By ALIN HETTHays Post
All photos by Alin Hett/Hays Post
With temperatures in the upper 70s and partly cloudy skies overhead, Saturday provided an ideal backdrop for a morning outdoors at the Hays City Sportsman’s Club, where local youth gathered for the 29th Annual Youth Outdoor Festival.
The free event brought together area conservation groups and businesses for a day designed to introduce young people to shooting sports, hunting, fishing and other outdoor activities. Youth ages 5 to 17, accompanied by an adult, could come and go throughout the morning, trying their hand at activities ranging from archery and air rifles to trap shooting.
For Nathan Legleiter, president of Smoky Hill Pheasants Chapter 424, which serves Ellis, Rush and Trego counties, the festival is about giving young people more of an opportunity.
“The goal is to give kids in our local area an opportunity to get outdoors, to understand the appreciation of the outdoors, to just have fun and interact,” Legleiter said.
With equipment and materials provided, participants could move between stations and learn from people experienced in each activity. The festival featured trap and skeet shooting, muzzleloaders, archery, air rifles and BB guns, small-bore rifles, BASS Casting Kids and paintball target shooting.
For some of the people helping at the event, the morning offered a chance to pass along an experience they once had themselves.
Gabe Seller, a Fort Hays State University student, remembers participating in the festival when he was younger. Now, he has returned to help teach the next generation how to participate safely and effectively.
“Honestly, It feels really good to be here because I know a lot of these kids might not get the exposure to these kinds of things unless we put these events on,” Seller said.
That connection between generations is what helps make the 29th annual festival a place where outdoor skills and experiences can be shared from one generation to the next.
