Roxburgh Area School pupils Georgia Buchan (left) and Dazhan Sunderland (both 11) now find moths a little less gross with the help of a travelling laboratory.
This week, the school was visited by specialist scientists and a shipping container filled with science equipment as part of the Lab in a Box programme funded by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment.
The box visits schools with a rotating cast of experts to teach about the natural world.
Roxburgh children learned the importance moths have in pollinating native New Zealand plants and were taught how to trap and pin them.
For Georgia, sticking a pin through a moth's head made her see the creatures in a new light.
''They are less scary when they're dead,'' she said.
This was the first time in Central Otago for the initiative, with organisers planning more stops across the region.
- Jono Edwards
