Our Week in the Forest...
Over the past few weeks the children have been constantly fascinated by all the amazing insects they have been discovering and this week has been no exception, we have had visitors in all shapes and sizes!
One animal the children have noticed on many occasions in Fulham Palace gardens came for a walk around our setting, it wasn’t a Fox or the Palace cat, not even a squirrel, it was in fact a duck! As it waddled past the children they all stayed really quiet and still, watching it with fascination, it came very close to some of us to have a look at what we were doing, and even had a quick look in the toilet tent, startling Katie in the process! Then off it went running with its big webbed feet back into the gardens.
The Palace bees have also been very active recently, the children have observed at a safe distance how many have been flying around the beehives in the walled garden, which has led to discussions about what they are all busily doing. This week we found out that many have been calmly flying in and out of our forest, which was an opportunity to observe them buzzing around the borage plants and other flowers collecting the nectar and pollen to take back to their hive.
It hasn’t just been insects and small animals visiting, we also had a visit from two of our local female police officers who came to find out what the children were all doing and to talk about their jobs. The children were particularly interested in their gadgets, especially when they heard a voice through one of their radios and wanted to know if they had caught a baddie! It was lovely to hear all the questions the children wanted to ask, from wanting to know why they had numbers on their uniforms to what was inside the black boxes on their belts. Before they left, we all wished them a lovely day and invited them to return to try out our mud kitchen one day.
We also had a surprise visitor this week as one of our children brought back some moths that he had observed transform from the box tree caterpillars at home. They had now turned into moths and he wanted to release them with his friends in the forest!
We hope you all have a lovely weekend!
Little Forest Folk
Fulham