The Club held its
annual Kids Fishing Clinic on 5 April 2003 at Alumni Pond on the NMSU campus. Attendance
was good, the weather was fairly good (just a little breezy) and a great time was had by
all. The clinic is sponsored jointly by Mesilla Valley Flyfishing, Inc. and the New Mexico
Dept. of Game and Fish. Ti Piper, who is contracted to the NMG&F to coordinate these
type of events all over the state of New Mexico, brought down a supply of fishing rods and
other assorted tackle. On Wednesday prior to the event G&F stocked the pond with 125
12" trout. Forty five kids between the ages of 5 and 11 years of age had registered
and there were only a couple of no-shows. The kids were split into small groups and went through the various
learning stations. The trout anatomy station was manned by Ti Piper, the knot tying
station by Jeff Arterburn, the fly tying station by Bob Pridgeon, the casting station by
the NMSU Chapter of the Wildlife Society and the fishing regulations station by the
NMG&F. After each group had gone through all the stations, they were rigged up for
fishing, given some bait and sent to the pond to catch a fish. Some of them did catch
fish.
At noon there was pizza and sodas for all,
kids and grownups alike. The kids had placed their names in a basket at registration and
these were drawn for door prizes. Some lucky kids won rod and reel outfits, tackle boxes
and other assorted fishing-related prizes.
The various people and organizations helping
out were:
MVFF: Jim Hulsey, Bob Pridgeon, Jeff
Arterburn with daughters Kara and Sophia, Tom Wobbe and Paul Turner
NMDG&F: John Sershen, Richard McDonald,
Chris Ortega, Joey Vega and Cindy Adcock with daughter Melissa
NMSU Chapter of Wildlife Society: Morgan
Vance, Danny Burton, Dominique Watts, Rachel Green, Robert Merrill and Chandra Freyermuth
Ti Piper
Domino's Pizza on N. Missouri came through with 21 pizzas to feed
the crowd
Wal-Mart donated all of the gifts given as
door prizes along with enough small items that each kid received a bag of goodies.
These events are a lot of fun for kids and
adults alike. Members who haven't helped out with events such as these will be surprised
at how much they will enjoy them.
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