The Audubon Discovery Camp, a nature-oriented summer day camp for children in the Eastern Panhandle and nearby Maryland, is now registering campers for its 2017 summer season.

The camp is entering its fifteenth year. It is sponsored by the Potomac Valley Audubon Society (PVAS), which is based in Shepherdstown.

Those who wish to register are encouraged to do so early-camp sessions usually fill up fast.

This year’s camp will span eight weeks from June 5 to July 28.

A variety of sessions geared to different age groups will be offered: pre-school, elementary school, middle school, and high school.

Fees will range from $50 to $225 per week. There will be an early registration discount of $10 before March 15. Scholarships will be available.

In addition, children age 12 and older can apply to serve as Junior Staff, positions that offer excellent opportunities to develop leadership skills.

Sessions for pre-school children will be held at PVAS’s Yankauer Nature Preserve on Whiting’s Neck in Berkeley County. Sessions for elementary and middle schoolers will be held at the Yankauer Preserve and PVAS’s new Cool Spring Preserve, about six miles southwest of Charles Town in Jefferson County.

There will also be a special Outdoor Adventurer camp for middle schoolers that will visit different interesting locations in the area each day and a Nature Photography camp for high schoolers that will use photo labs at Shepherd University and engage in outdoor photo shoots in the Shepherdstown area.

This year, for an additional fee, PVAS will also offer before- and after-camp child care services for all sessions held at the Cool Spring Preserve.

Full details, including details about scholarships, can be found on the PVAS website at www.potomacaudubon.org/discovercamp; easy online registration is also available there. Payment can be made by credit card or check.

All of PVAS’s camp sessions are aimed at helping children gain a better understanding and appreciation of the natural world. All of them offer hands-on experiential learning led and are supervised by experienced instructors.

Session sizes are kept very small to ensure an excellent instructor/child ratio.

This year’s sessions for elementary and middle schoolers at the Yankauer Preserve will include “Nature Detectives” and “Camp Survivor.”

The Cool Spring Preserve camp sessions for these age groups will include “Camp Survivor,” “Mud Pies and Dragonflies,” “Blast from the Past” and “Birds, Bugs and Bats!”

For additional information, contact daycamp@potomacaudubon.org or 240-818-4714.