West Virginia Wildlife from Eyewitness News

Wildlife Boxes

A great resource for teachers. Wildlife Boxes!

January 16, 2008
Reporter: Patrick McMurtry
Videographer: Brad Rice

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Everyone knows how much kids love animals. They just can't get enough of them. That desire to hold, touch and just learn about wildlife is almost unquenchable. Dnr biologists do their best to stoke the interest by making available a set of educational wildlife boxes for teachers.

Jim Fregonara WV DNR says:
"A lof of kids really like the hands on stuff. We have mammals, we have mammal skins, we have beavers, skunks, oppossums, raccoons, river otters. Not only do we have the skins, we encourage the teachers to hand them out, let the students touch the skins and feel what a beaver pelt feels like."

Jim says they especially like feeling the skunk. They also get to feel more than just the skins. These boxes also have life size skulls.

Jim Fregonara WV DNR says:
These are replica skulls of these mammals. This one is a raccoon, they can see thier teeth and molars and teadchers can talk about the skulls and teeth. We have a beaver skull here and the kids can actually feel these large incisors."

And this is really cool because you can see how the food chain works."

It's one thing to tell a kid how big an animal is, it's another to let them see for themselves.

And there is lots of stuff for younger students, too.

Jim Fregonara WV DNR says:
"We also have puppets here, too, the beaver that teachers can put thier hands in. We have a play that someone wrote and you can act out all the characters."

An educational box that's as easy to teach out of as it is to get. All teachers have to do is give the dnr a call and ask and the box will be on its way.

For west virginia wildlife, i'm patrick mcmurtry, eyewitness news.

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W. Va. DNR

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