Children took part in yesterday?s Earth Day celebrations by painting an environmental mural at the Annual Exhibition .

The first Earth Day was held in 1970 but it is now celebrated by millions of people worldwide. The theme of Earth Day 2005 was Protect Our Children and Our Future.

President of The Greenrock Project, Erin Moran said the new charity decided to get children to help paint a mural to get them more involved in Earth Day.

?It gets them thinking about Earth Day, thinking a bit about nature and their connection to it,? Ms Moran said. ?We are not the only species on the Island.?

Children who were passing by were invited to take part in the painting.

?The little ones can colour in the shade,? she said, while older children were provided with painting bibs and allowed to paint a large mural.

Ms Moran said the mural will be saved and be used as a backdrop for the Greenrock Music and Arts Festival 2006, which will be the first annual environmental festival held in Bermuda.

?This event, featuring both international and local talent, is dedicated to the celebration of self-expression and the inspiration of social and environmental awareness,? Greenrock?s web-site (www.greenrock.org) said.

Close-by to where the painting was taking place, more energetic children were challenged to leap the distance of a giraffe?s step, a phenomenal 15-feet, into a nearby sandbox.

Greenrock, the Bermuda National Trust and the Eden Project designed educational stalls about the environment, which were on display inside the Botanical Gardens? Education Building.

The National Trust will give away a year?s free membership to the Trust to the person who could guess the closest number to how many toy butterflies, tree-frogs, turtles and fish were inside a glass-jar.

The Trust?s stall incorporated pictures, prizes, music and real-life objects to show children the dangers of illegal and uncontrolled development upon the environment.

?Illegal and uncontrolled development destroys the habitat of our endemic animals,? Conservation Officer Dorcas Roberts said.

Cartoon posters of potentially hazardous characters like Danny the Developer, litterbugs, and water-wasters, were on display.

?A picture is worth a 1,000 words,? Mrs. Roberts said.