Wildlife

Making a mini wormery is very easy to do. It’s finding the worms that’s the hard part – or at least that’s what we found anyway. This looked like a nice activity to do with my kids as who doesn’t like looking for worms?! Plus I thought the boys would enjoy learning about what the worms do, why they are important and how they burrow. Worms are vital for soil to help it breathe and are also an important food source for birds.

To make a mini wormery, you’ll need a plastic container like an old pop bottle. Cut the top off. Fill the bottle with layers of damp mud or compost, leaves and sand.

Find some worms, then add them to the top followed by a few more leaves or garden debris. Wrap up with black card, including the top, as worms don’t like being in the light and check the wormery every day for a week to see what the worms do. Keep the soil damp and don’t let the worms get too cold either. It’s like a mini break for them it seems!

Let your worms go after a week. Their job is done.

We built our wormery no problem and tried searching for worms after a rainy day but found nothing. We looked under stones and pots, in the compost and dug around a bit. There are definitely loads that come out on my eldest son’s school field but we didn’t get the chance to look this week unfortunately. We’ll find some after 30 Days Wild has finished I’m sure.

Looking for worms in the garden

Three-quarters of the way through the 30 Days Wild challenge, and we’re definitely feeling a little more in touch with our outdoor world. I’ve really enjoyed finding new wild places to explore, and learning some new crafty ideas to do with the kids outdoors (which really don’t take much time or effort at all). Most of all I’ve like learning more about UK wildlife, where to find it and how we can do our little bit to improve their lives.

I think my kids have loved doing an activity, the older one especially. He adores being outside and learning about the natural world, so I hope I’m installing a love of it for the future. This is what we did on week 3 of the 30 Days Wild Challenge with Surrey Wildlife Trust:-

Built an insect house

We cheated a little as we had an insect house in a tin to build (great idea for a gift by the way) but you can make an easy DIY insect house too. We now have a daily insect watch to see who’s been sleeping there overnight!

Made shapes out of nature on clay

My artistic streak has improved no end on this 30 Days Wild Challenge. I bought some clay (which the boys just loved modelling and shaping) and we went outdoors to collect some bits and pieces before doing some pressing and painting onto our bits of clay.

Made more effort to walk to school

We’re lucky enough to be able to walk to school through some woodland so this week we made the effort to leave a little earlier and stroll through the slightly longer woodland route. I’m not sure why we don’t do this more often. No car fumes, worry about cars and far prettier.

Wrote our names out of nature

We definitely got the gold star of approval and show and tell for this one! We collected different coloured natural materials then wrote out our name with it back out in the garden at home.

Explored Whitmoor Common in Surrey

Whitmoor Common is a Surrey Wildlife Trust site just north of Guildford. It’s a lovely spot for a walk and feels very wild. There’s heathland and woods but we especially enjoyed exploring the bogs and more marshy areas and sitting by the pond for while to look for dragonflies.

Made some wild art in the woods

A quick after school arty activity where you mark out a square on the ground as your ‘paper’ then go forage for natural materials to make a picture. There are different ways you can do this like thinking of a theme to draw, or doing different sized pictures. Whatever you do it’s a good way to immerse yourself in nature for a bit.

Practised some meditation on summer solstice

I’ll be honest I feel pretty worn out most of the time so even a few minutes meditation did me good. I do try and do some meditation every now and then when I feel the overwhelm but lying still outside and tuning into the sights and sounds around me was an even better way to check out of my busy mind for a while. Did the kids do this?! Nah!

Here’s what we did on the 30 Days Wild Challenge for week 1 and week 2.

My mum bought the boys a ‘make your own insect house’ so we made it. You can make your own DIY insect house too but this was much easier for us. It’s a great present idea too.

The kit comes with everything you need including the pieces of wood and bamboo sticks, glue plus tow ladybirds to stick on the top. All you need to do is glue it all together, find some grasses and old leaves to stuff into the house before adding the bamboo sticks.

This is a complete five-star luxury pad for insects. They be happy under an old log or in a pile of leaves too, as we’ve been finding on our little adventures here there and everywhere for the 30 Days Wild Challenge, but it was nice to do something crafty with the boys and they loved making a little home for the bugs.

The insect house we got from The National Trust

What a rainy week it has been. I won’t lie, it’s been harder to find the motivation sometimes to get outdoors and into nature with the kids, but I’ve learnt from week 2 of the Wildlife Trust’s #30dayswild challenge that you really don’t need to do anything major or organise anything crazy, just a wander around the garden or a splash in some puddles for five minutes is enough to raise the mood, get some fresh air and feel a bit more connected with the outside world. Rain or shine 🙂

This week we did a mixture of things – some at home, some out and about, and we enjoyed nature that was very, very big (trees) and nature that was very, very small (bees and bugs).

Gardening with kids

After the success of planting our wildflower seeds that came with our #30DaysWild pack, we went to the garden centre to buy some more bee-friendly plants and seeds, and had a marathon plantathon in our patio. The beauty of this activity is you are helping wildlife as well as getting kids into the outdoors and enjoying learning about nature. Find out what bee-friendly flowers we planted in the link above.

A visit to the British Wildlife Centre

The British Wildlife Centre is close to me but we’d never been so this was a good opportunity to visit to see what it was all about. Verdict? A great day out for all the family. If you want to earn a ‘good parent’ badge, this is a good place to go as it’s educational as well as being really good fun for all ages. We saw British Wildlife you generally never get to see out in the wild like otters and badgers. The red squirrels were feeling a bit shy when we visited but the foxes and owls were quite happy to be seen out and about.

Eggbox scavenger hunt in Staffhurst Woods

Defying the rain we headed under the canopy to the Surrey Wildlife Trust’s Staffhurst Woods. This is a lovely spot for a walk. In summer (or when it’s dry anyway) there trail walk is even suitable for pushchairs. We didn’t walk too far as our eyes were kept peeled to the ground for beetles, bugs and butterflies.

Exploring a local street tree

The Wildlife Trusts have some good activity sheets to print out and follow with kids. Great if you are feeling a bit uninspired. We took our little legs to explore our local street tree. We climbed it, examined it, hugged it and drew it. Then used all our clues to work out just exactly what tree it was.

Reading nature books outdoors

So simple, so why have I never read to my kids outdoors? It makes such a routine task much more enjoyable. I could have sat out all day reading with my son. Bonus was we actually had some sunny weather too – hooray! Find out what nature books we read in the link above.

Going on a minibeast hunt

Another woodland trip. What is it about kids and their obsession with bugs and beetles? We had great fun turning over logs and tree stumps and rifling through piles of wet leaves looking for critters. Taking some spotting sheets from The Wildlife Trusts turned this game into something a bit more interesting too as we got to put names to faces. Hello bloody nosed beetle.

Making a bee watering station

We went full circle and back to making our garden patch more wildlife-friendly with a homemade bee watering station. Find out how easy it is to make, and what you definitely should not do in the blog post link above!

Onto week 3!

Making a bee watering station is another really cool (and speedy) after school activity to get kids outdoors and exploring nature.

Bees are having a hard time at the moment, and this is very bad news as bees pollinate the food we eat. We need bees to survive. but 1 in 10 species of bee faces extinction, and over the past 50 years over half of all species has declined. Climate change, biodiversity loss, fragmentation of land and the use of pesticides are all contributing to the problem.

So how amazing is it that we can contribute DIRECTLY to change this decline in species. This really resonated with me, and I hope it did with my kids too (the older one anyway). Sometimes I feel so powerless to change anything. All the big problems seem so vast that I don’t know where to begin or how to act, but just making some simple changes in your back garden or patio can be the start of some huge changes.

There are various ways of making a bee watering station but we used a shallow dish, some stones from around the garden of different shapes and sizes, and some water. You could also use marbles. The key is for the water in the container to be shallow, so that bees, and other insects, will not drown in it. The water will need refreshing every so often to keep it clean, fresh and free from mosquitoes.

Many sites tell you to add sugar but it appears to be a myth. It seems to have come from a fake tweet from Sir David Attenborough, which has now been deleted. Bees do not need to be given any added sugar. It’s not a natural food source for them. They need nectar and pollen, so the best thing to do if you want to really help bees thrive is to plant lots of flowers that are bee friendly. You can also make a bee hotel with kids. Hopefully we will have a go at making a bee hotel on our 30 Days Wild challenge too.

My son loved this activity. Rummaging around the garden for stones, arranging them in the dish and watering the dish. The station sits outside a window and he keeps asking me where all the bees and butterflies are. I’m telling him that the rainy weather is probably more than enough water for the bees and the butterflies for now but they might like the water station if it gets really hot later in summer.

B arranging his stones and pebbles in the dish

I’m finding it quite tricky at the moment to find any decent stretches of time to do something outdoors with my kids. So today we did something very easy and relaxing – took some books outside with a rug and read. Obviously you can choose any books, but I thought I’d stick with the theme of wildlife and nature and pick out all our books about the great outdoors and read a few of them to my pre-schooler son. So today we read nature books for kids outdoors!

This was a lovely activity to do, and it really made a difference being outside reading. Sometimes I think I’m trying to be on the go all the time. Being active outdoors is great, but is is also very nice to just sit, tune into the sounds around you and smell the fresh air. It was very relaxing and I wondered why I’d never read outdoors with my children before?!

Luckily for us it was also a lovely day – finally. So we had the sun on our backs and a good half an hour of studying our books and reading some nature stories.

Choosing our stories to read outdoors

B enjoying The Little Gardener

We have these nature books for kids:-

Sharing a Shell by Julia Donaldson

My favourite book. It’s just got great rhythm to it and I adore the story about these three seaside creatures making friends and making a home together. Great for two and up.

The Little Book of the Dawn Chorus by Andrea Pinnington and Caz Buckingham

A new book in our collection, after being inspired on this nature journey of ours to listen to birdsong more and try to interpret who is singing what. It’s a fact book, so my toddler wasn’t interested in anything other than pressing the buttons but my older son loves it!

Nature’s Day by Kay Maguire and Danielle Kroll

Another amazing book for older children, with great illustrations. It takes the reader through the seasons with pages on things like pond life, roots and shoots and birds that fly south with the sun. This would also make an amazing birthday present for girls and boys from five and up.

A World Full of Animal Stories by Angela McAllister

Another great birthday present idea. This hardback book is packed full of short folktales and legends about animals from all over the world. Examples include the story of the prairie wolf and the song of the armadillo.

The Little Gardener by Emily Hughes

A nice story for ages three and up about a little boy who loved looking after his garden.

A First Book of Nature by Nicola Davies

A good book to dip into, with short poems and stories about nature in all its forms. Lovely illustrations too.

Boris Goes Camping by Carrie Weston and Tim Warnes

A tale about a group of animal friends who go camping in the woods, but come across some mischievous little wolves who try to spoil their fun. Good for ages three and up.

Tree by Britta Teekentrup

Another new story for us. I bought this a gift for a friend and liked it so much I bought one for my children too. It’s a cut out book which follows a tree throughout the seasons, highlighting all who live in her branches.

They are all really lovely and imaginative books. Some are stories, and some are more factual. The illustrations are beautiful too.

All our nature books