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Bear River Celebration Teaches About Nature

On Saturday, children painted fish with rubber stencils, made beavers out of rocks, and held a recycling basketball game where participants learned about recycling at the 14th annual Bear River Celebration — which highlights all the things that a healthy watershed provides.

Sam Saltern, who played the basketball game, stated why recycling is important.

“Because if you don’t recycle, the whole world would be garbage,” Saltern said.

A band played music while children and families were free to walk around to different booths. Visitors could get their bags stamped at each place, and whoever went to all the stations got a free hat.

People from water and wildlife groups came to the event to educate children and families. One of them was Peter Bergeson from Stokes Nature Center, who brought parts of animals for children to touch. They included an antelope horn, an eagle talon and skin from a snake named Gonzo.

Bergeson said he would like to get kids interested enough to one day become naturalists or just appreciate nature.

“We all need to be stewards of nature,” Bergeson said. “So we need to take care of it, and the best way to take care of it is if you actually learn about it and know about it, start being interested in it, start caring about it.”

The Ogden Nature Center brought a tortoise to the event and let everyone touch it.

Shawnee Sawyer from the center says the more people know about animals like the tortoise, the more desire they’ll have to care for them.

“I think when it comes to endangered species, people like to think of nice, fluffy, cute things, and you don’t really think of a tortoise as something you want to save or protect,” Sawyer said. “But they’re really important to the environment and the habitat. So we want to make sure that we protect them, and they’re really cool.”

Just off the park by the pond, poles were provided for people to try catching trout as part of the state’s Free Fish Day. 

Robert Holloway sat by the pond with his son Kyle Holloway, who attempted to hook a fish. Robert said he likes that this event is family oriented.

“I think it’s a good activity for families to come out and just to relax and enjoy being together and bonding,” Robert Holloway said.

“And fishing,” Kyle Holloway added. “Don’t forget fishing.”