Northwest forests and woodlands provide a variety of items for kids to find, collect, organize, and classify. Drawing helps to enrich the experience. Another way is to make casts to bring home. It's also fun to talk about why the prints are the same or different from each other, and to guess the weight of the animal. Fur provides yet another possibility for making a collection, says Jolene.
Many animals rub trees, or in bedding down for the night, they leave pieces of fur behind.
Scientists look at fur and scat collections to track animals. In fact, the Wall Street Journal recently told the story of a zoologist who is heading the Great Grizzly Search, looking for just such evidence of grizzly bears in the Bitteroot mountain range that borders Montana and Idaho. Oregon and Washington woodlands and parks also are rich with oak, maple, and dogwood trees which are deciduous, loosing their leaves each year. Seeds, such as acorns and pinecones, offer good potential for collecting. One of the great things about making forest collections, says Jolene, is that kids can make one for each of the seasons.