Posts tagged ‘Earth Day’
Chipper Craft: Celebrate Earth Day
With Earth Day inching closer, now’s a great time to start thinking about good ol’ Mother Earth. Held annually on April 22, Earth Day is a world-wide support day for environmental protection. Earth Day began in 1969 when John McConnell, a peace activist, proposed a day to celebrate the environment and Earth’s beauty. The reason why Earth Day is on April 22 is because of the abundant amount of youth activism in the 1960s: April 22 is a likely day for college students to be available because it falls between Spring Break and Final Exams. Interesting, right?
In celebration of the upcoming Earth Day, Chipper made an Earth Day craft this week! Not only is this craft simple, it will teach your little one about the importance of loving our planet.
Here’s what you’ll need:
Firstly, draw a circle on blue construction paper and cut it out. This will be the water of planet Earth.
Secondly, cut out arbitrary land-like shapes out of green construction paper and glue (or tape) them onto the blue circle. Your planet Earth is starting to take shape!
Then, place your hands into a heart like shape like so. Trace your hands and cut them out.
It will end up looking like this:
Using glue or tape, adhere your hands onto your already-made Earth. Voila! This craft symbolizes the importance of using your hands in activity to love on the environment around us.
Optional: Using red marker, draw a heart in the middle like so. This could further solidify the link between using hands to actively take care of Mother Earth.
Let’s Go Chipper for Earth Day!
Recycling 101
We are told recycling is important and necessary to sustain our planet’s resources and environment. This is undoubtedly true, but what are some strategies TO recycle? What CAN’T be recycled? Where do all the materials we recycle GO anyways? After some research on the National Recycling Coalition website (www.nrc-recycle.org/dos.aspx), here is some basic information and a few tips to improve your recycling efficiency!
- CLEANLINESS COUNTS: Rinsing cans and keeping boxes out of the weather makes them easier to process, thus keeping costs down.
- PAY ATTENTION TO WHAT GOES IN YOUR BIN: Be an accurate recycle-er! Cereal boxes are good but not greasy pizza boxes; recycle your milk jugs but take off the caps. Check your bin’s lids and follow instructions!
- GOOD BETS: Steel cans, aluminum, newspapers, magazines, junk mail, plastics bottles, glass bottles and jars, ad any kind of clean, dry cardboard can all be recycled (sometimes for money!) at your local recycling center.
- PROBABLY NOT: Styrofoam, light bulbs, food-soiled paper, wax paper, and ceramics are probably not recyclable. Be aware and try to use less of these materials.
- DO RECYCLE ELECTRONICS: Recycle your old computers and cell phones. Check out Dell, Stables, and Waste Management Recycle America Web sites for information on how can recycle these items.
- HAZARDOUS WASTES HAVE THEIR PLACE: Household hazardous wastes, like paint cans, motor oil, antifreeze, car batteries, pesticide, pool chemicals, etc., usually need to be disposed of separately. Again, check your community resources and guidelines.
Sometimes recyclable products are recycled into exactly what you’d expect. Old newspapers are recycled into new newspapers, and old glass bottles are recycled into new glass bottles. However, there are thousands of different products created out of recycled materials! Here are just a few.
GLASS BEVERAGE CONTAINERS are recycled into materials for roads, marbles, decorative tiles, surfboards, and jewelry.
FIVE PLASTIC SODA BOTTLES yield enough fiber for one extra-large T-shirt, one square foot of carpet, or enough fiber to fill one ski jacket.
PLASTIC BOTTLES are also recycled into carpet, park benches, picnic tables, park benches, pipes, flowerpots, and sleeping bags.
MILK JUGS are recycled into sandbox toys, tea sets, and cookware.
STEEL AND ALUMINUM CANS are recycled into new cars, bikes, appliances, cook ware, lawn chairs, window frames, toys, fire hydrants, and tools.
NEWSPAPER is recycled into festive wrapping paper, construction paper, tissues, game boards, animal bedding, puzzles, and telephone books.
WORN-OUT SNEAKERS are recycled into material used in basketball courts, tennis courts, athletic feilds, running tracks, and playgrounds.
TIRES are recycled into shoes, purses, raincoats, umbrellas, farm tools, and hats.
FLIP-FLOPS are recycled into doormats, jewelry, toys, and furniture.
MIXED PAPER is recycled into tissues, napkins, paper towels, school supplies (folders, index cards, and notebooks, and even cat litter.
CARDBOARD is recycled into brown paper lunch bags, cereal boxes, and soap boxes.
Once you start recycling and get into the habit, it becomes second nature. And you will be blown away by how little you actually throw away! Get Chipper and start recycling today!
The Importance of Rainforests (Earth Day)
Green Rainforest
Did you know that rainforests are home to 50% of the world’s species but it only covers 2% of the Earth’s surface?! Rainforests are chalked full of life and are found around the world, on every continent but Antarctica. Not only do rainforests provide homes for tons of plants and animals, they are also an important source of fresh water. One-fifth of the world’s fresh water is found in the Amazon Basin.
Trees are absolutely vital to life here on Earth, but they are also being destroyed at an alarming rate. So many of the choices we make throughout the day when we’re shopping, eating, or even driving, are powered by deforestation. Trees are cut and burned down for a number of reasons. Forests are logged to supply timber for wood and paper products, and to clear land for crops, cattle, and housing. Other causes of deforestation include mining and oil exploitation, urbanization, acid rain and wildfires. And according to the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the 33 million acres of forestland that are lost annually around the globe are responsible for 20% of human-caused greenhouse gas emissions! Deforestation also contributes to air and water pollution, a loss of biodiversity, erosion, and climatic disruption.
So what can you DO about deforestation?
One easy way to combat deforestation is to PLANT A TREE. Not only is it fun for you and the kids, something they can watch grow with them through the years, it’s a great way to add some beauty to the back yard. And what day is more perfect to do that than Earth Day (April 22)? You can also take it one step further by making sure the choices you make at home, at the store, at work, and on the menu don’t contribute to the problem. Here’s what you can do:
- Plant a tree.
- Go paperless.
- Recycle and buy recycled products.
- Look for Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification on wood and wood products.
- Eat vegetarian meals as often as possible.
It’s that easy and if we all pitch in, we can make sure our planet is green and healthy for many generations to come! Let’s Go Chipper and Save the Planet!
Go green today and start recycling! You'll be surprised by how little trash you have once you start!
Park Ranger Profile: Lloyd Luketin from Great Smoky Mountains National Park
View from one of the many beautiful campgrounds in the park
Park Ranger’s inspire us to reconnect with nature. Many of us get caught up in our busy lives and feel like there’s never enough time to get to the park or take the family camping. But being in touch with our planet gives us all a much-needed respite. The Earth is not only our home; it provides us with everything we need, physically and spiritually. Nature was mankind’s first church and our National and State park rangers are our current environmental-clergymen! No matter what you believe, no one can deny the extreme importance of every facet of our planet. That’s why it’s so much fun to learn more about it!
Like Chipper, Lloyd Luketin is one Ranger who very dedicated to encouraging future generations to appreciate the outdoors and get inspired by the environments many fascinating aspects. He was very grateful for the opportunity to answer some of our questions about how awesome it is to be a Park Ranger at the famous Great Mountains National Park, home of “Smoky the Bear”-America’s fire watch mascot.
1. What inspired you to become a Park Ranger?
As a child I always liked to play outside, exploring the natural environments around me, and I still do. I like the feel of snowflakes melting on my face and mud squishing between my toes. I used to take long walks in the woods behind my house and examine all the birds, trees, flowers, and butterflies. There are two reasons I wanted to become a Park Ranger. First, I want to get today’s youth outside and in touch with the natural world around them. In sharing my love of nature I hope I will have a small part in developing the next generation of stewards who will be protecting the world’s wild places for future generations. The second reason I became a Park Ranger is that I get to be outside everyday. The mountains, valleys, forests, and streams that make up the Great Smoky Mountains are both my office and my playground.
2. What is the best part about being a Park Ranger? Describe a day on the job.
I work in the Resource Education Division. I teach outdoor, curriculum based, environmental education programs with children from kindergarten to high school. Every morning I will meet a school bus of children that are here on a school field trip. We may hike to a waterfall and study animals groups and habitats along the way or we may climb into a mountain stream and study aquatic invertebrates. We may even hike to the top of the highest peak to study weather and air pollution. Every day is different. The one thing that doesn’t change is that every day the student, teachers, and Rangers all have fun outside learning about the natural world.
Rainbow Falls with a Spring Rain
3. What’s a fun fact about your park that you like to share with visitors?
The Great Smoky Mountains is famous for its natural history, cultural history and scenic vistas. We are located in Tennessee and Half in North Carolina. Scientists think we may have 100,000 different species of life in the park. One of those species is the American Black Bear. We have more than two Black Bears per square mile in the park. This may be the highest density of Black Bears in the world. We like to say that the Black Bear is a charismatic mega fauna. That means that it is a big (mega) animal (fauna) that everyone likes (charismatic).
4. What advice would you gives kids and their parent’s visiting your park?
There are so many things to do in the park that you should plan your favorite activities first before you even arrive. A great way to research what to do is on our website, www.nps.gov/grsm. When you get to the park, stop at one of our visitor centers and pick up a free Smokies Guide and a map. There is a lot of information available in our visitor centers along with rangers to answer any questions. Don’t forget to visit “Clingmans Dome”, the highest mountain in the park!
5. What is the most important thing about parks in your opinion?
There are two important things about National Parks. All the plants, animals and history are protected for all time and National Parks are here for us to enjoy. Please come visit us here at the Great Smoky Mountains. You will be glad you did!
The Great Smoky Mountains National Park is one of the few places remaining in the eastern U.S. where black bears can live in the wild, natural surroundings. For many, this famous Smokies' resident is a symbol of wildness.
Most of the park is a magnificent wilderness. The Cherokee described its foggy, serene mountains as shaconage, meaning “blue, like smoke.” Artifacts and log-home ruins from the Native peoples, who were very much in touch with their environments, can be seen all over the park. A visit here will surely motivate your kids to get out and play while also learning so much about nature. The Junior Park Ranger program (available at most National and State Parks) is an excellent place to start the process of improving our home we call Earth for your kids and all the generations after them. Let’s get outside and get Chipper today!
Why Trees Matter
Trees aren’t just the home of Chipper and many of his animal friends, and they don’t just provide shade or a fun climb. Trees are much more important than we realize and their necessity is often underestimated. Filtering pollution from the air and water and making the oxygen we need to breath are only two of the many benefits of trees. Their daily work is truly a miracle! One study by researchers at Columbia University in 2008 found that more trees in urban neighborhoods correlate with a lower incidence of asthma.
In a bit of natural alchemy called photosynthesis, for example, trees turn one of the seemingly most insubstantial things of all — sunlight — into food for insects, wildlife and people, and use it to create shade, beauty and wood for fuel, furniture and homes. It may not be obvious, but hey are essential to all life on this planet we call home!
Decades ago, Katsuhiko Matsunaga, a marine chemist at Hokkaido University in Japan, discovered that when tree leaves decompose, they leach acids into the ocean that help fertilize plankton. When plankton thrive, so does the rest of the food chain. In a campaign called Forests Are Lovers of the Sea, fishermen have replanted forests along coasts and rivers to bring back fish and oyster stocks. And they have returned!
Other researchers in Japan have long studied what they call “forest bathing.” A walk in the woods, they say, reduces the level of stress chemicals in the body and increases natural killer cells in the immune system, which fight tumors and viruses. Studies in inner cities show that anxiety, depression and even crime are lower in a landscaped environment!
Trees also release vast clouds of beneficial chemicals. On a large scale, some of these aerosols appear to help regulate the climate; others are anti-bacterial, anti-fungal and anti-viral. We need to learn much more about the role these chemicals play in nature. One of these substances, taxane, from the Pacific yew tree, has become a powerful treatment for breast and other cancers. Aspirin’s active ingredient comes from willows!
Trees also absorb much of the heat created by green house gasses and asphalt in urban areas, yet thousands of them are cut down every day and they are few and in between in our cities. This Earth Day, please do your self and the planet a favor by planting a tree. Whether in your back yard or somewhere else in your community, every tree counts!
Our National Park System
Since 1872, the United States National Parks System has grown from a single, public reservation called Yellow Stone National Park to embrace over 450 natural, historical, recreational, and cultural areas throughout the United States, its territories, and island possessions. These areas include a diverse varieties of areas —Parks, Monuments, Memorials, Military Parks, Parkways, Recreation Area, Seashores, Scenic River Ways, Scenic Trails, and others.
Parks are the living, breathing monuments to our nation’s history, culture, and landscape. In some ways, they represent the soul of the Nation. They need care and support to overcome the many dangers that threaten to destroy them forever, such as pollution and and an increasing lack of funds from Congress for the vital care and support they need. The Park Rangers, charged with this protection, need our help as well, by visiting and volunteering at a park near you.
Next week is National Parks Week and the folks here at Let’s Go Chipper want to encourage all of you to take the family to your local Park to show your support for the priceless benefit to our lives, health and education that parks give. We want to encourage our future generations to champion the park systems by appreciating their beauty and fun. Junior Park Ranger programs are one great way to embed this appreciation and interest. Join us in raising awareness and necessary funds to support local playgrounds and our national park systems by buying one of our Chipper for Parks Badges. You can leave a specific park in your order and we will contribute a portion of the price directly in your name.
CHIPPER FOR PARKS BADGE (click here to purchase)
The National Parks Service also has “Fee Free Days” each year where you don’t have to pay any entry fees to gain access to the park. (“Fee waiver includes: entrance fees, commercial tour fees, and transportation entrance fees. Other fees such as reservation, camping, tours, concession and fees collected by third parties are not included unless stated otherwise.“)
The Fee Free Days for 2012 are:
- January 14-16 (Martin Luther King Jr. weekend)
- April 21-29 (National Park Week)
- June 9 Get (Outdoors Day)
- September 29 (National Public Lands Day)
- November 10-12 (Veterans Day weekend)
This deal applies to the 397 national parks that in the USA, but of the total national parks many don’t charge regular admission fees. To find out if there is a national park near you this Easter Weekend that is free year-round check out the U.S. National Park Service’s Find A Park page and explore the great outdoors!
The Importance of Play
Almost half of Pre-schoolers do not play outside daily, according to research presented in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine this week and noted Dr. Sanjay Gupta with CN&N Health, due to a variety of factors, including a hurried lifestyle, changes in family structure, and increased attention to academics and enrichment activities at the expense of recess or free child-centered play. (http://www.childrenandnature.org/news/detail/no_outdoor_play_for_many_kids/).
The development from ages 3 to 5 is extremely important. A number of research projects (such as this study by the American Academy of Pediatrics: http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/119/1/182.full) have shown that taking kids to play at the park is not only benefits their physical and mental health, it gives children a chance to explore the mysteries of nature. Getting out your local playgrounds gives your child a chance to socialize and make friends with their peers, improving their communication skills and self confidence. Play also offers an ideal opportunity for parents to engage fully with their children and teach them about our environment and learn some fun facts yourself!
Parents now have another reason to shoo their kids outdoors to play, along with making sure they get enough fresh air and exercise. In a study, Australian researchers found evidence that children who spent the most time outdoors were the least likely to suffer from myopia, also called nearsightedness or shortsightedness.Let's go and smell the blooming flowers with Chipper this Spring!
From climbing trees, to making dirt castles, there are so many ways to have some fun outdoors! Have your kids hunt for colorful leaves, rocks, and sticks to make their very own fairy castle. Or just play a simple game of leap frog! There’s no limit to the fun and games you can have when you’re under the open sky with some friends and family.
Click this image to check out the National Park Service's Junior Ranger information page now to find the closest program near you!
National Parks Week (April 21-29) is right around the corner, and there’s all kinds of fun for Junior Ranger visitors at a number of parks for kids to learn, explore and help out. Our national and state parks are the perfect place to give you and the family a chance to get our in the Spring sunshine and play the day away!
What is the best kids’ activity you’ve ever experienced at a park? Please share and let us know! And have fun in the sun…just don’t forget your sunscreen 
Chipper for Parks!
Chipper for Park Badge
This month, we are launching our Chipper for Parks campaign! Open, urban, state, and national – Chipper supports programs committed to educating children and families about our parks. Parks not only preserve natural spaces and protect local plants and animals, they encourage families to enjoy the many wonders of nature and connect with our planet. Spending time in your own community park allows children to build friendships that will last a lifetime. Parks help parents to spend some productive time with their kids by playing outside, something that is even more essential in our increasingly digital world. The noble park rangers that help run our parks teach us about our complex environment and organize many activities and programs for future generations to take part in caring for mother nature.
Let's Stroll Crissy Field
Spending time in nature not only educates, it inspires us and promotes physical and spiritual well-being. Support your community and have some essential fun with your family by visiting your local park today! Please share your story with us and take some photos to earn your very own Chipper for Parks badge as seen above. Also, take a look at some of our books, music and DVDs for more ways to inspire your family to get outdoors and learn about the planet: Chipper guided almost 1,000 families through Crissy Field in Golden Gate Park during Earth Stroll a 40th Anniversary celebration for Earth Day. Through a grant by Growing Up For Good, our book “Let’s Stroll Crissy Field” educates and excites children about urban parks and the importance of taking public transportation to help reduce our carbon footprint and live a more healthy lifestyle.
Park Ranger Profile: Casey Overturf from Mount Rainier National Park, WA
The south face of Mt. Rainier, looking from Longmire. On a clear spring day, the mountain seems to glow!
The spring-time snow is finally here and now is your last chance to hit the slopes with the family! Not only is it great exercise, playing in the snow is also a fun, fantastic way to connect with your family and with the beauty of nature this season. Our National and State parks are great resources for you and the family to find physical and emotional rejuvenation in nature this spring as nature begins to bloom again.
Mount Rainier National Park in Washington State is one park with all kinds of outdoor activities to take advantage of and also see an amazing patchwork of vistas: deep green forests, tumbling rivers, flower dotted meadows, ice-blue glaciers, a snow-shrouded volcano. There are 25 major glaciers on Mount Rainier and numerous unnamed snow or ice patches which serve as important indicators of climatic change, major visitor interpretive objects, sources of water for park aquatic systems, and hydroelectric and recreation pursuits outside of the park. Visit the interactive Mount Rainier glacier webpages of in-depth information on the park’s glaciers to learn more about our dramatically changing landscape.
Mount Rainier was one of the US’s earliest National Parks, having been established on March 2, 1899 as the fifth national park in the United States, encompassing 236,381 acres of pristine forest. The snow there is some of the best on the west coast and thousands of visitors come each year to experience the thrill of riding down the magnificent stratovolcano (also known as a composite volcano) that is Mount Rainier. Check http://twitter.com/#!/MountRainierNPS for daily winter road status.
In 2010, 2,016 volunteers contributed 73,990 hours of service to Mount Rainier National Park. Find out how you can volunteer at Mount Rainier by clicking this photo!
Considering herself extremely lucky to work in such a beautiful part of the country, Park Ranger Casey James Overturf, who has worked as a West District Park guide for over 6 years, tells us more about about this National park and her important job of keeping it safe and clean for generations to come:
1) What inspired you to become a park ranger?
I could not think of any other job that I would like to do. I get to live and work in some of the most beautiful and powerful places in this country. I get to work outdoors at times, always get to learn more about nature and share that with others. The flat hat is pretty sharp looking as well.
2) What is the best part about being a ranger? Describe a day on the job.
Describing a day would be tricky, every day is different (another part of the job I like). Depending on the season, the weather and the day of the week what I do during the day changes. I’d say the most rewarding part is getting to help people. From finding a bathroom and picking a trail to helping them learn about nature and helping them understand how it works.
My two favorite things to do are the snowshoe walks in the winter and the evening programs in the summer. In the winter we take folks outside on snowshoes, many for the first time, and talk about winter ecology. I like to have my snowshoe walks play a “choose your own adventure” game where they get to “live the life” of an animal that stays active throughout the winter. Based on their choices they see if they can survive a winter here at Mount Rainier.
In the summer we go to the campgrounds at night and get to talk to many of the people camping there. Once it is dark we meet with anyone who wants to in the amphitheater and the ranger gets to share what they love about the park. Last summer I explained to people how Native Americans have lived in this area for thousands of years and shared some of their stories about this special place.
3) What’s a fun fact about your park you like to share with visitors?
OH! There are so many things I could say! This is another great part of my job. The fact that I work on an active volcano covered in the biggest glacier system in the continental United States really excites me.
4) What advice would you give to kids and their parents visiting your park?
Because there is so much to do see and do in the park I would plan ahead before you get here to make the most of your time. Also be flexible in your plan. I would always ask a Ranger what they think is special or fun to do. Some of the best times I’ve had in parks were based on suggestions from the ranger. They know the “off the beaten path” stuff that most people do not even know to look for.
For example one of my favorite places in the “spring” (when the snow starts to melt here usually around May) is on the Westside road. If you drive the 3 miles up that dirt road and then walk for no more than half a mile you will be glad you did. Only as the snow melts there are waterfalls coming down Mount Wow that are tall and skinny, thousands of feet tall if you count all the drops. Then on top of that you can often see mountain goats on Mount Wow during the spring. Wow actually comes from a Native American word meaning goat.
5) What is the most important thing about parks in your opinion?
That it offers so many different opportunities for many different people. Some people come to find a challenge, to pit themselves against the elements and see what they are made of. Some come for the solitude and the chance to escape a busy and stressful day to day life. Some come in big groups to spend time in a safe place with friends and family. Some come for the history; the people and buildings that are part of the story of this park, even Wilderness is historic as it is the only place to see early America before it was settled. A park experience can be almost anything you want it to be, and these extraordinary places belong to all of us.
Come and visit this epic park soon to enjoy it’s beauty and to reconnect you and your family to the wonders of nature with great fun like snow show walks, sledding and sliding, and winter camping! Mount Rainier also has a volunteer program and Junior Ranger books available at all their visitor centers. Complete the activities for your age group, have a ranger review your work and you will be sworn in and issued your official Mount Rainier Junior Ranger badge! Once you start your badge collection, also check out our Chipper For Parks badge we are featuring this April!
Most everyone is familiar with this very beautiful and common plant of the moist woods, whose common name is "Tri-Folwer," as the leaves and petals are in threes. The petals at first are pure white but turn a dark rose color with age.
Photo by Daniel Keeble
Park Ranger Profile: Jan Stock from Bryce Canyon National Park (UT)
ELECTRONIC FIELD TRIP HOSTED AT BRYCE CANYON THIS PAST SPRING
Saint Patty’s Day is right around the corner and now is the perfect time to go GREEN! The folks here at Let’s Go Chipper are going green by celebrating the noble work of Park Rangers everywhere with weekly ranger profiles to help inspire future rangers and increase interest in parks.
This week we are looking at Jan Stock, a Park Ranger Interpreter for Bryce Canyon National Park in Utah. Currently working as a Volunteer Coordinator, Jan has been with the National Park Service since 1978 (over 30 years!) and been apart of the Bryce Canyon family since 1986. Jan was kind enough to answer a few questions for us with her expertise, explaining why park rangers are so important and giving a wonderful description of how fun it is to work in the great outdoors for a living. Here are her responses:
1) What inspired you to become a park ranger?
I grew up in northern Connecticut with five siblings. My parents didn’t have a lot of money, so family vacations were spent doing things that didn’t cost much: hiking, camping, picnicking, swimming, etc. Sometimes, we’d vacation in national forests, sometimes in national parks. As long as I can remember, the thought of being a park ranger and GETTING PAID to work and play in these special places intrigued me! Even though my Dad tried to talk me out of it (telling me that being a park ranger probably wouldn’t pay much — and he was right!), I decided that it was more important to do something I loved for little pay, than to do something I didn’t like just because it paid more. So I pursued becoming a National Park Ranger. I always have, and always will, LOVE the great outdoors. Our national parks help protect natural and cultural resources so they’ll be unimpaired for future generations to enjoy!
2) What is the best part about being a ranger? Describe a day on the job.
National parks are some of the most beautiful places on Earth, and there are days when I practically have to “pinch” myself as a reminder of how blessed I am to be living and working in these spectacular sanctuaries. My career is what some people only dream of doing! A typical day for me is full of variety. I might spend a couple of hours working at the visitor center information desk as I answer questions and help visitors make the most of their time here. Sometimes I go out in the park and offer an interpretive program to a group of visitors. We offer a number of different walks and talks, including: geology talks, snowshoe hikes, rim walks, canyon hikes, kids programs, full moon hikes, astronomy programs, and campfire programs. I also do a lot of “behind-the-scenes” work, including: managing the park’s museum collection as the Park Curator, producing interpretive publications and exhibits, maintaining the park’s website, supervising visitor center volunteers, and serving as the park’s
Volunteer Manager.
Thor's Hammer at sunrise on a cloudy day (Photo by Ray Mathis)
3) What’s a fun fact about your park you like to share with visitors?
Bryce Canyon National Park is best known for its “hoodoos.” Hoodoos are odd-shaped pinnacles of rock left standing by the forces of weathering and
erosion. Although hoodoos ARE found in many places around the world, Bryce Canyon has the largest and most colorful collection of hoodoos that you’ll find anywhere on Earth! Some of our hoodoos have been given names based on what they look like. Here at Bryce Canyon, we have an alligator, a hunter and rabbit, Queen Victoria, a sinking ship, the Pope, the Poodle, and Thors Hammer — just to name a few. We encourage visitors to use their imaginations and name other hoodoos they believe look familiar to them. Many of our visitors have found (and named) a particular hoodoo in the park
– “E.T. the Extraterrestrial!”
4) What advice would you give to kids and their parents visiting your park?
Slow down, take your time, relax and enjoy yourselves. Don’t try to do too many parks in a short time, or you’ll end up spending all your time in the car — rushing from place to place and getting totally “burned out!” There are many different things to do here: hiking, horseback riding, attending ranger programs (including astronomy and/or moonlight hikes). If possible, we always encourage visitors to take a hike. Not only is it a good way to get some exercise and “family-bonding-time,” but hiking “immerses” you in the resource — you get up-close and personal with our beautiful and bizarre hoodoos. If all you do is gaze upon distant hoodoos from the viewpoints then move on, you’re missing out on the unique and amazing experience that our hiking trails have to offer.
5) What is the most important thing about parks in your opinion?
As I mentioned above, national parks are sanctuaries — set aside to protect resources to leave them unimpaired for future generations to enjoy. These national parks belong to everyone — not just Americans, but all citizens of the world! National parks do an amazing job, not only of protecting natural and cultural resources, but of telling important stories, too — whether it’s the story of immigrants coming to America seeking freedom and opportunity (Statue of Liberty), or the story of Pearl Harbor being attacked in 1941 (World War II Valor in the Pacific National Monument). It is our hope that these special places will serve to remind us of the beauty and fragility of both our species and our planet, and instill a sense of stewardship so that all may experience these special places forever.
It is also Chipper’s mission to instill this sense of stewardship in future generations so we can keep our planet healthy and beautiful! Taking the time to enjoy our parks is one way to do encourage children to appreciate nature for years to come. Thanks to our wonderful park rangers like Jan Stock, there are numerous Junior Ranger programs for kids at parks all over the world, including at Bryce Canyon.
The Bryce Canyon National Park is only one of thirteen National Parks in the State of Utah that receive around 9 million visitors annually (for more information on Utah’s park highlights and numbers: http://www.nps.gov/state/ut/index.htm?program=parks). Visitation is the main source of revenue that keeps these parks alive and benefits the Park Rangers that run them.
Ranger snowshoeing "China Wall Basin" of Fairyland Loop Trail (Photo by Jan Stock)
Bryce Canyon is even more beautiful in the wintertime! For the casual visitor, hopping in and out of their warm car at the overlooks to see the striking contrast of white snow, red rock, and blue sky might be thrilling enough. However, for the more adventurous winter recreationists, many opportunities beckon. BEFORE setting out on one of the adventures described below, stop at the Bryce Canyon Visitor Center to get up-to-date weather and safety information. The best time of winter to visit Bryce Canyon is during the Bryce Canyon Winter Festival. This annual event is usually held over President’s Day Weekend.
Ever wonder why the rocks are red? Where we got the name hoodoo? What’s a deer’s favorite food? Well, you’re not alone! Check out the FREE Park Ranger Programs to learn all sorts of fun facts about Bryce Canyon to expand your imagination and your exploration of the park. Their summer schedule is packed so visit their visitation page today to plan your next outdoor adventure! http://www.nps.gov/brca/index.htm
