already has a terrific eye and excellent ability, operates by the well-known photographer’s motto: “If you think you’re too close, take one step closer.” His shots are well framed and detailed.

photo of pink and white flowers on a tree branch

My daughter, who is 4, had the wide-angle lens and preferred sweeping images of scenery. She liked one particular field because the yellow grass looked like blonde princess hair.

My wife is a fan of contrasting texture and color, like moss carpeting a dead tree trunk. (Insert Jill moss pic)

photo of moss growing on a dead tree trunk

I prefer wildlife and action shots.

As we neared the end of the loop, we clunked along a bridge atop a stream. The kids couldn’t resist it and before we knew it, their socks and shoes were off and they were in the water. Their toes appeared to be just fine.

When we got back to our house, we couldn’t wait to look over the photos and upload them to iNaturalist. We weren’t sure what everything was – and that’s OK! Let your natural curiosity and wonder carry you through. There’s an entire support system to help classify and identify. You can even do the same for others.

We could use your help identifying our photos! Look for phillipps_family in your iNaturalist app or the website.

Eddie Phillips is an educator at Carnegie Museum of Natural History. Museum staff, volunteers, and interns are encouraged to blog about their unique experiences and knowledge gained from working at the museum.

May 5, 2020 by wpengine

Pokémon Inspired by Animals

When Pokémon launched as a franchise in 1996, quickly becoming a worldwide multimedia phenomenon, the Pokémon creators had their work cut out for them imagining a whole new world with new creatures that we had never seen before. Or had we? Believe it or not, most Pokémon creatures have real-life animal inspirations!

Caterpie and Eastern Tiger Swallowtail Caterpillar

photo of Eastern Tiger Swallowtail caterpillar

Caterpie is a bug type Pokémon. It’s known for devouring leaves bigger than its body and releasing an intense odor from its orange antennas when battling another Pokémon. You can’t miss the similarities between Caterpie and the eastern tiger swallowtail caterpillar. Both creatures have a distinct green body with bright orange antennas.

The eastern tiger swallowtail is a butterfly native to eastern North America. Similar to Caterpie, the swallowtail caterpillar possesses something called an osmeterium, an orange fleshy organ that emits a foul smell to ward off enemies when threatened.

Magikarp and Yelloweye Rockfish

photo of Yelloweye rockfish held out of water

Magikarp is a water Pokémon and a large fish with orange scales. Magikarp flops around while blinking its large bulging eyes with its mouth open.

Yelloweye rockfish are one of the biggest members of the genus Sebastes and are prized for their meat. Both the real fish and the Pokémon are orange in color and have long rigid head spines to protect them from predators. Yelloweyes also have bulging eyes and a gaping mouth like Magikarp.

Drowzee and Malayan Tapir

What about Drowzee, a hypnosis Pokémon with insomnia who senses dreams with its trunk-like nose? Drowzee has beady eyes and triangular brown ears.

It can’t sense your dreams like Drowzee, but the Malayan tapir has many resemblances to the Pokémon. The tapir is a large mammal with a short trunk. It uses its snout to pick up things or as a snorkel when in water. Aside from both having a short snout, Drowzee seems to have been inspired by the tapir’s two-toned coloring.

What other Pokémon/real-life animal resemblances have you noticed?

Fun Fact

Poliwag, Poliwhirl, and Poliwrath are all based on tadpoles. They each have a spiral on their stomach that resembles the intestines which are visible through a tadpole’s translucent stomach.

August 26, 2019 by wpengine

Make Your own Cloud

Are you the kind of person who always has their head in the clouds? Come back down to earth, but bring the clouds with you. With just a few household items, you’ll get to see clouds form right in front of you!

Here’s What You Need:

A glass jar with a lid
Hot (almost boiling) water
Ice
Aerosol hairspray

Here’s What To Do:

Fill your jar about 1/3 full with hot water.
Place the lid upside-down on top of the jar.
Fill the lid with as many ice cubes as will fit.
Let the jar sit for about 10 seconds.
Quickly, lift the lid and spray some hairspray into the jar.
Place the lid with ice back on top of the jar.
Watch as a cloud forms above the water!

For step-by-step visuals, check out this quick animation!

Here’s How It Works:

Clouds are formed when water vapor (the gaseous form of water) condenses (turns from a gas into a liquid) into very small, visible droplets. The water vapor condenses onto other particles in the air, like dust or smoke. In the jar, the hot water gives off water vapor that cools when it reaches the ice on the top of the jar. By spraying hairspray in the jar, we give the water vapor particles to condense onto. The water vapor condenses into tiny droplets that we see as a miniature cloud.

Go outside and take a look at the clouds. How do they compare to the cloud you saw in your jar? What is the same? What is different?

Fun Fact:

Clouds are actually quite heavy. Those white, fluffy clouds that look weightless as they float through the air can contain millions, billions, or even trillions of pounds of water! Clouds float because they are not as dense or heavy as the dry air beneath them. It’s similar to the way that oil floats on water.

Blog post by Eddie Phillips.

Learn more in Nature Lab!