Over recent years, former landfill ground at Dimmer near Castle Cary has been transformed into a thriving nature reserve by Carymoor Environmental Trust.

This month, the team explain what they get up to during the school holidays.

MORE than 5,000 people visit Carymoor each year and a large percentage of these are school children, coming for our exciting educational activities.

Our Wild Days Out give hands-on experience of the wildlife and habitats at Carymoor, while our tours of the working and capped areas of the landfill site encourage children to think carefully about waste and sustainability issues. Our outreach programme takes sustainable learning into schools - we deliver a range of fun workshops and assemblies covering a variety of environmental issues, all closely linked to the National Curriculum.

So what do we do in the school holidays? Far from sitting back and taking time off, the education team is busier than ever. Carymoor is buzzing at the moment as the team develops new and exciting ways of getting our message across to children, ready for the new school year in September.

Neil Gemmell is working on his Switch On! theme to get youngsters excited about renewable energy. He has been building an energy-producing bike, and in true Carymoor fashion, is building it out of recycled materials with a lot of the parts retrieved from the Recycling Centre at Dimmer. This way children can see that many of the things we throw away may still be useful, and maybe it will inspire them to be creative themselves. The idea is to connect the bike to various appliances – like a stereo to play music. Children will also get a chance to make small wind turbines and experiment by changing the shape of the blades.

Neil's hoping to develop further ideas for Carymoor's after-school clubs – possibly showing children how to make toys out of waste and natural materials as many African children do. He's also working on a design for a solar oven, made out of a pizza box and some cooking foil. So far he has produced temperatures to 62°C but is still working on it!

Carymoor is a great place to explore plant life. Not only do we have a wide variety of habitats from ponds and bogs to woodland and chalk banks, we also have several living collections of plants. There's a wildflower plant collection of around 400 British species growing in raised beds of recycled lorry tyres, a tree trail, a willow walk with around 200 varieties of willow, and a heritage orchard featuring traditional varieties of cider apples. The challenge is making plants exciting for children.

Julia Percy and Beth Coleman are developing plant-themed games and activities that are both fun and educational, with the help of Dr Anne Bebbington from Science and Plants for Schools. In the Germination Game children experience the challenge of developing from a seed into a plant - what do they need to germinate and can they collect all of the things they need before being eaten? In the Food Factory Challenge, children become parts of the plant and have to work together to ensure their plant food factory functions smoothly, stays healthy and grows. Who are the 'miners' that collect essential minerals like phosphates and nitrates, the 'truckers' who move things around the plant and where do we find the 'chefs' of the plant who turn carbon dioxide and water into food? The Seed Dispersal Game investigates the advantages of producing lots of seeds. Children become sycamore trees and experience wind dispersal in action, finding out what proportion of seeds end up in places where they are likely to germinate and survive.

Come and see us

To find out more, visit our stand at the Castle Cary All Saints Church Fete on Bank Holiday Monday 29th August and heart about our new volunteering programme.

You don't have to be a school group to visit Carymoor. To find out more, or to arrange a visit for an adult group or organisation, contact us on 01963 350143, email info@carymoor.org.uk or visit www.carymoor.org.uk