Baldilocks

Thanks Mark I'll PM you separately but I have no objections to answering your questions here either. I'm based at a school in Purley Surrey. Put 51.34372, -0.11980 into Google maps should give you our site, everywhere within the perimeters of people's gardens. I have considered AutoCAD but rejected it. In a previous incarnation I was involved in the selection of a Facilities management package and the one we chose was fronted by autocad with a database behind. All the problems that we had were caused by autocad being 1000 times more complicated than we needed. It meant that the users had to learn too much autocad before we could use the data. We ended up getting the thing reprogrammed so that we bypassed autocad except when we actually needed to work with the images. I haven't worked on it for about 8 years though so the newer versions may be better.. The Westonbirt map looks really good and is exactly what I had in mind. The kids should really drive the selection of the data and, while photos are a good idea, I have my doubts given that most of our trees are in tight clusters so it would be difficult to photograph 'A Tree' in isolation. Pictures of bark and leaf detail would be good though. I had thought of using free software like Google Sketch-up but haven't had much time yet to look at it. I have had a look at the AIT site and your prices above but they are unfortunately way outside our league. At the moment I have to fight to get a pair of loppers. I am hoping to start applying for some funding to get things running but that won't be just yet. Firstly I need to get the pond planted and populated so that we can get junior schools in to use it , then use that to spread the word and get the momentum up. Now if I can get one of the 'A' level biology students to do a project on trees, THAT would start things going. Thanks Ian

Hi. New boy here, and not an arborist I'm afraid. I work in a school as science technician. Since I joined last Sept I have been working on using our grounds to best effect. I've built a pond and populated it, started building loggeries for stag beetles etc. Just starting to look at the educational possibilities of the 800 or so trees that we have, which is why I'm here. I would love to set up a system for the kids to use to map the data that we have. It could use GPS but equally need not - mapping with compasses and tape measures is also educational. Ultimately, a grid of the site with clickable links to give the available data on what is there. Any ideas, anyone? Please? Thanks in anticipation. Ian