The 21st annual PA Rivers Conservation and Fly Fishing Youth Camp was held June 21 - 26 at the Allenberry Resort in Boiling Springs. Thirty-two students, ages 14 to 17, from Pennsylvania, Maryland and New York participated in the week –long resident experience.
Emma Butler of Centre Hall was the recipient of the Leon Chandler Memorial Award. The award is presented each year to a student who displays leadership qualities both in the classroom and on the stream. The award is in honor of the late Leon Chandler, former Vice President of Cortland Line Company and an instructor and stalwart supporter of the camp.
The college-level classes include principles of ecology, hydrogeology, aquatic vertebrate and invertebrate sampling, hydrology, trout behavior, trout stream entomology, the biology of pollution, watersheds, riparian buffers, invasive species and streamside ethics and etiquette. New this year was a wet lab where students performed water chemistry tests, identified aquatic invertebrates, identified fish and the parts of a fish.
In addition, the camp provides hands-on classes such as fly tying, fly casting and fishing. Fish were plentiful and hungry, and thanks to Don Albright’s efforts and Clark Hall’s compliment of ghillies, all of the students caught fish. A few students had never fished before let alone fly fished and this class opened up a whole new world to them.
The students also participated in a stream habitat repair project in the Yellow Breeches Creek at Allenberry. This project is designed for the students to complete while they are at camp in order that they can observe first -hand the effects of their efforts.
Instructors came from a wide variety of disciplines. There were professionals from the Department of Environmental Protection, the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, the Natural Resource Conservation Service, Gleim Environmental, Ecotone, Inc, PA Council of Trout Unlimited and the Fish and Boat Commission who is a partner with the camp.
The keynote address this year was again provided by Dr. Thomas Sholseth, DVM, MPVM from Vancouver, BC. He spoke on the same topic as his book, “How Fish Work.” Dr. Tom also included a lab with his presentation where the students examined fish for parasites.
Ken Reinard did a presentation as Ye Olde Colonial Angler, and provided information about what fishing was like in the 18th century, including how rods, hooks and flies were made.
The students learned fly tying from Kieran Frye, an international award winning fly tyer as well as many other unsung heroes of fly tying. Al Stansbury, a mechanical engineer presented a program on rod building, not tying the guides and setting the cork but rather how carbon fiber is made and then wrapped around a mandrel to create a rod blank. The contrast between Ken's 18th century methods and the 21st century methods was striking.
Also on the list of speakers was Senator Pat Vance from Cumberland County, Secretary of the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources Cindy Adams Dunn, Meg Murphy, an attorney for the Pennsylvania DEP who explained in clear concise terms how laws, regulations and policies affect the students.
But perhaps the classes that got the students most attention was Reptiles and Amphibians by Chris Urban from the Fish and Boat Commission along with his live specimens. Nothing will keep a class awake in the afternoon like terrariums full of live snakes, turtles, salamanders and lizards.
Phil Bietsch, Fire Forester in the Michaux State Forest in Fayetteville, Franklin County received the Dr. Robert Behnke Award. Phil, a 1999 graduate of the class went on to serve a tour in U.S. Marine Corps, following which he graduated from Penn State. He worked tirelessly to re-create brook trout habitat in the now drained Old Chambersburg Reservoir.
The award is named in honor of the late Dr. Behnke who was an internationally acclaimed expert on salmonids and a longtime instructor at the camp.
The camp was founded in 1995 by the late Dr. Jack Beck and Fish and Boat Commissioner Inky Moore, as a way to begin to educate tomorrow’s leaders about coldwater conservation issues.
The Board of Directors of the camp has made a commitment that no potential student will be turned away because of financial need. Sponsorships are available for qualified students. Gear will be loaned to a student if they have never fly fished or tied flies before and do not have their own.
The classes presented to the students, whether in the stream, on the bank or in the classroom planted a seed of conservation knowledge that will last the students a lifetime no matter what their chosen profession.
The success of the camp is not only apparent in its continuous operation for twenty one years but also in its imitation by camps in twenty-two other states.
For further information, visit the PA Rivers Conservation and Fly Fishing Youth Camp website.
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