October 1 meeting minutes

Thanks all for who attended the meeting today-sorry about the late notice.  Next meeting will be in two weeks, Tuesday at 5PM in Wiestling.  If anyone has major problems with this date, please email me.

Some of the topics we covered today at the meeting are as follows below:

Sunday, October 21st-

A scout troop from Mechanicsburg, PA  is looking for help in forestry information, just some basic information.  We were thinking of meeting at Mont Alto Park.  If anyone is interested in helping out, please email Dr. Linehan for details.

Tuesday, October 23 at 7PM-

Keystone Chapter of the SAF is having a meeting on pheasant reintroduction... Mr. Houghton will be sending out an email with details soon, if you are interested in attending.  It's a good time and always great to meet the older SAF members... they have tons of information to share!!

Thursday, October 25th at 7PM-

Dr. Brantley is giving a talk in Gettysburg.  As of now the date is TENATIVE.  Please email Dr. Brantley for more details...

Saturday October 27th:

Tree planting project! Again, email Dr. Brantley for more details if you are interested in helping!

Oak Road Cleanup!

Tenative date of November 30th for the cleanup!  It's something the forestry club has always done in the past and we would love to have people come out and support the forestry club!

Hikes!!!

So far, we have a tenative date of October 16th for a hike! We were thinking only a couple of hours, and then having dinner afterwards.  We suggested chimney rock- if anyone has other ideas, PLEASE speak up! We're always open to suggestions! Say something to either me or Stuart about hiking suggestions.  We would like to do an overnight hike in November... we'll have more details at the next meeting!

Ok! So I know that was a lot of information... please email with questions if there are any.  Next meeting October 16th at 5PM!

Maddie Erickson

Forestry Club President

Snakes in a Forest

P091312_2029.jpg, a photo by P_Linehan on Flickr.

Last Thursday the forestry club attended the Cumberland Woodland Owners Association meeting in Carlisle. The topic was timber rattlers in the Pennsylvania forests. Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources (DCNR) Wildlife Biologist, Aura Stauffer, and Forester, Mike Wright discussed research work to find out how many snakes are left and what they need to survive. Timber rattlers are surprisingly gentle and fragile. They need a good hibernacula for the winter and an undisturbed habitat. They are great at controlling the populations of rodents, which can carry diseases, in the forest. We also got to meet this young rattler, who made himself heard throughout the presentation. I sat next to Andy Reed, who was a little skeptical about rattlers at first, but seemed to warm up towards them a little, by the end of the evening!

Return of "Sunshine"

Penn State Mont Alto alum Paul Shogren visited the campus this past week. He talked to students about life at Mont Alto in 1947 during his freshman year at Penn State. Paul subsequently served in the Korean Conflict. His first forestry job was at Mount Hood in Oregon, working for the Forest Service. This was particularly interesting for Maddie Erickson, who will be doing an internship in Oregon, near Mount Hood, this coming summer.

See pictures from Paul's previous visit here.

Klondike Derby 2012

This year there was no snow, but it was definitely chilly at the Klondike Derby at Camp Hidden Valley in Loysville. This year four Mont Alto forestry students volunteered to run a tree identification station for the Boy Scouts. 

James Baigmoradi explaining the rules.

Kurt Sherrard with one patrol.

James, Andrew, Kurt, and Adam

Hurry!

Volunteering at the Klondike Derby

The forestry club  volunteered at the Boy Scout Klondike Derby at the Big Springs Fish and Game Club in Newville on Saturday February 26. We judged the shelter building and fire building competitions for the 75 scouts in nine patrols attending.

Pictured after lunch were: Andy Gundlach, Mike Trisket, Zach Hetrick, Seth Morris, Dr. Linehan, Mitch Oswald, and James Baigmoradi. Not pictured is Gina Berger.

It was a great opportunity for old Scouts to give back to the cause! 

Minutes from February 18 Meeting

Forestry Club Meeting 2/18/11

We will be helping with the Klondike Derby for the Boy Scouts on Feb. 26th. We will helping with the fire burning event. The derby will be from 8:00 to approx. 4:00. We will be leaving from the school at 6:30 am. There will be a sign-up sheet outside Mr. Houghton's office. We need about 10 people to help with this and if you sign up you cannot back out! Mike Trisket, Adam Wentzel, and Grizz Baigmoradi will coming up with the scoring for this event. Fore more info. please see Mr. Trisket.

Fort Indiantown Gap will be doing prescribed burns throughout the month of March. If there is enough people interested we will go see one of these burns. Mr. Wakefield will be looking into a date when we can go.
We will be burning the burn pile this year and this will be on a weekend and we will need people to sit and watch the fire. More information about this will be announced later.

We are looking for people interested in visiting the Harrisburg museum to look at historic logging photos. More info on this is TBA.

The Heli-skiing talk with Mr. Houghton will be on March 1st. at 6:00. The location is TBA.

We would like to have a speaker from Pheasants of America to come speak about introducing pheasants. More info on this is TBA.

We would like to try and have a Fishing Derby sometime this spring. More info is TBA.

More info about the T-shirts is TBA.
Respectfully Submitted by
Your Forestry Club Secretary,
Zachary Hetrick

"By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail." - Ben Franklin

Minutes from February 4 meeting.

Forestry Club Meeting 2/4/11

The Klondike Derby will be held on February 26th. Registration for the event will be at 8 and that is when Bruce wants us to be there. We will be helping out with the fire building and shelter building events. Each station will be 45 minutes long and there will be 3 teams of 8 kids. We will be taking the bus to the event. At the next meeting we will discuss who is going to help and more details about the event.

Tubing has been rescheduled to this Tuesday at 6:00 pm. Fore members that do not have a free pass, the Forestry club will pay for half of the ticket price and you will have to pay the other $10. There will also be 2 free passes that will be raffle off for people that are not able to come up with the money.

We will be burning the burn pile this year and this will be on a weekend and we will need people to sit and watch the fire. More information about this will be announced later.

The Heli-skiing talk will Mr. Houghton  was rescheduled to Tuesday March 1st at 6:00 pm. Location TBA.

The T-shirt design was picked and more information on that will be sent out by Dr. Brantley.

Also some previous items of business:

The forestry club will be visiting the state museum in Harrisburg to view historic logging photographs. This will be on March 19th. More information is TBA.

Tyler Wakefield is looking up information about viewing a prescribed burn on the Fort Indiantown Gap property. More information on this is TBA.

And finally The Allegheny Winter SAF Meeting will be on February 16th-17th. We have picked 7 people to go to the convention and 4 are on the quiz bowl team. The 4 on the team are Mike Trisket, Derek Furry, Tyler Wakefield, and Shane Strommer. The other 3 going to the convention are Mitch Oswald, Andy Gunlach, and Zach Hetrick.

Respectfully Submitted by
Your Forestry Club Secretary,
Zachary Hetrick
Go afield with a good attitude, with respect for the wildlife you hunt and for the forests and fields in which you walk. Immerse yourself in the outdoor experience. It will cleanse your soul and make you a better person. ~Fred Bear