Charles Carlson
The History
Natural Resources wildlife management has come a very long ways since it started to come into the mind of people. There have been several groups and organizations created like the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources and the Natural Resources Conservation Service. This paper will cover many aspects. First it will cover the history of natural resources like, how and when it was starting to come into play. Second it will cover significant events that have happened in natural resources wildlife Management history. Finally it will cover several people that contributed the development of the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, the Natural Resources Conservation Service, and Natural Resources wildlife management in general.
Natural Resources started to come into play in the 1930's around the dust bowl when they realized they needed to conserve water usage. When water began to deplete and animals began to become scarce, people realized they needed to do something about these depletions or it lead to terrible things in the future. In 1931 the governor of Minnesota Harold Stassen had asked Chester Wilson if he would create the Department of Conservation. He founded this organization and it exploded into the minds of the people in Minnesota. In 1971 the organization had changed there name into the Department of Natural Resources (DNR). This is when the Minnesota DNR came into play. This group believed in many aspects of conserving natural resources. But they ran into many obstacles of getting things organized and having people believe in them (Breining, G., 1981). The DNR covers many things like forestry, fisheries, wildlife, soil conservation, parks, trails, water conservation, and many other natural resources. The Minnesota DNR has a mission witch they follow by. This mission is stated as followed
The mission of the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources is to work with citizens to protect and manage the state's natural resources, to provide outdoor recreation opportunities, and to provide for commercial uses of natural resources in a way that creates a sustainable quality of life (State of Minnesota, 2000).
Another group that was created in response to natural resources was the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS). Hugh Hammond Bennett was a man that started the soil conservation service back in the 1920's. This organization focused on soil erosion and he convinced people that it was a big problem. The Soil Conservation Service today is now known as the NRCS. The NRCS now covers a larger category of things than just soil erosion. This organization covers everything from soil science, water sheds, and agricultural farm land. This group try's to reach out to land owners and people to inform them the importance of soil science and agricultural farming (Helms, 2008). These groups the Minnesota DNR and the NRCS are founders of natural resources and have gone back a long ways. Although we call it the Minnesota DNR, almost every other state in the United States has a Department of Natural Resources.
Over the last 100 years or so there have been several significant events that have happened that have to do with natural resources. One event that has happened in Minnesota that we still remember is the great Hinckley fire. On September 3, 1894 over 400 people had died in a massive fire that swept Pine County just a few days earlier (Dickson, 2008 100 years). This fire was not the only fire that year but the biggest and most devastating. Those last years in the 1800s were very dry and many sparks from trains would ignite fires quickly. The fires charred many woodlands and prairies throughout Minnesota. The Hinckley fire would feed on down log piles that were made by commercial loggers. In 1895 the legislator hired the first ever fire chief who was in control of maintaining fires. This hiring was one of the states first conservation measures (Dickson, 2008 100 years). This eventually led into wildlife management groups and the creation of the Minnesota DNR.
In 1971 Minnesota's whitetail deer population had plummeted to nearly nothing. The winters in the 1960's were extremely harsh killing off thousands of deer. The over harvest of doe's and the increasing habitat loss could not sustain the hunting season. In other words the deer population could not increase or sustain itself and it was plummeting into the disappearance of whitetail deer in Minnesota. So then Minnesota DNR started to regulate the hunting season to being able to only shoot 1 buck and making people apply for doe permits so they can regulate how many doe's are being taken every hunting season. Back then it was uncommon to see deer in south western Minnesota so people would have to call and report to the DNR if they saw a deer (Dickson, 2008 100 years). Farmland deer don't really have places to hide like around here Crookston, MN. So it's very easy to kill lots of doe's and deplete the population.
From 1945 to 1965 the state of Minnesota would pay anyone ten dollars who would shoot a black bear that was thought to be a nuisance. The black bears were viewed as varmints and people would shoot the bears and just let them lay there to rot. This never did kill off the population but the bear population was always low. There are now over 200,000 bears in Minnesota today that is over three times the amount of bears then back then. The DNR made a hunting season and restricted the amount of bears that people could kill allowing the population to increase significantly (Dickson, T. 2008).
Lake Mille Lacs is one of the biggest lakes in Minnesota and back in the day when people only had small fishing boats they would not go on large lakes due to huge swells and incredible wind. From the world war two economic boom people were able to afford bigger boats to put up against the huge waves. From the 1950s to the 1970s the number of people fishing on large lakes increased by nearly fifty percent (Dickens, 2008 growing game). Along with the amount of fishermen was the amount of lake cabins being built on the lake. These new increases led the legislator into making new parks and setting fishing regulations on the lake.
There are many new programs out there to teach people how to teach kids many different aspects of natural resources. There are three main programs that teach people project wet, wild, and learning tree. Project learning tree teaches kids about appropriate forest managing techniques. It also teaches kids people about certain harmful tree and plant diseases. Project wet teaches people how water runoffs help the environment also different water managing techniques. Finally, project wild teaches different wildlife managing strategies, what would happen if we didn't manage wild animals and how they would get more diseases.
There were many different events that happened in natural resources and it would have never have happened if it weren't from other people starting programs. Chester Wilson was a lawyer back in the 1930's. He had a good paying job and has a family. His working days changed when the governor at the time Harold Stassen had asked him to be the leader of the Conservation service program. Wilson had to think about it for a while but finally came to his senses and accepted the job. His 12 year term with the conservation service eventually led into a career (Breining, 1981). This conservation service eventually turned into the Minnesota DNR, and he was the founder of the whole operation.
Frank Fortin was a huge wildlife poacher back in the early 1900's. He would always find a way to avoid the law too. He had built his house half on Minnesota's side and the other half of his house were on Canada's side so police would not be able to touch him (Dickson, 2008 growing game). So indirectly he was a huge part of the natural resources conservation program because it was people like him that would make wildlife population decrease dramatically. So we had to set up specifically game wardens to catch people like this.
Hugh Hammond led the soil conservation program back in the 1930's which eventually created the Natural Resources Conservation Service. He was born in North Carolina and graduated school from the University of North Carolina. He began his career as a soil survey volunteer for the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). His main focus in his career was soil erosion. He helped develop the soil erosion service and was appointed chief of it until he retired in 1951. In 2000 he was conducted into the USDA hall of heroes. He received many honors and was the president of many organizations (Helms, D. 2008).
So among us are the two largest natural resources conservation groups which are the Department of Natural Resources and the Natural Resources conservation service. So as long as we conserve wildlife and manage land we can avoid large events of population decreases and large fires. We should all thank the people that started these conservation programs as it leads to future opportunities for us and the people to come into our world.
Resources
Breining, G., 1981. History of the Department of Natural Resources. Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/aboutdnr/
History/dnr.html. Accessed February 24, 2008.
Dickson, T., 2008. 100 years of Conservation. Division of fish and wildlife. http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/volunteer/janfeb00/100years.html. Accessed February 25, 2008.
Dickson, T., 2008. Minnesota's Growing Game. Minnesota Department of natural Resources. http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/volunteer/sepoct98/growing_game.html. Accessed February 25, 2008.
Helms, D., 2008. Natural Resource Conservation Service History. United States Department of Agriculture. http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/about/history/. Accessed February 25, 2008.
