Books by Phyllis Root

Phyllis Root is the author of more than forty books, including Creak! Said the Bed and Lily and the Pirates, both named in Smithsonian’s 2010 Notable Books for Children; Aunt Nancy and Old Man Trouble, winner of a Minnesota Book Award; Big Momma Makes the World, winner of the Boston Globe Horn Book Award; and, published by Minnesota, Plant a Pocket of Prairie and One North Star, both winners of the John Burroughs Riverby Award, and Searching for Minnesota’s Native Wildflowers. She was awarded a 2006 McKnight Fellowship for Lucia and the Light. She has taught at the Loft and currently teaches in Hamline University’s MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults program.Betsy Bowen has written and illustrated numerous children’s books, including Helen Hoover’s Great Wolf and the Good Woodsman (Minnesota, 2005) and Phyllis Root’s Big Belching Bog (Minnesota, 2010), Plant a Pocket of Prairie (Minnesota, 2014), and One North Star (Minnesota, 2016). She lives in Grand Marais, Minnesota.

A beautifully illustrated, family-friendly guide to Minnesota\u2019s native wildflowers and how to find them Once prairie grasses and flowers bloomed for hundreds of miles in the western part of what we now call Minnesota. Once tiny orchids grew among the roots of giant old pines, and fleeting blossoms sheltered in the shade of great maple and oak forests. These flowers that grew here for hundreds of years, though harder to find now, are still there, and this book shows you how to discover them.Searching for Minnesota\u2019s Native Wildflowers chronicles the ten years that Phyllis Root and Kelly Povo spent exploring Minnesota\u2019s woods, prairies, hillsides, lakes, and bogs for wildflowers, taking pictures and notes, gathering clues, mapping the way for fellow flower hunters. This book is a treasure trove of plant lore and information, the perfect companion for anyone who wants to find—or simply to find out more about—shooting stars and kitten tails, prairie smoke and Dutchman\u2019s breeches, blazing star and butterfly weed, and more native flowers than most Minnesotans imagine are blooming nearby.Readers of Searching for Minnesota\u2019s Native Wildflowers will learn where to look for wildflowers and how to identify them, whether in the woods, wetlands, peatlands, or the prairie in spring, summer, or fall; around the state\u2019s 10,000 (or so) lakes; on the North Shore; or, especially, in Minnesota\u2019s many great state parks. Featuring helpful tips, exquisite photographs, and the story of their own search as your guide, Phyllis and Kelly place the waiting wonder of Minnesota\u2019s wildflowers within easy reach.

Phyllis Root is the author of more than forty books, most of them picture books. She received a McKnight Fellowship for Lucia and the Light; Aunt Nancy and Old Man Trouble won a Minnesota Picture Book award; Big Momma Makes the World won a Boston Globe–Horn Book Award; and Plant a Pocket of Prairie (Minnesota, 2014) won a John Burroughs Riverby Award. She lives in Minneapolis. Beckie Prange is a biologist and printmaker who has illustrated two previous books, the Caldecott Honor winner Song of the Water Boatman and Ubiquitous: Celebrating Nature's Survivors. She lives in Ely, Minnesota. Betsy Bowen has written and illustrated many children’s books, including Antler, Bear, Canoe: A Northwoods Alphabet Year; Helen Hoover’s Great Wolf and the Good Woodsman (Minnesota, 2005); and Phyllis Root's Big Belching Bog (Minnesota, 2010) and Plant a Pocket of Prairie. She lives in Grand Marais, Minnesota.

The creators of "Big Belching Bog" take young readers on a trip to another of Minnesota's important ecosystems: the prairie. Here they explain how changes in one part of the system affect every other part: when prairie plants are destroyed, the animals that eat those plants and live on or around them are harmed as well. Full color.

Cold, wet, and acidic, bogs appear to be extremely hostile to life, yet numerous plants and animals have adapted in fascinating ways in order to survive there. In Big Belching Bog, Phyllis Root lets us in on the secrets of the mysterious bog, describing such special inhabitants as plants that eat insects, bog lemmings, and frogs that stay frozen through the winter and thaw out in the spring. But what''s that coming up from the bottom of the bog?The biggest bog secret of all, we learn, is the remarkable process of methane gas belching out of the bog. The gas is created by decaying peat moss and forms a bulge in the surface of the moss six inches or taller before breaking through. Does this "belch" make a sound? No one knows, says Root, because no one has ever heard it. In fact, bogs are known as some of the quietest places on earth. Maybe you will be the first to hear the big bog belch!Illustrated by renowned woodcut artist Betsy Bowen, Big Belching Bog also contains a section of bog facts, including more information about the plants and animals mentioned in the book as well as tips for visiting a bog. Big Belching Bog will stir the imagination of young readers and teach them about the landscape and environment of these mysterious and, ahem, gassy places.