beasts, bugs and crawly things

The girls and I are fully fledged members of RSPB.  With the girls interest in the outdoors and wildlife growing and my love for outdoors I thought it was a great investment to support a worthy cause.  We decided to make the most of the lack of rain today and headed to our local RSPB site, Old Moor.  

One of the lovely things about being a member of the RSPB is that activities like pond dipping are included.  The girls, their Grandma and I went in search of some pond life.  We picked up our nets and trays and headed over to the dipping pond.  

I am not sure that my eldest could quite believe her luck.  She was given her own net and told she could use it in the pond.  I showed her that when she had 'dipped' it we had to put it in the tray to see what we had caught

checking the netpond dipping

My youngest loved it too and she was so pleased that she could have a net to 'dip' with

pond spottingwaiting on the pond

We emptied the nets into the tray to investigate what we had caught

looking at the bugs

Here are our trays

pond dippingpond dip tray


We caught lots of water boatmen, a fair few snails in a variety of different shells, water flea, a tick, a bloodworm, lots of water plants and the girls favourite some fish

fish

After we had done our pond dipping we headed out on a nature trail, we needed to find

A bird in the water
A bird in the sky
A bird whose name you know
A beetle
A flower
A butterfly
A dragonfly
Something small
Something you have never seen before

tick off listspotting nature

The girls started looking and began ticking off items as they found them.  I really liked that the nature hunt was done like this as it meant that both girls could get involved and look for things themselves.  They pointed out that they had never seen a flower in a shoe before

plant in shoe

and together they looked for all the other items on their list

girls nature huntingyoungest exploring


youngest in grass

We headed into the family hide to look for birds on the water and in the sky.  I really love the family hide as there are child friendly chairs for the girls, colouring, activities on the wall and glass low down so the girls can see out the window at the birds

girls bird watching

We even managed to tick off a bird whose name you know, as my youngest pointed and shouted 'Geese' at the Canadian Geese.  

girls spot bird

We found everything on our list and headed over to play in the playground

youngest playingyoungest in tunnel


girls on a swingyoungest in play ground


girls playinggirls in swing


eldest climbingyoungest hiding


youngest peekingslide down

The girls and I have had a really fun filled day.  I loved watching them work together and play together.  It is so lovely that they have an interest in outdoors and wildlife and that they got the chance to explore and learn.  We shall be visiting again soon.

This day I love Beasts, bugs and crawly things. 

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4 comments

  1. You take the most beautiful pictures

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  2. I love this day out - don't want to wish my baby's babyhood away but can't wait to experience nature with him hands on!

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