National Screen and Sound Archive of Wales preserves and celebrates the sound and moving image heritage of Wales, making it accessible to a wide range of users for enjoyment and learning. Its film collection reflects every aspect of the nation’s social, cultural and working life across the 20th century, giving a fascinating insight into Welsh filmmaking, both amateur and professional.
This film is part of Free
Nature walk - Maesmawr School
Learning outdoors: children find rosehips and oak apples in the winter sunshine.
From the collection of:
Overview
Mr Roberts, headteacher of Maesmawr School, Welshpool, takes his charges for a walk in nearby fields. Sheep dog ‘Patsy’, belonging to the film-maker Ion Trant, keeps an eye on them all. They find rosehips, and also oak apples or galls which Mr Roberts later dissects. The gall without a hole holds a grub, a wasp larva. A small hole in another indicates that a grub has already tunnelled its way out; a large hole in a third indicates that a bird has pecked out the tasty grub within.
Ion Trant of Dovea Farm in Tipperary, Ireland, studied agriculture in Canada and then joined the staff of the Welsh Plant Breeding Station, Aberystwyth, where he met his future wife, Janet Owen of Maesmawr Hall, Welshpool. The Trants farmed at the Hall, the adjoining farm Cefn Du, and Esgairdraenllwyn, Llaithddu, Llandrindod. Conscious of a gulf emerging between town and country, Ion welcomed school visits to his farms and created/filmed the "Country Close-Up" series for children (BBC TV - 1956-62), the programmes often featuring his own three, as here (Rosemary, the youngest, is on the walk). This ‘story’ was used in the December 1959 C C-U. Trant subsequently combined farming with freelance filming.