Hello bulb buddies!

I hope you’re all having fun looking after your bulbs.

Autumn has finally arrived in Cardiff. There is a chill in the air and the leaves on the trees are turning lovely shades of orange, yellow and brown.

Autumn has arrived late this year. October’s weather was warmer and wetter than average and this meant lots of the trees kept their green leaves for longer than usual.

The weather on Halloween was extra-special! Temperatures in some areas of the UK, such as south England and north Wales, reached well over 20°C. 

The temperature in Kew Gardens in west London reached a whopping 23.6°C, which is the highest temperature ever recorded in the UK on Halloween. I hope you didn’t get too hot in your spooky costumes!

I think these weird weather conditions are very interesting and am excited to see what strange things you find during your spring bulb experiments.

Has autumn arrived where you live? Are the leaves changing colour and falling from the trees? Why don’t you take an autumnal picture and send it to me in an email? I might even post it here on my blog.

Remember that you should now have started recording the temperature and rainfall on your weather charts. If you can’t remember what you’re supposed to do you can look at the Keeping Weather Records page on my website.

Many Thanks

Professor Plant

A planting day of bulbous proportions!

Eleven thousand and three hundred bulbs were planted by school scientists across the UK to kick start the Spring Bulbs for Schools investigation. Seven and a half thousand pupils from one hundred and seventy nine schools got planting to investigate climate change.

Here is a map to show you where the bulbs were planted.

Here are some of the pictures they sent in. Follow their progress and the questions they raise as they record the local weather and flowering through the winter and into the spring.

Professor Plant

Ysgol Clocaenog in Denbighshire was awarded first place out of sixty nine Welsh schools taking part in the Museum's Spring Bulbs for Schools investigation this year.

The Super Scientists won a fun-packed trip to the National Slate Museum where they learnt about the Story of Slate, looked for mini-beasts and built giant nests in the quarry!

Professor Plant: “Ysgol Clogaenog did really well in the Spring Bulbs investigation and sent in the most weather data out of all the schools in Wales! This really was an achievement as schools are getting better and better at recording and sending their data. It was lovely to meet the Super Scientists from Ysgol Clocaenog, we had lots of fun building nests and pretending to be little birds! We also learnt lots about Slate and I especially enjoyed watching the slate splitting!”

If you would like to take part in this project next term please complete the on-line application form:

Spring Bulbs for Schools - Application form

Congratulation to the winners of the Flower Drawing Competition 2014! Here are their excellent botanical illustrations.

• 1st: Abbey – Coppull Parish Church School
• 2nd: Louise – SS Philip and James CE Primary School (Pink 3)
• 3rd: Amelie – Stanford in the Vale CE Primary School

In this competition I was looking for botanical illustrations – these are pictures of plants drawn in a scientific way. This means I was looking for beautiful pictures but they also needed clear labels to show the different parts of the flower.

All of the drawing sent in were really fantastic, so I have put them all on our website for you to see! Well done to all of you.

Click here to view all the drawings.

Many thanks,

Prof P

The ‘Spring Bulbs for Schools’ project allows 1000s of schools scientists to work with Amgueddfa Cymru-National Museum Wales to investigate and understand climate change.

Since October 2005, school scientists have been keeping weather records and noting when their flowers open, as part of a long-term study looking at the effects of temperature on spring bulbs.

Certificates have now been sent out to all the 4,075 pupils that completed the project this year.

See Professor Plant's reports or download the spreadsheet to study the trends for yourself!

• Make graphs & frequency charts or calculate the mean.
• See if the flowers opened late in schools that recorded cold weather.
• See how temperature, sunshine and rainfall affect the average flowering dates.
• Look for trends between different locations.
   

Professor Plant

www.museumwales.ac.uk/scan/bulbs

Twitter http://twitter.com/Professor_Plant