100 Species Challenge

I discovered the 100 Species Challenge from Sarah at Homeschooling the Doctorate? click here to see her site. She was inspired by a now-forgotten author that made this statement " few people these days can name a hundred plant species growing in their own neighborhood." Quite honestly, I think 100 should be changed to 50, I know plenty of people that have trouble with this. I was raised learning and identifying the flora and fauna of Ohio, so I tend to get a little cocky when it comes to flora. I decided to humble myself and take this challenge, with the little ladies of course....how many do I honestly know? I will post it all here as we go along.



The 100-Species Challenge (I tweaked the rules a bit to fit us)


1. Participants should include a copy of these rules and a link to the original challenge in their initial blog post about the challenge.


2. Participants should keep a list of all plant species they can name, either by common or scientific name, that are living within walking distance of the participant's home. The list should be numbered, and should appear in every blog entry about the challenge, or in a sidebar.

3. Participants are encouraged to give detailed information about the plants they can name in the first post in which that plant appears. (**This is where my challenge really comes in, I can name a lot of plants, but I want to also know if the plant is an Ohio native, if it's edible and if it has medicinal value.)


4. Participants are encouraged to make it possible for visitors to their blog to find easily all 100-Species-Challenge blog posts.


5. Participants may post pictures of plants they are unable to identify, or are unable to identify with precision. They should not include these plants in the numbered list until they are able to identify it with relative precision. Each participant shall determine the level of precision that is acceptable to her; however, being able to distinguish between plants that have different common names should be a bare minimum.

6. Different varieties of the same species shall not count as different entries (e.g., Celebrity Tomato and Roma Tomato should not be separate entries); however, different species which share a common name can be separate if the participant is able to distinguish between them (e.g., camillia japonica and camillia sassanqua if the participant can distinguish the two--"camillia" if not).

7. Participants may take as long as they like to complete the challenge.



***I plan to include the flora of our county parks as well, I really don't want to limit ourselves. I plan to have the flora of our yard put into a field guide made by the girls. Feel inspired to get your own field guide started? Then click here and a great book to help you start is "No Student Left Indoors: Creating a Field Guide to Your Schoolyard by Jane Kirkland."


So are you up for the challenge with us??? If you plan to do this challenge please let me know so we can share the fun and knowledge right along with you!