We had a very successful day at Pippfest in Dorking on Sunday, the team - Caroline, Simon, Nigel and Sue - were kept busy chatting with visitors. The magnetic fishing game was very popular with both children and adults trying to identify a variety of river dwelling fish, invertebrates, animals, and birds - it's harder than you think to sort a mink from an otter and water vole, especially when they aren't to scale; matching the invertebrate larva/nymph stage to the correct adult fly and identifying a chub from a perch was also proved a challenge!
We had a large map and asked visitors to write on a post-it their favourite 'activity/place/memory' on the river Mole, it is good to focus on what is enjoyable about the Mole, and not just talk endlessly about the pollution issues! But of course we did lots of that, explaining the various and complex sources of pollution, what the results of our monthly phosphate testing has shown, and answering a myriad of interesting questions. We also were learning ourselves from knowledgeable visitors who had lots of expertise and ideas to offer.
It was a thoroughly enjoyable day, the other stands were colourful and inspiring, the food stalls kept us sustained with bacon rolls, iced coffee and beer, and the bands were excellent to boogie along with! 😄
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