Photos, from left: Dragonfly at Watkins Mill State Park by Beatrice Eckertson; Rare Brown Booby native to the Caribbean at Discovery Center by Ellen Brenneman; Wildflowers at Watkins Mill State Park by Beatrice Eckertson
This eNews Contains:
WE NEED YOU! (Treasurer, Political Committee, and more!)
Fire Building Workshop (Sat., July 11)
July General Meeting (Tues., July 28)
Upcoming Local Public Hearings Regarding Evergy Rates
Team Monarch Update—Including Missouri Monarch Mission (Sat., July 18)
Area Farmers’ Markets
Upcoming Events Led by Allied Organizations
We Need You!
Are you interested in deepening your involvement with the Sierra Club? Do you have financial skills or political savvy and need somewhere to use them? Consider volunteering with the Thomas Hart Benton Group of the Sierra Club as our next Treasurer or as a member of our Political Committee. If you have any extra hours each month to spend on climate action and environmental justice, fill out this brief interest form by the end of June and someone will be in touch. We look forward to working with you!
Keep an Eye Out!
Sometimes events are planned after our e-newsletter goes out.
Please watch our Meetup pages and our website calendar for events that may be planned after each E-Newsletter’s publication date.
Photo by Bruce Dupree, Alabama Cooperative Extension System
Fire Building Workshop (Sat., July 11)
Location: Weston Bend State Park Trailhead, Weston, MO
Time: 4 p.m. - 6:30 p.m.
Fire building is one of the most important outdoor survival skills. Whether you're interested in camping, bushcraft, emergency preparedness, or simply expanding your outdoor knowledge, this hands-on workshop will introduce the fundamentals of building, maintaining, and using a fire safely and effectively.
Agenda:
Intro to Fire Building - Why fire building is the most important survival skill to learn and the elements required to be successful.
Types of Fuel - Size and composition needed for Tinder, Kindling and Fuel.
Creating Heat/Igniting - Discuss different ways to ignite a fire using matches, lighters with different fuel types, ferro rods, flint & steel, and friction methods.
Mechanics of Maintaining a Fire - Maintaining a flame while adding fuel.
Creative Solutions for Adverse Conditions - wind, rain, and wet/damp fuel.
How to "harvest coals" from the fire for cooking.
Throughout the workshop, instructor Sheryl Vasquez will maintain a demonstration fire while discussing firecraft techniques. Participants will have opportunities to practice starting fires with flint and steel, ignite jute twine, and create their own charcloth using coals harvested from the demonstration fire. Participants will be able to take their charcloth home.
July General Meeting: Presentation by Taylor Neff, Community Forester with Missouri Department of Conservation
Date: Tues., July 28
Time: 6 p.m. – 8 p.m.
Location: Minsky’s South Plaza, 5105 Main, KCMO
Come and hang out with like-minded people who care about conservation and the planet, in a convivial setting!
Our July 28 speaker will be Taylor Neff, a Community Forester with Missouri Department of Conservation. She will speak about the Community Conservation Program.
We will pre-order pizza and salad, so please be sure to register so we can have an accurate head count. Drinks are on your own! We will pass the hat to pay for the pizza and salad.
We'll continue maintenance on the pollinator garden at Wendell Phillips Elementary in July—the school was closed in June for floor replacement. If you're available to help weed on a weekday morning (second week of July), contact me and we'll make it a Team Monarch effort!
We're getting plans together for the July 18th Program at Burr Oak Woods, "Missouri Monarch Mission." We still need a few volunteers: two people to work on children's activities (coloring contest, face painting) from 9am to 11am. And two people to set up for picnic lunches from 10:30-11:30am. There will be an easy bird walk on the trail behind the Nature Center, led by Mike Stoakes of the Burroughs Audubon Society. There are several other short trails nearby that might provide an "Outing" for two volunteers (lead and sweep). We will provide all volunteers with one of our bright orange "Team Monarch" T-shirts, to make us recognizable that day! Contact Jennifer Helber (jthelber@hotmail.com) if you can help!
The Conservation Committee will meet on Tuesday, July 7th to finalize plans. For those who are available, we will scope out the area in person from 6:30 p.m. at Burr Oak Woods. Also, we will share the area via Zoom for those unable to be in Blue Springs that evening. I will be bringing a picnic sandwich; join me at 6 p.m. if you want to picnic too! Register for the Conservation Committee Meeting.
Besides morning activities, you will want to hear the speakers in the auditorium in the afternoon! First off is Kristen Baum, Director of Monarch Watch. She is very knowledgeable about the Blu-Morpho radio tags being used to track monarch migration—and has used them to monitor spring migrations from Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas. She agrees using these trackers in Missouri this fall could provide valuable information! We're exploring a possible "Adopt-A-Monarch" program, similar to a program organized in Washington and Idaho—come learn more! Also, Lilly Germeroth from the Missouri Prairie Foundation will talk about how prairies are "Precious Wells for Monarch Conservation". Finally, Jessica Poush from The Nature Conservancy will talk about their work—in particular, Dunn Ranch near the Iowa border. Please mark your calendars for the day at Burr Oak Woods—and bring friends! The auditorium holds 140.
You can probably tell from recent Newsletters that we are getting a lot more active in 2026. We welcome all the new friends and allies we have been meeting and speaking with at our recent in-person meetings. We also welcome any donations you can spare to help with all our new activities…thanks so much! Every little bit helps!
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