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Dandelions

Kamil Gopaniuk/Flickr Creative Commons

Just this weekend, my young daughter Emma brought my wife a tiny bouquet of flowers. There were some nice greens, and many more bright yellows. The arrangement would be familiar to any parent, as it was a bunch of sweet, sun-loving dandelions.

Whether in their yellow-rayed blossom phase or their “blowball” stage, children love dandelions – and no wonder! In a park or a garden, it’s often the only flower they can pick without getting into trouble. But most of us grow to dislike the pesky dandelion and regard it as a lowly weed, even going so far as to nickname it “the curse of the front yard.”

W. Brooks Paternotte took the helm of Irvine Nature Center as executive director in July 2013 and immediately began building on the strong 35-year foundation. Brooks is a Baltimore native who was a teacher, coach, advisor, dean and Head of the Middle School during his 13 years at Boys’ Latin School in Baltimore. He is also an instructor and ambassador of the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS) and is a Leave No Trace Master, as well as an avid outdoorsman and a features writer for FlyLife Magazine.