24/08/2010

Issued by Castle Howard

The 2nd annual Wild About Wood Festival, a fundraising event for The Arboretum Trust, Kew at Castle Howard, will be held at the arboretum on Saturday 11th and Sunday 12th September.

At the inaugural festival last year The Discovery Zone, dedicated to the festival's younger visitors, welcomed more than 1,300 children who enjoyed a range of free activities including pond-dipping, explorienteering and building with oak. One workshop, particularly popular with the inquisitive youngsters, involved dissecting mammal droppings! Demand was so great for places that extra workshops had to be laid on at the last minute to avoid any tears of disappointment!

So in 2010 The Discovery Zone will more than double in size to cope with the estimated demand. Arboretum Art, shelter building, Mollusc Madness and bushcraft skills have all been added to last year's favourites. The Discovery Zone now offers over 5,000 workshop and activity places, all designed to introduce children to the marvels and mysteries of the natural world around them.

Dr. Katherine Forsey, Education & Outreach Programme Manager at The Arboretum Trust, said "We were thrilled by the enthusiastic response to The Discovery Zone in 2009. Our staff and volunteers worked incredibly hard to make sure all the children had the very best experience and that nobody was left disappointed. But we've recently launched our Schools' Initiative, in which we offered free Wild About Wood tickets to North Yorkshire primary schoolchildren, so we expect to welcome even more youngsters in 2010."

"We're determined that every child has the opportunity to participate and have fun with nature, so we and our wonderful workshop providers wanted to put together an even bigger and better programme for 2010. We're incredibly grateful to the Howardian Hills AONB Sustainable Development Fund, who have funded this expansion and enabled us to keep all The Discovery Zone activities free of charge, and are excited to be able to offer children so many new experiences to explore."

As well as The Discovery Zone the festival offers a huge variety of woodland craft demonstrations, including pole-lathe turning, heavy-horse logging and willow weaving. For the more intrepid visitor, the festival even offers visitors the chance to have a go at archery, climb a tree, or ride in a coracle on the arboretum lake!

Full festival details can be found at http://www.wildaboutwood.org/

ENDS