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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
November 6, 1995
95-167
CONTACT:
Gary Seelig, Belfair Elementary School (360) 275-2863, home (360) 275-8204
Annie Phillips, Ecology (360) 407-6408
Mary Getchell, Ecology (360) 407-6157
ECOLOGY AWARDS MAGIC APPLE GRANT TO NORTH MASON TEACHER
OLYMPIA, WA -- This school year, a fifth grade teacher at Belfair Elementary School will get extra help for a special project from a "Magic Apple" grant of $750 from the Washington State Department of Ecology. Gary Seelig plans to use the money to build a small removable dam to ensure a constant flow of stream water for his class’s salmon project.
Last May Ecology presented "Magic Apple" grants to nine teachers throughout our state in recognition of outstanding water quality education projects, and to support activities in the coming school year. The money is part of a larger environmental education grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
"Teachers can really influence whether a student grows up to cherish or to misuse our natural resources," said Linda Crerar, Ecology assistant director for the water division. "These educators are teaching stewardship along with their traditional subjects of science, language arts and social studies."
The salmon project at Belfair Elementary began four years ago. Gary Seelig uses Sweetwater Creek, which runs through the school property, as a living classroom to teach about life cycles and Northwest stream habitats. His students grow fertilized chum salmon eggs in an aquarium and release the small fish into the creek each spring. They also hatch eggs in an "outdoor incubator” they have built in the creek. The surviving salmon should make it back from Hood Canal in about three years, if the creek doesn’t rise. However, sometimes the creek does rise. Once, a January storm wiped out all the stock in the mini-hatchery.
"The high volume of debris in the water clogged some of our pipe with gravel and completely covered our intake overnight,” reported Seelig. "This problem occurred even though we had completely reconstructed our lines and intake area after earlier storms and have done continual routine maintenance.”
The "Magic Apple" grant will pay for a small dam system consisting of concrete piers, a concrete splash pad and a removable wooden spill way. The dam system should prevent a catastrophe like the wipe out of the stock in the mini-hatchery from happening again.
"As students are touched by the salmon so are their parents, grandparents, friends and anyone else who walks by the aquarium next to the school office. I teach that salmon are the indicator species for the quality of life here in the Pacific Northwest,” said Seelig. "If indeed they are, and if they have a better chance to thrive as the result of our project on Sweetwater Creek, then life in Belfair and the lower Hood Canal watershed will be just a little bit better.”
Teachers interested in applying for a "Magic Apple” grant should contact Annie Phillips at Ecology, (360) 407-6408.
Copyright © Washington State Department of Ecology. See http://www.ecy.wa.gov/copyright.html.
