Beginning next year, a new outdoor education initiative will allow every 8th grade student in the St. John Valley to participate in a three-night canoe expedition on the Allagash Wilderness Waterway.

Dan Dinsmore, executive director of the Allagash Wilderness Waterway Foundation, said the annual Youth on the Allagash program will cost roughly $75,000 and will be funded by his organization.

“The effort here is to not do this once, but to do this in a sustained way and bake the Youth on the Allagash into the school calendar for all three of these schools,” he said.

The Allagash, which is part of the National Wild and Scenic River system, extends 92 miles between Aroostook and Piscataquis counties.

Dinsmore said the idea is to give students a transformational outdoor experience right in their backyard.

“We’re trying to raise that next generations of stewards who will just take this sort of, you know, hometown pride in this incredible wild river,” he said.

Dinsmore said the trip will be run by Chewonki guides and will also give students a chance to learn about careers in Maine’s North Woods.

Hunters in Maine have been warned not to eat wild turkeys in parts of the state, after the birds were found to contain “forever chemicals” that can cause an increased risk of cancer.

Maine officials warned that high levels of Pfas – per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances – have been detected in wild turkey and deer killed and harvested in areas in the south-west of the state.

The warning could put a dampener on Thanksgiving plans for those who like to hunt and shoot their own dinner centerpiece. But the reality is that wildlife becoming contaminated with Pfas is increasingly a problem in the US.

Earlier this fall Wisconsin and Michigan also issued “do not eat” advisories for deer, fish and birds, while in January health officials in New Mexico warned hunters that harmful chemicals had been found in wildlife at a lake in the south of the state.

Maine’s department of inland fisheries and wildlife issued “do not eat” advisories in four areas north of Augusta, Maine’s capital earlier this month.

“It was found that wildlife sampled within a mile of areas with high soil PFAS concentration levels resulted in animals that had levels of PFAS in their muscle tissue that warranted an advisory,” inland fisheries and wildlife said. “The Department and the Maine CDC [Centers for Disease Control] recommend that no one eats deer or wild turkey harvested in these wildlife consumption advisory areas.”

Pfas are a group of chemicals that have been used in manufacturing and added to consumer products since the 1950s. They can take hundreds or even thousands of years to degrade, meaning if they leak into soil or water they can remain there for centuries. The chemicals have been linked to cancer, birth defects, decreased immunity, high cholesterol, kidney disease and a range of other serious health problems.

“Wildlife is already contaminated with Pfas on a global scale, and that contamination will continue to be an issue until we greatly reduce the use of Pfas in consumer products and industrial applications,” Tasha Stoiber, a senior scientist at the non-profit Environmental Working Group, said in an interview with the Guardian.

Maine, which said it was sampling other areas in the state for Pfas, is not alone in being forced to confront the problem of forever chemicals. At least 17 states have issued advisories against eating fish containing Pfas, and birds and mammals appear to increasingly be a concern.

The Michigan departments of health and human services and natural resources issued do not eat advisories in Clark’s Marsh, close to the former Wurtsmith air force base, in September. Officials warned that deer were likely to have “various” Pfas substances, and also said people should not eat any fish, aquatic or semi-aquatic wildlife taken from the marsh.

Various advisories have been in place in the area since 2012, with the Pfas contamination linked to the use by the military of foam to extinguish fires. In August New Mexico found alarming levels of Pfas in the blood of people living or working near Cannon air force base – again due to military use of firefighting foam.

Wisconsin issued advisories against eating fish and deer in an area around the town of Stella, in the north of the state. Officials said people should only eat deer muscle once a month, and should avoid eating deer liver altogether.

Stoiber said it would take “decades” to remediate existing Pfas contamination.

“The most effective and important step is to phase out the widespread use of Pfas in commerce and stop ongoing discharges of Pfas into the environment,” she said.

“Federal regulations such as enforceable drinking water standards and stronger protections for source water are essential to reducing Pfas pollution and limiting future exposure.

“Public education is equally critical. People need clear information about how Pfas exposures occur, since informed public pressure is often needed to drive policymakers to take action and end the widespread use of Pfas.”