Hello everyone!
For my second year as Boone County Conservation districts summer intern my first week at BCCD has gone by fast! We have gotten started with a couple different projects. The biggest thing on the radar is Conservation Kids Camp. We’re having camp happen this year at our new property the Earl and Hazel Jones Center for Conservation. Camp is a great time to impart some knowledge on some youngins. In the current era of digital youth I like to think these camps can provide some core outdoor memories and help these kids develop a relationship with nature where as they might not otherwise.
I often quote my experience turkey hunting with my father when I was a kid as the reason I am a conservationist today. For others maybe there was backyard woods where they had a fort, maybe it was hiking with older siblings. While it certainly isn't close to being gone, it is harder for youth to connect to nature than ever, particularly for children in urban areas. I believe that our county's youth environmental education programs can provide the inciting moments in children's lives that get them to care for the outdoors in the same way turkey hunting did for me. That for me is such an exciting and fulfilling project to be a part of.
Not all of what I am doing this summer is environmental education though. We are also working on restoring and managing our new property, The Earl and Hazel Jones Center for Conservation. We’re mostly removing invasive species such as bush honeysuckle. We also have been in discussion with other conservation centers and nature preserves to get ideas as to how to best serve the community using Earl and Hazel Jones Center for Conservation.
I am so excited for the rest of the summer. In my next blog post I will get a little more into detail about the bat research project I am doing. It should be good! For now I will leave you with a portion of a poem by Wendell Berry, a KY born poet.
The Want of Peace
by Wendell Berry
All goes back to the earth,
and so I do not desire
pride of excess or power,
but the contentments made
by men who have had little:
the fisherman’s silence
receiving the river’s grace,
the gardener’s musing on rows.
