DATE: Thursday, July 31, 1997               TAG: 9707310358

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B9   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY REBECCA MYERS CUTCHINS, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: PORTSMOUTH                        LENGTH:   76 lines

YOUTHS LEARN CONSERVATION THE NATURAL WAY

When a snake slithered through the thick underbrush along Twin Pines Road at the Hoffler Creek Wildlife Refuge, 16-year-old Vernon Avant wasn't alarmed.

After all, he and the other teens participating in the Chesapeake Bay Youth Conservation Corps summer job program had studied snakes recently, so everyone knew the small, black reptile was not poisonous.

``There was no reason for me to freak out,'' Avant said. ``I just backed up, and the snake went on by.''

There was a time, however, when the teens clearing the roadside may have used their brush axes and weed-whackers to ``defend'' themselves against the wildlife that inhabits the refuge.

Among the most common animals in the 142-acre parcel of wilderness are deer, foxes, raccoons, woodchucks, river otters and turtles.

``When we first came out here, they wanted to chop everything they saw,'' said Rick LaFollette, who oversees one of two teen work groups. ``If they saw a mouse, they wanted to kill it. If they saw a snake, they wanted to kill it.''

Now, LaFollette says, the teens have a new appreciation of the environment and nature.

``And if that's the only thing we accomplish, at least that's something,'' he said.

For the 15 teens, all Chesapeake residents ages 14 to 18, the work is as much a learning experience as it is a job. They are hired through the Southeastern Virginia Job Training Administration at $4.75 an hour and work six hours a day, five days a week.

They pull discarded tires and trash from shorelines, plant grass to restore wetlands along the Chesapeake Bay, test the waters of the Elizabeth River for nutrients and take inventory of the aquatic vegetation in the waters around Seashore State Park, among other tasks.

``I vary the projects so that they don't get too burned out,'' program coordinator Don Marx said. ``If we're out at Hoffler Creek all day, every day, all summer, that can be pretty tiring. I want them to have a variety of different jobs to do and go to different places so they don't get burned out.''

At Hoffler Creek Wildlife Refuge, the teens have been clearing the brush away from Twin Pines Road so that a fence can be built around the preserve, which is being developed and managed by a group of volunteers who fought for two years to save the land from development.

``The first day we officially got word that it was ours, we had the Chesapeake Bay Youth Conservation Corps the next day,'' said Randi Strutton, president of the Hoffler Creek Wildlife Foundation.

``It's been mostly cutting, tugging, pulling and cleaning. Hard physical work for this time of the year,'' she said. ``Work that probably would not have gotten done if they hadn't done it.''

``It's hard work, but it's fun,'' said Kenneth Worsley, 15, wiping away the beads of sweat on his forehead.

``I love the job, but I don't like the bugs and the fleas,'' added Ricky Etheridge, also 15.

Because one of the main goals of the program is to mold teens into young environmentalists, the teens also get a small dose of classroom study in addition to their field work.

``Once a week, we have an environmental speaker come in and talk from a half-hour to an hour,'' Marx said. ``The kids are required to take notes and then write a one-page essay just so we know that they've been paying attention and have learned something.''

The program, which started in 1989, also puts teens to work who have been sentenced to community service work for minor offenses.

``Sometimes it can be tiring to work out in 100-degree weather and deal with mosquitoes and deer flies,'' Marx said, ``but I think they get a lot out of it.'' ILLUSTRATION: Photo

MARK MITCHELL/The Virginian-Pilot

Teens from the Chesapeake Bay Youth Conservation Corps clear brush

away from Twin Pines Road so that a fence can be built around the

Hoffler Creek Wildlife Refuge. They say the work is hard,

especially in the heat. And they could do without the bugs. But,

they also say, it's fun.

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