Blog: Learning

Last Friday we attended the Torfaen Treasure Day at Pontypool Museum, where the latest treasure finds from the Trevethin and Henllys area were presented.

The treasure included a decorative gold finger-ring from the late 16^th or early 17^th century, as well as Bronze Age artefacts, which date back 3,000 years. The Bronze Age hoard consists of five Bronze Age artefacts, including three socketed axes and two spearheads and these will be the first Bronze Age items to be displayed at Pontypool Museum.

Adam Gwilt, Principal Curator (Prehistory) at Amgueddfa Cymru, presenting the Trevethin Hoard.

Rt Hon. Lord Paul Murphy of Torfaen, President of the Torfaen Museum Trust, welcomed in the event warming up the audience before presentations from Adam Gwilt and Rhianydd Biebrach from Amgueddfa Cymru and local MP Mr Nick Thomas-Symonds followed.

The newly declared treasure was presented to the museum by Adam Gwilt, the Principal Curator of Prehistory in the History & Archaeology Department. Adam talked about the history of the treasure and provided background information so the audience could gain a further understanding of the items. Since the items were acquired by Pontypool Museum with grant funding from the Saving Treasures;Telling Stories Project Dr Rhianydd Biebrach, the Saving Treasures; Telling Stories Project Officer discussed the key messages and aims behind the project.

Rhianydd Biebrach, project officer for Saving Treasures Telling Stories at Amgueddfa Cymru, giving a presentation about the project.

The Saving Treasures; Telling Stories project is currently working with the University of South Wales assisting student journalists for a two-week work placement where they can use their journalistic writing and interviewing skills to help tell the stories behind items. We thought it would be a good idea to send them up to Pontypool Museum before the event to talk to the curators at the museum and the finders of the treasure.

They spoke to Gareth Wileman, a metal detectorist in the Pontypool area who found the hoard back in November 2014, and asked him how he felt about his discovery being exhibited. While we would have loved to hear from Simon Harrison, the finder of the gold finger-ring, he wasn’t available at the time so a potential phone interview looks likely for the next batch of students.

The students are still currently working on this project and will provide us with written and video content of their interview - so keep your eyes peeled on our Twitter and Facebook account for more content and videos coming your way!

The hoard is being acquired by Pontypool Museum with grant funding from the Saving Treasures;Telling Stories Project. This project, funded via the Collecting Cultures programme of the Heritage Lottery Fund, is acquiring archaeological objects discovered by members of the public for public museum collections across Wales. The project is also encouraging communities to engage with their pasts and portable archaeological heritage, by funding a programme of community archaeology projects led by staff in museums throughout Wales.

Hi Bulb Buddies,

Thank you for all of your hard work on the Spring Bulbs for Schools project.

Please check your data entries and flower records this week to ensure that they are all correct and up to date. I will analyse the results over the holidays and will announce the winners and prizes on 28th April. The certificates and prizes will be sent out by 15th May. The report will be sent out the week of 15th May.
 

 
All schools with complete weather and flower records will have a chance of winning a nature activity trip for their class! In previous years we have drawn winners for England, Scotland and Wales from a hat.

Runners-up and high achieving schools will receive sunflower seeds.

All schools that have entered regular weather data and flower records will receive Supper Scientist certificates and pencils.

Applications for next year are now open!

Applications are on a first come first serve basis. Please read the form carefully.

Schools in Wales                                         Schools in England and Scotland

The Edina Trust are opening their applications to schools in Rhondda Cynon Taf, Merthyr Tydfil and Conwy. If your school is located in one of these areas and you would like to take part in the Edina Extension project please read the details here.

Thank you for all of your hard work Bulb Buddies!

Your Comments:

Professor Plant: I'm sorry if some of you were disappointed because your plant didn't grow or didn't produce a flower. This happens sometimes and is down to pot luck, so please don't think that you have done anything wrong. There are guidelines on the website about how to prepare your bulbs for re-planting next year. And if your school has entered complete weather records you will be receiving Sunflower seeds in May. Thank you for taking part in the project Bulb Buddies! 

Weather comments:

Rougemont Junior School: Last week, signing off Professor Plant.

Our Lady of Peace Primary School: We are very sad that this week is the last week of the competition. We really enjoyed it.

Garstang St. Thomas' CE Primary School: Have a lovely Easter Professor! Hope we have helped with your investigation.

Barmston Village Primary School: It's the last week 👍 I hope we win ⚡️⭐️🌟🌙 if we do your the best🔥

Garstang St. Thomas' CE Primary School: wet and warm like the teacher's tea.

Arkholme CE Primary School: This week was very warm. The mystery bulbs have now flowered and there are about two daffodils that have not quite come out yet. We did not get a lot of rainfall due to the nice sun.

Broad Haven Primary School: The last week for our data and we have only missed 2 INSET days and half term when we were not in school . Our mystery bulb flowered on March 27th it is a lovely red tulip Thank you agian for letting us join the project we have enjoyed it. Hope we can join again next year!!

Carnbroe Primary School: It has been mixed weather this week sometimes cold but mostly we can feel it becoming warmer. All our daffodils finally flowered. Some children were disappointed because their crocus did not flower. We are taking our plants home with us. Have a good Easter and thank you for including us in your project.

Carnbroe Primary School: We had mixed weather last week and many of our daffodils have not flowered, yet! It snowed on Tuesday and we sent Professor Bulb photographs of our daffodils and crocus in the snow. By lunchtime the sun was out and had evaporated all the snow. We decided these flowers must be really hardy to survive in the cold.

Stanford in the Vale Primary School: It's been a cold windy week! We cannot believe spring is coming .The clocks go forward this week, looking forward to lighter evenings.

Broad Haven Primary School: The weather is getting better we have been to our beach to do a marine litter pick this week. We have tidied our garden ready to plant vegetables.

Flower comments:

Ysgol Glanyfferi: Sadly all of the crocuses have died but some are fighting for their lives

Ysgol Borth y Gest: On Monday two tulips plants appeared. We were all surprised!!!!!!
We have daffodils, crocus and tulips. They look beautiful.

Ysgol Deganwy: Everyone is taking their plant home today

Darran Park Primary: Another 9 have flowered the remainder have no flowers at all.

Darran Park Primary: 12 more crocuses have flowered.

Darran Park Primary: The remainder of the daffodil bulbs have flowered, we have a total 40 flowers together.

Darran Park Primary: All of our daffodil bulbs have flowered, but we are still waiting for our mystery bulbs to flower.

Tonyrefail Primary School: Unfortunately a bug eat some of my plant

Tonyrefail Primary School: Thank you for the bulbs they are good.

Usworth Colliery Primary School: All have grown but no flowers at all as of 30th March.

Rougemont Junior School: Pretty colour

Rougemont Junior School: A small daffodil, did it have too much shade?

Rougemont Junior School: A very tall daffodil, I looked after it well.

Rougemont Junior School: Daffodils are tricky to measure.

Rougemont Junior School: Beautiful!

Wormit Primary School: Very good daffodil :^) !

Arkholme CE Primary School: Our bulbs have flowered including the daffodils and the crocus; and brought them home for mother’s day as a gift. But some of the crocuses are starting to die.

Bellyeoman Primary School: Has lots of leaves but no flower yet.

Broad Haven Primary School: Our daffodils look lovely in their pots and we can see other signs of Spring around our school

Tonyrefail Primary School: My daffodil grew taller than I thought.

Ysgol Deganwy: All of the plants are fully grown.

Hi Bulb Buddies,

We’ve had lots of flower records in! Spring is truly here.

The results so far give us an average flowering date for the Crocus of 3^rd March, and an average flowering date for the Daffodil of 8^th March.

Last year the average flowering date for the Crocus was 10^th March and the average flowering date for the Daffodil was 15^th March. So the flower data entries shared so far indicate that our plants have flowered earlier this year than last year!

The graphs on the right show the results so far for temperature, rainfall and sunlight hours compared with last year. From these we can see that although the average temperatures were much lower October-January, there was a sharp increase in February with temperatures exceeding those of the previous year. We can also see that although rainfall was much lower, sunlight hours were higher for the October-January period than they were the previous year. It’s likely that a warm February and high sunlight hours resulted in our bulbs flowering slightly earlier this spring!

Thank you for all your lovely comments Bulb Buddies. I’m glad to hear that you are enjoying the project. Keep up the good work!

Professor Plant

Your comments:

Weather comments:

Ysgol Pentrefoelas: Mae hi wedi bob yn andros o sych. Ryden ni wedi bob allan yn chwarae bob dydd.

Carnbroe Primary School: It rained most days but it was not too cold. On Monday and Thursday the sun was out and the sky was blue, it felt like Spring. Still no signs of our bulbs flowering. Maybe next week.

Ysgol Glanyfferi: It is starting to feel like spring.

Arkholme CE Primary School: Our first crocus bulb has flowered and is looking good and healthy. We have also moved the plant pots into the sunlight so hopefully they will flower too. The daffodils from last year have grown also the weather has been improving and there has been more sunlight.

Broad Haven Primary School: The garden is looking lovely with the pots of crocus and daffodils flowering. On Thursday the temperature got up to 15.5 at lunchtime. Today (Friday) the sun has come out this afternoon. The children are very excited because their bulbs from last year which we planted in the bank are now starting to flower.

Stanford in the Vale Primary School: Hello, this week it has been cold and hot and it has been a really good week because we have had a delivery of two new trolleys and we even invested in a wormery which is a big hit with our foundation friends.

Flower comments:

Ysgol Pentrefoelas: Fy mlodyn yw y cyntaf I agor y flwyddyn hon,ond y llynedd nath o ddim agor o gwbwl.

Ysgol Pentrefoelas: blwyddyn dwytha mi ddaru y cenin pedr flodeuo ar y 21ain o Fawrth, 2016.

New Monkland Primary School: We noticed that our crocus plants started to grow slightly later than our daffodils. We were so excited to see them growing in our plant pots.

Ysgol Deganwy: All of them of grown and most people have taken them home.

New Monkland Primary School: We were so excited to see our plants starting to grow and the class enjoyed getting to see the Daffodil in their plant pots.

St Robert's R.C Primary School: I like that it’s blue not purple.

Beulah School: :):D All of our flowers have flowered except one :( :P
We have enjoyed our project :D ;)

Carbrain Primary School: We have flowers. :)

Carnbroe Primary School: My daffodil opened on the Friday and it has a small flower.

Severn Primary: I like it cos it is little and cute.

Severn Primary: Sadly a football hit my daffodil and it fell off.

Severn Primary: When I saw my flower it was so beautiful and I was happy.

Severn Primary: I like it cos the colour yellow is bright and the colour of the sun.

Severn Primary: It was a long time you af to wait a long time to open the daffodil.

Severn Primary: For some reason my flower never grew.

Severn Primary: Thank you for the spring bulb project.

Ellel St John's CE Primary School: We think that the crocuses have been water logged because when we went to measure them they were all floppy and droopy.

St. Michael's Primary School: The daffodil has not produced a flower.

Carnbroe Primary School: It rained lots this week but we checked on our flowering bulbs every day. Many of our bulbs in the pots flowered. The daffodils and crocus in the ground also flowered, hooray!

Auchenlodment Primary School: Nearly all of our crocuses have opened, we're now excitedly waiting for our daffodils to bloom.

Our Lady of Peace Primary School: When we go out it is fun and when it is raining we get soaked.

Our Lady of Peace Primary School:  It was fun planting the flowers. I like Daffodil.

St Robert's R.C Primary School: I enjoyed looking after it and watching it grow.

St Robert's R.C Primary School: I enjoyed the whole experience

St Robert's R.C Primary School: I enjoyed planting it and taking it home.

St Robert's R.C Primary School: I liked watching the stages of growth.

St Robert's R.C Primary School: I had fun taking part.

Barmston Village Primary School: My doffodil is quite small but the flower is beautiful.

Barmston Village Primary School: My daffodil is very tall compared to some of the others.

Barmston Village Primary School: My daffodil is smaller than some others but I think my sign might have been in the way of the sun getting to the plant.

Barmston Village Primary School: We've noticed the crocuses have a different flower to the ones we planted in our village last year. Your crocuses have smaller pointier leaves than ours.

Barmston Village Primary School: My daffodil is only small and my crocus didn't grow. I wonder if I didn't plant my correctly.

Ellel St John's CE Primary School: We had 15 crocus' were open on Wednesday but when we checked on Friday there were 27 crocus'.

Ellel St John's CE Primary School: 8 of our daffodils are open and the tallest of them (When we measured them on Monday) was 250mm.

Broad Haven Primary School: We are delighted we have our crocus and daffodils flowering. But it was very rainy on Thursday.

Broad Haven Primary School: We have the double- first crocus and first daffodil!! The bulbs from last year’s project are now flowering in the bank by our garden.

Broad Haven Primary School: Yes ours flowered first. A purple crocus.

Ysgol Deganwy: all of the flowers have budded.

Standing on what felt like the top of the world and slowly regaining our breaths back, they were soon taken away again when looking at the awe inspiring landscape of Whiteford Sands in Swansea Bay.

Swansea Museum is working on a project called ‘The Lost Treasures of Swansea Bay’, which is funded by the help of the ‘Saving Treasures; Telling Stories’ project. Saving Treasures is funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund which is acquiring archaeological objects for local and national collections, providing training for heritage professionals and volunteers and engaging local communities with their pasts.

Last week the museum teamed up with young people from Swansea YMCA, The National Trust and The Glamorgan Gwent Archaeology Trust to hike around Whiteford Sands in the Gower area of Swansea Bay. This walk was intended to give us an understanding of the changing landscape of Swansea Bay since the Bronze Age.

Young people from Swansea YMCA, The National Trust and The Glamorgan Gwent Archaeology Trust members are gearing up for a hike in the Whiteford sands area in Swansea.

The Landscape

Corinne Benbow is a National Trust Ranger and she led the first half of the walk up a very steep hill in order to get the best viewpoints overlooking the beach and woodland areas.

Corinne explained that what we could see was quite unspoiled, she said: “You’re looking at quite an ancient landscape and it wouldn’t have changed that much since the Bronze Age.”

Pointing over towards the coastline, Corinne spoke about how the landscape has slightly changed over the years.

“This piece of land is actually brand new and doesn’t belong to anyone as it has only appeared over the last twenty-five years; that’s because of the sand being washed in and building up. The new dunes get washed away and are then re-built back up; so it’s always shifting, but is basically the same as it’s been for thousands of years.”

The view of the Bay from above

Hidden Secrets

After a lunch break and water painting session of the landscape, we continued our walks through the woods, over the sand dunes and onto the pebbly beach. It was here where Paul Huckfield, an archaeologist from the Glamorgan Gwent Archaeology Trust, revealed some hidden treasures found on the beach.

Paul said: “We are currently stood on a prehistoric ground surface which was originally a forest. This dates back to the late Mesolithic, early Neolithic age at around 5000-4000 BC. As you can see the remains of the trees around you are still here.”

At a first glance you would assume the trees were drift wood washed ashore, but they were in fact, alder trees almost 7000 years old. Paul explained how the landscape which is currently a sandy beach area would have actually been a woodland area similar to the one we walked through. 

Why were they a secret?

Nobody knew these 7000 year old trees even existed until they were found between 2010- 2012 when the beach lost some of its sand and the trees came to light.

Standing on Prehistoric ground surface.

The Saving Treasures; Telling Stories Project is a partnership project between Amgueddfa Cymru – National Museum Wales, The Federation of Museums and Art Galleries of Wales (The FED) and the Portable Antiquities Scheme in Wales (PAS Cymru) promoting the portable archaeological heritage of Wales through acquiring finds made by the public. The project secured Heritage Lottery Grant funding in October 2014 through the Collecting Cultures programme and runs for five years.

It will help Swansea Museum to acquire and safeguard items of portable heritage with special significance to Swansea Bay for the people of Swansea. It will also enable the museum to work with local communities to engage with and explore these treasures and to find out more about Swansea Bay

Hello Bulb Buddies,

Thank you to all schools who have already entered their flower data! Remember to make sure the dates entered are correct and that the height has been entered in millimetres! We have had a few flowers reported for April and lots of very short crocus and daffodils!

If you spot that your entries need amending, just re-enter them to the website with a comment to explain that the new entry is to replace a previous one.

I have enjoyed reading the comments that have been sent with the weather and flower data over the last fortnight! I’ve attached some of these below. An interesting question was raised by Stanford in the Vale Primary, who asked whether they need to enter multiple flower records if the height and flowering date are the same in each? It is still important to enter this flower data, as the number of flowers at a particular height and particular date will impact on the overall averages for the project.

To work out your schools average/mean flowering height for the crocus and daffodil, add all of your crocus or daffodil heights together and divide by the number of entries for that flower.

If you have one flower at 200mm and one at 350mm the mean would be 275mm. If you have one flower at 200mm and ten flowers at 350mm your mean flower height would be 341mm. This is why it is important that you enter all of your flower records.

Every flower record is important and impacts on the overall results. If your plant hasn’t grown by 31^st March, please send in a flower record without a date or height and explain this in the comment section. If your plant has grown but hasn’t produced a flower by 31^st March please enter the height without a date and explain this in the comments section.

Keep the questions coming Bulb Buddies! There are resources and activities on the website to help you. Once your plant has flowered, why not draw it and label the different parts of the plant? I would love to see photos of your drawings and will post any that are sent in on my next Blog!

Keep up the good work Bulb Buddies!

Professor Plant

Your comments:

We’ve had lots of lovely comments about your plants, sent in with both weather and flower data:

Ysgol Y Wern: Mae'r bylbiau i gyd wedi egnio ac mae sawl blodyn crocws i'w weld!! Mae'r bylbiau ddirgel yn edrych yn diddorol iawn gyda streipiau ar y ddail!

Ysgol Pennant: Mi roedd yn hwyl iawn i tyfu crocws a i weld o.

Stanford in the Vale Primary School: 17 daffodils have all flowered on the same day! Do we still have to enter individual flowers? They all measure the same height! Regards R.

Professor Plant: Hi Stanford in the Vale, I’ve answered your question in detail above as it was the star comment this week! It’s a very good question, but all of the individual flower records are important and can help us to create a bigger picture of the results! I have a special task for you this week, why not work out your school’s average flowering date for this year and last year, and let me know whether your plants flowered earlier or later on average this year! There’s a fun game on BBC Bitesize to help you with Mode, Median, Mean and Range! http://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/ks2/maths/data/mode_median_mean_range/play/

St Robert's R.C Primary School: I am so glad my bulb has flowered.

St Mary's Primary School: Our first crocus flower has opened. We are all really excited.

Ellel St John's CE Primary School: They've grown quite quickly and are just opening.

Stanford in the Vale Primary School: We will send photographs later today. The crocus have a beautiful radiant deep purple colour.

Rougemont Junior School: Our Crocus are flowering and our Daffodils are growing well. We hope it will be sunny tomorrow. I think we are in luck!!!

Tonyrefail Primary School: Hi Professor Plant most of our plants have grown. We are measuring them. Nine of are crocuses have flowered.

Garstang St. Thomas' CE Primary School: We had a couple of frosty mornings this week but our crocus plants are still flowering and all our daffodils have buds on them now.

Beulah School: A lot of crocuses have flowered but none of the daffodils have yet.

Boston West Academy: 2 daffodils have grown

Ysgol Deganwy: all of the plants came out the soil yay!

Rougemont Junior School: our crocus is growing well but needs sunshine and warmth to open its flowers.

Barmston Village Primary School: The bulbs are starting to grow!

Loch Primary School: The plants have grown quite a lot!

Ysgol Deganwy: All of the bulbs have come up from the soil.

Broad Haven Primary School: Our daffodils and crocus now have leaves but no flowers yet.

Loch Primary School: We are happy to see our plants growing!

Tonyrefail Primary School: Our Crocuses have also started to grow.

Garstang St. Thomas' CE Primary School: We were back into school on Tuesday. We had a surprise as J's crocus had blossomed and a lot of us have noticed our plants have grown buds so we are all on stand-by to record our blooms too. Storm Doris came on Thursday so we didn't catch all the rain as most of it was sideways! Luckily none of our bulb pots were blown over.

Professor Plant: Fantastic Bulb Buddies, I'm glad to hear you are watching your plants so carefully! Don't worry about sideways rain as the rain gauge is designed to collect a sample of rainfall. Keep up the good work Bulb Buddies!

We’ve had lots of insightful comments about the weather, and many of you commented on storm Doris. More information on storm Doris can be found here: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/barometer/uk-storm-centre/storm-doris

St Robert's R.C Primary School: Storm Doris wedi chwythu y brigau oddiar y coed ar dydd iau.

Ysgol Pentrefoelas: Yn wlyb iawn ar Dydd Llyn ond wedyn yn mynd yn sych.

Ysgol Y Wern: Oer iawn, iawn wythnos yma. Wedi bwrw eira ar ddydd Gwener.

Carnbroe Primary School: We had lots of rain on Tuesday and we were slipping about the garden while we were checking on our plants. Still no flowering yet. Nearly everyone's bulb has begun to show shoots. C's bulb has not come through the soil yet.

Professor Plant: Ooo be careful if the ground is slippery Bulb Buddies! I hope C’s plants grow, but if they haven’t grown by 31^st March please let me know by entering a flower record but leaving the date and height blank. It’s as important to record this as it is flower records!

Stanford in the Vale Primary School: Hello, this week has been quite chilly and on Monday it was icy. It has been rainy to. Bye Bye.

Rougemont Junior School: It's going well. Hopefully it will be sunny tomorrow.

Arkholme CE Primary School: This week the Temperature has gone down quite a bit on Thursday. And there was not a lot of rain on Friday and Wednesday are bulbs are starting to grow so we are quite pleased. Thank you very much.

Garstang St. Thomas' CE Primary School: It’s been getting colder this week but our bulbs are still growing.

Darran Park Primary: The temperature has been quite consistent over the week. There has been a drop in the amount of rainfall this week.

Henllys CIW Primary: It has been snowy a little bit this morning.

Staining C of E Primary School: There has not been much rain during the second part of the week. It has been a bit warmer as well. There was some rain on Monday and Tuesday.

Arkholme CE Primary School: This week was a very dull and wet week. There was a little bit of growth from the bulbs that we planted. It was also a very cold week on Friday the sun came out and the temperature rised. Best wishes.

Stanford in the Vale Primary School: Hello, On monday it was teacher training day so we couldn't record it. But this week it has been hot and cold. On Thursday we had storm Doris so it was very cold. Bye,bye.

Ysgol Rhostyllen: This is fun.

Our Lady of Peace Primary School: I liked doing the temperature because it was fun.

Broad Haven Primary School: Yr 5 are in LLangrannog this week so we are recording the weather. Rain and gales at the end of the week.

Professor Plant: Thank you for filling in Bulb Buddies, I hope you enjoyed the project! Good work.