What a welcome start to 2025? Harrington Hall and the trails surrounding it were a winter wonderland ready to be explored! Everyone had reviewed their cold weather clothing instructions because we looked like a group of adventurers ready to climb a mountain! Why is it important to keep warm on our hikes outdoors? What is frostbite?
After our morning affirmation, it was wonderful to catch up with everyone’s holiday. The first part of our morning was spent enjoying the snow with our friends, reviewing our rules, routines and nature calls. We made tracks in the fluffy snow and looked at some tracks animals left behind. Did you have a chance to be the tail in our deer trail game? Great team work as all the Turtles followed the path. It didn’t take long for the deer tail to be caught!
Time for a snack so we went into the hall. Thanks to Monarch, Hawk and Pileated Woodpecker for looking after the hand washing and drying station for us today. After having a drink and filling our bellies it was time to bundle up once again in search of winter birds. On the trails, we worked on being quiet and slow moving observers and it worked! On the pond we were excited to see the ducks enjoying some quiet time and on the other end of the pond was a muskrat. We found out later that Grey Squirrel says there is a family of five muskrats! I wonder what the muskrat was doing on the ice and what does it eat? Right by the pond’s edge, in the dogwood branches (thanks for letting me know what the branches were called Pileated Woodpecker!), were numerous juncos flying busily around. Why do you think they were all in that one area? Do you think they found any food there? They certainly can find food in all the bird feeders we saw today! What shall we call that part of the trail “Bird Alley” or “Bird’s Way” or do you have any suggestions?
In the library Grey Squirrel kept our curiosity fed with the book The Snow Knows and Whose Tracks Are These? By Jim Nail. It was fun to try to figure out what animal was coming on the next page and to try to guess all the animal tracks. After our stories it was time to solve more mysteries as we searched for all the winter bird pictures hidden throughout the library. Thanks Grey Wolf and Snapping Turtle for helping to give clues to some of our youngest Turtles. Do you remember what bird was on the blue box? Who doesn’t love a good scavenger hunt! What was your favourite bird?
Welcome Monique (soon to have a nature name)! She will be taking part in our adventures every Tuesday afternoon! We certainly enjoyed having you share your lunch with us and helping out with our afternoon adventures. Sometimes we need a little help to get all the layers of clothing on. Why not practice getting dressed to go outside by yourself and try to remember the best order for getting ready. Monique and Monarch were happy to pose for a picture between toboggan runs on Sunrise Hill.
After a short hike in the deep snow, Dragonfly called us in for a game of Fox and Goose. Using track mazes in the snow the chosen fox ran after all the delicious geese trying to catch his meal. What other animals could be part of this tagging game? Who else to start the game off than Red Fox himself! How many different track mazes can we create next week? Some of us have started drawing them in our journals and we can share them next week! Maybe yours will be the idea we use for our game! Have you shown your families your journals? We know everyone was excited to take them home. Please bring your nature notebooks back next week so we can continue to add to them and share our favourite pages!
After our afternoon exploration we trekked our way back to the Hall. We continued to work in our nature notebooks and had a chance to each make a pine cone bird feeder. Thanks to Beaver and Coyote for collecting cones and providing the bird seed. Hang your bird feeder in a spot where you can see it. In this cold weather the birds will be looking for food. Have you seen any birds munching away? Homework: Use one or two pages to draw a picture of your favourite spot outside or draw a picture/write a few sentences about an adventure you had at home this week?
Comments