Animal Carer Activity Badge

With our visit to the Heads of Ayr Farm Park, and handing out the pet care logs on Tuesday evening we have finally kicked off our Animal Carer Activity Badge which the Cubs can work towards over the summer.

In order to obtain this badge the cubs must do at least 3 of these activities:

• Visit a zoo or wildlife park. Find out about some of the feeding habits and natural habitats of the animals they see.
• Take care of a pet for three months and know the correct foods to give it. Be able to recognize common illnesses and know how to treat them.
• Help to care for a farm animal and know the correct food to give it. Know how to recognize common illnesses and what special care is needed before and after the birth of farm animals.
• Keep a record, in pictures, sketches, photographs or tape recordings, of bird, animal and/ or insect life in their garden or local area/park.
• Know six different freshwater, seawater or tropical fish and what types of foods they eat.
• Belong to an animal, bird or wildlife society. Either take part in one of its activities or make progress in any award scheme offered.
• Find out about the dangers in the countryside that threaten wildlife and either make a poster, collage or drawing or tell other Cub Scouts about their findings.

Since we have already been to the Farm Park, that means choosing at least 2 of those that are left. Most of the cubs have a pet or animals at home so that makes the second choice easy too.

Welly Relay

What a beautiful evening to be out and about. We spent almost the entire session tonight out in the park.
We started off with some jousting. With bamboo lances the cubs had to collect gold rings held aloft by our young leaders. The team with the most gold rings at the end would win. In order to rouse the cubs before hand we tried to get them to roar.
"What would a knight do before going out to joust!"
"Get up on his horse!"
Not the answer we had in mind but they got there in the end and the joust was on.
Its not as easy as it sounds. The lances are long and thin but the rings are small. And no one told the explorers to keep them steady.

Once that game over we had a welly relay. This one was easy. You fill your welly with water, run around the hall and then empty the (remaining) water into your bucket and pass the welly to your teammate. The first team to fill their bucket wins.
The instructions use 'remaining' so there is an expectation that some water will be lost from the welly during the run around the hall. However, once cubs started arriving back soaked with little or no water we discovered that the explorers had again added their own element into the mix. They were stationed halfway around, armed with water pistols. Now our cubs aren't going to let an explorer squirt them and not retaliate, especially if they are holding a welly full of water!

In order to let the cubs dry out a little we then organised a traditional obstacle course race.
Team 1 had to go over the climbing frame and then slide down the big slide at the opposite end of the park and return to the start. Team 2 had to go the other way. Once they arrived back one team complained that they had further to go. Naturally this means that they had to run it again but in the opposite direction. There were no comments about it the second time.

We headed back into the hall for a drink and a biscuit and to introduce the Animal Carer Activity badge which we want the cubs to work towards over the summer.

It was then back outside for the water balloon shot putt game.
The objective here is to lob your water balloon into the bucket for points.
As we completed setting up for this game we recognised how similar this looked to bucket ball. Bucket ball is like basket ball but instead of throwing into a basket mounted to a pole, you have a teammate hold the bucket and they can move it to catch a wayward shot.
Since the explorers had added their own mark to the other games tonight we felt bucket ball with water balloons would be a fitting variant.

The cubs were certainly excited about this, the explorers less so once they realised there were three of them and three buckets and that Dave, Gillian and I intended them to hold the buckets not us!
To their credit they accepted then and got stuck in. 
It took only a few moments to figure out that they would not get we if they actually caught the balloons as the water would not come out of the buckets. If they did catch a balloon then they would have water in their bucket which could be thrown at a cub.

Lets just say that almost everyone got a little bit wet.

A couple of rounds of mosquito tig finished off the evening.

Heads of Ayr Farm Park

We had a great day at the Heads of Ayr Farm Park.
This kicks off the Pets Care badge which the Cubs will be working towards through the summer. More details of this will follow...

The farm park has a variety of animals and a variety of 'activity zones' mostly involving jumping and sliding.

Once we arrived and made it into the park itself we headed straight to the slides - three different styles and 2 different heights.

After that session ended it was onto Fowl Play where two teams fire foam balls from air cannons at each other and at who ever decides to go collect the balls.
Then some animals - the Guinea Pig Village, the reptiles and horses.
This brought us to lunch at the tractors and the gift shop.

After lunch we headed out to the big field. Where the cubs immediately staked out the jumping pillows and the sand pit.

From here the group split with some heading off to the animals - goats, cattle, deer, donkeys, llamas and camels, while the others took part in water wars, aerial slides, bumper boats, and ringo sledging.
After a quick detour into Digger World we brought them all back into the adventure barn before back to the car park to be collected

Campfire Songs

The good weather is beginning to kick in and we can get back outside.
Tonight's activities included a 'sausage sizzle' which was more of a hot dog boil but the cubs don't mind.
We also had toasted marshmellows with melted buttons on chocalate chip cookies. A socttish version of s'mores  - the traditional campfire food.
With the fire going well and the cubs refueled with charred sugars Dave and Gillian led us in campfire songs.

Bush Tucker Trial

We had our Bush Tucker Trial tonight to finish off the session before Easter.

After each challenge the losers or sometimes the winners were sent off to the dungeon to sample some exotic fare.
We had spider soup (rice pudding with raisins), frogspawn (tapioca pudding), jellied snake (gummy worm in jelly), curl grub in chocolate (chocolate covered raisins), dingo meat (chicken), kangaroo poo (wheatabix made up with chocolate milk) and a few other similar delicacies. It was an incredible example of mind over matter as very few manged to actually eat any of it, even after we explained what it really was.

Strange enough, they all ate the hot dogs even the ones who claimed they were vegetarians.
Since it was the first good night we were able to get outside for a bit and after a few games and setting off Chinese lanterns it was back inside for the winners announcement.
One cub who actually didn't manage to eat any more than anyone else, but who did show great courage in trying it all first was awarded the bush tucker prize and carried on Scout shoulders around the room.

Thank You

Just a Big Thank You to all the Beavers, Cubs, Scouts, Explorers, Mums, Dads, brothers, sisters and cousins who gave up part of their Saturday to participate in the bag packing at Morrisons in Troon on Saturday the 17th.

It was very refreshing to see so many people out helping make the day successful. It was also very reassuring to see how well behaved and responsible we conducted ourselves while 'guests' of Morrisons.

We choose bag packing as a fund-raising activity as it is a service, not charity, its out in the community, and because its very efficient. In total, we raised over £1500, the equivalent of £50 per person packing.

A primary use of this funding is to cover the cost of the training our leaders have to undergo. As a group we have been very lucky to recruit four new leaders in the past year. In addition to the continual development and re-assessments all leaders have to undertake, our new leaders have an extensive programme of training to undergo to ensure that the young people in our care are correctly challenged, stimulated and kept safe. The leaders already volunteer so much of their time already, asking them to pay for this training would be a step too far.

Both the young people and the leaders get so much out of Scouting and this fund-raising helps ensure the group can continue.

Thank you so much for your support.

Bag Packing Success

Just a Big Thank You to all the Beavers, Cubs, Scouts, Explorers, Mums, Dads, brothers, sisters, cousins and leaders who gave up part of their Saturday to participate in the bag packing at Morrisons in Troon yesterday.
I think we should all be pleased with the way we behaved and with the polite way we treated the customers.

Dermot,
Bagheera