One of our favorite group activities has become our Nature Club - part of our local homeschool group. About twice a month, we get together at various locations and take a hike or explore, often with a theme. We've done bark rubbings, salmon sighting, low tide explorations, and more. Today we took a trip to Mima Mounds, a nature preserve south of Olympia. It is a prairie environment, but rather than being more or less flat, it is full of small hills, or mounds. I find it neat that the origins of the mounds is still not fully understood. They are likely the product of glacial retreat at the end of the last ice age, but there is still a bit of mystery to them. Today, it is a vast, grassy area that looks like it could be a mini-Hobbiton, and this time of year it is peppered with wild flowers.
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| Lots of pretty purple Camas flowers |
The kids had a good time wandering along the trails. When we got them to slow down enough to pay attention, we saw some butterflies. Personally, I was curious as to why there were so few bees, even with all the flowers. I wonder if the decline in the bee population is to blame. We identified some of the wildflowers, and David was a little nervous at the news that there were poisonous flowers (we didn't see any of them).
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| We're the kings of the hill! |
The weather was amazing, and all in all, it was a great way to end our week.
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| You can't really tell from the angle, but she's on top of one of the mounds |
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| Looking out over the prairie |
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| He was all decked out in his "nature explorer" stuff |
What a wonderful day! I've never been to the Mima Mounds - always been curious about their origin too.
ReplyDeleteIt's so fun to read your blog!
Great pics! I would have loved to visit a bit.
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