Get down, get muddy!
Whyalla school kids have spent a messy day getting dirty all in the name of a good cause – to help their local environment.
To help revegetate Whyalla’s hills, nine children from the Whyalla swimming team have been playing in the mud making clay balls and filling them with seeds indigenous to our Whyalla hills to give the area and its wildlife a big boost in health.
"Local plants are an important way to improve the health of our environment as they are the food and habitat source for our local animals and help them survive our harsh weather conditions,” Natural Resources Eyre Peninsula (NREP) Officer Kate Brocklehurst said.
“What we've done today is part of a rehabilitation project for our hills. We spent one day getting really dirty playing with lots of muddy clay and putting seeds in the middle of the balls and then we let them dry and came back and threw them into the areas that need new plants," eight- year-old Minette Schoeman said.
"It was so much fun," Minette added. Last year, NREP with the help of the Council undertook controlled burning of pest weeds on the hill and now the area has been given the best chance at being restored to its natural beauty.
"There are thousands of seeds that will now germinate as the clay balls disintegrate naturally,” Kate said.
