Dibs Fletcher: "I’ve been doing 30 Days Wild now with my son since 2016, when he was just 3yrs old. Each June we look forward to a month of being more mindful of nature. This year when I spotted the 12 Days Wild winter challenge, there was no question as to whether we would do it! Here's how we made time for nature every day...
Our 12 Days Wild
12 Days Wild is the Wildlife Trust's festive challenge. We caught up with Great Fen fans, the Fletcher family, to see how they managed to do one wild thing every day!
Day One 12 Days Wild - Hinchingbrooke Park
Day One: We kicked off our challenge with a Christmas Day walk at a local park, Hinchingbrooke Park. It was nice walking round saying 'Happy Christmas' to everyone we passed.
Day Two 12 Days Wild - Feeding the ducks
Day Two: We snuck in a quick visit to the ducks on the way past to see Granny and Grandad and noticed it was a lot quieter than when the ducklings arrive in spring. We normally try to take rice to feed them, but they definitely aren't as interested as when it's bread!
Day Three: After a busy couple of days we spend today snuggled up reading some facts in the new nature books we got for Christmas. Our favourite so far is 'The world's most ridiculous animals'!
Day Three: After a busy couple of days we spend today snuggled up reading some facts in the new nature books we got for Christmas. Our favourite so far is 'The world's most ridiculous animals'!
Day Four: Today was a very cold walk at Ferry Meadows in Peterborough. My son filmed the whole 32 minute walk documenting ‘how beautiful it all is!'
Day Five: We decided to have a night-time adventure at the Ramsey Heights nature reserve and headed out in the dark with torches. We're used to visiting this site for various daytime events but it was fascinating to see it this way. One of my son’s friends joined us and we crept quietly through the woods watching for animals. Amazingly it was the quietest the boys have ever been and it meant we were lucky enough to see a flash of a fox and then watched two deer cross our path and wander slowly into the trees! They talked about this excitedly on the way back home. It was a great experience.
Day Six: This was another cold one so we tested ourselves with some of the Wildlife Trust's nature quizzes. I have to say my son did very well at the poo quiz!
Day Seven: Today we waited for the darkness and wrapped up warm so we could watch the stars. We counted 11 satellites travelling though the sky and I saw a shooting star . Unfortunately, my son missed the shooting star as he had given up star gazing after about 20mins and was jumping on the trampoline in the pitch black. But that's still going wild!
Day Eight: It was New Year's Day and our first nature walk of 2025. We decided to enjoy it at Holme Fen NNR and my son’s friend joined us again. I challenged the boys to find something they thought was small and beautiful. My son found some patterns on the bark of a tree and his friend chose some tiny pinecones. At the end of the walk they said they’d had enough and wanted to get back to the computers. However, I suggested a quick game of poo sticks and we didn’t head home for another 15 minutes while they happily watching reeds race through very slow moving water.
Day Nine: This was a freezing cold day but we were on a mission...bear hunting. We visited Anglesey Abbey near Cambridge with their amazing painted bear trail. They have a big treehouse where you can climb up round the trunk of a huge tree to see what it is like looking down from the height of the leaves. Granny also took her digital camera so Oree had a go at taking photos of reflections in the water.
Day Ten: We discovered lots of ice in the garden and my son had great fun experimenting with how hard it was. We also made sure there was some fresh water and food still available for wildlife.
Day Eleven: We went for a quick scooter/bike ride to the park then spent the afternoon painting foxes and writing a nature poem. It's lovely to see how our previous days wild could have influenced him.
The Shooting Star
by Oree
The fox looked high
into the sky,
To try to find
a shooting star.
As he saw a shooting star fly across the sky,
He said I will try,
to fly.
To the world beyond,
where the star shone,
and burnt bright beyond.
Forever more
beyond 2024.
Day Twelve: Finally, we had a real treat on our last day wild as we woke up to snow. In fairness, it wasn’t a lot of snow, but enough to make a few big snow balls; and for our kittens it was their first experience of the cold white stuff!
We had a great 12 Days Wild and it was the perfect excuse to make sure we got lots of fresh air and exercise at a time where its easy to eat loads and do nothing. I'd recommend everyone to take part. Since then, I've been asked a few times if we can go back to the Great Fen to look for deer again. We'll be back very soon!
My favourite part of 12 Days Wild was when we went to the nature reserve at night time and when were driving back home from there and we saw the deer cross the track in front of us and we got to watch it for ages cos it stopped just in the trees!