Primary School Riverfly
Went up to Ebley early this morning to host a visit by Year 4 pupils from Leonard Stanley Primary School. Met up with Tony, Lois and Tamsin and agreed the agenda for the day.
We had three activities: how the river flows naturally, how people have made changes to the river and what lives in the river. I took the last of these and set up a riverfly monitoring area over in Ebley Meadows where Tony and I do the regular monthly check.
The children divided into three groups and rotated around. I stayed by the bank the whole morning and Tamsin escorted each new group for their half hour session.
The first part was for them to tell me what creatures live in a river and then I showed them how we collect samples for analysing.
They stood behind a rope line and timed while I collected a kick sample in places where they told me creatures might be living. We then headed over to the middle of the field where I set up sample trays for them to use the pipettes, spoons and magnifying glasses to identify what they could see.
They were all magnificent – really engaged with excellent questions and able to spot different types of beetles, fly and shrimp in the tray. At least four told me directly they found it a really fun activity. It’s really uplifting to see their interest wildlife, and you never know what this might inspire someone to do in future.
One thing that took me aback was the low number of species present in the three samples I took. This is never a particularly stellar site, but each of them would have breached trigger level if it was the formal count. I’ll be back here with Tony next Monday, so we’ll see what the actual situation is then.
