Topics : ENVIRONMENT : Program Helps Youths Get in Touch With Nature : Project sponsored by the Audubon Society impresses on children their duty to help preserve the ecosystem.

As the group of children huddles by the pond, they gaze intently at the insects they have trapped in small, glass boxes.

“OK, let the bugs go where you found them so they can go back to their homes,� hollers Holly Gray, a 17-year-old volunteer with the Palos Verdes/South Bay Audubon Society.

The children, ages 6 to 12, wander back to where they caught the creatures and release them.

On this Saturday morning, the youngsters are beginning their three-hour activity in Wilderness Park, Redondo Beach, with a game of charades, imitating their favorite animals and birds. One boy keeps the group guessing when he gets down on all fours, tucks his head in and makes like a slug.

Before the morning is over, the children also hear Native American tales and touch fluorescent green iguanas, a salamander, snakes and other living reptiles.

They are participating in “Sharing Nature With Children,� a program initiated by the Audubon Society’s local president, Lillian Light, three years ago.

The program, which attracts about 30 children to the park one Saturday a month, is designed to develop the instinctive feelings that children have for nature in hopes of teaching them to respect and care for the ecosystem.

It is an education difficult to come by in the urban sprawl of Los Angeles County, but one that is essential, Light says.

“A life without natural places to go is not worth living,� she said. “If you experience nature, you love it and you want to save it.�

In the 11-acre park on Camino Real that used to be a Nike missile base in the 1940s, leaves crunch beneath the children’s feet as they move through the park, touching trees and spotting possums and turtles. Birds sing overhead, a cool breeze rustles through the treetops and a fresh, earthy aroma fills the air.

Beatrice Rasof, a retired clinical psychologist from Harbor/UCLA Medical Center who also volunteers for the Audubon Society, says children who do not experience nature lose their connection with it.

She lays pine cones, sycamore leaves, wild radish and other plants on a yellow bandanna so the children can identify them in the park.

“So many of us live in the cities, and when we go out for a picnic we might not be aware of all the senses that are used because we’re so used to using our eyes for everything,� Rasof says.

Children in the 1990s seem to be more aware of the need to preserve the environment than were earlier generations, Rasof said. Schools are playing a big part in this new awareness, she said, by encouraging students to recycle and by including programs similar to “Sharing Nature With Children� in their curricula.

Information: (310) 545-1384.