April 20th is the John Muir Birthday – Earth day celebration. We’ve been doing what we can to get ready for it and the many hundreds of children that join our activity. This year we wanted to emphasize beavers importance to salmon, so we’re creating a banner that can be used in the children’s parade at the beaver festival. The idea is that kids would will pick a button with either species out of a hat and then draw that species on a 6-foot table runner. By the end of the day we should have something truly splendid, covered in memorable children’s artwork. The complete banner will be mounted on poles so it can be carried in the parade. Here’s how the banner looks before the kids decorate it. We used leftover tattoos from Coyote Studios to get them started.
Of course no American child lives past the age of 10 without having to play at least ONE game of “Simon says” – so I thought “Salmon sez” would be very familiar. There will be various beaver/salmon puppets hanging around the tent where kids are working and some images to get them inspired. This poster came out very cute so I think it will be on display as well.
As you know, the best way to get adults to pay attention to a new idea is to have them watch their children drawing it for 15 minutes. And maybe for them to snap a photo of their child in the parade featuring said idea very cutely so that the photo gets sent to grandparents.
Works for me.
I’ve been chatting about the idea with Dan Logan from NOAA Marine Fisheries in Santa Rosa who will be joining us again for this years beaver festival. He was asking me about the fish population in Alhambra Creek and who was monitoring it. I told him about our informal photos and playing ‘name that fish’ with Peter Moyle over the years.
He laughed and said he had to be careful with that game, because one time a man asked “can you tell a steelhead and a salmon apart if I send you a photo?” so of course, fisheries biologist Dan answered, yes I can.
Then the man sent him a FILET.
Earth day is always fun and exhausting, and there is so much to see and do. If you want to join the fun you should stop by and say hi, or lend a hand!
