Nurture and Nourish

Last week we visited Riccarton Bush / Pūtaringamotu and the Botanical Gardens.
At Riccarton Bush, Ranger John guided us through and pointed out three types of trees; Totara, Mahoe and Kahikatea. Totara are very tall with papery bark, Kahikatea are tall with roots that look like piles of rope, and Mahoe is a small tree with leaves that have 'zig-zag' edges. We had morning tea in the bush and when we left John gave us a kahikatea sapling!
After playing at the Botanic Garden playground and some lunch, Katie and Brian taught us about three types of birds that live in the gardens; Korimako, Kererū and Pīwakawaka. We even learned to recognise their bird calls. Korimako says "plink-plink-plonk", Kererū says "kuu-kuu" and Pīwakawaka says "cheet-cheet-cheet".
Then we went searching for bugs in the garden. Afterwards we were blindfolded and had to make friends with a tree. We felt the leaves for shape and smoothness, we felt the trunk to find out how thick and tall our tree friend was, and we even smelled the leaves. After we took our blindfolds off, we could easily find our tree-friend!
Check out our photos of the day!
Room 3 Garden Field Trip 2013 on PhotoPeach