Along the Path

The first part of the path is paved and winds through prairie grasses. We could hear frongs and crickets. In the fall, most of the plants are starting to dry out.

One of the first things that caught our eyes was these milkweed pods. They were huge, and the bugs (like the one in the lower left-hand corner of the picture) really seemed to like them.

When we peeked inside one of these pods, we were amazed at the number of seeds inside. Each of the seeds contains is flat and hard and has "hairs". All of these seeds were packed together so that the "hairs" pointed towards the top of the seed pod.

We pulled out one of the seeds and threw it up in the air. The wind caught the seed and carried it further down the path. The tails seemed to act like propellers on a helicopter. That was pretty neat. Then we pulled another seed and examined it more closely. The "hairs" on the seed seemed to be somewhat sticky. When we dropped this seed, it stuck to Ellie's sweater instead of floating down the path. We talked about how this would allow the seed to travel for miles with no effort.