As I have written several times over the last year or so. I think that Maine Outdoors is actually in the conservation education business. My goal is for each client to learn something new about the environment that gives them a deeper appreciation for our world. Of course that has a variety of facets from the family fishing trip where we have an eagle watch us fish, to working with the Board of Directors of the Maine Conservation School or Unity College or even explaining the realities of a decision to a legislator. All of those are important but one of the most enjoyable is helping at the Youth Fishing events here in Union.
These events are sponsored by my neighbors Scot and Mary Sabins in memory of their son Mike. Their long term goal is to organize a kids fish and game club that focuses on getting kids out to enjoy the natural world, fishing and hunting like Mike did. This is the first ice fishing event we have run and it was a total success with over 100 in attendance. I am posting pictures of the event, you can see that except for the wind the weather was perfect and the fish cooperated, something that has not happened at our open water events.
There are two things that I find most rewarding about working on these events the first is the number of parents and kids that are repeats. They come to every event and in fact do not fish at other times. So we are succeeding in introducing some to an outdoor activity that would not do it without us. The second thing I enjoy is the number of adults that simply show up to help out and help make the event a success. Every event has several folks that I have not met before that come up tell me their name and ask what they can do to help. It makes the events easy to pull off and adds a great deal to my personal enjoyment of the day.
After we had packed everything up and were standing in the parking lot talking two eagles appeared to see what had been left on the ice that they might eat. Quite a site to have adult eagles only 50 feet or so in full breeding plumage against a crystal clear blue sky. That alone was reward enough for the day. A nice article with a few pictures of the event are online at Village Soup.
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