everyone on stan this year has experience at ouf

everyone on stan this year has experience at ouf camp. Jamie Harris, who along with Van Carney will initiate a class called “Hiking!” was a camper at our first session in 1998.

Carney has taught his own herpetology class for the past two years. (Our campers know that “herpetology” is the study of reptiles and amphibians — snakes, lizards, turtles, frogs and salamanders.)

Other former campers who will be on staff are Tom Fort, Arlen Sherwood, Ruth Purnell, and Alex Purnell.

Robin Purnell, well-known artist and former camp director, will be here to show us how to “Make a Nature Book.”

Collecting clay and making sculptures. Touching harmless rat snakes and learning to identify poisonous ones. Naming the moths that come to the greenhouse lights at night. Building a dam to create a shallow swimming hole. Catching salamanders and worms to feed them, then watching them swim away on the last day of camp. . . These are some of the traditional experiences that campers can look forward to.

Oh yes, and our favorite game, “Capture the Flag.”

As for new experiences, there will be more of a focus on learning all about plants and animals and how we, as human beings, relate to them. Swallowtails in the garden, tree frogs in the new frog pond, skinks in the new pole bam, graceful hemlocks along the Hazel River Trail. . . these will become our friends, and we will get to know them better.

How does an owl fly so quietly through the dark woods? We will see that an owl’s feathers have fringed edges, which soften the sound of flapping wings.

Do you know where a tree’s food comes from? (Not the soil!)

Did you know that all kinds of plants undergo a kind of metamorphosis, a change in form and color, just like tadpoles and butterflies?

Do you know how to tell which bumblebees can sting you? You can catch the one’s that can’t, and make them sing.