18 IT’S TIME!

Marshmallow was surprisingly silent moving through the forest—and somehow he could weave between the trees despite his enormous size. "Shhhh," Pip reminded us once we caught up to him. He pointed to a log, and Sassafras, Mom, and I silently squatted down behind it. Marshmallow stopped by some trees and started shimmering. I rubbed my eyes. I could barely see him—his scales shifted to the same colors as the trees behind him. Mom tapped me and pointed at two proud hippogriff parents nudging a tiny wobbly baby

forward. The baby hippogriff took a few toddling steps and tumbled over. It let out a little tiny eagle shriek. The dad hippogriff came over and gave it a gentle head bump, and the baby huffed as it got to its feet again. It tottered over to a forest rose and gobbled it down. Its little wings wiggled and sparkled and… grew a tiny bit. "Whoaaaa," I whispered. Pip glared at me, and I put a hand over my mouth. He nodded once, and we both looked back over at the baby who had toddled to another rose bloom.

I felt my chest swell with pride. All the rose bushes in this clearing were completely healthy— and completely covered in delicious-smelling rose blooms. Once the baby gobbled a second bloom, its wings shook again, grew a bit more, and then started beating faster and faster. After it ate a third rose, the baby flew up into the air! The parents gave a cry and started flying off toward the mountains, and the baby gave a tiny cry in return and followed. Their beating wings blew a single rose petal over to our log. I picked it up and sniffed. "This would be so cool to keep in my science journal," I said, but then I sighed and put it back on the forest floor. "I'll leave it for the baby hippogriffs, though." Pip picked it up and handed it to me. "Thanks to you, there are plenty of forest roses now. You should keep this one." I looked over at Mom and she nodded. We said our thank-yous and goodbyes to Marshmallow and Pip—after all that work delivering the bips they were both exhausted, but oh so proud.

As soon as we got home, I pressed the rose petal into my science journal right after the pages on bip experiments. I flipped the page and piled some books on the left side of my journal to help press and preserve the magical forest rose petal. The right side of my science journal was open to a new blank page, ready for the next magical creature we would meet.

GLOSSARY Algae: Plantlike things that have chlorophyll (for photosynthesis!) but don't have true stems, roots, or leaves (so they're not plants even though they can look like them). Bacteria: Tiny microscopic living things that can be helpful or harmful, depending on the type. Data: Information about your experiment that you write down. Data can be measurements or observations. Fungus: A living thing that is neither a plant nor an animal. A mushroom is a kind of fungus. Grow light: A special kind of lamp or bulb that makes light similar to sunlight so you can grow plants inside. Lichen: A living thing made up of alga or cyanobacteria living alongside fungus in a special relationship. You can usually find it growing on trees and rocks in forests. Photosynthesis: The process by which green plants use sunlight to make their own food.