Good Neighbors Stream Ecology Days

 

Crawdads and Minnows!

On June 8th and July 9th, the Blue Ridge Foothills and Lakes chapter of Virginia Master Naturalists conducted a Stream Ecology Day at Booker T Washington National Monument for 8 to 10 year old’s from the Good Neighbors summer camp program.  Groups of about 80 kids from Franklin County and Bedford County areas learned about the stream ecology in Jack-o-Lantern Creek at the park.

Shearer Rumsey explained to me that “Good Neighbors is a wonderful organization. It is 100% free to all children and includes 2 meals a day plus snack, food for several kids in the free weekend bags that include a new book to keep each week. Every day each child reads for thirty minutes with an adult volunteer. Lots of fun activities, themes like Peace Week and Nature Week”. 

Each day these kids were having the best times of their lives wading in the creek, netting for Benthic Macro Invertebrates, and anything else that they could find. They especially liked catching crawdads and minnows!

Thank you to Lisa Leitz from Good Neighbors for giving us the opportunity to educate your kids. And thanks to chapter members Chekka Lash, Connie Hylton, Shearer Rumsey and Bob Rasmussen from for running this event.  

submitted by Bob Rasmussen