The Wrack

A new story walk is installed on the Saw-whet Owl Trail for the winter season!

A new story walk is installed on the Saw-whet Owl Trail for the autumn season!

A new story walk is installed on the Saw-whet Owl Trail for the spring season!

I facilitated my final Head Start preschool story hour of the season this morning with a group of real sweethearts from Old Orchard Beach. The towns of Sanford, North Berwick, Lyman, Kittery, Biddeford, and Waterboro also participated in the program this fall. Whales Are Amazing...Just Like You! by local author Tony Viehmann was the featured storybook this time around. Families enjoyed learning about these gentle giants, creating whale crowns, and taking a walk to the ocean to see whale habitat. The children were delighted to receive their free books and blue whale puppets at the end of each program! Below are photos taken during one of the programs last month.

Reading the story...

We had lots of cuties here on Tuesday for our monthly public Preschool Story Hour, featuring Brian Lies' Bats on the Beach. After a reading of the story, the group delved into a bat cookie cutter painting activity and then hit the trails for nature exploration and a bat and mosquito scavenger hunt. Did you know that a little brown bat eats up to 1,000 mosquitoes in an hour? Thank you, bats! You are the be…

Thirteen Head Start preschools from across York County visited the Reserve on numerous occasions this past year to experience the great outdoors and make exciting wildlife discoveries. They came in the fall, winter, and spring seasons to hear a nature-based story, meet a variety of animal puppets, create a related craft to take home, and walk the trails while engaged in scavenger hunts and sensory adventures.

Today's preschool story hour featured local author/illustrator Tony Viehmann's Whales Are Amazing...Just Like You! After a reading of this playful story in the library, our group of little marine scientists moved to the barn and learned that blue whales can grow up to 100 feet long. We measured this distance together and discovered that blue whales are a few feet longer than the barn! Below are photos of some of the participating preschoolers and their caregivers, creating their very own whale sock puppets to take home.

As 2013 comes to a close, so too does the Reserve's pilot preschool story hour program for Head Start centers in Biddeford and Sanford. In October, November, and December, children and their parents visited to listen to a reading of Giving Thanks. This beautiful story written by Jonathan London tells of a father and son who take a walk in the woods, giving thanks to the trees, birds, insects, mushrooms, and all the other wonders of nature they observe. The words and illustrations on each page convey the importance of appreciating and respecting those with whom we share this world.

Lots of oversized, cheerful, full of energy chipmunks descended upon the Reserve earlier this month during Preschool Story Hour! Thanks to parent Jackie Lipsky, their festive activities in response to Chippy Chipmunk Parties in the Garden were captured for all to see. Thanks so much for the photos, Jackie! We look forward to seeing lots of preschoolers and their parents for our next story hour on Tuesday, June 11 from 10:30-11:30am, when Nicole Fazio's Down East in the Ocean will be featured.

Last week, five local families participated in the Preschool Story Hour featuring Sarah Marwil Lamstein's Big Night for Salamanders. The "Big Night" is the first warm and rainy night in the spring when salamanders and frogs migrate to the vernal pool where they were born, to breed and lay their eggs.

Lamstein's story follows a young boy and his family as they set out on the Big Night to help spotted salamanders cross a nearby road. They stop cars, encourage drivers to slow down, and carefully pick up salamanders and place them close to the vernal pool where they are headed. The story provides a wonderful stewardship message, and encourages all of us to be mindful of wildlife crossing our roadways.