Thank you

A big thank you to all of you who brought in resources for the Eco Kids Club.  We will be able to use these in our activities.  A special thanks to Liam Cribb's mum for the seed raising mix.  Awesome!

2013

Welcome to a new year of eco learning!

We've had our first Eco Kids Club meeting and a huge turnout of 43 children who are keen to find out more and be involved in sustainability.

Our group is open to anyone in our school at anytime.  We would love to see more grownups too!

Keep checking our blog to see what we've been up to during the year!

Planting winter veges

Some of our Eco Kids Club weeded the vege garden today.  It was a great day for it and they did a fantastic job.  It didn't take long before the ground was weed free (almost!) and ready for planting.  At this time of the year the plants need to be hardy and able to cope with cold weather.  We planted Pak Choy - awesome in stirfries, broccoli and spinach. 

Welcome to Term 2

Today we had our first meeting and talked about the Kereru.  You might also know it as the Wood Pigeon.  Over the school holidays I was fortunate to be staying where there were several Kereru flying around close by, feeding from berries in the trees.  They make a beautiful sight and have a distinctive 'whoosing' sound when they fly. There used to be thousands of Kereru in New Zealand, but the numbers are dropping and they are in danger of becoming extinct.  Hundreds of Kereru are killed or injured when they fly into windows.  So are lots of other birds.  We made some paper snow flakes to put on windows to help stop birds from flying into the glass and being hurt or killed.

This term we are also going to plant up our vegetable garden with veges that we can use to make vege soup. 

Help!  Can you donate some onion bags?  These are the mesh ones they come from the supermarket in.  Bring them to Room 9 please.

Living Legends Muck In

Last weekend, some of the Eco Kids helped to plant 4,000 native plants in a protected area near Ahuriri Estuary. These plants will grow and provide a natural habitat for many of our birds. Ian McCrae was there to meet us too. He is a former All Black and has also worked in conservation, helping to protect our environment. A big thanks to Selena, Alicia, Becky, Millie and Ben for giving up their Saturday for this very worthy project. It was also great to see Brayden Leicester and his family helping too!

Brayden Leicester's family building a new vege garden

Brayden brought in a pendrive on Friday with photos of his family building their new vege garden. Brayden's little brother Nathan helped too! I bet you enjoyed helping to plant the new plants Brayden! Your scarecrow looks fantastic.

Living Legends

Living Legends is taking the field to the forest during New Zealand’s hosting of Rugby World Cup 2011.

During September and October 2011 we’ll be planting almost 85,000 native trees and honouring our Rugby Legends.


The Ahuriri Estuary is a unique and valuable habitat that resulted from landform changes associated with the 1931 Napier earthquake. This important wetland is a sanctuary for a wide variety of wading birds including grey herons, royal spoonbills and pied stilts and offers a significant opportunity for revegetation and ecosystem enhancement. Its closeness to Napier city provides great potential for community use and involvement in its development. The work already undertaken east of where Living Legends will plant provides a popular walking area and shows the value of native plantings in enhancing this environment.

On 24 September 2011, volunteers will plant 4000 additional native trees at this site as part of Living Legends programme of work.

Some of those volunteers are from our school Eco Kids Club.
Porritt students - if you want to be involved, see Mrs. Anderson at school.
You can also visit the Living Legends website to find out more.

Rugby Legend - Ian MacRae
The man who spent seven years as an All Blacks centre has been chosen as the Hawke’s Bay rugby legend as part of the Living Legends project.

Napier’s Ian MacRae, 64, who played 45 matches for the All Blacks between 1963 and 1970, said the appointment was flattering and close to his heart.

“I am excited to be part of it as I started my working career as a forest ranger. I trained in conservation in the back country, trying to prevent erosion, so it’s quite fitting that now I am involved in this,” says Ian.