Set aside a spot to house and show off your nature treasures and projects. This needn't be elaborate. While a table that can remain set up with your collections would be a nice, a windowsill can easily be turned into an ever-changing exhibit space. A bulletin board is ideal for tacking up pictures and information, but the refrigerator works just as well with a good supply of strong magnets. Explore the possibilities of using a pegboard or a freestanding oversized box to tape things on, or even a piece of string stretched taut from which items can be hung.

It's fun to collect things that you find when you are out on walks, and within the bounds of nature etiquette (only take what you really need, and leave plenty of flowers to reseed themselves, etc.), you can bring some of what you find. You may discover that you have to design some creative storage solutions for everything you save!

Just like animals, plants have ways to deal with the cold and frozen precipitation that envelop them during winter.

A lot of them may look dead, but only the annual plants have actually died. These are the low-growing plants that you can pull up easily, roots and all. They die after producing and scattering their seeds. Some plants take two years before their seeds mature, and these are known as biennials.

Many plants live for more than two years. These are the perennials. Trees are the most visible members of this group. Because little moisture is available to them (it's frozen!), these plants halt their growth, and shed their leaves (or needles as we call them), because they have a protective waxy coating. It's a bit like the hand lotion you use to protect your hands in winter!

Some plants are sensitive to changes in temperature. Have you ever noticed how rhododendron leaves curl up tightly (they almost look like cigars!) when it's very cold outside? They relax and unfurl when it's warmer. Do you think you might be able to gauge the temperature by watching these plants?

While there is something missing from many trees during the winter (mainly their leaves!), you can still tell one tree from another by looking for other clues.

Trees have very distinctive silhouettes (with and without their leaves). Many guide books include tiny silhouettes to help you identify the trees. Trees come in all shapes and sizes, just like people! The bark also differs considerably from tree to tree, and from young to old. Again, like people, the bark of younger trees is smooth and even; older trees have rough and wrinkly looking bark.

Buds offer many clues, too. Before trees even lose their leaves in autumn, they are preparing for the new leaves that will clothe them the following spring. Each bud is protected by a scaled covering, or fuzzy hairs. There is much variation from tree to tree.

Some trees are easy to identify any time of year. These are the evergreens that keep their leaves year-round.

Do the evergreens really keep their foliage year-round? Well, yes and no. They do shed their leaves (as the needles are properly called), but it is an ongoing process, making the loss less noticeable.

Not all evergreen trees are conifers (cone-bearing trees such as pines, firs, and hemlocks). Holly trees, live oaks, and palms are three exceptions, being broad-leafed examples of evergreens. On the other hand, some needle-leafed trees, such as larches, are deciduous and lose all their leaves each autumn.

You can tell the three major groups of conifers apart by their leaves. Here are some clues to look for.
Firs: Short needles with blunt tips, leave round scar on branch.
Spruces: Four-sided needles that are very sharp.
Pines: Needles grow in bunches, wrapped together at the base.

You can probably think of dozens of uses for trees, but did you ever wonder what role trees play in nature? Take a walk outside and see if you can detect some of the ways trees serve the natural world.

You can't really see, but you might guess at one way that trees are important, and that is their ability to hold the soil together with their far-reaching roots. These "underground branches" prevent erosion, but they also provide safe havens for burrowing animals. Animals live in other parts of trees, too. Look for holes in trunks that squirrels and birds have made. On dead limbs, life the bark and look for squiggly tunnels and pinholes made by various insects. Leaves also provide shelter (check this during the summer).

Of course, trees furnish food for many animals. Not only are nuts and fruits eaten, but also twigs, bark, and leaves. The leaves serve other functions as well. They give off oxygen and transpire great amounts of water. And when the leaves fall from the trees, they decompose and enrich the soil, as does the tree itself when it dies and rots, but not before still other creatures find food and shelter in the tree. Little wonder trees are so valuable in the wild!

Besides benefiting from trees in their natural settings, people use trees in many ways. Look around your house, or in your neighborhood stores, for examples of tree products. You can even make a game of guessing what objects in your house started out as part of a tree.

You'll probably find many examples. Your house may be made from wood (at least in part) as well as some of your furniture, tools, and toys. Paper, and such products as fabric, photographic film and cellophane are made from cellulose (the major component of the cell walls). Food is harvested from trees (from apples to almonds) including spices and flavorings (from cinnamon to maple syrup). Gums and resins (special saps that ooze from certain trees) are used to manufacture paint thinner, soaps, and rubber goods. Some bark is used for floats and bulletin boards.

So thank a tree the next time you make a paper airplane or crack open some pistachios! Come summer, you'll be glad for the shade that trees offer, too.

You can record variations in bark patterns by making rubbings. All you need is a sheet of lightweight paper and a wax crayon (dark colors show up best). Peel the paper-covering off the crayon and hold it horizontally. Smooth barks are easiest to rub, and steady one-directional strokes work best. If the paper keeps shifting, tie it to the tree.

You can bind your rubbings in a scrapbook, or frame them to hang on the wall. Include rubbings in the diary that you are keeping of a single tree.

Note: Never strip bark from trees, as that may damage or even kill a tree. You can collect bark off of fallen branches and stumps.

Trees grow not only in height each year, but also in girth, and you can actually count the years that have passed by counting the rings on the stump of a tree. The rings also offer clues to the conditions that affected the tree during its lifetime. Wide rings show years of strong growth; narrow rings suggest that the tree was subjected to adverse conditions, such as drought, a hard winter, insect damage, fire, and even competition for sunlight and nutrients from neighboring trees.

Unfortunately, to see the rings of a tree, the tree must be felled. Search your area for stumps, take a look at a fireplace log, or determine the age of your or a neighbor's Christmas tree.

Many trees, including the flowering dogwood and magnolia of the eastern United States, have plump buds that hold the promise of spring inside each gray bundle. The flowering dogwood tree has two kinds of buds, one for its flowers and another for its leaves.

During February, when the days steadily grow longer, scout out a dogwood tree where you live. (If you don't have a dogwood in your yard, ask your neighbors or check a park.) Count as many fat, gray bundles as you can on one branch. Estimate the number of similar branches on the tree. Multiply these two figures to predict roughly the number of fragrant, scarlet flowers your tree will have in the spring. Write this figure down and save the paper until spring, when you can confirm how close your estimate was.