Nature Rangers Camp Review 2014

T.A.S.K.S.-teamwork, action, skills, knowledge and sharing...those were the main ideas the Nature Rangers of Tifft Nature Preserve focused on this past week!

We learned teamwork through survival shelter building, games like Insanity and Crocodile River and our Japanese knotweed work project with Mr. Dave.

We took action against bully plants like Japanese knotweed and learned about some other bully plants at Tifft.

Skill-learning included orienteering, survival skills, telescopes, binoculars, fishing, terrestrial and aquatic macroinvertebrate sampling (looking for land and water bugs), firebuilding and stalking prey.

So much knowledge...astronomy, different habitats at Tifft, different types of fish, all about the super cool Sun, edible insects, monarch butterflies, waste and energy.

Hopefully they shared some of these things (and more) with you throughout the week. We also made a sign for all the volunteers that helped us that will be included in a thank you card.

Some big highlights for the campers were:

• using natural materials to build a survival shelter, and the survivial rules of 3
• fishing
• superhero sidewalk shadows
• solar oven-baked cookies
• sweepnetting for land bugs in the grassland
• dipnetting for water bugs in the marsh
• helping Mr. Dave with the Japanese knotweed work project (getting rid of an invasive (bully) plant
• searching for and finding a monarch caterpillar and watching it grow
• going in the portable planetarium and learning about the stars and constellations
• edible fires and roasting marshmallows on a real fire

How the 5 days flew by! Not sure what some of this stuff is...quiz your campers and see how much they remember!
I enjoyed getting to know each camper and I hope they had a great time working with all of us. They accomplished their TASKS and earned their Nature Ranger badge (see beginning of entry).

Below is a slideshow of photos of campers throughout the week. There is a slight delay but it should start playing on its own.