The Duchess of Cambridge paid a special visit to the Natural History Museum in London on Tuesday to view their new Urban Nature Project.
Kate, who is patron of the Natural History Museum, joined schoolchildren from St. Mary of the Angels Primary School for part of her visit, and also viewed the Wildlife Garden and the Angela Marmont Centre for UK Biodiversity.
During her visit, Kate shared homemade honey she jarred herself from her beehive at Anmer Hall in Norfolk. Kate asked the children, “Would you like to try some? This came specially from my beehive. Does it taste like honey from the shops? Does it taste like flowers?”
After the children had tasted her honey, she said, “Every time you see a bee; say thank you so much because they make delicious honey.”
Kate and the schoolchildren then took part in a series of nature activities that included making spiders—with Kate revealing that she’d named her spider Cuddles because she enjoys cuddling, just not with spiders—and interactive storytelling.
Before she left, Kate helped attach an acoustic monitoring device to a cherry tree in the Wildlife Garden that will help scientists at the Museum to study the “patterns of birds, mammal and insect activity within the garden” that will be analysed after the summer months by students partaking in the UNP National Schools Programme in September.
According to the Natural History Museum, there are thousands of various species of plants and animals in the Wildlife Garden.
Per Kensington Place, the Urban Nature Project “aims to help people to reconnect with the natural world and to find practical solutions to protect our planet’s future. Working with partner museums and wildlife organisations across the UK, the project will engage the nation with the importance of nature in towns and cities, and produce practical tools for supporting the wildlife that lives around us.”
The Museum’s location in South Kensington will be transformed into an urban green space over the next few years as a way to kickstart the urban nature movement.
