Fall Nature School, Lesson 6 – Animal Homes Nature Hike

This is a great time of year to study Animal Homes. If you are a teacher and would like to do a live virtual Animal Homes Nature Hike with your class, please contact me. Below you will see a Youtube video I created in a park near my house.

As you are watching the video, follow along and try to figure out what type of animal home you are seeing. To help you identify the animal homes use the handout below, from my book, Nature Seeker Workbook.

From Nature Seeker Workbook. Lawrence Wade

 

To download handout, click here:  Animal HomesPDF copy

In order to watch the Animal Homes Video, do not click on the red box, but where it says, ” Watch on Youtube.

 

 

If you would like to view another Old Naturalist posting on animal homes that shows the inside of different animal’s homes go to:

Animal Homes Program

 

Inside a Fox Den
www.animalanswers.co.uk:classes:mammals:amazing-underground-animal-homes:

 

How do you tell the difference between a Crow/hawk/owl nest and a squirrel nest? Look at the two photos below and see if you can tell the difference.

Squirrel Nest
photo by Lawrence Wade

Crow Nest

The Crow/hawk/owl is made mostly of sticks and is flat on the top. Whereas the squirrel nest is mostly leaves and is rounded at the top. See you can tell the difference when you are taking your own nature hike.

Photo by Weston Yost

Using  your Animal Homes handout what type of nest is this? This nest is made out of paper. Before the first hard frost the queen leaves the nest and hibernates under a log nearby. All of the workers die after the first hard frost. Do not bring the nest inside your home unless it has gotten very cold. The larvae may still be alive inside the nest, if so, they will hatch into adult hornets inside your home (scary!).

Now see if you can make a bar graph of some of the animal homes you found:To download the handout, click here: AnimalHomesBarGraph