A visit to Martin Mere
Chris Whitehead with Ava the puppet
We are up the M6 towards Manchester this week as Barney and I are visiting WWT Martin Mere to meet their Learning Manager Chris Whitehead and install Generation Wild.
Roundhouse roof at WWT Martin Mere
It’s exciting, as Martin Mere is one of the biggest of the 10 WWT sites, and I haven’t travelled this far since before the covid pandemic began. A great thing about working with naturalists and nature enthusiasts is that there’s always things to learn from these keen-eyed professionals. Chris gave us a tour of their lovely wetland centre and explained that ‘Martin’ means ‘Mere-town’ as the settlement was grown up on the shores of the Mere, an old English word for lake or sea, which nowadays is more synonymous with a wetland or fenland marsh area. The round houses they’ve built by hand on the site give a nod to simpler times and are used in reenactment sessions for children to learn about different periods in British history. There’s an impressive live collection of birds as well as an extensive nature reserve and our interactive trail will have groups exploring multiple different terrains - Chris has really thought about ways of getting school groups and families off the beaten paths and into the more wilder areas of the wetlands.
Before Ava had even got to her nest, a passing mother with two young children exclaimed “Look there’s Ava…. and she’s got hair just like yours!” It was a heart-lifting moment, where I knew our work with diversity consultant Ngaio Anyia was really worth it’s weight in gold. We’re really hoping Ava feels at home here and stirs the hearts of the children and families who meet her.
Another great meeting this week was having lunch with one of our collaborators, Loz Ives - one half of the duo, Fieldwork, who have been designing the Generation Wild website. Zoom and Teams have made remote working so commonplace this past year, but often at the expense of chatty lunches and communing over cups of tea. It was great to see Loz in the flesh and for him to meet Ava and try out the translatorphones on one of the trails.