MWA all done............

[Quack]

Speaking of Fowler... he’s MIA... anyone do a wellness check on him??


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[lanyard]

Figured he was negotiating prices for MWA merch.

[Hansen]

Speaking of Fowler... he’s MIA... anyone do a wellness check on him??


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Fowler is probably off the wagon after the devastating news. Better do a wellness check.

[Fish Felon]

Speaking of Fowler... he’s MIA... anyone do a wellness check on him??


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Fowler is probably off the wagon after the devastating news. Better do a wellness check.

No kidding, you're probably right.....bet he's trying to find the bottom of a bottle right now and drown his sorrows. Someone that knows where he lives should call the local authorities and have them conduct a welfare check on the big guy.



In regards to the HOF and organization's history, are there any plans to have some other entity harbor it? Like a hunting club, DU, PF, the DNR, or hell....set it up at the Owatonna Cabela's or something.

[h2ofwlr]

Unlike the arm chair QBs here, I've been helping at the state office with what they ask me to do.

As for me drinking over such a thing, wow, some of you are pathetic. Go stick your head in a bottle - to celebrate its demise or what ever, hell any excuse you can come up with seems to work for many of you to get shnockered up.

HOF bird mounts was hauled out a week ago, headed to Fergus.

Any one that bought a 128 Gun Calendar raffle, they will be notifying the remaining winners next week with the gun certificates (the 128 gun winners are all drawn at the same time in April, and the guns were already paid for to Reeds). Also the ATV raffle winner will be notified too, the ATV has been paid for, and picked up already. So no worries if you are a winner.

[h2ofwlr]

Here's my take on it:

The start of the end was McGinty's BS. What really happened was that we got screwed by the politicians. There was supposed to be a about a 5% admin fees for administering the grants - the politicians reduced to like 1-2% as I recall. It was NOT enough to cover expenses. McGinty's ego got in the way - he should have told them - no, can't do it for that % and also tell the BD that too - but did not. So the MWA got into like $5k a mo lease that was supposed to house about 8-10 employees to admin the grants. Well then the co-mingling happened that Rob referred to and the shit hit the fan. Also McGinty flat out lied to the BD repeatedly that spring/summer. We lost 1/3 of the chapters and members as a result. We never recovered from it. (FYI - when the DNR approached PF to take it over after it hit the fan with the MWA - they balked because of the low admin% and said no as it was not financially feasible).

Then in the mean time demographics and how society interacts and its values (guns are evil) has happened in the last 15 yrs. Fundraising banquets are ho hum thing, especially in the metro areas. How younger people communicate has changed. - Look at participation on the web based hunting forums has changed in the last 8 yrs for an example. FB - "oh that what you old people use" is what i was told by an 18YO a couple of yrs ago. The bottom line is the MWA is NOT the only 1 taking hits because of these changes. Ask any informed DU, PF, Delta involved person, there is a definite concern.

I agree with them going against the early Teal season was a strategic misstep - I told them that. But the old White hairs would have none of that. So then they wonder why no younger people getting involved/helping out? Sigh... Even brought it up to the new DNR Commissioner when she was at the Waterfowl Symposium during a Q&A session 5 Mo ago if she would support an Early teal season. (she was not sure where she stood on it yet). Then someone in the audience asked for a show of hands of who supports an early Teal season, the vast majority in attendance were against the early teal season. They old white hairs are out of touch with the younger hunters (15-40 YOs) IMHO

United we stand, divided we fall. It's a classic example of how the end came about.
They fell divided because of 1 person - John Wolf. When he was President about 3-4 yrs ago he pushed for and stopped the CPL habitat grant work the MWA was doing. (they were doing about a $1/2M a yr in grant work) Then starting 2 yrs ago he started bitching they were not doing enough habitat work. Are you F u c k i n g kidding me? As he was the one that put the kibosh on it! He was like a cancer, he infected the Scott Lesuer chapter and another chapter that he was buddies with the Chair of that chapter. They pulled the 2 chapters out of the MWA earlier this spring/summer, Financially the MWA could not sustain itself with the loss of these 2 chapters. I said it the Special Delegates Meeting and I'll say it here - his actions were Treasonous. In August it was determined by the BD that the money on hand will run out end of Sept. They will cease all operations Sept 30 of this year.

Will Woodie Camp for the 13-15 YO kids continue in the future? IMHO Yes, but not under the MWA name. Not sure who exactly, but there's a far amount of interest of it continuing.
What about the existing MWA chapters, what will happen to them? IMHO about 1/2 will change their names to become stand alone local conservation groups doing local projects. So if you are a member of 1 of the chapters, please continue to help and financially help them locally.
What about the MN Waterfowl Symposium? At best it'll be a 50/50 chance that some other org will organize and hold it.

I believe the MWA's demise is a telling tale of what bodes for us waterfowl hunters as a whole in the forth coming years. The MWA was a blue collar group of guys and gals that rolled up their sleeves to try and help. I think that 50 yrs from now the rich will be the majority of waterfowl hunters partaking in it, and there will be 2/3 less waterfowl hunters than now. Hell the way society is looking at gun ownership in recent years, it may end up like European countries, where you store your guns in vaults at the club house.
Waterfowl hunting from my perspective in the future has a bleak outlook.

[Hansen]

Good gawd man . . . .The MWA was lost about 15 years ago. There is no connection with MWA and hunting opportunities for blue collar dudes in Minnesota. There is so much public land in MN is nuts. Plenty of place to go, quality is another matter. I honestly didn't even know MWA was still around.

[Bullet21XD]

The facts are...they didn't do shit for MN waterfowlers or MN waterfowling!

If they were beneficial, the organization would have thrived. Period.

[h2ofwlr]

They did over 1000 habitat projects in their 52 yrs. Enough said.

[Fish Felon]

They got too political. DU is successful because they have a singular mission and don't deviate from it---habitat. They don't ever get involved in any other issue. When Delta made a big splash in the early 2000's onto the fundraising scene after being solely a research organization for the entirety of their existence....billing themselves as being for duck hunters and pushing for funds to be spent on stuff like predator control, massive bird house sites, etc.....DU faced a ton of pressure during a very public onslaught by Delta, with myself being one of many that drank the Delta Kool-Aid and bought into the hype....

....DU never flinched. They stuck to their guns and didn't deviate from their singular mission---habitat.

They were right to do so....because they believed in their singular mission, and all these years later guys like myself that bought into the Delta hype at the time have realized DU was right and have a ton of respect for what they do and even more respect that they had the stones to not waiver and cave to all the external pressure they faced at the time.

MWA has never had a singular mission that they adhered to....they've always been a Jack of all trades, master of none....that "specializes" in, at different times, things such as hunter recruitment, various habitat projects (I.E. some of those thousand habitat projects consist of removing a small amount of trees on existing public areas, or even just putting up a handful of nesting structures, and not any actual noteworthy "conservation" work).....

......and unfortunately mostly as of late, they've focused on political initiatives---keeping the wood duck limit at two when the rest of the nation went to three, making MN the only state to ever slap the feds in the face by refusing the opportunity to hold a bonus teal season, and largely being behind duck rallys at the capital that resulting in accomplishing nothing more than MN being the only state to have a limit of four when the rest of the continent was allowed to shoot six, seven, eight, or higher.....they confused trying to create paper ducks through ridiculous forced restraints on state hunters as being the same as "conservation."

That's the biggest issue I have with the Old Guard. They have developed this warped concept that marginalizing the hunting opportunities of the same blue-collar guys that don't have a lot of time to invest in focusing on such issues, essentially the same exact people they once were and stood for....they view limiting the opportunities of others as being something that's noble....something that's the same as "conservation," that opposing of any expansion of hunting opportunities beyond what they've already unilaterally decided as being too liberal is noble.....and they were unable to ever look in the mirror and see how misguided, self-righteous, and hypocritical that notion is.

Maybe the biggest irony is that what made MWA more useless and meaningless was the passing of dedicated funding.

Prior to dedicated funding, MWA had a unique and important niche when it came to fundraising----all the money they raised stayed local.

MN had long been both DU's largest source of membership and fundraising. However, that money didn't stay here. Rightfully so, DU as a habitat organization for North America, took the funds raised in MN, and elsewhere for that matter, and directed them to the Dakotas and prairie Canada. $30K to $40K can't get you shit for conservation in Southern MN or Iowa......not even a few acre pond.....but it can get you a permanent easement on a section of land by Stanley, ND that protects in perpetuity the uplands from being plowed and the wetlands from being drained (FYI this is a personal reference of gentleman I knew that literally put his entire section of land into permanent easement after DU offered him money for what he described as "doing what he was going to do anyways." Guess what? That was fifteen years ago and he already wishes he didn't do because there are now land-use practices that he otherwise could've implemented that would make him a lot of money from farming.....luckily he's not too bitter since he kept mineral rights in the deal and made a fortune during the last Bakken Boom).

Long story longer, MWA represented a way to keep an average duck hunter's expendable conservation dollars local.

With dedicated funding---that all changed......What happened was nothing short of a land grab for dollars.

With the creation of a pool of hundreds of millions of dollars that had to stay within state borders, why wouldn't DU/PF jump in and take advantage of them?

All of a sudden this giant pool of money exists that can't go out of state that presents a huge opportunity for an organization like DU to come in.....an organization with more experience, resources, expertise when it comes to conserving habitat than MWA......

.....of course DU is going to come in big and capitalize on getting those dollars, conducting habitat projects, being able to add a shitload of acreage....their only and favorite feather they put in their cap.......when it's FREE MONEY.

Dedicated funding eliminated the void that MWA filled in keeping conservation dollars local.

DU/PF do it far, far, far better than MWA could ever possibly dream of and dedicated funding made them the red-headed stepson of habitat conservation in this state that no one had any want or need for anymore.....

In short----dedicated funding made the MWA beyond useless.