Last Friday and Saturday, more than one hundred Richford Elementary School students and community members explored the elementary school nature trail to observe and document the wide range of plants and animals that call the school campus home. This two-day event, called the Richford Nature Rally, was co-organized by Franklin County NRCD and the Richford Conservation Commission.
The fun started on Friday, May 19th with a field day for Richford Elementary School Students. Students in grades 1-5 learned about a variety of critters living at the elementary school campus from local experts: Sophie Mazowita of Cold Hollow to Canada coached students in wildlife tracking, UVM Extension Master Gardener Ricky Klein taught all about pollinators, and Mel Auffredou of Franklin County NRCD showed off the many kinds of bugs living in Loveland Brook along the school nature trail. Students were challenged to consider how water quality and land-use change in the watershed may impact the different animals that they learned about.
On Saturday, May 20th, community members came together to try to identify as many plants and animals as possible along the nature trail. Participants made over 150 observations of 95 different species on the iNaturalist app, and even more observations were documented "offline."
A big thank you to all of the volunteers, teachers, students, and community members who made these events a success!
This event was part of the 2023 What's Out Here? Series which aims to bring together groups to host events to inspire communities to get outside, explore with others, and learn more about the natural resources around them. The more we know about what's out here, the more we can do to protect and restore! To learn more about the events in the series, please visit: https://www.franklincountynrcd.org/whats-out-here
This event was funded by the Upper Missisquoi and Trout Rivers Wild & Scenic Committee.