Special Projects by Talus

Hi Camp Kintail it’s Talus here at the end of the summer. One of the best things about being on staff is the ability to make camp a better and more enriching place for others. This is done through taking the time to improve the site in creative ways and projects. This year in April I made a list of all of the things that I wanted to achieve. For the most part I crossed off several of these projects by the end of the year. Some of these have been personal growth and knowledge such as learning more star constellations, but others are to the site itself. I want to talk about two of my yearly projects.

This year I used some of my spare time to create a space behind Feathers and next to Tir-na-nog called hammock village. The space itself once was an old apple orchard and before I got to it the lower branches were overgrown and dead. I did my best to cut out the old branches and yet still keep the general old rustic feel of the grove. When the space was cleared, I took your donated old Christmas lights and strung them up around the orchard in the lower branches. The first night that I turned on the lights it looked magical. Mercury brought a cabin’s worth of hammocks from Guatemala to hang up underneath the lights and the rest is history. Hammock Village has become a popular place for down and outs and flashes. The hammocks make the space a great area for overnight sleepovers and the twisted trees look quite neat. Being on staff allows you to express yourselves in different mediums.

Another project has been a cumulative year round experience. I have been raising chickens since the early summer in a coop that the staff designed and built together. There are currently eight hens that live onsite in a portable chicken “tractor” that can be moved from place to place. The chickens are named Yarno, Yoke, Pox, Benedict, Saunders, Barbra Q, Rotisserie, and Melvin. The names don’t mean much because I can’t tell them apart. They have been great because when coupled with our vegetable garden they really do show sustainable farming practices on a micro scale. Chickens will eat anything; just today I fed them leftovers from the staff cubby, organic cereal and mixed berries. This helps to keep our waste a little lower.

Thanks for reading

Talus