(upbeat music) Welcome and thanks for watching Arkansas TV and a special thanks for watching Naturally Wild.

I'm your host here on the show each week, my name is Steve Wildman Wilson.

Hey, I want to start out this show with a couple of questions for you.

If you don't hunt and fish, why not?

I mean, it's okay if you don't, but why not?

And if you do hunt and fish, who introduced you to hunting and fishing?

You know, wildlife agencies today have a real challenge ahead of them.

I mean, it's different than when I was a kid, but a few years ago, probably over 25 or 30 years ago when I worked for Game and Fish, there was a conference in in Pierre, South Dakota, and it was called the Conference on Hunting Heritage.

And the problem is, they noticed that the sales of hunting and fishing license across the United States was on the decline.

Now, now Arkansas is holding it's own pretty good, but we see the future kind of going the other way.

So what they did, they held this conference, and me and another colleague of mine went out to the conference.

And the purpose of that conference was to try to identify some of the reasons why hunting license sales were declining, and probably more than that, as why the hunting heritage or outdoor heritage wasn't being handed down to the next generation.

And we came away with that, from that conference with basically five different major, there's a lot of reasons, but five major reasons, and we'll put them on the screen for you.

One was time.

And that's always a problem.

Competition for time.

Now back, this was in the mid 90s.

So back then it was obviously baseball in the summer and soccer.

It's even worse today because now you have electronics.

We didn't have all that stuff back then.

So competition for time was one of the major reasons.

The second thing was access.

People said, I like to go, just don't have any place to go.

Where do I go?

How did I get in with all the hunting leases up now?

And you have to travel.

No boat to fish in.

Number three was cost.

That's always a problem for all of us on everything, isn't it?

It's expensive.

I mean, if you start buying a license and permits and lease fees, equipment.

So cost was a barrier as well.

Number four was the rules and regulations were too confusing.

They were scared to go get in trouble.

And number five was single parent homes.

Nobody in the household to pass those outdoor skills down to the next generation.

So they took all that back to the States.

And in a couple of years, we met back together again with some possible solutions to those problems.

Makes sense.

So I'm going to give you some Arkansas solutions.

Now we don't have all the answers, but we've made some great headway.

And I think you'll enjoy tonight's show because it fits right in here.

But you know, when you talk about the number one thing was time competition.

Still, it's still a problem.

Electronics has added so much to that.

And that's a real challenge for us.

But you'll hear us often say, hey, we're trying to get these kids unplugged and engaged in the outdoors or off the screen and into the stream.

Game and Fish has fishing derbies, and they have special hunting seasons just for the kids, trying to get them recruited into hunting and fishing.

The second thing was access.

I went to a commission meeting here a couple of months ago.

They just approved $5.5 million for additional boat ramps and boat docks.

Places to go.

So people don't need a boat.

Fishing piers.

And so they're trying to make that more affordable and accessible to the outdoorsman.

Cost always a problem.

Did you realize that the hunting and fishing license here in Arkansas, there hasn't been an increase in right at 40 years?

40 years.

I mean, you can fish here in Arkansas for $10.50.

365 days a year, 24/7.

That's a bargain.

We hadn't had an increase in 40 years, so we're trying to do our part there.

Four: rules and regulations too confusing.

Just this past year, you'll be seeing it in the regulation guidebooks coming out that they passed, they really monitored 200 changes.

They made 200 changes trying to simplify and clarify the rules and regulations for all of us hunters and fishermen.

And the last things, one reason we're here tonight, the single parent home problem or nobody in the family to hand that down to the next generation.

One of the solutions that Game and Fish came up with is called Becoming an Outdoors Woman.

And here with me on this show to talk about that is the coordinator of that program for the Game and Fish Commission, Lea White.

Lea.

That was a long introduction, I know, but I wanted to explain to people how we got here.

I understand.

Well, welcome to the show.

Tell us a bit about yourself.

I know you've been with Game and Fish quite a bit.

Tell me where you've been.

Game and Fish for almost 27 years.

I've been in this position for about eight years now.

Where'd you start out, in fisheries?

I started out in fisheries at the Lonoke Hatchery.

I did the mobile aquarium that drove around, and then I worked on the hatchery as well.

Yeah.

What she's talking about there, folks, if you've been to the State Fair, the Big Buck Classic, anywhere in Arkansas, you see that big aquarium, big aquarium, the one you pull the truck there.

Yes.

And you drove that around and put up great public relations and great educational tool.

Yes it is.

Yes.

So many different cities and stuff and around the state that I got to see a lot of kids, a lot of adults.

It was amazing.

Now you have a degree in fisheries?

I have a degree in art and biology with emphasis in fisheries.

Yes.

Now, how did you get started here?

In other words, what did you do before you became Becoming an Outdoors Woman coordinator?

Besides pulling that.. Pull the aquarium around.

I just love the outdoors.

I just wanted something different.

And the job opened up and I was like, hey, I've been 18 years in this one position almost.

And I was like, I just wanted to change.

And I got to go hunting now and fishing.

Score.

And get paid for it.

And get paid for it.

It was just a great opportunity.

And you get to hand that down to people that know nothing about it.

Women.

It's amazing to watch their eyes light up when they finally get something, or they've done something that they've been scared of their whole entire life, like shoot a shotgun.

And it's just amazing to see the empowerment of the program.

I'm going to ask you the same question I ask them, who introduced you to the outdoors?

My parents always took us outdoors, but my grandmother was an avid fisherman and she would have all three of us, my siblings, in a boat by the time we were two years old.

Oh my gosh, with cane poles and everything.

And I don't know how she juggled us in those little boat, but she took us all the time.

So I still am avid fisherman and love it.

Yeah.

And of course, now you get to pass that on.

If you could sum up Becoming an Outdoors Woman, the program and a word or two or sentence or two, how do you describe it to people?

Well, it's broken like a third, a third fishing, a third hunting.

And they call it third non-consumptive, but that's more like.

It is more of a workshop or a class?

The workshop for the weekends, the big weekends are set up as one, like a Friday afternoon.

You can choose from like 5 to 10 different classes.

Saturday you can choose from those classes as well, two sets and then Sunday it's another set of classes you can choose from.

So and they range from everything from Dutch oven cooking to knot tying to shotguns.

Some years we even have your mounts.

Yeah, I was looking at some, I wrote down some of the things I used to help teach this thing back when, I taught the turkey hunting and I thought it was, I thought it was real funny when I taught it.

I thought most of these ladies were single parent moms, and they weren't.

I mean, a lot of them had families.

Have families, yes.

But really they were in my class for two reasons.

One was they wanted to learn how to turkey call because they'd never done it, and they've seen it on TV and they wanted to get involved.

But more than that, a lot of these ladies had husbands that turkey hunted and they wanted their own call.

They wanted to do it themselves.

They didn't want the husband to help them.

No, we get that all the time.

They want their own shotgun.

They want to learn how to load.

They want the safety.

They want all of it.

The duck calls.

I mean, there's so many ladies now that drive around their cars, blowing the duck call before duck season.

They're like, none of my friends want to ride with me.

I said, I understand that, but yeah, they want to learn it on their own and they did great at it.

Well, let's be honest.

Men, husbands especially probably are not good teachers.

Some of them are.

Some of them aren't, but they... The most part they're not.

Okay, if you say it, then.

Well, and the reason I say that because they usually start them off what they're using.

I mean, with 12 gauges, say they think they already know a lot.

You got you got to start off easy with these.

And we do.

We start off baby steps and we take you through everything.

If you come to a squirrel camp, we're going to teach you how to use your shotgun, the safety and everything about that before we take you in the woods.

And you'll have a mentor there the whole time, we just stay right beside you.

I started saying in these workshops, in other words, you have a one day workshops we'll talk about after a while.

You have overnight workshops and hunting trips and so forth.

Then you have the three big day workshops.

Who do you find the instructors?

Are you, you have men instructors, lady instructors, or are they all certified or who's volunteers for you?

So most of my instructors are going to be Game and Fish, and most of them are lady instructors, women.

We do have some men, and all the men have gone through classes.

I've sat in their classes and make sure that they understand how to speak women sometimes, but they're very patient.

And yes, and we also have some volunteers that we have too that are vetted as well, that our instructors have.

These workshops cost wise.

What is it?

They have different costs associated with them?

Yes.

Yeah.

The camps are usually about $75.

And that's just for your food.

The bigger events where we're having to rent the facilities and everything, they may go up to 350.

Right now I have a scholarship fund and we're doing pretty good and keeping it in the 200 range.

Age limits on this.

What's the youngest you've ever had and what's the oldest?

So 18 is the youngest.

This is the youngest we have and we just put 100 was the break off limit for one of our classes.

And the lady called my grandmother's 102 and wants to come.

I was like, bring her on, we'll move it up to 102.

Yeah.

That's awesome.

Yes.

Wow.

102.

102.

Wow.

Okay, we'll talk more about that at the end of the show about how to find out when the next ones are.

They have them year round all over the state.

But if you've watched this show very much, if you watch this station very much.

Do you remember a show that we used to work on?

I was on there many times.

It was called Arkansas Outdoors.

You probably don't remember me being on there as much as you remember a lady named Phyllis Spear.

You remember Phyllis and John.

I mean, he had the best job in the world.

Phyllis was the outdoor chef, if you will, with Dutch oven cooking.

And John got to taste everything.

Well, we have a lady that we're getting ready to do an interview with.

Her name is Hollie Westseven, Whiteseven, and we're going to see.

She went through the workshop and the reason she got involved was because of Phyllis Spear.

Let's hear from Hollie.

My name is Hollie Sanders Whiteseven.

I've been an outdoor educator for over 30 years.

I worked for Arkansas State Parks Corps of Engineers, and then I also worked with Arkansas Game and Fish.

And so my first year with Arkansas Game and Fish in the education division, my supervisor said, hey, I want you to go to this Becoming an Outdoor Woman fall event and check it out.

That was 17 years ago.

That first year I took Dutch oven cooking from Phyllis Spear.

She made Dutch oven cooking feel easy and very welcoming, and she's very knowledgeable about what she does.

So I love that I was able to build a friendship with her.

I had never done that before, never really knew about it, and I took it on.

And I've been cooking in the outdoors for 17 years now.

Anything you can cook inside, you can cook outside in a Dutch oven.

I like to challenge myself with new recipes.

I love to go camping and hiking and do overnights, and I'd much rather have a venison steak pie or a chicken barbecue pizza, then a pop tart or Bologna sandwich.

And it's it's social.

If I break out the Dutch oven even at Thanksgiving, guess where everybody's at?

Around the Dutch oven, right?

And they think you're really cool that you can cook that way.

I like to encourage people to do something they say they want to do, to be intentional about it.

And in a workshop setting, I can give them those skills, but also I want them to not be intimidated by the skill, and I really encourage them to get out and use it.

In fact, if I see them again the next year, I say, have you Dutch oven cooked or have you done whatever skill is that we did?

A lot of times I tend to put myself last.

The things that I want to do.

I'm juggling schedules, I'm taking care of people, making sure other things are happening.

And if I say that I want to learn how to do something, it's so easy to put it on the shelf.

And so I decided actually through the Become an Outdoor Woman program, that I was going to be intentional about doing the things that I say I want to do, like making time for that.

Sometimes you just have to say, okay, I'm going to do that, and that's okay.

And so that's kind of my mantra, I guess, is just be intentional about the things you want to do in life.

My favorite thing about becoming an outdoor woman and the workshops is it builds community.

If they don't have community around it, they may not do it.

You know, people to encourage them, to challenge them, people to do the activity with.

And so that's what Becoming an Outdoor Woman does.

It builds that community.

You're going to learn life skills that you can put in your pocket and take it anywhere, and you're going to meet friends and you're going to have a good time.

And so I would just say do that for yourself, you know, check it out.

And there's plenty of opportunities around the state to get involved.

Thank you, Hollie.

What a great testimony that is.

She's amazing.

You know, the one thing she said there about the community and the network of lifelong friends, you see that, you hear that quite often.

Oh, I hear it all the time.

I've made more friends now with this job.

It's amazing.

When I went to that, I remember the first couple of years I saw that happening where I never saw that many people get that close that quickly, if you will.

Because you think about it, they all have one common thread pretty much, the outdoors.

Correct.

They want the outdoors and they love it.

And it just it makes them even bond.

They find friends that they've never even known, long lost friends.

And it's amazing to see them just go out and multiply and do other programs too as well.

So many people get involved for so many different reasons, and I know a lot of people do that because if they're single or whatever, if they want to go hiking or floating, usually wives kind of frown on guys, their husbands taking them so they can get together with a group of ladies and going on.

And it's a safety thing, safety with numbers.

I mean, if they find friends that like to kayak or say, hey, let's go kayaking, it's great to be out in the water with somebody.

Now that was that was the big workshop.

And back then when Phyllis did that, it was one big weekend at the 4-H Center.

One time a year.

It's changed now like we talked about.

You do that.

You do three of those a year pretty much?

Where do you do those?

So spring will be at a different nature center each year.

Okay.

So last year we were at Pine Bluff.

We haven't decided which one it's going to be at this year.

Summer is going to be at Huntsville at the Ozark Nature and Science Center, and it's usually the second week of July.

And then then the October, the first week in October, we'll have our biggest one.

It's usually with 100 to 140 ladies.

And it just depends.

Every other year we do the Conway Wildlife Management Area or we do it at the 4-H Center.

Now that's the big one.

But now you started since you took over, you got some one day just kind of one day class.

You go and go home that night.

Well, give me some examples of what you might have to offer for one day classes.

One day classes, maybe everything from archery classes, pistol class, one day pistol class.

We also had a couple of weeks ago I did charcuterie boards and bat box building one day.

The morning you have to build a charcuterie board, the evening you have to build a bat box.

Wait a minute, all the power and I even get the ladies get to use the saws and they build it from scratch.

So you teach power tools.

Power tools and all.

You got to build birdhouses.

You got to build deer stands.

That makes sense to me.

Correct.

Yes.

So we have all kinds of classes, even pollinator classes, where you can come out to a management area, learn to burn classes where you learn how to burn the fields off in your yard to get more pollinators and more grass to grow.

Those are good one day classes.

About how many of those do you do around the state in the year's time?

I do probably about 20 of those around the state.

Wow.

And then there's also other educators that do them out of our facilities as well.

You work through your nature centers quite a bit?

Yeah.

Got what, 8 or 9 nature centers around the state.

So we'll tell you how to find out when and where these classes are.

They all have their own calendars and so forth.

Those are one day workshops.

And I know I've seen on Facebook some of your, I guess you call them two day or overnight workshops where you bring them in.

I saw one, you went frog gigging.

We do do frog gigging and that's usually an evening programs and stuff.

But we also do a birding camp, which that's a three day workshop where you.

Oh yeah, where you come in and we teach you about how to tell what birds are flying in the air.

And then the next day we go out and we look for birds.

We usually average about 85 different species of birds we can find over that weekend.

Bird watching, just bird watching.

Now.

Also another bird you watch and kill.

I saw where you took some ladies on a duck hunt.

We do do a duck camp as well.

A duck camp.

A duck camp.

So that's a three day camp.

We teach you how to use your shotgun.

We also supply all the firearms and ammunition so that you're not out of pocket.

If you don't have camo, we'll set you up with some camo too as well.

It does cost to do this, but you provide everything.

We provide everything they would have to purchase their hunting license and duck stamps and federal duck stamping.

That, and it's a $75 for the weekend for just the food cost.

First of all, let me make an announcement.

This is for ladies only, guys, don't get just just don't even think about it.

It's ladies only.

You can't come.

Go ahead.

We'll teach them how to teach you.

They'll be teaching the guys pretty soon.

So the duck camp was that pretty successful?

The duck camps are pretty successful.

We shot quite a few ducks this year.

We also got a few geese as well.

And then we also have deer camps.

I'm up to three deer camps, two rifle and one crossbow camp.

No.

Yes.

We did trapping camp.

How'd you do on the deer hunts?

We did very well on the deer hunts.

Crossbow, not as well.

It was in mid-February.

It's a little tougher.

You got to get them a little bit closer.

So.

But hey, it was the first year.

And did you have some ladies kill their first deer?

And for the, yes, the rifle hunts.

Yes we did.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

It's amazing.

You only have one first deer and I don't care how old you are, right?

You're just like an eight year old when you kill that first deer.

And not just they killed their first deer, they got to clean their first deer because we do everything.

The ladies get to participate and do it all themselves.

We are there to teach them.

But they're hands on classes.

Well, I've seen some of that.

Yeah, that's that's unique.

Hey, right now we're going to take another little break and catch up with somebody else that went through this.

Another testimonial.

Her name is Teresa Gray.

And listen to this.

She attended one of these big three day workshops, I think, at the 4-H Center.

I'm Teresa Gray and I am an electrical manufacturer sales rep, and my family has 200 acres in north central Arkansas.

And we have deer.

We deer hunt and turkey hunt.

And I never hunted because my daughter did that with my dad and she was his little hunting buddy.

My daughter had just graduated high school and was leaving to go to college.

And so my dad had made the comment about, I don't know what I'm going to do.

My little hunting buddy's gone off to college and I was like, well, I'll go hunt with you.

And he's like, well, you don't like to hunt.

I was on Facebook one day in the middle of July, and it came up and it talked about the Game and Fish, this Becoming an Outdoors Woman program.

I was like, maybe that's something I could do.

So I signed up for it.

But the day that we had registration to go and start the classes, I sat in the parking lot and came up with every excuse of why I could not go in.

I knew no one.

And so that was almost ten years ago.

And now I know all of the staff and all the volunteers, and I'm a volunteer.

So when you've gone for as many years as I have, you've done all the classes.

And so then you get to be a mentor.

We really want to get as many women introduced to the classes as possible, and so that then they can share it with other people, whether it be a single mom or someone whose husband goes out and hunts then they're like, okay, you need volunteers for the classroom.

So while people are tying flies, one person can't do it all, or helping to rig a fishing pole or talking about ammunition.

There's always things that people in the classroom can help.

So kind of like a teacher's aide.

I got to sit in a deer blind with Holly and she had never harvested a deer.

And so we did a mentor deer hunt out at the 4-H Center.

And I got to sit in the deer blind with Holly.

And so that was a lot of fun, is that she has taught me so much.

And then I got to sit in the deer blind with her as her mentor.

I've gone turkey hunting when Covid came up and I was like, I can't go see customers, what am I going to do?

And so I stopped at the gun store and bought a new rifle and cupped some camo and went and from what I learned at BOW, I've been turkey hunted, I will hunt with my dad.

We have just so many pictures of us together, and my brother and my older brother and my nephews, my daughter.

And so it's kind of a family thing that we do.

There are all over the state of Arkansas, and all of the different nature centers have different events.

Don't think you have to have someone to go with.

I went as an individual my first time.

You don't have to be an expert or you can be an expert.

There's always things to learn.

There's so much to get out and enjoy, and the Game and Fish offers us so much opportunity to do things.

And if you're not comfortable going out, this is a great way to learn.

Folks, that's the way it's supposed to work right there.

You think about it.

Phyllis handed it down to Hollie.

Hollie handed it down to Teresa.

Teresa is now handing it down to the next generation, teaching others.

That's the way it's supposed to work, right?

That is exactly right.

Yeah.

She's excited.

And I think one thing she said before we run out of time, that's so that's so important.

If you feel like you don't belong or if you feel have some fear about anything, come anyway.

You'll release that.

Just come anyway.

If Teresa is there, you'll be her best friend by the end.

She is amazing making you feel at home for sure.

Tell us how we can find out where these classes are.

Give us a website, Facebook, whatever before we leave.

So it's becoming an Outdoor Woman Arkansas Facebook page.

Or you can go to the Arkansas Game and Fish's website and just type in the search engine becoming an outdoor woman, and it'll bring up a website.

And you can click on a calendar there, and it'll list all the classes that we have going on throughout the state.

Just come back every week because I'm posting stuff constantly.

All right.

And you can go to agfc.com/ becoming an outdoors woman.

we call it BOW for short.

The main thing is get involved.

Go to one of those nature centers.

They all have their own Facebook pages.

Find out when these activities are, get enrolled and enjoy Arkansas's great outdoors.

And that's all the time I have this time.

I'll see you next time right here on Naturally Wild.

This program was made possible by Arkansas Hunters Feeding the Hungry, East Harding Construction Company, David's Burgers, Greenway Equipment, Arkansas Farm Bureau, and the Electric Cooperatives of Arkansas.

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