By Larry Quilling

The 1^st Annual BFC Youth Riparian Restoration Day was held Saturday, May 8^th and was an unqualified success. Fifteen youth participants and parents from Fairview High School, Boulder Country Day Middle School, and as far away as Allens Park participated in the project. Don D'Amico and Bob Crifasi from Boulder Mountain Parks and Open Space led the crew to a site on Coal Creek west of Superior to complete the restoration of an area where a high head dam was removed in December. The youth team planted nearly two hundred different riparian trees, bushes and shrubs to erase the scars left by the heavy equipment required to remove the dam. Willows were planted at the edge of the creek channel where the water they desire is most plentiful while chokecherries and Hawthorns were planted near the top of the channel with a few cottonwoods planted behind.

Four youth participants went away with new L.L. Bean rod& reel sets while others were given a fly vest, boxes of flies and fly fishing books. A father and son team was given fly-fishing lessons on Boulder Creek after the project was completed where they practiced their casting skills and drag-free drifts. A second fly-fishing instruction will be held next Saturday for the project participant who came down from Allens Park. We will be taking him to Dirk Larsen’s Pactolious property on South Boulder Creek to catch a few of Dirk’s fish.

I want to thank Don D'Amico and Bob Crifasi for their help in planning this project. Their volunteer efforts and commitment to improving our local riparian corridors are exemplary. And of course, thanks to our young women and men who gave up their Saturday to help make a difference for Coal Creek.

Here is Bob Crifasi, left, and D'Amico, bottom, with some planting instructions

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