Study: Children can benefit from activities in the wild

It's never hard to find an excuse to take kids fishing or hunting.

Last week, for example, I knew our boys would be devastated after the Food & Drug Administration banned eating fresh spinach. So I decided to cheer them up with a quick trip to the woods.

Dusk fell as Harrison, our 6-year-old, ate cherry Twizzlers and helped me watch a soybean field framed by dense South Carolina swamp. Deer season opened there in August.

He scanned the field with my huge Nikon 7x50 binoculars, which made his tiny head seem even smaller.

"See anything?" I whispered.

"Nope," he replied. "So why are we whispering?"

Behind us in the darkening forest, something approached noisily.

"Maybe it's an ogre," Harrison said, eyes widening.

As the sound came closer, an armadillo shuffled directly under our deer stand, pausing to look upward with pale, pink eyes.

Then all was quiet.

As the sun slipped below the trees, purple martins swirled above the field, dining on the few mosquitoes that weren't already dining on us.

Harrison was midway through telling me how he learned in Mrs. Montgomery's first-grade class that a purple martin can eat 5,000 mosquitoes each night - when his voice trailed off.

"Deeeeer," he gasped, trying to whisper.

They glided single file from the dark woods into the beans; first one, then two more. A fourth deer appeared seconds later.

Harrison was mesmerized. "You gonna shoot one?" he asked, covering his ears.

"Nope," I replied as the does and fawns fanned out into the beans. "We're after a buck."

The deer were still feeding when we climbed down to go home, but one of them snorted repeatedly as they galloped into the darkness.

Harrison's assessment was a positive one: "That was cool!"

Is it wise to take someone so young on a sport so rugged?

Lots of folks think so, including a team of researchers at Cornell University, which released a study in August suggesting that children who spend time "in the wild" before the age of 11 are much more likely to become adults who care deeply about the environment and natural resources.

The study involved surveys of 2,000 adults interviewed about their backgrounds, attitudes and outdoor experiences.

Nancy Wells, assistant professor of environmental analysis at Cornell's College of Human Ecology, summed up her conclusions this way:

"Although domestic nature activities - caring for plants and gardens - also have a positive relationship to adult environment attitudes, their effects aren't as strong as participating in wild nature activities as camping, hiking, walking, fishing and hunting," she said in a university press release.

Interestingly, the study concluded, children don't derive the same benefits from participating in scouts or other forms of environmental education programs.

"Participating in nature-related activities that are mandatory does not have the same effects as free play in nature, which don't have demands or distractions posed by others and may be particularly critical in influencing long-term environmentalism," Wells said.

The study is yet another bit of evidence supporting what most outdoorsmen already know: an afternoon in the woods, away from video games, computers and televisions, is almost always an asset to a child.

This weekend, by the way, marks the 35th year our nation has recognized National Hunting & Fishing Day. It was established in 1971 by Congress and President Nixon.

The annual observance, celebrated Saturday, is to recognize and honor the generations of anglers and hunters who have helped establish and maintain countless programs aimed at protecting natural resources, both for game and non-game species.

Reach Rob Pavey at 868-1222, ext. 119 or rob.pavey@augustachronicle.com.