Monday, March 28, 2016

Easter egg hunt with binomial nomenclature clues

You’ll find…
Uncle: Two eggs, one chicken and two rabbits, one each, underneath five of the trees in the garden.

Nephew: Which trees?

Uncle: I’ll tell you the first one. It’s Cordyline australis. Or do you want the common name?
Do Easter rabbits hatch from eggs?

Nephew: The common name.

Uncle: Cabbage tree.

Nephew: Found it. Here’s another note. “Olea europaea.” What’s THAT?

Uncle: Olive tree.

______________
Voice-over

And so it went. The nephew knew no Linnaean names but he recognized most trees from the common names. Helped by an accompanying picture. Rewarded with two chocolate eggs, a chocolate chicken and two chocolate rabbits. He asked if rabbits come from eggs. No, but he was rewarded in a Pavlovian way for remembering scientific names of five trees.
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