Appledore Primary visit Julians

Yesterday was a very exciting day down on the farm, as we welcomed Appledore Primary School Class 4 to the farm for the first time.

Under the leadership of Mrs Stephenson, Class 4 came to learn all bout Rivers.  

After a walk down to the Culm and a quick talk about the Culm, what it is and why its so special, we made our way through it down to the banks of the River Torridge.  We even spotted a Marsh Fritillary Butterfly on our walk.  We were joined by Izzy from the Devon Wildlife Trust and 2 students working with her on the Riverfly Partnership project.  They led the first session, as we took the children to the waters edge to collect samples from the river to see what insects and invertebrates were in the river.  This was something the children really enjoyed.  We took the samples back onto dry land and started the process of trying to identify what had been caught.  We found a great selection of Olives, Leeches, Mayflies and Caddis.  This shows the water quality of the River is good.  

Our second session of the day was to do speed tests along different sections of the river.  We split into groups.  Some had a meander to work on, some had the rapids, some had a pool area, some had fast flowing water and some had very slow moving water.  The stretch of river we work on is great as it has all these different areas on a relatively short stretch.  The students set up a 10 meter length, had stop clocks at the ready and threw oranges into the river.  Oranges work well as the are bright and can be easily seen but also float.  The children made a note of the times it took for oranges to travel the 10 meters and did this 5 times per stretch.  They also recorded details about their stretch, making a sketch and some notes about how the water moved.

Appledore, I was very impressed on how well you listened to instructions and respected the rules of the farm and working by the river.  You did really well and we look forward to welcoming you back again soon.