We have our winners! And a poetry competition!

It's June 1st and we are delighted to announce that our fabulous judges have now selected their winners and runners-up, and the cover picture (shown here!) for the next Wild n Free Book Wild n Free Forever!

Scroll down to see the list of names! But read about our other competition first!

Very well done to all who entered and all who made it into the book and especially to our winners!

There will be a special book launch in London in December (details to follow!) and the book will be out in November!

Well done everyone!

Winning drawing by Morgan Joy Ashby Aged 13 (just!)

Go Wild Poetry Competition!

The deadline has been extended and we need your animal poems!

Virginia McKenna encourages young poets
to let their imaginations run wild!
   
Founder of international wildlife charity the Born Free Foundation and much loved actress, Virginia McKenna OBE, is calling for young animal lovers to get creative and take part in a very special poetry competition – ‘Wild About Animals’.

Virginia said: “I know, from meeting lots of children during school visits, that young people have deep and instinctive feelings about animals. Sometimes these feelings are hard to put into words but that is exactly what we are hoping they will do now.”

“Our ‘Wild About Animals’ poetry competition will offer an unusual and exciting opportunity for children to express their thoughts about animals - how perhaps they care about them, befriend them, admire them, or are fascinated by them. Through poetry one has a particularly powerful yet economic way to do just that. Every word counts”.

“That we have two famous and admired poets amongst the judges – Pam Ayres and Brian Patten - should be an added incentive to pick up a pen. We are all looking forward to reading the entries – I know they will be written from the heart.”
  
The competition celebrates the 30th anniversary of the Born Free Foundation’s work to save wildlife, and is being run in partnership with ‘Paws n Claws Publishing’.
Children in school years 3-9 (ages 7-14) are invited to submit poems about animals… or about what it’s like to be wild about animals! With five weeks left to enter, now is the time for budding young poets and animal lovers to set their imaginations free!

Fifteen to twenty winners will then be chosen from each year group by the panel, which also includes top children’s author Lauren St John, Born Free’s poet in residence Richard Bonfield and ‘Paws and Claws’ director and author Debz Hobbs Wyatt. Poems chosen will feature in a special book to be published later this year.

Entrants can also submit pictures to illustrate their work and help bring their poems to life! A number of drawings will be selected to feature in the book, including one very special illustration which will be picked for the front cover!

The competition is open for entries until Saturday 14th July. For more information about this exciting competition, and to submit an entry, visit: www.bornfree.org.uk/poetry

The PAWS 2014 Winners

Here they are!

Years 5 and 6

WINNERS (JOINT 1st PLACE)

Xander Cleak
An Old Galápagos Tortoise’s Thoughts

Tristan Warnock
Dolphin Encounter

2nd PLACE

Daisy Cuthburt
Shelly – A Turtle's Shell

RUNNERS-UP

Charlie Aldridge-Bate
The Fig Tree

Adam Amrani
Survival Beyond Belief

Sophien Amrani
Life is Different in the Murky Depths of the Sea

Thomas Cumming 
Platypus

Jack Forshew
The Cheetah

Tristan Hartwell
The Little African Elephant Calf

Teddy Jenkins
It’s a Rat’s Life

Emma McCarthy
Courage

Vivek Nair
The Lethal Royal Bengal Tiger

Years 7 and 8

WINNER 1st Place

Maia Freeman
Howl to Save a Life

2nd PLACE

Vienna Cooper
Saving Atiya

HIGHLY COMMENDED

Alex Cumming
A Monkey’s Tale

RUNNERS-UP

Henry Gadsdon
Soot

Honey Hilton
The Creature and the Foal

Tayin Lakhani
A Mud Bath

Manas Madan
The Elusive Panthera uncia

Ryan Ratnam
Hope

Thomas Rochussen
The Story of a Real Hunter

Lakshman Samarakoon
An Elephant’s Journey

Wynn Thomas
The Leopard

Years 9—11

WINNER 1st Place

Marisa Orton
Wriggling away from Wombattiness

2nd PLACE

Emily Wootton
The Tigress

RUNNERS-UP

Bethany Dale
Snow Baby

Keira Layton
The Hunt

Dominik Reynolds
Goshawk – Life in the trees

DRAWINGS

COVER ARTIST

Morgan Joy Ashby
Mother and Baby Giraffe

OTHER DRAWINGS FOR THE BOOK (and some for the BACK COVER)

Adam Amrani
Fennec Fox

Sophien Amrani
Octopus

Morgan Joy Ashby
Dolphins, Tiger, Zebras

Liah Clayton
Tiger

Mairi Clayton
Orcas

Thomas Cumming
Platypus

Tayin Lakhani
Black Panther

Vivek Nair
Bengal Tiger

Nicole Radtke
Wolf

Very well done to all!

And we look forward to your poems!

Please feel free to share this email and tell your friends, schools, Brownie packs, scouts ... etc. about the book and the poetry competition!

The animals need you!

What would you like to do next?