It's not talking to them. For Rowell, who edits science materials for schools, being a volunteer guide satisfies urges to be outdoors and to pass her love of nature to the next generation. I like the discovery process. Tanisha Larsen, who had her long ponytail tucked beneath a baseball cap, brought a green leaf to her nose and inhaled. The Indians used it to rub it on themselves as an insect repellent because mosquitoes don't like it.
People also cook with it.
At a different spot Mehlman asked the kids to place their hands on the smooth bark of a manzanita tree to feel how cool it remained in the hot morning sun. Even when it's hot outside, it stays cool. The kids learned that lichen was favored by Native Americans as an absorbent lining for papooses, and that foxtails, a bane to hikers and pets, freeload rides in order to grow elsewhere. One of the goals of the Terwilliger program is to attach analogies to the things kids experience in nature. The kids responded with enthusiasm, climbing up and down paths without the usual complaints of boredom.