Feb. 22, 2013

Organization positively impacts wildlife habitat and youth through grassroots campaign

OTTAWA – Pheasants Forever (PF), a nonprofit organization dedicated to upland habitat conservation, raised more than $10 million for Kansas’ upland hunting tradition during their Kansas Grassroots Conservation Campaign. Campaign partners included Quail Forever (QF), the Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS), the Kansas Department of Wildlife, Parks and Tourism (KDWPT), donors, volunteer leaders, and local PF and QF chapters.

“By working together over the past three years, Pheasants Forever and our campaign partners have been able to drastically increase our collective impact on Kansas’ upland habitat and wildlife,” said PF President and CEO, Howard K. Vincent. “In addition, this campaign has allowed us to ramp up our youth mentoring efforts designed to get more Kansas youth outdoors.”

The conservation campaign, which surpassed the original monetary goal of $10 million, made it possible for PF to support the following efforts:

• More than 500,000 acres positively impacted.
• Expanding wildlife biology-focused conservation planning assistance and conservation program delivery through PF’s Farm Bill biologist partnership with NRCS and KDWPT.
• Helping to host upwards of 115 Landowner Habitat Workshops across the state in partnership with Kansas conservation partners.
• Contacting more than 4,000 Kansas landowners and helping them enroll in USDA conservation programs like the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) and CP-33 Quail Buffers.
• Improving public land habitat through PF’s Habitat Specialist partnership with KDWPT on three Kansas wildlife management areas.
• Increasing outdoor youth mentoring opportunities through a partnership with KDWPT, Pass It On – Outdoors Mentors, National Wild Turkey Federation (NWTF) and others.
• Permanently protecting over 2,340 acres for public use through PF land donation legacy partnerships.

“This Campaign has produced spectacular results, but the reality is that we all must do much more if we intend to overcome the challenges facing Kansas’ upland wildlife,” said Pheasants Forever Development Officer, Jordan Martincich. “Habitat is vanishing at a never-before-seen rate, so we must continue increasing our impact through strategic initiatives.”

PF and QF recently celebrated their accomplishments at the Kansas Convention and Habitat Meeting on Feb. 2. The event was held at the Great Plains Nature Center in Wichita.

For more information on this campaign, or to pledge your support for Pheasants Forever’s Kansas initiatives, contact Martincich at (785) 242-3175 or visit www.kansaspfqf.com.

Pheasants Forever, including its quail conservation division, Quail Forever, is the nation's largest nonprofit organization dedicated to upland habitat conservation. Pheasants Forever and Quail Forever have more than 135,000 members and 720 local chapters across the United States and Canada. Chapters are empowered to determine how 100 percent of their locally raised conservation funds are spent, the only national conservation organization that operates through this truly grassroots structure.

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