Jeff Laszlo, owner of Granger Ranches, explains the importance of conservation to wildlife and ranchers to a group of campers at a recent Montana Outdoor Science School camp. Photo by Greg Lemon
We all know water is important.
In Madison County and southwest Montana we know this all too well.
But the science of water and the animals and habitat it sustains were the focus of a camp for 10 local 6 and 7-year-olds last week in Ennis.
Montana Outdoor Science School was in Ennis last week to focus kids on the many ways water impacts their life and the world around them. The different lessons included looking at the water cycle, aquatic life and wetlands. Campers also learned about conservation.
For instance, many of the campers were surprised to learn that if they leave the sink on while they brush their teeth, they could waste two gallons of water.
Local first and second graders stare into the shallow water of a spring feeding fresh cool water to upper O’Dell Creek south of Ennis. The kids were part of a Montana Outdoor Science School camp last week in Ennis. Photo by Greg Lemon
The goal of MOSS is to get kids exposed to the outdoors and science in an interactive way, said Jenna Fallaw, MOSS instructor. Typically, the teachers introduce new concepts in the morning, re-enforce the lessons with some hands-on exploration and then guide kids through fun games and exploration the rest of the day to continue to show them how the science lessons apply to the real world.
The idea is to use education and experience in the outdoors to instill a conservation ethic in the students.
“If you don’t have an understanding and awareness of what’s around you and an enjoyment and appreciation, you aren’t going to want to save it,” Fallaw said.
This year MOSS, which is centered in Bozeman, has pulled back on some of their camps, she said. In the past summers, they have held outdoor camps in areas around southwest Montana, but this year the only camp outside of Bozeman was in Ennis.
That camp came together by working with Sunni Heikes-Knapton, the Madison Watershed Coordinator. Her daughter had attended the MOSS camp last summer in Ennis and learned a lot. When Heikes-Knapton called MOSS this spring, they said they needed 10 kids to sign up for the camp before they could commit to coming to Ennis. She made some calls and recruited kids and the camp came together.
On Friday, the campers headed out to the Granger Ranch and the O’Dell Creek restoration project.
During the past six years Jeff Laszlo has overseen a major wetlands restoration project on upper O’Dell Creek, which is located on the Granger Ranch near the Madison River. The wetlands had been drained in the 1950s because the thought then was draining the land would help promote rangeland grasses and cattle grazing.
The restoration work has involved blocking old irrigation ditches along O’Dell Creek.
Laszlo and Rob Hazelwood, a consultant in the O’Dell Creek restoration work with Ranchland Wildlife Consultants, met the students at the ranch and talked a little to them about the restoration project and the relationship between conservation and ranching.
Conserving water with the wetlands project has improved the grass for the cattle in addition to creating more habitat for birds like ducks, songbirds and sandhill cranes, Laszlo said.
The campers then walked out along the creek banks and looked at fish rising, bugs hatching and water bubbling up from the ground. They crowded around the water anxious to see what Fallaw was pointing out.
“These programs are so much fun that I don’t think the kids even realize they’re learning,” Heikes-Knapton said.
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