England-2011-kew

Kew Gardens, Saturday 12 February 2011

Travel

We'll meet outside the Kew Gardens tube station (District line) at 10:00 on Saturday. It's a short walk from there to the Victoria Gate entrance. Don't forget to check the TFL's weekend closures list ahead of time to make sure you know the route to take on Saturday morning.

For the return trip to London we'll meet outside the Kew Gardens tube station at 17:00.

Preparation

1. Read about Kew Gardens and the Royal Botanic Gardens, there is a wealth of information on their website and in the Wikipedia article about Kew. In particular make sure you read about the science that is done at Kew:
   • Science and Conservation at Kew
   • Scientific Research and Data at Kew
   • Kew discovers largest genome
2. Check the assignments page to see what's due related to this excursion, considering those ahead of time will make your visit much more informative.
3. Brent Smith, one of the Biologists at Earlham and someone who is very knowledgeable about Kew, suggests the following:
   • Cedars of Lebanon
   • Victoria waterlily from Argentina
   • All of the greenhouses

Plan

Once we're there and have secured tickets, etc. you are on your own to explore during the morning.

For lunch we'll meet at 13:00 at one of the Kew's cafes (TBD when we get there, probably the Orangery self-service menu) to discuss what we're seeing and learning.

After lunch we'll take a tour together on the Kew Explorer around the grounds. Afterwords you are again free to explore on your own.

We'll meet outside the Kew Gardens tube station at 17:00 for the return trip to London.

Science, Technology and Society

There is a lot of science and some interesting technology as well at Kew. Read the information found at the URLs listed above beforehand so you are prepared to engage it while we are there.

There are two homework items related to our visit to Kew Gardens, the details for both of them can be found on the assignments page.

Blogger and Photographer

We will need two volunteers from the studio audience to take pictures and write-up/post a blog entry about this excursion. Get in touch if you are interested. In order to spur interest in these positions I'm offering 5 bonus points if you take on one of these tasks.

• Mamus is offering to write a blog post about this excursion : )