Tree Day Lá na gCrann 2014

Tree Day 2014
We invited Mrs. Kelly back to school on Thursday 9th October (Tree Day) to plant a tree for Tree Day.  This year we planted an Alder Tree.  We planted it in our Wildlife Park beside the school.  Here is some information about the Alder Tree:

Alder / Alnus Glutinosa.
"Common or Black Alder"
broadly conical, in shape.

Pear shaped shining green leaves which stay on the trees until late in Autumn, very attractive in Spring with hanging catkins. Alder trees are excellent for screening and sheltering a site. They thrive in waterlogged soil, it will really love the wildlife park.

Every Alder has both male catkins and female fruits, which look like small pine cones. When Alder wood is submerged in water it becomes as hard as stone. Did you know that is why they are used in the building of canal lock gates. 

We also planted some daffodil bulbs in the park for Spring.

Nature Trail

A Nature Trail has been developed for the Wildlife Park with the help and advice of an environmental education officer. Ten stops have been chosen and marked in the Wildlife Park and each stop has an accompanying axctivity sheet and information sheet. This is really graet fun and is a wonderfully active way to enjoy and learn about nature using the Wildlife Park.

Tree Planting

Tree planting has been carried out in recent years, to celebrate Lá na gCrann every October and National Tree Week every March. A very exciting project was initiated by the local Creggs Tidy Towns Committee this year. It was called "Sponsor a Tree" Project, it gave the chance to families in the village and the wider community an oooprtunity to sponsor a tree - this resulted in an extra 35 trees being planted in the Wildlife park this march for National Tree Week. The names of all the families and individuals who sponsored a tree will be acknowledged in a permanent way in the park.

La na gCrann 2012
Today it is Tree day.  We were planting an Oak Tree the Irish for an oak is dair.  David Silke told us about the oak tree.  Fr. Hogan came for tree day.  David told us about hard wood and soft wood.  The theme for tree day is "If Trees could Talk".  by Eve 4th Class.

The Butterfly Garden

The butterfly garden is another lovely feature of the Wildlife park. Over the years we have been busy planting an area of the park that would be especially attractive to butterflies and bees. Buddleia, sedum, lavender, red-currant and crab apple trees have all been planted in this area to encourage "feileacáin agus na beacha"

Wildlife Park

The wildlife park in creggs is adjacent to the school and is a wonderful asset for us at the school. We can walk down there safely and we have been planting and taling care of it for a good number of years now. it consists of a wetland area where lots of yellow flag irises, silver birch trees and alder trees grow: This area is on the opposite side of the lovely river called the Derryhippo river that runs through the wildlife park. The Derryhippo river is a tributary of the river Suck which in turn is a tributory of the River Shannon, Ireland's longest river. The river has a beautiful stone arch bridge over it and under this bridge live some Daubenton's bats. Traces of other life have been found as well by our local widlife ranger. Recently we had an interesting visit from two members of the Fisheries Board and having taken samples of the river we were all introgues by all the wonderful signs of healthy insect life evident in the samples.