Bearskin Lake Junior Rangers best in Ontario

The Junior Canadian Ranger patrol in Bearskin Lake has been named the outstanding Junior Ranger patrol in northern Ontario for a second consecutive year.
“It is the first time a patrol has won the award twice,” said Captain Caryl Fletcher, the officer commanding the 19 Junior Ranger patrols in northern Ontario. “That is an outstanding achievement.”
The award was announced at Camp Loon, the annual training camp for Junior Rangers from across northern Ontario, being held in the bush 50 kilometres north of Geraldton. Seven members of the winning Bearskin Lake patrol attended the camp.
“That’s good news,” said Bruce Kamenawatamen, Bearskin Lake’s deputy chief. “We’ll have something in their honour, for all the patrol, when those seven get back with the award. Winning it for two years in a row is quite something.”
“It is a very active patrol,” Fletcher said. “They participate in the training program and they do a lot for their community as Junior Canadian Rangers. This spring, for example, they did area sweeps, picking up garbage that had been hidden under the snow. They cut wood for the elders and the sick. They raised funds through bake sales and so on.
“They hosted a winter training session in their community that brought together Junior Rangers from Sachigo Lake, Kitchenuhmaykoosib, and Muskrat Dam. That involved snowshoeing, putting up tents, snaring and other traditional activities, as well as various sporting competitions. They did a lot of the work.”
During their spring clean-up the patrol collected 41 large bags of garbage and seven truck loads of larger garbage. Its members cut the grass in the community’s cemetery after picking up all of the winter’s accumulated garbage.
The patrol receives tremendous support from Chief Rodney McKay and council and from the community, said master corporal Amanda McLean, the Canadian Ranger who runs the patrol. “We try to meet weekly,” she said, “and we go out on the land. We fish and we hunt.”
Master corporal McKay is the principal of Michikan Lake School, which is used for the patrol’s meetings. “In Bearskin Lake, as soon as a kid gets into Grade 7 you become a Junior Canadian Ranger,” she said. “I was shocked when I found we had won as best patrol of the year for a second year in a row. But the kids deserve it.”
A key part of the patrol’s success is the support it receives from the adult committee that helps to run it in partnership with the Canadian Rangers and the Canadian Army, said warrant officer Mark Kendall, an army instructor who works with the patrol. “It’s made up of mothers who really care about the kids,” he said.
(Sergeant Peter Moon is the public affairs ranger for 3rd Canadian Ranger Patrol Group at Canadian Forces Base Borden.)