Sportsmen's and conservation groups across the country are applauding a secretarial order signed Friday by Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to expand hunting and fishing opportunities and enhance conservation efforts.
Secretarial Order 3356 comes days after the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced a survey that found there are 2.2 million fewer hunters in the U.S. now than in 2011. The order seeks to improve wildlife management and conservation, increase access to public lands for hunting, shooting, and fishing, and puts a new and a greater emphasis on recruiting and retaining new sportsmen conservationists, with a focus on engaging youths, veterans, minorities and other communities that traditionally have low participation in outdoor recreation activities.
"In the past, management plans for federal lands have been put in place to ban hunting and shooting," said Chris Cox, executive director of the National Rifle Association. "Sportsmen and women can now breathe a sigh of relief that those days are over. This administration values access to public lands for sportsmen and we commend them for it."
In Bismarck, officials of Delta Waterfowl commended the order's commitment to conserving wetland and upland nesting habitat through conservation easements, while also advancing predator management as a tool to increase duck production.
"Today's Secretarial Order demonstrates the Trump Administration's willingness to double down on its commitment to ducks and duck hunters," Frank Rohwer, president and chief scientist of Delta Waterfowl, said in a statement. "We are most appreciative of the bold leadership of the secretary and president in pursuit of our shared vision for conserving America's rich waterfowl breeding grounds, while increasing duck production through the use of intensive management."
ADVERTISEMENT
Other groups weighing in with support for the order included the National Wildlife Federation, the National Shooting Sports Foundation, Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation and the Congressional Sportsmen's Caucus.
