The title of this year’s FCAL essay contest was “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly in Forest County Lakes and Streams”
This essay contest is one of the events FCAL uses to raise the awareness of our youth to the importance of our waterways and their part in being good stewards of those waterways. 5th and 6th grade students in Forest County once again stepped up to write essays on the topic. 86 essays were written by Crandon students, 15 Laona students and 45 Wabeno students. Cash awards of $100 for 1st place, $50 for 2nd place and $25 for 3rd place at each school were awarded recently.
The winners are as follows: Crandon’s winners: Carter Bissonette 1st, Elle Reeder 2nd, and Haley Walentowski 3rd; Laona’s winners: Grace Krawze 1st, Kaden Matuszewski 2ndand Wyatt Collins 3rd; Wabeno’s winners: Benny Peters 1st, Hailey Krueger 2nd, and Owen Seeber 3rd.
The winning essays will be on display at the Crandon Public Library until Kentuck Day, July 30th, at which time they will be on display at the FCAL booth.
The essay contest winners and their parents will be invited as guests to the FCAL annual meeting in October and will be given an opportunity to read their essays. We hope that many of them will be able to attend this dinner event.
The Forest County Association of Lakes would like to thank the teachers, students and principals of all three schools for their participation in the annual essay contest. They did an exceptional job.
“Forest County Lakes and Streams”
By Carter Bissonette – Crandon Middle School 6th Grader
Forest County has many amazing lakes and streams. Therefore, they provide excellent locations for fishing and swimming and many other water activities. Our lakes are wonderful, from the beautiful sunsets to the great fishing, swimming and boating. Even our wildlife benefits from our waterways.
But there are many downfalls of our Forest County lakes and streams. For example, in Lake Metonga there are the invasive species, like zebra mussels, the milfoil and rusty crayfish! So we have to treat the milfoil because it is taking over the lake: from there, the chemicals are harming the fish. The invasive species got into the lake from careless people who did not rinse their boats before they entered the lake. Also, people are being harmful to even our wildlife living on and in all Forest County lakes by throwing garbage and old fishing lines into the lakes. This hurts the wildlife. The fishing line gets into the gills of fish and they die; it also gets into the boat motors.
Our Forest County lakes are very good for businesses because they bring tourists from all over. If you love to see many birds or waterfowl our Forest County lakes have them all. How about fishing? Our lakes have so many species, from Walleye to Northern Pike to Bass and lots of panfish.
In conclusion, all the Forest County lakes are beautiful. From the beautiful lakes to the wildlife and sunsets, the lakes and rivers of Forest County are amazing. Lets’ keep them that way.
“Forest County Lakes”
By: Grace K. Krawze, Laona School
Introduction
In this paper I will be telling you about my experience with Forest County Lakes
Good
One day I was playing a board game with my friends, and my nanny told us to go outside or do something. So my friends and I went to the beach.
I love the beach because I love swimming, playing on the rafts, and plenty more.
Every time the softball season is over, we go the Laona beach
Bad
Once I was in my camper at the dam in Crandon, and my family and I were playing cards and Elizabeth and I wanted to go to the beach part. So we did. When we got there we ran into the lake right away. When I got in the lake I sliced my foot on a clump of zebra mussels.
Ugly
“COME HERE QUICK!” shouted Nadia. I ran down to the place where she was. “WOW!” I said.
I thought to myself, “How did all this garbage get here? Deer? Racoons? Squirrels? Hhhhmmm…what if we clean it up?” I thought to myself again.
I ran up to my grandma’s house. When I got there I grbbved some garbage bags and plastic gloves, and ran back down to where Nadia was. “Here, take this and these”, I explained as I was handing her the bag and gloves. “Clean it up”, I said. “Great idea!” replied Nadia.
The End
“Lakes Essay”
By: Benny Peters, Wabeno School
Hello to whoever is reading this. Have you ever thought of our lakes and streams here in Forest County? Well, if you have you might have thought why do some of our freshwater lakes and streams look trashed and disgusting and others look so beautiful and clear? That’s the same thing I always have in my head. This essay is about my thought about them.
I think that the ugly in the lakes and streams is pollution. The reason why I think this is because I have seen people throw their garbage and junk in the water. I feel so mad inside that they are polluting the water and they don’t realize that they are doing it. I also think that they should throw their bait away or put it in a fish tank because it might ruin the ecosystem in that lake or stream.
I think the bad in the lakes and streams is invasive species. Invasive species wreck the ecosystem in that environment. There are different invasive species in our lakes and streams here in Forest County and the names of them are: the banded mystery snail, freshwater jellyfish, rusty crawfish, Chinese mystery snail, narrow-leaf cattail, spiny waterflea, eurasian water-milfoil, purple loosestrife, curly-leaf pondweed, phragmites, rainbow smelt, yellow floating heart, yellow iris, and the zebra mussel.
I absolutely love the lakes and streams that are clear and clean. I always wondered why they are so clean and refreshing. I think that the lakes that I think are clean are very secluded.
In conclusion I think that the ugly in lakes is pollution, the bad is invasive species, and the good is clean and refreshing. So whoever is reading this, always think about this essay. Thank you for reading this essay.