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Camp Teaches Environmental Stewardship

Northumberland and Lancaster counties have more than 870 miles of shoreline on the Potomac and Rappahannock rivers, their tributaries, and the Chesapeake Bay. Leaders in these communities identified a need for their youth to have a basic understanding of the environment and how to take care of it.

“Our Extension Leadership Council identified a need for stewardship education and for environmental education,” says Wendy Herdman, Extension agent for 4-H youth development in Westmoreland County. “We decided to combine these two areas into one program on environmental stewardship.”

   

The 4-H Junior Ranger Day Camp offers a three-day session where children ages 5 to 12 learn about the predator-prey relationship and how to identify carnivores, herbivores, and omnivores. An instructor from Belle Isle State Park teaches them the ABCs of outdoor safety and survival and gives basic canoe instruction.

“The program has been successful. All of the children learned to appreciate plants and animals in nature, and all of them can define a marsh and describe what makes it a special ecosystem,” Herdman says.

Most striking, 100 percent of the children who completed a survey after the three-day session say they will put their garbage in the trash and pick up litter when they see it.