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NPAA Member Educates 13 Lucky Kids

 Jul 29th, 2014 by OutdoorsFIRST 

Modified Jul 29th, 2014 at 12:00 AM

On June 23rd, Nancy Koep NPAA # 323 put on a kids fishing clinic for the Sharp Shooters 4-H club in Glenwood. The two hour clinic was a success with 13 kids attending the event. The club had to log hours for outdoor activities and this clinic counted towards their goals for hours they need to reach by the end of the year. ‘It was a little smaller group then I anticipated, but it worked out well because I got to do a lot of hands on and one on one with the kids’, said Koep.

She started the clinic with fish identification and also had the kids classify them into their proper fish families. After that she showed them how to tie knots. Because of the number of kids, after practicing with a tool, she gave them all their own fishing poles and had each kid tie on their own jig head. This was where Nancy was really able to give each kid her attention and help them with it, until they got it down. ‘It was fun seeing the look on their faces when they realized they did it’, said Koep. After that she showed each kid how to rig up a slip bobber, and then had the kids do it themselves on their own poles.

They spent a lot of time going over invasive species. Nancy handed out cards to the kids with all the different local types of invasive species in the area lakes and talked about them. In this section, they covered what they look like, why they are bad, and what they can do to prevent the spread. ‘My message was simple, but yet important, and the kids came away with a much better understanding of why these invasive species are so bad. I even had some samples of Milfoil there to show the kids what it actually looks like. Sometimes seeing it up close and in person will help them remember what it looks like when it’s hanging off their boat trailers’, said Koep.

Each kid also got to work on their casting skills with Nancy teaching them the proper techniques on how to cast. After it was over, all the kids were able to leave with their own fishing pole, courtesy of the NPAA, many handouts on invasive species from the Sea Grant Association, water bottles, Ice Team pins from HSM Outdoors, bumpers stickers from Kruger Farms, and the NPAA Side Kick’s Go Fishing Books.

Special thanks to all the business and organizations that made this event possible and a success.

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