WWA was proud to support Oconomowoc High School’s Cody Haar in his local Eagle Scout project earlier this year. Cody recently sent us the following report on the successful completion of his project to install seventeen wood duck boxes along the Ashippun River Greenway:
My name is Cody Haar, and I am a Life Scout in BSA Troop 169 based out of Okauchee, WI. I am a junior at Oconomowoc High School, and I am an athlete and also enjoy shooting sports and hunting.
As an Eagle Scout project, I wanted to focus on wildlife conservation due to my love of animals and the outdoors. I have always admired birds, especially ducks, so I chose to do a project with wood duck nesting boxes. I then contacted the Waukesha County Parks Service and asked them about the possibility of putting up wood duck boxes on the Ashippun River Greenway.
To make my project come to life, I needed to fundraise and seek out donations from local groups. I raised a lot of my funds from Scout fundraising, from family, and also received discounts or donations from Lowe’s, the Oconomowoc Junior Woman’s Club, and Menard’s. I also arranged equipment loans from Lorlebergs True Value and the Town of Oconomowoc Department of Public Works. I decided to buy twelve wood duck nesting box kits from the Wisconsin Waterfowl Association, and received a donation of five nesting boxes from WWA as well. With all of my materials obtained, I started the construction process.
I held an event at my house where we constructed all of the wood duck boxes a couple of weeks before putting them out on the river. During this event, I had eight scouts and four adult volunteers. The kits were easy for the scouts to put together and very sturdy.
About two weeks later, I set up another service day to go out on the river and place the boxes using WWAs suggested installation methods. We started the day by launching boats from a local boat launch, and my helpers paddled upriver in kayaks while I provided support in a power boat. My purpose was to supervise the installation, help the scouts installing the boxes and to ferry tools and equipment to each installation site. My project was executed very smoothly, and the installation of the seventeen boxes took about six hours. In total, about one hundred seventy total volunteer hours were spent on this project.
The end goal of my project was met, and there are now seventeen wood duck boxes along the Ashippun River Greenway that are accessible for ducks and other birds to nest in.
