John Janzen Nature Center

Today we went to the nature center. It's a pretty fun place to take kids here in Edmonton and they also do plenty of learning classes, some of them are really affordable too!

The building consists of a decent sized play area, a room all about animals, with a few live and deceased specimens.

There are also classrooms and lots of space outside, with a pond where you can view plenty of tadpoles and fish in summer. We have been going there from time to time for a few years now, especially since it's pretty inexpensive to visit.

My favourite part is the large plexi-glass beehive! They have a large colony of honey bees which you can view through the glass to see them work, eat, dance, the works! They have a tube coming out the bottom which vents out the wall so they can come and go as they please. During the winter they cover the hive so that the bees get some sort of hibernation, so unfortunately I'm not able to show you that right now. I'll make a post about it in the spring for sure :)

I really love the design of the play area, there's so many cool features!

There's a beaver lodge, complete with a space to go inside and a stream of water on top.

A bee themed jungle gym with a bee learning center next to it.

There's a cool squirrel den/cave that the kids all love running through.

I love being one of the few parents that don't have to duck! I guess being ridiculously short is pretty cool sometimes!

The outside of the cave area looks so cool! I just love it!

It's great for climbing too apparently!

Above the cave there's this HUGE mushroom!

The kids love sending foam acorns down the chute to the cave below.

I love this little flower making area next to the mushroom too! There's foam petals that you stick in the stem to make custom flowers!

Across the wide hallway there's the other room, with animals both live and stuffed, as well as parts of animals like shed antlers. While I'm not a fan of killing creatures or stuffing them, it is a great way to get up close to an owl without getting your eyes scratched out!

The garter snakes were so cute!!

I'm not positive but I think they release them in the spring.

Thanks for reading this post! If you're ever in the Edmonton area please drop in and visit this place! :)