Whew!  We've had a busy week.  Baseball season has begun for my son.  So I'm a little late this time in getting our Green Hour Challenge posted about.

For this week's challenge, we were to pick a small square area in our backyard to observe everything we could.

Unfortunately, we picked a pretty dead spot in our yard, and found very few things.  We did pull up some grass and observed the root system, and saw a few really tiny bugs.  Perhaps if we'd pulled out the garden trough and started digging we would have found more.  But instead we decided to go on a hunt around our yard to find some things we could look under.

First we found a old log pile and started turning over logs.

We found lots of squishy worms to observe with our lens.  And we also found ants and lots of decaying leaves.

Then we meandered over to a rock pile and started turning over rocks.  The first thing we found were a couple of crickets.

We captured them and spent some time observing and talking about how much, over the winter, we've missed hearing their beautiful song.

THEN, OK this is hard for me to post about, really!  And all my friends who personally know me are going to laugh....we turned over a rock and found a monster!!!!

You know I LOVE nature, BUT there's always one thing that every person has to admit gives them the shivers....and friends this is mine!  Barb, this one's for you....I just knew as soon as I commented to you on your reptile post about my fear of spiders, that the Lord would bring me this one!  We have identified this as a WOLF SPIDER, I think the largest we get here in Kentucky.  I've always called them "miniature tarantulas" though!  Ok, I admit, that it's pretty neat how they carry their babies on their backs.  That's enough about that!

Next, we went looking hunting around down closer to the creek, and look what else we found to observe!!

My Sweet Gabby Rose!

Lastly, we crossed the creek, and went over to the kid's "special" play area.  The kids had made some pretend fishing poles earlier in the week, and put them to the test.  They caught lots of stuff!  We also talked about how their play area down there was like a secret hideaway in a beautiful fairy tale world!  Can you see all the spring green popping up from the wood's floor?!  Yippee!

Down there, we observed this big old tree growing on the side of the ravine and how some of it's roots are on top of the ground.  Neat!

Then we looked up and saw woodpecker holes in this tree.  Hannah informed me that when she's down there playing she sees a White-Breasted Nuthatch fly in and out of there all the time, and hears lots of beeping sounds like babies!  I sure wish we could see them.

Then we wandered up the hill a bit and came upon another "yuck"!    This is a view of the bottom of the skull.  We are pretty sure this was once a Virginia Opossum.  We have lots of those around here, and also lots of Coyotes in Kentucky.  We wondered if that could have been this poor opossums demise?

We have a great nature craft planned that hopefully we will have time for the next couple of days.  So check back soon!!

To participate in fun Green Hour Challenges like this one, visit Barb at The Heart of Harmony.

EDITING TO ADD IN THE LINK to our nature craft:  Nature Prints in Clay