We had a "real" farm kid staying with us this week and he certainly showed us what separates the farm kids from the townies.
You can just see the farm kid in the stream, while a former farmers daughter sits on the bank wishing she still jumped in streams, climbed trees and chased other kids with weta's and hu hu grubs.
We waited and watched for eels coming upstream attracted by the smell of the eggs, while he just waded on in bare toes only covered by orange "crocks" and broke the couple of eggs that hadn't exploded when they hit the water. Though instead of high -tailing it out of the water quickly, he stayed in to look for koura or fresh water crayfish.
It was nice to see that our stream is so healthy with wildlife, he found 5 in a matter of minutes. He also informed me their Maori name was "koura" as in "Kaikoura" on the South Island East coast, renowned for it's lovely sea crayfish and whale watching. We spied about 3 eels (in Maori tuna )make their way upstream to our eggs, but they weren't as big as the ones we saw last summer.
We also discussed the New Zealand place names we know which include the words Kai (food) Koura (crayfish) and tuna (eel) and came up with quite a few from the areas we had lived and visited. These give a good clue to the history of an area. We deciphered another Maori place name we know. The road where we live translates to: dog oven!! So we speculated that probably this area may have been known in olden times for eating dog. For the boys especially our evening excursion in cooperated some great lessons that they just wouldn't get if traditionally stuck in a classroom to learn local history and ecology. Parents, never underestimate the value of family life and what kids can learn by"living"
It was nice to see that our stream is so healthy with wildlife, he found 5 in a matter of minutes. He also informed me their Maori name was "koura" as in "Kaikoura" on the South Island East coast, renowned for it's lovely sea crayfish and whale watching. We spied about 3 eels (in Maori tuna )make their way upstream to our eggs, but they weren't as big as the ones we saw last summer. We also discussed the New Zealand place names we know which include the words Kai (food) Koura (crayfish) and tuna (eel) and came up with quite a few from the areas we had lived and visited. These give a good clue to the history of an area. We deciphered another Maori place name we know. The road where we live translates to: dog oven!! So we speculated that probably this area may have been known in olden times for eating dog. For the boys especially our evening excursion in cooperated some great lessons that they just wouldn't get if traditionally stuck in a classroom to learn local history and ecology. Parents, never underestimate the value of family life and what kids can learn by"living"We all came home glad to have taken the time to do it.
"Stuck to the computer boy" formally know as the "teen" sadly didn't join us.
Though at least I could also refer to him as "passed NCEA, stuck to the computer boy". Exam results came through yesterday.
Or to be specific, I should describe as: "often grouchy with mother, doesn't want to work, obsessed with a nice girl, talks to her online, thankfully passed NCEA, stuck to the computer, teen, lovely,boy"
