Home

Fishing is a fun activity that offers tremendous benefits to our youth. Through the H2Ozarks Youth Fishing and Water Quality Program, students will develop skills and knowledge they can use for the rest of their lives.
Youth will benefit from this program by:
• Gaining skills for an outdoor activity they can use for a lifetime and pass on to others.
• Feeling a sense of accomplishment and building self-confidence.
• Learning problem-solving and decision-making skills.
• Escaping from everyday problems.
• Gaining a sense of responsibility and respect for the environment.
• Learning what harms fish habitat and our waterways.
• Learning they can make a difference by protecting fish habitat, natural resources, and our waterways.
• Forming a relationship with nature.
The community benefits from this program as well by gaining a generation of youth who care about our wildlife, the habitats they live in, clean water, and a desire to protect our natural resources.
The key factor to this program is these young students will receive fishing equipment they can take home with them for their own use if they complete all three sessions. This gives them an incentive to attend each class and the tools to continue practicing the skills they learned.
This program is supported by the Missouri Department of Conservation through the permitted use of Bella Donna educational pond at the Shepherd of the Hills Hatchery in Branson, Missouri.
This program will be open to youth ages 8 – 16 that live in Barry, Stone, and Taney counties of Missouri.

Youth in this program will be educated on identifying fish habitat, preserving fish habitat, and how to create fish habitat for the future.

Shane Bush, Missouri Department of Conservation, is the fisheries biologist for Table Rock Lake and Lake Taneycomo. Shane supports this program and has volunteered his time to help teach the youth about fish habitat. The Missouri Department of Conservation has committed the use of their educational pond at the Shephard of the Hills fish hatchery for this project.

Largemouth bass, smallmouth bass, crappie, sunfish/bluegill, catfish, and trout

This project will be promoted through local news media outlets (KYTV, KOLR, KRBK, KSPR, KOZK), local radio stations (KRZK, KOMC), newspaper media (Branson Tri-Lakes News, Stone County Chronicle, Branson Globe, The Rattler), social media (Facebook, Instagram), and the H2Ozarks monthly newsletter (over 3,600 subscribers). The project will also be spotlighted at our outreach meetings such as our quarterly Water Quality Group meeting, local business meetings, and at other water quality organizations’ regular meetings.