By Bob Strohm
bstrohm@wbcowqel.com
Archers took to Unger Park Friday evening to test their bow shooting skills as the Crawford Park District held an archery program.
Hosted by Park District Naturalist Lisa Bogard, the archery program started in a semi-circle with Bogard going over form, terminology, and rules when shooting arrows. Pairing off in groups of two the archery program started off the shooting portion with practice shooting at square archery targets. Once practice wrapped up the games began. Archery games included target shooting, popping a balloon, a candy shoot, and tic-tac-toe.
Bogard, who is certified to instruct archery, explained how she got into instructing the sport.
“I was certified three years ago when I attended an NAI conference,” Bogard said. “I went to the director at Findlay and asked about doing outdoor recreation, he asked what for, I said archery. I budgeted it, turned in the proposal and they said ok.”
While the park district did have bows on hand for people to use, attendees were able to bring their own bow and arrows. One such attendee was Audra Meadows. Meadows, who has been shooting archery since age seven, enjoyed the program at Unger Park with the candy shoot being her favorite event.
“It was pretty fun,” Meadows said. “We learned some new games that we will probably play at home.”
Aaron Brown, who has been shooting bow and arrow for seven years, came to the event because he thought it would be fun. Brown explained what his favorite game was at the event.
“My favorite game we played today probably was tic-tac-toe,” Brown said.
Aaron Ryan, who got into archery five years ago through scouting, explained what his favorite archery game was.
“My favorite game was the balloon pop,” Ryan said. “Just because of being able to see what the balloons did when we shot them.”
Kids weren’t the only ones getting in on the archery action as many of the parents attending the event took aim at the targets as well.