• Aug 19-23, 2024 Blue Skye Farm & Forest Camp (no prerequisites)
• Aug 26-30, 2024 Advanced Farm & Forest Camp (with prerequisite)
Give your child the gift of our Blue Skye Farm & Forest day camps. August 19-23 is excellent for ages 8-15 (and seven year olds okay with older sibling at camp) who want to learn to work efficiently with tools, the soil, water, people, plants and animals. August 26-30 is excellent for ages 8-15 with prerequisite of at least one of our camps in a prior week or year who love service work and have an entrepreneurial spirit, with prerequisite of at least one of our camps in a prior week or year.
Enjoy beautiful Clark’s Creek Park and surrounding neighborhood including our very own Blue Skye Farm where we will explore gardens, farm animals and the old pioneer trolley route through the woods. Campers will work on the farm and surrounding conservation forest lands, learning the full circle life from seed to market, rain collection to wetland mitigation, and compost to animal care.
Instruction runs from 9:00-4:00 with drop off between 8:30-9:15, and pick-up between 3:45-4:30. Campers are grouped with others closest to their age within our hallmark 6-1 average student-teacher ratio that’s so critical for safe and profound outdoor experiences this year. You can also check out our day camps at Lake Sammamish.
Aug 19-23, 2024 Itinerary for the Blue Skye Farm & Forest Camp
Monday: Our story begins with Ezra & Eliza Meeker, founders of Puyallup who traveled the Oregon Trail in 1852. We’ll follow the literal path of the old Tacoma-Puyallup Trolley Route that Ezra founded, running past our old farmhouse where the Wolf Camp home office is now situated. We will also have an opportunity to tour our neighbor sister-farm Second Star Farms horses, cows, pigs, sheep, goats, and more.
Tuesday: Campers will get to tour the Blue Skye Farm gardens, orchard, chickens, rain collection and compost systems. Campers will learn how our compost systems work, the cycle of rain collection and the way things on the farm work in full circle. Campers will get to harvest and learn how to make apple sauce from our apple tree and tea from our grown herbs.
Wednesday: In addition to working on the farm in preparation for bringing product to market , campers will choose and design a restoration project to enhance salmon, plants and wildlife habitats in the Clark’s Creek watershed. Options include targeting invasive species for removal where they crowd native species, finding overheated waterways and choosing the best native shade trees for planting, shoring up trails to reduce erosion, and transplanting shrubs to block human incursion into sensitive habitats.
Thursday: Campers will start the day pouring over old maps and the latest satellite data to understand the landscapes in which they are affecting this week. They’ll do a real-life scavenger hunt to find remaining old growth trees in upper Clark’s Creek Park, and use them as inspiration to create strategies for carbon neutrality in their own lives. The ultimate goal, in addition to understanding the land, water, wind and weather, is to establish a baseline for recognizing local climate changes as they occur over time, as well as find inspiration for brainstorming strategies to mitigate and even reverse the effects of global warming.
Friday: Students will have a choice of activities on their last day at camp. They can hike to the Meeker Mansion for a tour, have an afternoon of pioneer games, and get ready to finish our day at the farm showing parents what the campers learned over the course of the week with us. Or they can begin to implement their conservation project, harvest Blue Skye Farm produce and sell it on our streetside farm stand, or come up with a plan of their own making for this final day of camp.
Aug 26-30, 2024 Itinerary for the Advanced Farm & Forest Camp
Itinerary TBA – Campers Split Farm Stand Proceeds!
Daily Camp Schedule, Pick-Up & Drop-Off Directions
Meet at the Clark’s Creek Park – South Shelter, 1710 12th Ave SW, Puyallup WA 98371 located one mile west of the Puyallup Fairgrounds. The best arrival time is 8:45-9:00 am, and the best departure time is 3:45-4:00 pm.
8:30-9:00 Check-Ins & Morning Care (no early check-ins available)
9:00-9:15 Songs, Stories, Stretches & Late Check-Ins
9:15-11:45 Morning Lessons with snack break at 10:30
11:45-1:15 Lunch, Games & Creek Wading
1:15-3:45 Afternoon Lessons with snack break at 2:30
3:45-4:00 Best Pick-Up Time
4:00-4:30 Aftercare & Late Pick-Ups
Camp Leaders
Kim & Chris Chisholm guide skilled staff instructors at our hallmark 6-1 average student-teacher ratio that’s critical for safe, profound and fun outdoor experiences. Read our FAQ’s for more details and check out camp testimonials dating all the way back to 1997!
Health Protocols
Hygiene protocols will remain the same as last year as long as there is still no evidence of Covid transmission in the outdoors with plenty of room to spread out. To start each day, campers must pass our health screening before being allowed to participate in camp. If there are reports of group participants who came in contact with an infection, we may provide n95 masks for participants of that group to wear when less than 3-6 feet from others. As before the pandemic, we will continue requiring hand sanitizing whenever sharing tools and materials, before entering toilets, and we train campers with proper hand washing after campers exit toilet facilities with doors left open between uses when possible to ensure ventilation.
Full vaccinations are strongly encouraged – we follow the scientific consensus – with tetanus shot (usually given as part of the normal Tdap vaccine series) considered the most important in the field of outdoor education. Otherwise, we know that due to our 100% outdoor setting, combined with health screenings, contact tracing, supervised hand washing, bathroom ventilation, mask use when exposure has been reported in a group, and individual/family style tenting at overnight camps, the risk of disease transmission has been negligible at Wolf Camp, so other vaccination records are not required. Please click here for full details on our health and safety protocols during the pandemic era, and see the latest CDC summer camp guidelines.
Day Camp Tuition in Puyallup/Tacoma
$495 is our full tuition rate in Puyallup, but we operate on a sliding scale and we don’t turn anyone away from being able to attend at least one week of camp due to financial reasons. Just email us and let us know how much you can contribute to the cost of camp, or to apply for financial aid from the Conservation College via the Max Davis Scholarship fund, click here and submit answers to their 8 simple questions. If your camper has physical disabilities that make other camps inaccessible, please call to discuss the accommodations we have available and register over the phone at literally any contribution level. To contribution to the Conservation College – Max Davis Scholarship fund, click here.
You will need to pack a healthy lunch, water and substantial snacks every day. Tuition includes t-shirt at your first camp with us, then in subsequent camps a choice of orienteering compass, recommended field guide, firesteel and other outdoor essentials depending on number of camps attended, age and availability.
Registration (opens November 20th for returning camp families, and January 20th for new camp families)
STEP 1 – Reserve your spots in camp by making $100 deposits per camper per week via one of the following methods:
• Zelle to “kim@wolfcollege.com” with a note including camper NAMES, AGES, CAMP DATES & THEMES, plus your EMAIL & PHONE since Zelle doesn’t otherwise share that with us;
• Or call us between 9am-9pm at 253-225-1547 with a credit card to register over the phone;
• Or use the PayPal system appearing below after January 20th;
STEP 2 – If this is your camper’s first year with us, complete our once-in-a-lifetime Registration Form WITHIN ONE WEEK of making your deposit, otherwise we will have to refund you and give your spot(s) to others. You can use our Microsoft Word or PDF registration form, or make your own copy of our Google Doc form, or choose our Bilingual Chinese-English Registration Form PDF / Word Doc – one per new participant. We’ll need you to email it back to us for review within one week to maintain your reservation. Again, skip this step if your camper has attended anything with us in the past.
STEP 3 – Pay balance before or during your summer camp week. We’ll email you an invoice this spring with camp prep info and balance payment options (Zelle, PayPal, Check, Credit Card) that can be done in advance or during your first camp week. All payments are non-refundable unless we refuse your registration. However, if you cancel (at any time for any reason is fine) we will save your payments as credit for you to use in future years, or you can choose to have us move the funds into our scholarship account if you prefer. The best practice is to make the minimum $100/camp deposit to register, and then wait to pay the remaining balance during your camp week via Zelle to “kim@wolfcollege.com” saving us time and transaction fees, or you can PayPal us at that same email address, or give us a check or have us run a credit card on site during your camp week.
Or Email us to be put on our our list for this program in the future. We always keep your information absolutely private, and will never share it.
Refund Policy: Payments are not refundable unless we don’t accept your application. If you cancel for any reason, you may receive a full credit good through the following calendar year on appropriate and available programs listed on our schedule, although an additional deposit is needed to secure your spot in the future program. If a program you sign up for is canceled and not rescheduled at a time you can attend, you may receive a full refund except in cases of natural (weather, geologic, wildfire, etc) disasters, grid failures, epidemics, government shutdowns, conflicts or curfews, or other unforeseen emergencies making it unsafe for staff and/or attendees to reach or use program locations, in which case all payments made will be held by us without expiration date for your future use in appropriate/available programs of your choice. Reasons include the expenditure of funds (property rentals, advertising, materials, admin staff time, etc.) long before programs take place, i.e. deposits make it feasible for Wolf Camp to schedule programs in the first place, but our mutually understood agreement is that Wolf Camp will run the program at the safest available time in the future. Finally, no refund, nor credit, is given if a participant is asked to leave a program for inappropriateness as determined by our kids, youth and adult agreements for participation.
Day Camp Preparation: Agreements, Packing List and FAQ’s
Day Camp Agreements for Participation
Other FAQ’s – Frequently Asked Questions
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