Year 7's bioblitz day
On June 22, Year 7 took part in a ‘treasure hunt’ in the school gardens. This treasure was not the buried variety, but the plants and flowers they walk past every day. The idea for this event came out of the United Nations Year of Biodiversity and the ‘bioblitz’ events taking place all over the UK this year.
While bioblitzing is all about looking for absolutely everything – plants, fungi, insects, mammals, birds – in a small area such as a back garden, our event focused on identifying 21 common plants. In the preparation for the event, Tony (the school gardener) identified 40 plants in the small wildflower garden alone.
Richard (the gardening teacher) devised a lesson that looked at plant families and required the girls to use all their senses. With a ‘clue sheet‘ for each of seven plant families, the girls worked in their House teams to identify 21 plants by the feel of the leaf, the smell of the leaf and the shape of the leaf and of course the flower. We made teas with lemon balm and sage to help identify these aromatic plants. The lemon balm tea proved more popular, and the tea was a welcome and civilised break from working in the sun. The other really popular ‘find‘ were the garden peas/mange tout, which made a crunchy snack throughout the day.
The plants the girls identified were:
- Water mint, catmint and lemon balm.
- Carrot, carraway and cow parsley.
- Foxglove and Great Mullein.
- Pea, vetch and laburnum.
- Geraniums, herb robert and cranesbill.
- Comfrey, sage and wallflower.
- Rocket, radish and mustard.
The girls were intrigued to find and identify so many plants, and quite a few were inspired to come and work in the vegetable garden. We hope to repeat this event next year and to create a natural history of the whole garden.
