iSpot Crowd-source nature identification site

From the OU Facebook feed:

iSpot, your place to share nature (www.ispotnature.org), has a new look with a fresh design and exciting additional features, including:
- create a 'Project' gathering observations from a location, species group or time period on one page
- experience iSpot through four core themes: Explore, Identify, Contribute and Personalise
- 'My Spot' becomes 'Your iSpot' with new features to filter observations
- the website will now re-size to fit the device you are using.

...See More

iSpot

iSpot - Your place to share nature. iSpot is a website aimed at helping anyone identify anything in nature. Once you've registered, you can add an observation to the website and suggest an identification yourself or see if anyone else can identify it for you.

WWW.ISPOTNATURE.ORG

This should be of interest to Teachers & parents:

I am writing to let you know about a fantastic new game that we have put together in order to support children in learning about their local wildlife and to also enable them to share what they discover with other children around the country.

The game has three main aims:

1) We believe that children have to a large extent lost the connect with nature that they used to have and this game has the aim of improving general basic knowledge of common creatures in the UK through reconnecting kids with nature.

2) To use technology to reduce the amount of screen time kids get by encouraging them outdoors

3) To give parents, schools and other organisations an easy to access, free tool that makes it easy and fun for them to support kids in connecting with nature.

Here it is: http://www.flyonthewall.uk.com/wildlifetrackers/

We need help in raising awareness of the game and have been kindly supported by The Wild Network and various Wildlife Trusts through mentions on their websites and social media sites but also need a LOT more help to bring the tool to as many children as possible.

Kind Regards

Joel Chudleigh

joel@deepfootprints.co.uk

Fly On The Wall

http://www.flyonthewall.uk.com/

Free event at JIC Norwich : become fascinated with Fungi for #ukfungusday2013

Looking forward to tomorrow (Oct 13th) at John Innes Centre (Near the Norfolk & Norwich Hospital).
We've a free family-friendly event (and not just for families) where you can be fascinated by fungi as it is UK Fungus Day.
Fungi range from the familiar Mushrooms & Toadstools to the moulds we dread to find on our bread to the yeasts that are used to make bread and beer.

The event will have several activities (arts & crafts, story telling, fungal foray (looking at woodland fungi with an expert), how the toadstool got its spots, mushroom growers, mushroom recipe tastings, beer tastings, fungi in medicine & disease, fungi used in food production (affecting taste, flavour & texture) and more...).
Come along to JIC on Sunday 13th to have a Fun-gi day!

Meet the Hornets at Richmond Park

Meet the Hornets - Richmond Park September 2013

Despite their impressive size and fearsome reputations hornets are of necessity rather elusive creatures. Richmond Park has a small but persistent population of these, the largest British social wasps. This
'event' is an opportunity to see some hornets close-up (without getting stung!), to visit their colonies and to learn something about their behaviour, their relationships with other animals and their place in
the ecology of the park.  Other social wasps will be available too and so hopefully will be some of the  insect species associated with their nests.

Date, Time & Location: Pembroke Lodge Information Centre: Saturday 21st September 10:
30

This could be - but isn't! - an all-day event.  For those planning to make a day of it, the Red Deer rut should be under way in the park. Alternatively the Royal Ballet School will be open as a part of the main Open House event.

See also:
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1IgtVVaHE7ayrPSmq8ojuJj18wbHclDe
and
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5072C26223212A8C