• View
• Edit
• History
• Print

2005 Kidz Fair

About

The Arkansas Herpetological Society was proud to host an educational booth for the 2005 Kidz Fair. This event was held at Alltel Arena in North Little Rock, on Saturday, August 20th, 2005. AHS volunteers were Brad Birchfield, Debbie ("DeBo") Doss, Tom Eason, Cyndi Porter, Kory Roberts, and Jeremy Sloan. An estimated 9,500 people participated in the event!

Reports and Downloadables

• Unofficial Report, by Brad Birchfield
• Kidz Activities Sheet (PDF Format), by Cyndi Porter

Gallery

Unofficial Report, by Brad Birchfield

I must say I was a bit skeptical in the beginning. As me and Jeremey turned onto North Poplar street, I made the comment that I hoped thered actually be some kids come to this thing, since Kory, Tom, Debo, and Cyndi had put so much into making it happen. We paid $5 to a nice man to park in this paved lot. Between the parking lot and Alltell Arena, there was a big pile of gravel, to the point were you really couldnt see anything but the roof of Alltell from our vantage point. We collected our little contribution to the display which included a couple of snake sheds, a turtle shell, and my black ratsnake and headed for the main entrance to meet the Korymeister. When we came around the gravel I mentioned earlier, all reservations I had about the turnout were answered.

After pushing and shoving our way through what had to be about 5000 kids waiting to get in, we found Kory. He gave us our official vendor wristband which had several little smiley faces on it. Corny? Yes, but it served its purpose. By the time we figured out which door to go in, the clock had struck 10 A.M. and we were racing to the AHS booth along with about half a million kids. (yeah, it seemed like the crowd grew that quick!).

This Kidz fair is a really neat thing for everyone involved. They basically have all kinds of exhibits and fun things for kids and their parents. Essentially, everyone just walks around at their lesiure to look at the different vendors booths. Our booth was on the outer ring which is basically the lobby of Alltell, that surrounds the entire building. The entire ring around the arena was filled with exhibits along with stuff down on the arena floor. For example, at a 4H/FFA booth near ours, you could milk a life sized fiberglass cow, and right down from that, there was some Shriners with one of them annoying minature cars you see them riding around in during a parade (can someone explain to me what is up with that? I have always wonderedbut hey, nice fez), on down from that, there was some model railroad club with a big electric train display, and all kinds of those inflatable bounce around things. As you can see, there was truly something for everyone.

Speaking of everyone, I guess itd be good to recognize those in attendance. Me and Jeremy were last to sign on to help, and we both kinda wondered if wed just get in the way as we headed to Little Rock. At the end of the day though, we all agreed we could have used even more folks to keep up with the crowd! Along with Jeremy and I, there was, of course, our fearless leader Kory. He brought some printed lists and games as well as the majority of display animals. Then there was Debo. She aquired/designed these cool tshirts that *should* be available for purshase in the near future. You will want one, trust me. Its a high quality garment. Tom Eason was there, he had come up with a Arkansas Herpotological Society banner that was top notch. And last but certainly not least, there was Cyndi, who aquired all the give away stuff from Game & Fish.

No sooner than wed dawned our super cool AHS tshirts, compliments of Debo, we were knee deep in kids wanting to see our collection of herps. Since this was our first time, we really didnt know how or what to do. I bravely stepped up to the plate and started rolling posters for all the childrensand what started out to be just something to do turned into a full time, rotating job for two people. We were out of both snake books and posters by 2 P.M. It was so hectic at times, I think I got a paper cut, but I just kept ROLLING. By the way, does anyone know a good attorney?

Soon after the festivities started, we noticed that the Little Rock Zoo had a booth set up right down from us. They had some of their display animals out, among them, a sinaloan milksnake and a big bearded dragon. After seeing the crowds reaction, we thought itd be good to get some of our display animals out for kids to touch. Kory brought up a good point too- for this age crowd and environment, we were gonna be much more productive with things to touch, feel and connect with, than if we were just standing there answering questions. I have to say also, for the Ironman Award, Tom tommyboy Eason wins hands down. He grabbed up a prairie king and waded out into the sea of people and didnt sit down till almost 6 Oclock!

You have never seen such magic in kids eyes as we witnessed Saturday. Now, as most of you know, I am pretty cynical and may appear on the surface to be uncaring, but man, seeing some of these kids faces light up and squeal when they touched a snakes tail, it would just melt your heart. Dear God, did I just write that?...Anyway, the kids absolutely LOVED our booth. We had many repeat customers too. One important repeat customer was a young lady named Mckenna(hope I spelled that right). She was 13, and apparently very interested in herps. Instead of asking typical questions like does it bite? or is it posionous, she was asking so if I wanted to keep a wild caught specimen, what size enclosure would I need to consider? and stuff like that. NOT your typical 13 year old girl, that is for sure! I am confident well be seeing her at our next field trip. By the end of the day, she was into the rotation of snake handlers giving some of us a much needed break! She is a special little lady.

I can just hear it wait a minute, there is nothing funny or entertaining about thisare you not gonna poke fun at ANYTHING? Surely you folks know me better than thatoh, where to start? Well, for starters, I am not even sure who it was that was holding the rat snake when it happened, but early in the day this, lets just say larger than average black lady was walking up with her kids, and talking to another lady with herthe point being, she was oblivious to the fact that someone was standing there with a 5ft black ratsnake. Well, she turned around only to be way too close to the aformentioned reptile and shrieked H o ly $ *%t!. Needless to say, the children around her got a good laugh, but she was none too excited about actually looking at the snake. Then there was Korys carnivorus box turtle. While showing the turtle to a bunch of curious children, one (I am guessing) 3 year old boy, some how flew under Korys radar, and managed to locate the turtles mouth with his pointing finger. Not pretty. Of course, he squawled like a banshee, and the parents were mortified, but Korys apology coupled with another visit with the turtle (touching only the shell this time), our little victim was happy and told the turtle bye bye. Then late in the day, my poor WESTERN (whatever THAT is) ratsnake was being handled and decided it was time to jettison all waste products. Unfortunatley the lady holding onto that end of the snake received a good dose of snake doo. I did what any member of the AHS would do in such a predicament. I ran off and acted like I didnt see it happen. Nah, just kiddingDebo was on that faster than mad on a cottonmouth, and by the time I had returned from the mens room with a half roll of paper towels, she had the mess cleaned up and our victim was long gone. Note for next year- keep hand wipes where you can find them quickly. Pretty ironic too, the booth beside us, not even sure what the organization was, featured a real arcade video game that kids could play. It was a jurassic park themed game. So, after learning all about the intricate and delicate nature of arkansas reptiles, you could spend the next 10 minutes blowing prehistoric reptiles to smithereens. Like I said, something for everybody.

Needless to say, I think the whole day was a huge success. I think we gave out a lot of good information, and got to show a bunch of skeptical folks that snakes are not the ferocious, blood thirsty killers they thought they were. I know we were all tired of answering the same is it posionous?(which late in the day, I started answering by you know, I am not sure come to think of it, let me get the book) and what kind is it, but for the most part, folks were very interested in what we had to say. I feel like the kids definitely thought our booth was one of the bestwe never really slowed down the whole day, it was a madhouse. Now , when we are like that competing agains a fake cow you can milk and a video game, I think thats pretty good. I am not sure how/if things could have went any better than they did. Sign me up for next year!

The evening was capped off with some FINE chicago style pizza and conversation at a downtown resturant. Kudos to Cyndi for pickin thatdaddy like pizza.

I know I sound like a nerdy kid at summer camp, but I really look forward to our next field trip, so lets all start thinkin that direction! And also, these are the events as I remember themI have been wrong before, so forgive me if I this is not 100% accurate.