On Friday 6th February James Murray from the Boyne Valley Activity Centre came to give a River Biodiversity Presentation to senior classes.
The Boyne Valley Activity Centre is an ecotourism company. Just like our school has became more environmentally friendly, they had to change their policies and procedures so that they could become more environmentally friendly.
James spoke to us about Biodiversity and the impact we as human beings have on the environment.
This is what we learnt:
We became more aware of different species and habitats.
There is a butterfly called the Painted Lady that comes from Morocco in North Africa to our own Broadmeadow river here in Ashbourne in springtime. This species of butterfly makes a remarkable journey of 2000 kilometres every year.
The Broadmeadow river used to be a dirty river but thanks to the work of the Ashbourne Tidy Town Committee it is now known as an Urban Corridor. As a result birds and otters have been seen in the Broadmeadow River.
Four hundred to five hundred years ago weirs and mills were built in the Boyne river. This prevented the salmon from spawning. They have now started to dig out these weirs and mills which has resulted in the salmon returning to spawn again.
It was a very informative presentation which left us with lots of green food for thought!!