Range Days in full swing at Camp Kiwanis

Montana Range Days began Monday at Camp Kiwanis in Beaver Creek Park, teaching students of all ages to identify up to 100 plants.

Jan Pratt, a member of the board of directors for Range Days, said the adults and high school students learned about 100 plants Monday and the 9- to 11-year-olds learned about 30.

"This is a real family event," Pratt said.

This is Pratt's 25th Range Days event, she said. The program chooses a host town every two years and holds the event there for two years, before moving on. This is the second and final year of Havre's Montana Range Days.

Among the other range-related skills, the attendees are learning how to read the textures of soil. They put some water on dirt from the land they are surveying to decide if it has more sand, clay, silt or otherwise in it.

Pratt said the land at Beaver Creek Park is great range land.

Eventually, those learning to identify the plants and soil of lands will be able to look at a tract of land and decide what kind of soil it has just by the plants that grow on it.

As part of the three-day educational event, the students will also look at a 10-foot-square area of land and separate the plants that are good or bad for a range, figure in their heads how much weight is of the good plants and then decide how many head of livestock will be able to graze there.

Pratt said there is usually around 90 FFA kids at the event and probably over 300 people taking part in the event in total this year.

During the activities, speakers in the Camp Kiwanis meeting hall also taught attendees about various topics in the range world.

Range Days teaches many skills that are used by the Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management and the National Resources Conservation Services.

"We're really supported by the NRCS," Pratt said. " ... We're practically training their future employees."

Pratt added that they have a good reputation for turning out well-informed kids, and their program is one of the best of its kind in the nation. Other states' programs similar to Montana Range Days will look to them as a good example of what their programs should be like, Pratt said.

The students of Montana Range Days will be tested Wednesday on how well they studied and retained the knowledge they picked up Monday and are learning today.