With the onset of autumn, schoolchildren and their parents often go for a walk in the woods. And not just to enjoy the last warm days. Very often, the goal of such weekends is to collect natural material. After all, children will need to make herbarium of leaves. October is especially suitable for this, when all the foliage is painted in bright yellow and red colors. Having correctly preserved such a "crop", you can then engage in its design after long winter evenings. Or even make paintings or crafts from dried plants with your own hands.
Collection of materials for herbarium
But first you need to choose the right foliage and flowers for drying. If there is too much moisture in them, they can become moldy or even rot. Therefore, in order for herbaria from leaves to retain a presentable appearance for a long time, you need to know the rules for collecting material.
1. "Hunting" for flower leaves should be undertaken only on a dry and sunny day. Drying wet plants is much harder.
2. Only whole, unspoiled specimens need to be selected from fallen leaves. They must be dry.
3. To bring future herbaria from leaves to the house, it is advisable to bring files and packages with you. It is better to put each sample in a separate folder, you can add it with a note on the place and time of collection.
Preparation of the collected material
Now that everything interesting in the forest has been collected, you need to dry it and save it. There are several ways to make a herbarium of leaves. They are used depending on which plants were collected and how they are planned to be used. The most popular method is press drying. The sheet is placed between two pieces of tracing paper or paper, and then placed in a book or under a small board. Several very impressive volumes are laid out on top. After 2 weeks, a herbarium of leaves with their own hands will be ready. This technique is best for drying autumn leaves and small flowers.
The second method involves drying with an iron. First you need to cover the sheet with paper, and then iron it with a warm iron until it dries completely. Compared with the first case, it significantly speeds up the preparation, but is absolutely not suitable for fragile flowers and thin leaves. In addition, under the influence of high temperature, the color of the material may change.
Another way to preserve the beauty of fresh plants. To do this, the leaves or flowers are collected in bunches and suspended in a cool dark place "upside down" until completely dry. Thus, you can dry the buds of roses, chamomile flowers and other twigs with flowers and fruits.
Herbarium decoration
When all the leaves and flowers have dried, you can proceed to their design. This stage may take more than one evening. But then it will be possible to enjoy your work with pleasure. If the herbarium of leaves and flowers will be used as a guide for nature, you can stick each copy on a separate sheet and put it in a file. Each such page must be supplemented with a commemorative inscription with the name of the plant, the time and place of its collection. It remains only to collect everything in a folder-folder.
And also such plants can be used to make interesting crafts. By the way, in elementary school, children often do this in labor lessons. This can be beautifully decorated paintings, illustrations for fairy tales, small models of parks and squares, etc. Such a pastime will perfectly brighten up any winter evening.