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Your support makes all the difference.How do you see the wildlife of the world without travelling? The Lovers' Trail at the Natural History Museum may be the answer. This is not an opportunity for lovey-dovey couples to smooch behind the stuffed animal cases (although presumably they can); it is in fact an activity trail for children to find out more about "the birds and the bees" from around the world, literally.
With a choice of 68 million plants, animals, fossils, rocks and minerals, the Natural History Museum can be a daunting place. But the Lovers' Trail demystifies everything, with a simple, fact-finding tour around the Life galleries. The trail takes you through the logically named Birds' Gallery, Creepy Crawlies' Gallery and Mammals' Gallery, and highlights some of the tactics different species use in courtship.
Pick up the receiver next to one of the insect boxes, and you can hear the chirps of South African crickets and cicadas from Southern France, and the hissing of a Dutch cockroach. "Try to imitate the sound of each insect," your Lovers' Trail guide says. And then it asks you to look around you. "Have you attracted a mate while making these sounds?" it asks. If you have, no doubt you should call security.
Spiders are not famous for their "ooh, ahhh" factor, being neither cuddly nor beautiful, but it turns out that the male hunting spider, found all over the world, is an old romantic: he has brought the female a present - some sort of food (an insect). The fact that he does this as a ploy to distract her from his real intention - sex - and that he sometimes cheats and gives her a duff present (a dried-out skeleton), makes one wonder about the similarities between human courtship patterns and spiders'.
Suddenly that cheap box of chocolates takes on a much more obvious meaning. Watch and learn, kids.
The Natural History Museum (0171-938 9123) is at South Kensington, London SW7. It opens at 10am on Mondays to Saturdays, and from 11am on Sundays, and closes at 5.50pm daily. Admission is pounds 6 for adults, pounds 3 for children and pounds 16 for a family ticket (two adults and up to four children). Admission is free after 4.30pm on weekdays and 5pm at weekends.
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