Lesson 1: Nature Journals—Naturalists-in-Training
Wild Things Key
Conifer cones:
(1) Douglas-fir cone
Pseudotsuga menziesii
The Douglas-fir is the biggest tree in Washington. It can
grow to more than 100 meters tall and can live for 700
years. It’s an important timber tree, and small ones are
commonly grown as Christmas trees. Its needles are a
favorite food of the caterpillars of many types of moths.
It grows best in dry soil and full sun so it’s most
common in drier climates or in disturbed areas. Around
Puget Sound it is often the first coniferous tree to
appear after the land is cleared. Each seed is protected
by a plate-like cone scale. The part of the seed that
sticks out from under the scale looks like the hind legs and tail of a mouse that has just dived
beneath the scale.
(2) Norway Spruce cone
(3) Western White Pine cone
Picea abies
The Norway Spruce, native to northern Europe and the
original Christmas tree, is now planted all over North
America. The country of Norway donates an official gift tree
each year to New York and Washington, DC. Like many large
conifers, Norway Spruces live a long time—up to 600 years.
Note the slender shape and fluted edges of the cone scales
(plate-like structures protecting the seeds), which are
characteristic of spruce cones. Most conifers are evergreens,
keeping their needles through the winter.
Pinus monticola
The Western White Pine is a big tree, up to 70 meters tall,
which grows from sea level to the mountains in this area.
It has needles in bunches of five and produces the longest
cone of any Washington tree. The heavy scales (plate-like
structures) on the cone protect the seeds from seedeating birds and mammals. When the scales finally open,
the winged seeds drop out to be blown some distance
from the parent tree. Western White Pines are
threatened by a fungus disease introduced from Europe
that has killed 90 percent of them in this region.
Lesson 1: Nature Journals—Naturalists-in-Training
Wild Things Key
Wild Things made by animals:
(4) Paper Wasp nest
Polistes sp.
This Paper Wasp nest is made by large wasps with the
ability to deliver a severe sting. They are often guarded
by several females. The nest is made by a solitary female
in the spring. She adds one hexagonal cell after another,
laying an egg in each cell. The eggs hatch, and she brings
insects, including caterpillars, for the growing larvae to
eat. The larvae change into worker wasps, which help
feed more of the nest-building female’s offspring. Later
in summer, the first reproductive males and females
appear, and the cycle begins again.
(5) Caddisfly case
Order: Trichoptera
Caddisflies are relatively plain
cousins of butterflies and moths that
lay their eggs in streams and ponds.
After the eggs hatch, the larvae
(which look like hairless caterpillars
with gills) build a case out of pebbles,
pine needles or even bits of paper—
anything that will stick together with
silk they make themselves. Safe
inside their mobile homes, they
crawl around as they eat plant material or scrape algae off rocks. After several months, they crawl
out of the water and fly away as adult caddisflies, leaving their mobile shelters behind.
(6) American Beaver chewed branch
Castor canadensis
Evidence of the work of beavers might be found around
the edge of any pond or lake. Beavers are nature’s civil
engineers, damming streams and creating wetlands all
over North America. Their big, continuously growing,
front teeth can gnaw into a branch this size and drop it in
a few minutes. It is then dragged to the lodge or dam
being built or repaired and wedged into place. Bigger
branches go first, the structure is filled in with smaller
branches, and all are secured with mud.
Lesson 1: Nature Journals—Naturalists-in-Training
Wild Things Key
Bird nests and eggs:
(7) Rufous Hummingbird nest & eggs
Selasphorus rufus
Hummingbirds are the smallest birds, and their nests are about the
size of a plum. After mating, the female builds a nest (often lined
with lichens and spider webs to camouflage it) and lays two eggs in
it. The nest is placed on top of a branch and may look like a clump
of moss, well hidden from hungry egg-eating predators like jays.
The eggs are incubated for 16 days before the young hatch blind
and helpless. The female immediately starts to deliver a mixture of
flower nectar and tiny insects to her fast-growing babies. Their
eyes open in 10 days, and in just 20 days they are able to fly away
from the nest.
(8) Marsh Wren nest & eggs
(9) Spotted Towhee nest & eggs
Cistothorus palustris
This small wetland bird builds its “home” in marshes, attaching its
oblong nest to cattail stalks, reeds or shrubs. The woven nest is
made from wet cattail reeds and grasses and is lined with cattail
fluff and feathers. Males build the nests and attract females to
lay their eggs in them. Marsh wrens flit through the reeds eating
aquatic insects and snails. They are shy birds, much easier to hear
than to see. Known for a rattle-like trill, these musical wrens can
sing up to 120 different kinds of songs!
Pipilo maculatus
Towhees are common forest birds in Tacoma. They forage
for seeds on the ground by scratching in the soil with their
(relatively) big feet, and they build their nests on the ground
or in low shrubs. The nest, made of twigs and grasses, has
great insulating value. The female presses her brood patch (a
featherless area on her belly with dense, warming blood
vessels) against the eggs; the nest helps hold in the heat.
When the eggs hatch, both adults bring food to the young 5
to 10 times per hour. To keep the nest clean, the parents
take away fecal sacs (poop bags) produced by the young.
Lesson 1: Nature Journals—Naturalists-in-Training
Wild Things Key
Arthropods (animal with no backbones, with exoskeletons, segmented bodies and jointed
appendages):
(10) Darner dragonfly
Family: Aeshnidae
Darners are some of the fastest and biggest local dragonflies,
with possible wingspans of more than ten centimeters.
Sometimes called “mosquito hawks,” they can fly up to 35
miles per hour! After hatching from eggs laid in the water,
dragonflies begin life as larvae nabbing insects at the bottom
of ponds with a powerful lower “lip.” After spending a year
underwater, the larva crawls out onto a reed or stick, sheds its
outer skin, and begins the second (and much shorter) part of
its life as a flying insect. Adult dragonflies live 4 to 6 weeks.
The Common Green Darner was voted Washington’s state
insect in 1997 by elementary school students.
(11) Shore Crab
Hemigrapsus sp.
There are two common species in the Puget Sound
area that essentially look alike. These small crabs
(the largest are only about six centimeters across) of
the intertidal zone stay under rocks when the tide is
out, hiding from gulls and other sea birds, their main
predators. The female lays eggs and carries them
with her for 3 to 4-1/2 months before they hatch.
These crabs spend the first month of their lives as
tiny plankton floating in Puget Sound before they
return to the beach, where they eat mostly algae
that they scrape from rocks with their big front claws. If a predator grabs a shore crab by the leg,
the leg will drop off so the crab can get away, and another leg will grow in its place. If you pick one
up, hold it on the flat of your palm to avoid a painful pinch.
(12) Ground Beetle
Family: Carabidae
Among the most common and least understood insects are the
ground beetles. Frequently thought of as “bad bugs,” these insects
are a gardener’s friend because they eat slugs, snails and
cutworms. Active at night, these beetles use their antennae to
sense food and danger. Ground beetles begin life as eggs laid in
the soil, then hatch out as larvae. It takes about one year for the
mealworm-like larva to become an adult beetle. About 2,000
species of ground beetles live in this country.
Lesson 1: Nature Journals—Naturalists-in-Training
Wild Things Key
Animal pelvises (the pelvis is the bone that connects the leg bones to the backbone):
(13) Opossum pelvis
(14) Great Blue Heron pelvis
(15) Bullfrog pelvis
Didelphis virginiana
Opossums, our only local marsupial, are common in
Tacoma, but because they are active at night, they are
rarely seen except as road kills. The opossum pelvis is
called the innominate bone, meaning bone without a
name. This bone is actually made up of three bones on
each side. All of them come together at the socket where
the leg attaches. The pelvis offers a wide point of
attachment for the large muscles that support the trunk
and move the legs, hips and tail, and is attached to the
backbone.
Ardea herodias
Great Blue Herons feed on fish along the shores of Puget
Sound and in freshwater wetlands. The synsacrum is the
name for the fused pelvic bone, which is made up of three
different bones on each side. The pelvis is fused to the
backbone as part of the strong “box of bones” that makes up
a bird’s body. This synsacrum provides a firm foundation for
attachment of the muscles that work the bird’s long legs.
From a common reptile ancestor, the bird pelvis has evolved
to become a very different structure than that of reptiles or
mammals, yet the socket for the femur, the upper leg bone,
shows their similarity.
Lithobates catesbeianus
Bullfrogs are common inhabitants of lakes and ponds all
around Puget Sound. They are an introduced species,
not native to the area, and their loud “jug-o-rum” calls
announce their presence. Frogs have the same three
paired pelvic bones as birds and mammals, but the side
bones are long and strong to support the big leg
muscles that are very important for jumping. Bullfrogs
rest on the shore but when approached by a potential
predator, they make a huge leap into the water and
swim quickly to the bottom with their big webbed feet.
After a while, they slowly rise to the surface.
Lesson 1: Nature Journals—Naturalists-in-Training
Wild Things Key
Echinoderms (marine invertebrates with tube feet and body parts arranged in 5 sections
around a central point):
(16) Ochre Sea Star
Pisaster ochraceus
Ochre Sea Stars are key predators, overcoming mussels,
barnacles, limpets, snails and other prey by pulling their
shells apart with their strong tube feet (hollow tubes that act
as suckers). Sea stars eat by pushing their stomach out of
their mouths and into their prey. The sea stars actually digest
their prey while it is outside of their body! Most Ochre Sea
Stars found in Puget Sound are purple, while the ones on the
outer coast are ochre-colored, a shade of orange-brown.
(17) Sand Dollar
Dendraster excentricus
Sand dollars are flat sea urchins with tiny spines that
allow them to move very slowly. They live mostly
buried in sand, often anchoring one part of the shell
into the sand so they can feed tipped up at an angle.
The small dove-shaped pieces are part of what is
called “Aristotle’s lantern”—a set of five jaws and
teeth. Lines of tiny tube feet carry small organic
particles to their mouth in the center of the body.
The lines where the tube feet were located can be
seen on the bottom of the shell. The sea-star pattern
on top of the shell is where additional tube feet were located—their job is to help the animal take
in oxygen. Like many marine animals, sand dollars release their eggs and sperm directly into the
water to breed.
(18) Sea Urchin
Strongylocentrotus sp.
Sea urchins live in the intertidal zone where they crawl slowly over
rocks grazing on algae. There are three species of sea urchins in
the Puget Sound and the Strait of Juan de Fuca: red, purple and
green. Inside the shell, sea urchins have a complicated structure
called an Aristotle’s lantern with five “jaws” that allows them to
scrape food off of rocks and chop it into tiny bits. The red species
is the largest sea urchin in Puget Sound, and its long spines keep
most predators away from it. After urchins die, their spines fall off
leaving the globe-like test, the hard shell that encloses the urchin.
Lesson 1: Nature Journals—Naturalists-in-Training
Wild Things Key
Sea snails:
(19) Moon Snail
(20) Leafy Hornmouth
(21) Hairy Triton
Euspira lewisii
Common in sandy areas around Puget Sound, this is the largest
known species of moon snail in the world. As it crawls over the
sand, the snail’s body seems impossibly large for the shell it belongs
to. But it can withdraw completely inside its shell, blocking the
"exit” with a plate called an operculum (the amber-colored thin
“door” found with this specimen, which is made of keratin like your
fingernails). Moon snails lay about 100,000 eggs in a spectacular
“sand collar” made of sand and mucous, which looks like a sandy
rubber plunger when you find one on the beach.
Ceratostoma foliatum
This predatory snail eats barnacles and bivalves (such as clams and
mussels). It drills into its prey with a file-like structure called a radula,
which grinds right through the shellfish shell. The snail then pushes
digestive juices inside its prey’s shell and sucks out the digested tissue. If
a Leafy Hornmouth is knocked off a rock, the shape of its shell causes it to
spin through the water so that it often settles with the opening facing
downward, keeping its vulnerable body away from predators.
Fusitriton oregonensis
This is the largest snail commonly found in Puget Sound. The hairy outer
covering that protects the shell and provides camouflage is called a
periostracum. Making their home in deeper water, Hairy Tritons are not
often found by beachcombers. This species is a predatory snail that eats
mollusks, sea squirts and even sea urchins. Its distinctive egg masses look
like sheets of sawed-off, clear grains of corn packed into a spiral pattern.
The microscopic larvae can remain swimming for up to 4 years before they
develop into adults!
Lesson 1: Nature Journals—Naturalists-in-Training
Wild Things Key
Teeth and jaws:
(22) Big Skate teeth
Raja binoculata
Big Skate teeth are arranged in more than 70 rows and replaced
as they wear out. Skate, ray and shark skeletons are made of
cartilage, so both the upper and lower jaws are cartilage, not
bone. These teeth come from a very large ray, up to two meters
in length. This shark relative is common in Puget Sound and often
seen by scuba divers. It swims slowly just above the sea bottom
by flapping its wide pectoral fins as it forages for shellfish, squid
and small fish. The tiny, pointed teeth help it hold and crush prey.
Big skate eggs are among largest of any skate or ray and are
sometimes found on beaches. They lay them in large egg capsules
that look like small greenish brown pillows, which are sometimes
called “mermaid’s purses.”
(23) Salmon jaw
Oncorhynchus sp.
These jaws come from a salmon about a half meter long. It’s
easy to find such bones on the shores of streams where these
fish spawn all around Puget Sound. After spending a few years
at sea, the adult salmon make their way up the same river
where they hatched. The males develop large hooked jaws
and sharp teeth to fight one another for access to females
and breeding sites. They breed, and then they die. Salmon lay
their eggs in gravel nests called redds. When the young
emerge in the spring, some species develop and grow in the
river until they are old enough to go to sea and repeat the
cycle. Meanwhile, the carcasses of the adult fish add nutrients to the river ecosystem.
(24) American Beaver jaw
Castor canadensis
The big front incisor teeth of a beaver are orange in color due to iron
in the tooth enamel. The front of each tooth is harder than the back,
so the back continually wears away as the beaver gnaws into tree
trunks and branches, keeping the teeth sharp. A beaver must
continually gnaw because the teeth never stop growing. Although they
prefer willows and aspen, they eat bark from a variety of trees and
also feed on many water plants. If their pond ices over in winter,
beavers feed on the twigs and branches that they stored in their cozy
lodge during the summer.
Lesson 1: Nature Journals—Naturalists-in-Training
Wild Things Key
Vertebrae (backbones that form the spinal column):
(25) Black-tailed Deer vertebrae
Odocoileus hemionus
Deer are more and more often seen in the city;
they make use of parks and ravines to forage for
plants, especially the new growth on trees and
shrubs. They also eat grass, fruit, nuts, fungi,
lichens and garden plants. Like cows, deer are
ruminants, meaning that after they chew their food
and swallow it, it is softened in a stomach called
the “rumen.” The food is then returned to the
mouth and chewed again. Watch closely and you
will see deer chewing their “cud”—this softened
food. Deer food passes through a series of four stomachs before it is fully digested. Deer walk on
the tips of their toes, which are hidden inside their hooves.
(26) Great Horned Owl vertebrae
Bubo virginianus
January and February are good months to listen for the Great Horned
Owl’s call, which people say sounds like, “Who’s awake, me tooooo.”
Owls nest in forested parks and ravines. Great Horned Owls are named
for the tufts of feathers that stand up on their heads for camouflage
but are neither horns nor ears. The owl’s primary feathers are edged
with fringes. Because of how air flows over the fringe, owls can fly
silently, making it easier for them to sneak up on their rodent prey.
Owls cannot move their eyes from side to side—which results in their
staring gaze. Their 14 neck vertebrae allow them to swivel their heads
around 270 degrees (360 degrees is a complete circle).
(27) Salmon vertebrae
Oncorhynchus sp.
These vertebrae come from a salmon about a half
meter long. It’s relatively easy to find such bones
on the shores of streams where these fish spawn all
around Puget Sound. After spending a few years at
sea, the adult salmon make their way up the same
river where they hatched. The males develop large
hooked jaws and sharp teeth to fight one another
for access to breeding sites and females. They
breed (spawn) and then they die. The eggs are laid
in gravel nests called redds. When the young
emerge in the spring, some species develop and grow in the river for a year until they are old
enough to go to sea and repeat the cycle. Other species return to salt water almost immediately.
Meanwhile, the carcasses of the adult fish add nutrients to the river ecosystem.
Lesson 1: Nature Journals—Naturalists-in-Training
Wild Things Key
Bird skulls:
(28) Double-crested Cormorant skull
(29) Surf Scoter skull
(30) Great Blue Heron skull
Phalacrocorax auritus
Double-crested Cormorants can be seen all around Puget
Sound in winter. They roost on docks, piers and boats and
are in the water only when foraging. They dive from the
surface to chase and capture fish underwater. Their
hooked upper bill helps them grab and hold especially
large fish, some as long as and thicker than their neck.
Cormorants are closely related to pelicans, and like
pelicans, have a flexible lower jaw that bows out, allowing
them to swallow fish whole. The unusual pointed bone at
the back of the skull is called an occipital style, an
additional bone for attachment of the large jaw muscles
that are used to grasp large fish.
Melanitta perspicillata
Surf Scoters are common winter visitors to salt water all
around Puget Sound, where they dive below the water’s
surface to look for mussels, other bivalves and a wide variety
of other marine invertebrates. Scoters pull small mussels
right off the rocks or pilings to which they are securely
attached. Scoter bills are thick and strong, and the ridges on
the edges of the bill gives the bird a better hold on mussels
and other slippery prey. The base of the bill is swollen only in
adult males, probably to better display the bright colors on
the bill.
Ardea herodias
The bill of a Great Blue Heron is used to capture or even spear
its prey. It is heavy enough to add momentum to the bird’s
strike. The nostril openings are prominent because birds need
to take in a lot of oxygen. There are grooves at the back of the
skull for the big muscles that work the jaws. The hole in the
back of the skull is where the spinal cord exits from the brain.
The brain cavity isn’t very large, and that’s why “bird-brain” is
not a compliment. You can also see the holes where nerves
pass from the eyes through to the brain.
Lesson 1: Nature Journals—Naturalists-in-Training
Wild Things Key
Tree seeds:
(31) Bigleaf Maple samaras
(32) Red Alder cones, catkins
(33) Garry Oak acorns
Acer macrophyllum
Bigleaf Maples grow in moist woodlands and are usually
associated with coniferous trees. They are one of the largest
deciduous trees in our area. This tree’s rough bark makes it a
good place for ferns and mosses to grow. Its seeds are called
samaras, and the “wings” on them allow the seeds to twirl
like a helicopter propeller as they fall. They can be blown
some distance by the wind, and they may eventually sprout
in the shade of another tree.
Alnus rubra
Red Alders are mid-sized deciduous trees that are common around
Puget Sound, often found in areas that have been disturbed by
logging or development. Red Alder roots hold bacteria that take
nitrogen from the air and turn it into compounds that make the soil
more fertile, benefitting all plant life. Their tiny seeds are produced
in little cones, but alders aren’t related to the cone-bearing pines
and firs (conifers). The slender catkins contain the male flowers, and
the wind takes their pollen into the air where it reaches the female
cones and fertilizes the seeds. When boiled, alder bark produces a
red dye that Native Americans used to color their fishing nets to
make them harder to see under water.
Quercus garryana
An acorn is the “fruit” of an oak tree, or to put it another way, an
oak’s way of making another oak. After they ripen, acorns fall,
sometimes carpeting the ground under their parent tree. If they
were all to sprout there, each seedling would have little chance of
survival, competing for light and nutrients with the parent tree
and all the other seedlings. However, nutritious acorns are a
favorite food of many animals including squirrels and jays. These
animals gather acorns and hide them to keep for winter-time
meals. Some of these hidden acorns don’t get eaten and end up
sprouting into oak seedlings far away from their parent trees.