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Page 01
A leaf with somewhere to go
The sea was sparkling beyond the garden when a piece of leaf walked across the path.
Liam stopped. Charlotte nearly bumped into him.
“Leaves don’t walk,” she said.
Another leaf hurried past. Then another.
Liam crouched well away from their path.
“Leaf by leaf, where do you go?”
Page 02
Six legs underneath
Tiny brown legs moved beneath the green pieces.
“Ants!” said Grace.
One carried a leaf shaped like a little sail. Another carried a wobbly triangle.
Mom joined them. “Leafcutter ants. They cut pieces from plants and carry them home.”
Charlotte nodded importantly.
“A picnic. Obviously.”
Liam pictured the smallest sandwiches in the world.
Page 03
The picnic problem
Charlotte drew an ant picnic in her notebook: leaf plates, tiny cups, one enormous crumb.
“Who brings the blanket?” Liam asked.
Grace watched the real parade.
“They’re all going past that lovely shady spot.”
Past the shade. Past a flower. Into the roots.
Charlotte lowered her pencil.
“Perhaps their picnic is somewhere else.”
Pause & wonder
What do you think the ants will do with the leaves? Which clue could help you check your idea?
Page 04
Down went the green
The ants carried their leaves into a little opening in the soil.
One green triangle tipped sideways.
Then it vanished.
“Leaf by leaf, where do you go?” Liam whispered.
Nobody poked the hole. Nobody lifted the roots.
“We can’t see what happens down there,” Grace said.
Mom smiled. “I know a book that can help.”
Page 05
A garden in the dark
On the veranda, Mom opened the nature book.
Its picture showed tunnels and underground rooms filled with pale, lumpy gardens.
“They grow a fungus,” she read. “The leaves help feed it.”
“A garden without sunshine?” Charlotte asked.
“Fungi get food differently from green plants.”
Liam looked from the picture to the garden outside.
“There’s another garden underneath ours!”
Page 06
Who feeds whom?
They followed the pictures.
Worker ants chewed leaf pieces into smaller bits for the fungus garden.
The fungus grew on that leafy mixture.
The ants ate food grown by the fungus.
Charlotte tapped the page.
“So the ants feed their garden…”
“…and their garden feeds the ants!” Liam finished.
He giggled.
“That is a very complicated picnic.”
Page 07
Room for another idea
Back beside the path, Charlotte looked at her notebook.
“My picnic was wrong.”
Grace turned to a fresh page.
“Now you have something new to draw.”
Charlotte began an underground garden.
Liam kept his toes well back from the passing ants.
“Leaf by leaf, where do you go?”
This time, all three answered:
“To help a hidden garden grow!”
Page 08
Two pictures, one discovery
Both pictures went on the Wonder Wall.
The picnic guess. The hidden garden.
Charlotte drew an arrow between them.
Liam added a parade of green triangles, right across the page.
Then he spotted something through the window.
A new fern frond was curled like a tiny fist.
“What’s that leaf waiting for?”
Grace reached for another sheet of paper.