Planting Native Trees in Fiordland

Wednesday 1st July

 The Southland District Council have allocated an area near the shed in Ivon Wilson Park, where is can plant native trees and plants.

They provided us with a number of plants to plant on the day of our Nature Discovery Book Launch in early June.

Since then we have planted 5 more plants which had self seeded in one of the Teacher's garden.

Today was Daniel's last Nature Discovery day so he brought along a tree to plant as a farewell gift.

His Mum, Gillian, said that he spent a long time at the Garden Nursery choosing which plant to buy. He chose one that had some berries on so the birds would have something to eat.


We found a spot to plant it with Daniel digging the hole.  He had many willing helpers, all the children were excited about planting "Daniel's Tree".


 Libby said, "We planted a tree for Daniel cos he is going to School."

Stefan said, "We dug a hole to plant a tree."

Wade said, "John moved the roots around so it can grow."


The children collected some moss to put around the base of the tree to keep it moist and not dry out.  They also arranged 2 or 3 rocks around the tree so that we wouldn't forget where Daniel's tree was planted.


Later on in the morning, we found a small round wooden disc to write Daniel's name and the date on.  With help from his Mum, he tied it onto his tree.

Just look how proud he is!!!!!!!!

Feeding the birds in Fiordland

Wednesday 26th June & Monday 1st July

At Kindergaren we feed the birds with the left over bread crusts from lunch.  Some of the children thought that perhaps we should also feed the birds at Nature Discovery so we decided to make some bird feeders for them.


We made 2 different types of feeders.  Gabrialla mixed the Wild Bird Seed and fat together and put it into a plastic net bag with help from her Mum.



Gabrialla's Story: "I mixed seed and something in a bowl. I put it in a plastic bag, it had little holes.  It smelled YUK!!!  We wanted to feed the birds because we love feeding the birds."





Neve and Jake made their bird feeders putting Peanut Butter and seeds on pinecones.


Neve's Story: "We did bird feeding by buttering the pine cones.  We rolled the pine cones in the seed. We make them because the birds were hungry.  We put them on the tree because they were hungry."

After spreading Peanut Butter over the pine cones, we rolled them in the wild bird seed mix until they were completely covered.





Jake's Story:
"We made a pine cone food for the birds cos it is winter.  The babies will die because they are hungry."

We hung the pinecones on one of the trees behind the shed where it was a little quieter.  We went for a short walk and checked the tree when we came back to see if the birds had found their food.
But we didn't see any birds.  I suggested that we get the Monday Nature Discovery children to check the bird feeders on Monday.

Monday 1st July

We checked the bird feeders that the Wednesday children had hung in the tree but all we found was string hanging from the branches and the net bag with the seeds and fat in it.  When we searched on the ground we found the pine cones but all the seeds were gone and there were only small traces of Peanut Butter on them.

We decided that we should make some more but this time we would use smaller pine cones so hopefully they wouldn't fall off the tree.

We still had seeds and Peanut Butter left over from last Wednesday but Sam had also brought along some Peanut butter and seeds from home for bird feeders.


We decided that it would be easier to tie the string on the cones before spreading on the Peanut Butter.  We set to work, it was like a production line.

Libby said, "We made bird feeders for the birds to eat when they get hungry.  We put string on so it can hang in the tree.  We put Peanut Butter on with a knife."

Wade said, " We made bird feeders, we put seeds on because the birds can eat it."

Libby said, "Cos that's what birds like."

Wade said, "We feed them cos the other seeds have got off the tree."

We were all happy that the birds at Nature Discovery would not be hungry now and we will check them next time to see if they need more.