Shelton Nimrod Club for fishers, hunters

The Shelton Nimrod Club hosts its 71st annual Ken Wolden Memorial Fishing Derby June 7 at Batstone Pond off Mason Lake Road for families involved with the nonprofit Exceptional Foresters, Inc, an organization that provides residential and vocational services to adults with disabilities.

The event was first staged at Spencer Lake, and then Lake Nahwatzel before moving to its present location. The fish are donated by Eells Spring Trout Hatchery, and the club donates fish food to the hatchery. Each Foresters guest is given a fishing rod, reel and a Nimrod member or volunteer to help them. Club members clean the fish, put them on ice to be taken home and then enjoy a barbecue lunch.

"You see a lot of smiling faces out there," said Jason Wells, the club's president.

The fishing derby is not a public event, but there are other ways to get involved with the group. The club meets at 6 p.m. the fourth Thursday of each month at the 40 et 8, 113 W. Cota St. With the sponsorship of a club member, interested sportspeople can join for $50 for the initiation fee and yearly dues. For more information, go to the group's Facebook page.

"We want more people to get involved," Wells said.

The Shelton Nimrod Club was formed as a sportsman's club in 1954 after the Olympia Salmon Club hosted a salmon bake at Schaffer State Park. Invited guests Harold LeGard, Tom Ogden and Ken Wolden, all Shelton residents, enjoyed themselves and wondered why Shelton didn't have a similar sports club. They rounded up 35 other sportsmen and began meeting in the old PUD3 building.

The club was formerly incepted in 1964. In the late 1960s, the club bought a building on Hillcrest that formerly house a private school operated by the Mount Olive Lutheran Church. The club outgrew that space and bought the Dayton Dance Hall at the Dayton crossroads. Women were allowed to join starting in 2003.

The club states that its prime objectives are to protect, propagate and increase fish and game and their natural food and to improve habitat of all wildlife; to procure the enactment of laws for the protection and restoration of fish, game and other wildlife; and to promote sportsmanlike methods in hunting and fishing.

The club awards four $1,000 scholarships each year to college-bound seniors attending high schools in Mason County.

The club sponsors four boys and/or girls to attend a week-long State Youth Conservation Camp on Orcas Island. It also conducts firearm and water safety classes, some online, some at the Mason PUD3 building.