Cornell University Nature-Study propaganda was essentially an agricultural movement in its inception and its aims; it was inaugurated as a direct aid to better methods of agriculture in New York State. During the years of agricultural depression 1891-1893, the Charities of New York City found it necessary to help many people who had come from the rural districts—a condition hitherto unknown. The philanthropists managing the Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor asked, "What is the matter with the land of New York State that it cannot support its own population?" A conference was called to consider the situation to which many people from different parts of the State were invited; among them was the author of this book, who little realized that in attending that meeting the whole trend of her activities would be thereby changed. Mr. George T. Powell, who had been a most efficient Director of Farmers' Institutes of New York State was invited to the conference as an expert to explain conditions and give advice as to remedies. The situation seemed so serious that a Committee for the Promotion of Agriculture in New York State was appointed. Of this committee the Honorable Abram S. Hewitt was Chairman, Mr. R. Fulton Cutting, Treasurer, Mr. Wm. H. Tolman, Secretary. The other members were Walter L. Suydam, Wm. E. Dodge, Jacob H. Schiff, George T. Powell, G. Howard Davidson, Howard Townsend, Professor I. P. Roberts, C. McNamee, Mrs. J. R. Lowell, and Mrs. A. B. Comstock. Mr. George T. Powell was made Director of the Department of Agricultural Education. At the first meeting of this committee Mr. Powell made a strong plea for interesting the children of the country in farming as a remedial measure, and maintained that the first step toward agriculture was nature-study. It had been Mr. Powell's custom to give simple agricultural and nature-study instruction to the school children of every town where he was conducting a farmers' institute, and his opinion was, therefore, based upon experience. The committee desired to see for itself the value of this idea, and experimental work was suggested, using the schools of Westchester County as a laboratory. Mr. R. Fulton Cutting generously furnished the funds for this experiment, and work was done that year in the Westchester schools, which satisfied the committee of the soundness of the project. The committee naturally concluded that such a fundamental movement must be a public rather than a private enterprise; and Mr. Frederick Nixon then Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee of the Assembly, was invited to meet with the committee at Mr. Hewitt's home. Mr. Nixon had been from the beginning of his public career deeply interested in improving the farming conditions of the State. In 1894, it was through vi Handbook of Nature-Study his influence and the support given him by the Chautauqua Horticultural Society under the leadership of Mr. John W. Spencer, that an appropriation had been given to Cornell University for promoting the horticultural interests of the western counties of the State. In addition to other work done through this appropriation, horticultural schools were conducted under the direction of Professor L. H. Bailey with the aid of other Cornell instructors and especially of Mr. E. G. Lodeman; these schools had proved to be most useful and were well attended. Therefore, Mr. Nixon was open-minded toward an educational movement. He listened to the plan of the committee and after due consideration declared that if this new measure would surely help the farmers of the State, the money would be forthcoming. The committee unanimously decided that if an appropriation were made for this purpose it should be given to the Cornell College of Agriculture; and that year eight thousand dollars was added to the Cornell University Fund, for Extension Teaching and inaugurating this work. The work was begun under Professor I. P. Roberts; after one year Professor Roberts placed it under the supervision of Professor L. H. Bailey, who for the fifteen years since has been the inspiring leader of the movement, as well as the official head. In 1896, Mr. John W. Spencer, a fruit grower in Chautauqua County, became identified with the enterprise; he had lived in rural communities and he knew their needs. He it was who first saw clearly that the first step in the great work was to help the teacher through simply written leaflets; and later he originated the great plan of organizing the children in the schools of the State into Junior Naturalists Clubs, which developed a remarkable phase of the movement. The members of these clubs paid their dues by writing letters about their nature observations to Mr. Spencer, who speedily became their beloved "Uncle John;" a button and charter were given for continued and earnest work. Some years, 30,00o children were thus brought into direct communication with Cornell University through Mr. Spencer. A monthly leaflet for Junior Naturalists followed; and it was to help in this enterprise that Miss Alice G. McCloskey, the able Editor of the present Rural School Leaflet, was brought into the work. Later, Mr. Spencer organized the children's garden movement by forming the children of the State into junior gardeners; at one time he had 25,000 school pupils working in gardens and reporting to him. In 1899, Mrs.i Mary Rogers Miller, who had proven a most efficient teacher when representing Cornell nature-study in the State Teachers' Institutes, planned and started the Home Nature-Study Course Leaflets for the purpose of helping the teachers by correspondence, a work which fell to the author in 19°3 when Mrs. Miller was called to other fields. For the many years during which New York State has intrusted this important work to Cornell University, the teaching of nature-study has Preface VII gone steadily on in the University, in teachers' institutes, in State summer schools, through various publications and in correspondence courses. Many have assisted in this work, notably Dr. W. C. Thro, Dr. A. A. Allen, and Miss Ada Georgia. The New York Education Department with Charles R. Skinner as Commissioner of Education and Dr. Isaac Stout as the Director of Teachers' Institutes co-operated heartily with the movement from the first. Later with the co-operation of Dr. Andrew Draper, as Commissioner of Education, many of the Cornell leaflets have been written with the special purpose of aiding in carrying out the New York State Syllabus in Nature-Study and Agriculture. The leaflets upon which this volume is based were published in the Home Nature-Study Course during the years 1903-19 r 1, in limited editions and were soon out of print. It is to make these lessons available to the general public that this volume has been compiled. While the subject matter of the lessons herein given is essentially the same as in the leaflets, the lessons have all been rewritten for the sake of consistency, and many new lessons have been added to bridge gaps and make a coherent whole. Because the lessons were written during a period of so many years, each lesson has been prepared as if it were the only one, and without reference to others. If there is any uniformity of plan in the lessons, it is due to the inherent qualities of the subjects, and not to a type plan in the mind of the writer; for, in her opinion, each subject should be treated individually in nature-study; and in her long experience as a nature-study teacher she has never been able to give a lesson twice alike on a certain topic or secure exactly the same results twice in succession. It should also be stated that it is not because the author undervalues physics nature-study that it has been left out of these lessons, but because her own work has been always along biological lines. The reason why nature-study has not yet accomplished its mission, as thought-core for much of the required work in our public schools, is that the teachers are as a whole untrained in the subject. The children are eager for it, unless it is spoiled in the teaching; and whenever we find a teacher with an understanding of out-of-door life and a love for it, there we find nature-study in the school is an inspiration and a joy to pupils and teacher. It is because of the author's sympathy with the untrained teacher and her full comprehension of her difficulties and helplessness that this book has been written. These difficulties are chiefly three-fold : The teacher does not know what there is to see in studying a plant or animal; she knows little of the literature that might help her; and because she knows so little of the subject, she has no interest in giving a lesson about it. As a matter of fact, the literature concerning our common animals and plants is so scattered that a teacher would need a large library and almost unlimited time to prepare lessons for an extended nature-study course. viii Handbook of Nature-Study The writer's special work for fifteen years in Extension teaching has been the helping of the untrained teacher through personal instruction and through leaflets. Many methods were tried and finally there was evolved the method followed in this volume: All the facts available and pertinent concerning each topic have been assembled in the "Teacher's story" to make her acquainted with the subject; this is followed by an outline for observation on the part of the pupils while studying the object. It would seem that with the teacher's story before the eyes of the teacher, and the subject of the lesson before the eyes of the pupils with a number of questions leading them to see the essential characteristics of the object, there should result a wider knowledge of nature than is given in this or any other book. That the lessons are given in a very informal manner, and that the style of writing is often colloquial, result from the fact that the leaflets upon which the book is based were written for a correspondence course in which the communications were naturally infounal and chatty. That the book is meant for those untrained in science accounts for the rather loose terminology employed; as, for instance, the use of the word seed in the popular sense whether it be a drupe, an akene, or other form of fruit; or the use of the word pod for almost any seed envelope, and many like instances. Also, it is very likely, that in teaching quite incidentally the rudiments of the principles of evolution, the results may often seem to be confused with an idea of purpose, which is quite unscientific. But let the critic labor for fifteen years to interest the untrained adult mind in nature's ways, before he casts any stones! And it should be always borne in mind that if the author has not dipped deep in the wells of science, she has used only a child's cup. For many years requests have been frequent from parents who have wished to give their children nature interests during vacations in the country. They have been borne in mind in planning this volume; the lessons are especially fitted for field work, even though schoolroom methods are sb often suggested. The author feels apologetic that the book is so large. However, it does not contain more than any intelligent country child of twelve should know of his environment; things that he should know naturally and without effort, although it might take him half his life-time to learn so much if he should not begin before the age of twenty. That there are inconsistencies, inaccuracies, and even blunders in the volume is quite inevitable. The only excuse to be offered is that, if through its use, the children of our land learn early to read nature's truths with their own eyes, it will matter little to them what is written in books. The author wishes to make grateful acknowledgment to the following people: To Professor Wilford M. Wilson for his chapter on the weather; to Miss Mary E. Hill for the lessons on mould, bacteria, the minerals, and reading the weather maps; to Miss Catherine Straith for the lessons on Preface ix the earthworm and the soil; to Miss Ada Georgia for much valuable assistance in preparing the original leaflets on which these lessons are based; to Dean L. H. Bailey and to Dr. David S. Jordan for permission to quote their writings; to Mr. John W. Spencer for the use of his story on the movements of the sun; to Dr. Grove Karl Gilbert, Dr. A. C. Gill, Dr. Benjamin Duggar, Professor S. H. Gage and Dr. J. G. Needham for reading and criticizing parts of the manuscript; to Miss Eliza Tonks for reading the proof ; to the Director of the College of Agriculture for use of the engravings made for the original leaflets; to Miss Martha Van Rensselaer for the use of many pictures from Boys and Girls; to Professor Cyrus Crosby, and to Messrs. J. T. Lloyd, A. A. Allen and R. Matheson for the use of their personal photographs; to the U. S. Geological Survey and the U. S. Forest Service for the use of photographs; to Louis A. Fuertes for drawings of birds; to Houghton, Mifflin & Company for the use of the poems of Lowell, Harte and Larcom, and various extracts from Burroughs and Thoreau; to Small, Maynard & Company and to John Lane & Company for the use of poems of John T. Babb; to Doubleday, Page & Company for the use of pictures of birds and flowers ; and to the American Book Company for the use of electrotypes of dragon-flies and astronomy. Especially thanks are extended to Miss Anna C. Stryke for numerous drawings, including most of the initials TABLE OF CONTENTS PART I THE TEACHING OF NATURE-STUDY Page What Nature-Study is What Nature-Study Should do for the Child Nature-Study as a Help to Health 2 What Nature-Study Should do for the Tcacher 2 When and Why the Teacher Should say "I do not know!" 3 Nature-Study, The Elixir of Youth 4 Nature-Study as a Help in School Discipline 4 The Relation of Nature-Study to Science 5 Nature-Study not for Drill 6 The Child not Interested in Nature-Study 6 When to Give the Lesson 6 The Length of the Lesson 7 The Nature-Study Lesson Always New 7 Nature-Study and Object Lessons 7 Nature-Study in the Schoolroom 8 Nature-Study and Museum Specimens 8 The Lens, Microscope and Field-glass as Hclps 9 Use of Pictures, Charts and Blackboard Drawings Io The Use of Scientific Names io The Story as a Supplement to the Nature-Study Lesson 10 The Nature-Study Attitude toward Life and Death I I Should the Nature-Study Teacher Teach How to Destroy Life? 13 The Field Note-book 13 The Field Excursion 15 Pets as Nature-Study Subjects 15 The Correlation of Nature-Study with Language Work 16 The Correlation of Nature-Study with Drawing 17 The Correlation of Nature-Study with Geography 18 The Correlation of Nature-Study with History 18 The Correlation of Nature-Study with Arithmetic 19 Gardening and Nature-Study 20 Nature-Study and Agriculture 2 I Nature-Study Clubs 22 How to Use this Book 24 PART II ANIMAL LIFE I Bird Study Beginning Bird Study in the Primary Grades 25 Feathers as Clothing 27 Feathers as Ornament 3o How Birds Fly 33 Eyes and Ears of Birds 36 Ila;:dbook of Nature-Study Page The Form and Use of Beaks 37 The Feet of Birds 39 Chicken Ways Pigeons 45 The Canary and the Goldfinch 49 The Robin 54 The Bluebird 6o The White-breasted Nuthatch 63 The Chickadee 66 The Downy Woodpecker 69 The Sapsucker 73 The Redheaded Woodpecker 75 The Flicker or Yellow-hammer 77 The Meadowlark 8o The English Sparrow The Chipping Sparrow 88 The Song Sparrow 91 The Mockingbird 94 The Catbird 98 The Belted Kingfisher 101 The Screech Owl 104 The Red Shouldered and Red Tailed Hawks 108 The Swallows and the Chimney Swift 112 The Hummingbird 120 The Red-winged Blackbird 122 The Baltimore Oriole 125 The Crow 129 The Cardinal Grosbeak 133 Geese 136 The Turkey 143 The Study of Birds' Nests in Winter 147 II Fish Study The Goldfish 149 The Bullhead 154 The Common Sucker 158 The Shiner 161 Brook Trout 164 The Stickleback 168 The Sunfish 172 The Johnny Darter 177 III Batrachian Study The Common Toad 181 The Tadpole Aquarium 185 The Tree-frog or Tree-toad 190 The Frog 193 The Newt, Eft or Salamander 197 IV Reptile Study The Garter or Garden Snake 201 The Milk Snake, or Spotted Adder 204 Table of Contents XIII Page The Water Snake 206 The Turtle 208 V Mammal Study The Cotton-tail Rabbit 213 The Muskrat 218 The House Mouse 224 The Woodchuck 229 The Red Squirrel or Chickaree 233 Furry 238 The Chipmunk 240 The Little Brown Bat 243 The Skunk 247 The Raccoon 25o The Wolf 255 The Fox 257 Dogs 261 The Cat 268 The Goat 275 The Sheep 281 The Horse 286 Cattle 295 The Pig 303 VI Insect Study The Life History of Insects. 308 The Structure of Insects 312 The Black Swallow-tail Butterfly 315 The Monarch Butterfly 32o The Isabella Tiger Moth or Woolly Bear 326 The Cecropia 33o The Promethea 336 The Hummingbird, or Sphinx, Moths 340 The Codling Moth 347 Leaf-miners 352 The Leaf-rollers 357 The Gall-dwellers 36o The Grasshopper 365 The Katydid 370 The Black Cricket 373 The Snowy Tree-cricket 377 The Cockroach 378 How to Make an Aquarium for Insects. 38o The Dragon-flies and Damsel-flies 382 The Caddis-worms and the Caddis-flies 387 The Aphids or Plant Lice 392 The Ant-lion 395 Mother Lace-wing and the Aphis-lion 397 The Mosquito 400 The House-fly 405 The Colorado Potato-beetle 409 xiv Handbook of Nature-Study Page The Ladybird 413 The Firefly 416 The Ways of the Ant 419 How to Make a Lubbock Ant-Nest 423 The Ant-Nest and What May be Seen Within it 425 The Mud-dauber 429 The Yellow-jacket 432 The Leaf-cutter Bee 436 The Little Carpenter Bce 439 The Bumblebee 442 The Honey-bee 445 The Honey-comb.. 451 Industries of the Hive and the Observation Hive 453 VII Other Invertebrate-Animal Study The Garden Snail 458 The Earthworm 462 The Crayfish 466 Daddy Longlegs, or Grandfather Greybeard 472 Spiders 475 The Funnel-web 477 The Orb-web 478 The Filmy Dome 483 Ballooning Spiders 484 The White Crab-Spider 485 How the Spider Mothers Take Care of their Young 487 PART III PLANT LIFE How to Begin the Study of Plants and Flowers 489 How to Make Plants Comfortable 490 How to Teach the Names of the Parts of a Flower 492 Teach the Use of a Flower 493 Flowers and Insect Partners 494 The Relation of Plants to Geography 495 Seed Germination 495 I Wild-flower Study The Hepatica 496 The Yellow Adder's Tongue 499 Bloodroot 503 The Trillium 506 Dutchman's Breeches and Squirrel Corn 509 Jack-in-the-Pulpit 512 The Violet 515 The May Apple or Mandrake 519 The Bluets 523 The Yellow Lady's Slipper, or Moccasin Flower 525 The Common Buttercup 528 The Evening Primrose 530 Tcble of Contents xv Page The Hedge Bindweed 535 The Dodder 538 The Milkweed 540 The White Water Lily 545 Pondweed 548 The Cat-tail 5,51 A Type Lesson for a Composite Flower 554 The Goldenrod 555 The Asters 558 The White Daisy 560 The Yellow Daisy or Black-eyed Susan 562 The Thistle 563 The Burdock 566 Prickly Lettuce, A Compass Plant 570 The Dandelion 572 The Pearly Everlasting 576 The Jewelweed, or Touch-me-not 578 Mullein 582 The Teasel 586 Queen Anne's Lace, or Wild Carrot 589 Weeds 594 Outline for the Study of a Weed 595 II Cultivated-Plant Study The Crocus 596 Daffodils and thcir Relatives 599 The Tulip 603 The Pansy 607 The Bleeding Heart 611 Poppies 613 The California Poppy 616 The Nasturtium 620 The Bee-Larkspur 623 The Blue Flag, or Iris 626 The Sunflower 631 The Bachelor's Button 636 The Salvia or Scarlet Sage 637 Petunias 640 The Horseshoe Geranium 643 The Sweet Pea 649 The Clovers 652 Sweet Clover 655 The White Clover 658 Maize, or Indian Corn 660 The Cotton Plant 666 The Strawberry 672 The Pumpkin 675 III Flowerless-Plant Study The Christmas Fern 684 The Bracken 689 How a Fern Bud Unfolds 691 XVI Handbook of Nature-Study Page The Fruiting of the Fern 693 The Field Horsetail 699 The Hair-cap Moss, or Pigeon Wheat 702 Mushrooms and other Fungi 706 Puffballs 712 The Bracket Fungi 714 Hedgehog Fungi 717 The Scarlet Saucer 718 The Morels 719 The Stinkhorns 720 Molds 720 Bacteria 723 IV Tree Study How a Tree Grows 726 How to Begin Tree Study 731 How to Make Leaf Prints 734 The Maples 736 The American Elm 745 The Oak 748 The Shagbark Hickory 755 The Chestnut 757 The Horse-Chestnut 761 The Willows 765 The Cottonwood or Carolina Poplar 770 The White Ash 774 The Apple Tree 778 How an Apple Grows 782 The Apple 785 The Pine 789 The Norway Spruce 796 The Hemlock 801 The Flowering Dogwood 803 The Staghorn Sumac 8o6 The Witch-Hazel 810 The Mountain Laurel 813 PART IV EARTH AND SiY The Brook 818 How a Brook Drops its Load 822 Crystal Growth 825 Salt 827 How to Study Minerals 828 Quartz 829 Feldspar 831 Mica 832 Granite 833 Calcite, marble and Limestone 835 The Magnet 838 The Soil 842 Table of Contents XVII Page Water Forms 850 The Weather 857 Experiments to Show Air Pressure 877 The Barometer 878 How to read Weather Maps 879 The Story of the Stars 887 How to Begin Star Study 889 Cassiopeia's Chair, Cepheus and the Dragon 893 The Winter Stars 895 Orion 895 Aldebaran and the Pleiades 897 The Two Dog-Stars, Sirius and Procyon 898 Capella and the Heavenly Twins goo The Stars of Summer go The Sun 905 The Relation between the Tropic of Cancer and the Planting of the Garden 909 The Zodiac and its Signs 91i The Relations of the Sun to the Earth 913 How to Make a Sun-dial 915 The Moon 918 In Nature's infinite book of secrecy A little can I read. - SHAKESPEARE.