Fencing In Beauty
And Fencing Out Future Problems
Yesterday, the 27th of July, Miss Louise Newman, from Mundubbera, QLD, came to visit our school to talk about the importance of having clean water in catchments that provide water for agriculture. Louise is an Environmental Consultant and she organised a very fun activity for the junior secondary students to take part in. We learnt many things when with her yesterday, such as it is very important to have clean water for agriculture as it improves the cattle’s health (just like humans) and they put on weight. We learnt that fencing of water catchment areas can reduce erosion and new grass will grow. Louise said that when new grass grows it improves the water quality as filtration occurs when the water passes through. We learnt all of this in a very fun and hands on activity, in the school sandpit. We made a model of a dam with an aluminium tray, and then we put a plastic garbage bag over a bank of sand, sprinkled a bit of sand on top and then let the water run down the bank. The water travelled down the bank into the tray catching the sand as it went. We then made a fence and fenced off the dam, we made troughs showing how the cattle reach water when the dam is fenced off and placed some grass on the bank. We then poured water down the bank and the grass caught some of the sand resulting in very clear water. This demonstrated how effective fencing off dams and water catchment areas is and how agriculture would benefit from one small action. Miss Louise Newman’s visit was very fun and it showed us how important it is that Australia learns more about erosion and the agricultural industry. Selena Still, Yr 7
|