Los alumnos de la sección bilingüe de 1º ESO B están realizando una serie de actividades relacionadas con el tema de las plantas. Una de ellas está inspirada en el reciente robo de uno de los pocos ejemplares de nenúfar enano ("Nymphaea thermarum") que existen en la actualidad. Para realizar esta actividad, los alumnos han leído el siguiente artículo en clase y han realizado una ficha para trabajar en inglés contenidos propios de la materia, tales como la nomenclatura científica, las partes de las plantas o la desaparición de especies de su hábitat natural.
The water lily “Nymphaea thermarum” has been
stolen from Kew Gardens, in London. Nowadays, the plant is almost extinct in the wild, but it is cultivated in
two places in the world: one is the Kew Gardens and the other one
is in Germany.
The stolen plant is one of the
rarest in the world: it is the smallest water lily that exists. It is as small as a fingernail (1 cm in diameter)! The flower is white with yellow stamens.
Fragile habitat
The plant has no official
common name but it is known as the "pygmy Rwandan water lily” because it
was discovered in 1987 by a German botanist at a hot spring in Rwanda. However, it disappeared from there in 2008 because of
the over-exploitation of the hot spring that kept the plants moist and at a
constant temperature.
Before the extinction, a
number of living plants were taken by scientists from Bonn Botanic Garden, in
Germany, and from the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew, which succeeded in
propagating the delicate plant in 2009. The “Nymphaea thermarum” grows in warm mud, at 25 degrees Celsius (77
Fahrenheit). There are more than 50 living water lilies at Kew and
a small number in Germany. Nowadays, a few plants grow
again in the wild in Rwanda, but the “Nymphaea
thermarum” is critically endangered.
Crime against nature
The plant is
believed to have been stolen between 8.30 am and 2.55 pm last Thursday, a
Scotland Yard agent said. Other instances of theft
have occurred, but they are isolated and infrequent, Richard Barley, director
of horticulture at Kew Gardens, said.
Anyone with
information about the theft is asked to contact Scotland Yard on 020 8721 5934. Adapted from cnn.com
and theguardian.com
AP Photo/ Royal Botanical Gardens
Kew
