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LEHMAN TWP. — While Chris Miller gave his usual opening comments about the tall grass on the edge of his property having roots running deeper than it grows high, naturalist Rick Koval alternately looked up at the sky or down at his smartphone.

“Just while you were talking, I saw or heard seven different birds,” Koval told the students from Wyoming Valley Montessori School who came to Lehman Sanctuary for a chance to see flora and fauna they’ve been studying in the classroom. One of the birds spotted had been a relatively rare black vulture, which has a tougher time soaring without flapping wings than its more common cousin the turkey vulture.

He took the crew of fourth, fifth and sixth graders not toward the forest but to the house at the front of the property owned by Miller’s family, which preserved the old growth forest down a steep hill and incorporated it as the non-profit Lehman Sanctuary available for educational tours like this.

“I can’t pass a rock without turning it over,” Koval said, and urged the students to gently flip a flat stone that had been part of an old wall. They found a snake’s shedded skin, and he turned it into a lesson on reptiles vs. amphibians, noting that both shed but “amphibians do it secretly. And do you know what they do with it?”

“Eat it,” one boy answered.

“That’s right, it makes them recyclers.”

Koval’s cornucopia of nature news never let up. As the headed for a newly cleared switchback path at the edge of the tall grass, he let them sniff some bergamot, noting it’s the stuff used to flavor tea (Earl Grey, specifically). He pointed up in one direction to a flock of crows, then to something hanging from a tree and said it was a bald-faced hornet nest.

Before reaching the bottom of the hill and the wetlands, he lifted a decaying branch big enough to be a walking stick and pointed to little orange-ish growths. “Being Halloween, this mushroom is appropriately called witch’s butter.” He cautioned never to eat wild mushrooms without an expert on hand who knows what is safe, warned “you only get one chance to eat a deadly mushroom,” then said this particular jelly mushroom was edible and popped a little one into his mouth.

“It tastes like a gummy bear without the sugar,” he critiqued.

“Why don’t you put sugar on it?” one girl suggested.

“What kind of mushrooms do they put on pizza?” A boy queried.

“I’ve never been asked that,” Koval replied. “I don’t think it’s field mushrooms.”

Before long the fun part for the students began as he unleashed them into the wilds to spot birds, ID trees, turn rocks and poke around spring seeps, looking for any of more than 120 animals and plants teacher Dan Kline had on a list of things spotted in previous trips.

“Let’s make like we’re a search party!” Haley Jacobs suggested. In short order she and Olivia DeLuca found a fairly rare four-toed salamander under one rock, which Koval explained is “lung-less” and breaths through its skin. Moments later the detective duo found a small off-white mass under another rock and recognized it as eggs — from a slug, Koval said.

“This is egg-citing!” he quipped.”

Okay, he may be an outdoors guru, but his comedy is nothing to crow about.

Kyla Kon, 12, a student at Wyoming Valley Montessori School, picks straw at The Lehman Sanctuary on Friday.
https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/web1_Montessori-Nature-Trip-2.jpg.optimal.jpgKyla Kon, 12, a student at Wyoming Valley Montessori School, picks straw at The Lehman Sanctuary on Friday. Tony Callaio | For Times Leader

Students from Montessori School participated in a field trip to The Lehman Sanctuary on Friday lead by outdoor specialist and noted naturalist, Paul Koval, center, in the blue jacket. Students look under a rock to see what species reside under it.
https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/web1_Montessori-Nature-Trip-3.jpg.optimal.jpgStudents from Montessori School participated in a field trip to The Lehman Sanctuary on Friday lead by outdoor specialist and noted naturalist, Paul Koval, center, in the blue jacket. Students look under a rock to see what species reside under it. Tony Callaio | For Times Leader

Naturalist Paul Koval, left, points out birds native to Northeastern Pennsylvania to students from Wyoming Valley Montessori School.
https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/web1_Montessori-Nature-Trip-4.jpg.optimal.jpgNaturalist Paul Koval, left, points out birds native to Northeastern Pennsylvania to students from Wyoming Valley Montessori School. Tony Callaio | For Times Leader

Chris Miller, right, owner/operator of The Lehman Sanctuary, Lehman Township, readies a group of students from the Wyoming Valley Montessori School for a field trip on Friday.
https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/web1_Montessori-Nature-Trip-1.jpg.optimal.jpgChris Miller, right, owner/operator of The Lehman Sanctuary, Lehman Township, readies a group of students from the Wyoming Valley Montessori School for a field trip on Friday. Tony Callaio | For Times Leader

By Mark Guydish

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Reach Mark Guydish at 570-991-6112 or on Twitter @TLMarkGuydish