Mud, Mud

Mud! Mud! Glorious mud!
Nothing quite like it for cooling the blood.
So, follow me, follow, down to the hollow,
And there let us wallow in glorious mud.
"The Hippopotamus Song" by Swann & Flanders

Today was the last Young Naturalist's Club - Estuary Explorers outing for the year. We were led once again by real, live, biologists from Environment Canada, and today we were out on a tidal mudflat, looking at the organisms there and learning about their importance in the estuary ecosystem.

This is Gail, who is also co-author of the book which we used as a spine for this unit study. Gail is a wonderful, funny & enthusiastic educator. Here she is after a slight mishap in the mud.

Here are Amelia and Hugo with Melissa, who is also a biologist, and a lot of fun. Part of her job today was to rescue any kids who got stuck in the mud. The mud was reasonably solid for the first couple meters from the shore, but then it got very squishy and deep.

The kids found quite a few organisms in the mud and had a great time: fresh air, partly sunny skies, birds all around.

Hugo learned that if you get your boots mucky up to the calves, and then squat down, your bum will get mucky as well.

And now we have a pile of laundry to do. The only other down-side to this was that it was an early start for us and they're both pretty pooped now. Amelia lost one of her molars; Hugo is having a melt-down because his paper chain isn't working out the way he wanted. I think it's time to go out for some medicinal ice cream.