Children Invited to Nature Festival
Nursery Nature Walks, an environmental education organization that introduces infants, young children and their families to nature, will be holding its fifth annual Kids Nature Festival on Saturday in Temescal Gateway Park.
The festival will feature concerts, puppet shows, a “bat lady,” undersea adventures and many environmental booths. Also on hand will be live owls, turtles, raccoons, lambs and lizards. Activities are designed for children, from infants to age 8, and their families.
Each year, the group teaches about 17,000 children and their parents about local ecology and plant and animal life.
Temescal Gateway Park is in Pacific Palisades, north of Sunset Boulevard. The festival will run from 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Call (310) 364-3591.
SCIENCE FOR FAMILIES
* An Insect Fair will be held at the Los Angeles State and County Arboretum on Saturday and Sunday, sponsored by the county Natural History Museum. Exotic and local insects will be shown, and experts will answer questions on how to study and collect insects. Symposiums will be held both days with guest lecturers discussing topics such as killer bees and the restoration of the El Segundo sand dunes. Call (213) 744-3558 or (818) 821-3222.
* An “Animal Babies” program for children ages 3 and 4 will be offered at the Los Angeles Zoo on Monday and next Tuesday and May 21 and 22 at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. Call (213) 666-4650, Ext. 5.
* The origins of spirals, circles, hexagons and other shapes in nature will be explored in workshops for children 5 and older at 2:30 and 3:30 p.m., and children 4 and younger at 3 p.m., at Kidspace Museum on Wednesday . Call (818) 449-9144.
BOTANY
* The Palos Verdes blue butterfly--considered extinct until a colony was discovered by Rudi Mattoni and Rick Rogers--will be discussed by Mattoni at the monthly meeting of the the California Native Plant Society Los Angeles/Santa Monica Mountains chapter tonight at 7:30 p.m. in the Brentwood Magnet School Auditorium. Call (213) 933-8993.
ASTRONOMY
* Veteran comet hunter David H. Levy, co-discoverer with Carolyn Shoemaker of the comet that will crash into Jupiter in July, will discuss the comet, Shoemaker-Levy 9, in a lecture at the Griffith Observatory on Monday at 7:30 p.m. His talk is co-sponsored by the Planetary Society. Call (213) 664-1191.
* A partial solar eclipse will take place this morning beginning at 7:44 a.m., the last solar eclipse visible in Southern California this century. When the eclipse reaches maximum at 9 a.m. about 72% of the sun’s surface will be covered. Many local astronomy groups will have telescopes with filters set up to observe the event. It is unsafe to look directly at the sun during an eclipse. The Griffith Observatory will open at 7 a.m. Call (213) 664-1191.
MARINE SCIENCE
* Channel Islands National Park field station biologist Gary E. Davis will discuss the issue of managed marine fisheries and the declining harvests off California’s coast at the Cabrillo Marine Aquarium on Friday at 7:30 p.m. Call (310) 548-7563.