10-year-old wins state-fish drawing contest

This is one fish story you’d better believe.

It starts with 10-year-old David Robinette’s father, Bryce, browsing the Outdoors section of the newspaper several months ago and noticing a brief article about the Wildlife Forever State-Fish Art Contest.

It will end with David accepting a national award in Minneapolis this month as one of two Washington winners in the contest, which students enter by sending a drawing of their state fish.

“I know David likes to draw,” Bryce Robinette said recently, “so I told him, ‘I just saw something you might be interested in.’ And that was the last that David’s dad or his mom, Chrisie, heard about it for a long time.

“I decided to go to the Web site and look for information,” said David. “There was a place you could look up your state fish (Washington’s is the steelhead trout), and I looked up some pictures on the computer and printed one of them so I knew what it looked like.

“I’ve always enjoyed drawing, but the main thing I noticed was that the winners receive a Rapala rod and reel.”

David, an avid fisherman, will get his rod and reel, but it will be presented to him at the Mall of America during the eighth annual art expo at the two-day ceremony on July 29-30. All winning artwork will be on display and will be viewed by as many as 250,000 visitors.

Winners and their family members also will receive tickets and be recognized during a pregame ceremony at a Detroit Tigers-Minnesota Twins baseball game. They’ll receive gift certificates for art supplies and other prizes as well.

David will be joined by his mother, Chrisie, who expressed her appreciation to the local businesses, friends and family members who helped with contributions so the two can attend the ceremony. David’s dad, a longtime auto mechanic, is enrolled at Spokane Community College.

Winners of the contest were posted on the conservation group’s Web site on Earth Day, appropriately enough.

“He knew the results would be posted that day, so when he got home he ran down and checked the computer,” Bryce Robinette said. We heard a huge scream, and for a minute we weren’t sure whether he’d won or whether someone had been hurt, it was so loud!”

David’s parents are proudest of the fact that the entire project was his own, everything from researching the steelhead to preparing the package it was mailed in.

“All he asked me to do was mail it,” said Chrisie.

David’s other hobbies include building rockets and reading, and now that he’s passed a safety course, he’ll take up hunting with his dad. He’ll be a fifth-grader this fall at Farwell Elementary School, where he was something of a celebrity in his fourth-grade class when his teacher downloaded his drawing and showed it to his classmates.

And between now and the end of July, you can expect him to be doing plenty of fishing, which he has done ever since he could hold a pole. The Robinettes fish mostly at Diamond Lake, and Bryce Robinette points out proudly that David’s had at least one catch every time he’s been out.

It’s probably a tossup whether David enjoys drawing more than fishing, but for at least a few days this month, he’ll be glad that he likes both.