KAMO December, 2024 Newsletter – 5 pages
For comments related to this document, contact Mike

President?s message – Hello to all Friends of KAMO and KAMO members,
This is KAMO president Mark Walters with my monthly update. First is info on our Joe Hunt which was held December 6th thru the 8th. I think a proper description would be phenomenal as usual. The team work provided by people like Bob Brodeur and his entire family, Jim Rydmark, Kevin Seymour, Rick Miotke, both Jeff and Patti Rouse and Bob Nicksic as well as at least a dozen other people is a beautiful thing to watch. Thank you to each and everyone of you!
Our 2nd Vice President Greg Pahl of the Dodge County Chapter of KAMO has sent a letter that will be sent out to the B.O.D. I ask every chapter to share Greg’s proposal among your members as soon as possible.
I just returned from a hunting trip down in Mississippi with my brother Tom who lives in Louisiana. We camped and hunted deer for 7 days. On Saturday night, the same storm system that killed some people in our neck of the woods hit our camp and dropped a tree on my pickup. That was a very sobering experience to wake up to.
There are ice fishing experiences with the Meadow Valley chapter on Lake Tomah and another on the Mississippi river with the Coulee chapter. Meadow Valley?s will be on the 11th and Coulee?s will be the following weekend. I believe Northwoods also has one planned for February 15th.
As always, thank you for all that you do for KAMO!
Mark

MOHEE response regarding what criteria KAMO would have to meet to have our logo displayed on their banners during their expo

No criteria at all – if you would like to support, we are very open!

We appreciate you reaching out. As you know, our outdoor traditions rely on volunteers, healthy natural resources, and generous donors. We are excited that you are considering supporting MOHEE. In 2024 alone, we offered over 4,800 individuals a unique field trip where they participated in, gained awareness, and built interest in outdoor skills; such as archery, airgun, fisheries, forestry, wildlife, history, and so much more.

OHEC is excited for spring and building off past success we are planning for MOHEE 2025. Dates are set for May 7 at Havenwoods State Forest in Milwaukee and May 14 & 15 at the MacKenzie Center in Poynette, WI. Two perfect locations for students to receive instruction on outdoor skills, mentoring programs, and life long outdoor activities; all while meeting academic standards for learning. Students and teachers alike say ?this is the BEST field trip ever!?
I hope you agree that this is an easy way to show your commitment to education and outdoor mentoring programs outreach that we both value. Let me know if you would like to help organize an activity station at MOHEE Milwaukee or Poynette …. or both! Or perhaps you are interested in helping to staff other areas of MOHEE? i.e. OHEC’s Touch of the Wild trailers, archery tent, parking, etc.
Your contribution can benefit both of our non-profits. OHEC would in turn promote you as one of our official sponsors. At minimum recognition will be on our website, social media, and day of event banners proportionately.
To see the sights and sounds from MOHEE last spring, please check out this video. https://youtu.be/jzfouTNpA2o
Please send contribution to: OHEC, 2955 Kennedy Road, Hazel Green WI 53811 or
online at https://square.link/u/cHEHLdoc
I am excited to hear from you!

Sincerely,
Ruth Ann

KAMO 2025 State Convention – It is time to set a date/ time/ location for a convention. Agenda items should be compiled. Some potential topics – Partnerships with Wisconsin Waterfowl Expo and MOHEE, Find someone to run Facebook pages, Officer elections/ rekindle president replacement, upcoming multi – chapter events, funding – raffle – sponsorships, Joe Hunt – size – capacity per chapter.

Wisconsin Interscholastic Fishing Association (WIFA) Ice Fishing State Championship – Pools 7 & 8 of the Mississippi River on Saturday, 15th, 2025. This is a colossal event with over 100 participating high schools. It is possible that a school in your area will be competing there.
WIFA has a Master Angler program that any kid, 8th grade (second semester) and up can enjoy and they don?t need to be in WIFA. Some KAMOKIDS have really embraced this quest to outdo other kids in the state – goes by length for 16 species.

Website – Please visit your chapter page to see that it is current. When I (Mike) go on Coulee?s page, I am usually surprised by some out of date things I put on their myself, meaning to come back and change it in a few weeks.
New or exiting members? – Please let Mike know if someone leaves your chapter so that they can be removed from the directory and mailing lists. If you have added members, Mike needs to know this as well – those new people need to be put in the directory and added to the group mailing list. First and last name, phone number and email.

Chapter Reports

Baraboo –
2024 Mac Kenzie hunt (the ?Joe?) – Note from Kevin
The 2024 JOE was a huge success again and thanks to all for pitching in . I recall earlier this summer being concerned how things would work out with the hunt being a week earlier, and with landowners wanting to hunt their own property during the muzzleloader season. It all came together nicely thanks to everyone pitching in

14 deer were harvested
4 deer tested positive for CWD
Reservations for the Mackenzie Center have been made and paid for 12-12,12-13,12-14-2025

Next Baraboo Chapter meeting at Upham Woods Learning Center on January 13th.

Coulee – Three mentors, one parent, and 4 youth participated in the Joe Hunt. One of these youths shot his first two deer and another young man also got two. All of us had a blast.
Our group met at the HyVee Food Court in Onalaska on the evening of Monday, Dec. 16th. Members of UMR, DNR, and Friends of the Upper Mississippi were present. This was primarily a planning session for the upcoming Kraig Hoff Memorial Fishing Event of January 18th. Kraig was a DNR/ UMR employee, thus their interest in participating.
We have been buying up give away fish poles at highly discounted prices and putting together small tackle boxes with a combination of new and used tackle inside for use during Wisconsin?s Free Fishing weekends. The Memorial event was scheduled intentionally on a free, no license Saturday.

Dodge County Conservation – DCC KAMO. Well, we started the month with The “Joe” Hunt . As 19 boys and girls participated in a Learn to Hunt for a weekend filled with fun and excitement. Our chapter received a 20 gauge over and under shotgun from the wife of a close friend that passed away unexpectedly and in his honor we were instructed to give it to a deserving kid. We decided to give it away at the Jue Hunt. Everyone was given a chip and all of those chips were thrown into a hat and one was drawn out. Congratulations to Brody Abfall . We also had a contest on our Facebook page , ” Show us your Best outdoor activity or Snowman ?. It started out great until we lost all the snow. Some of our mentors took some kids to the Ice fishing expo as well and fun was had by all there. Lots of exciting things planned for the New Year. I would like to thank everyone that is part of DCC KAMO for making 2024 a very special year and looking forward to 2025 being bigger and brighter for all the kids that we impact during our outdoor adventures.
Get a kid outside and see what happens.

Jim B Pres,

P.S. An extra THANK YOU goes out to Rick, Kevin and everyone that made the JOE hunt happen and run smoothly.

Lake Wisconsin – Kamo Lake Wisconsin hosted the 2024 Joe hunt. Which took place at the Mackenzie Center in Poynette WI. Where a total of 19 mentees along with mentors, spent Friday afternoon hunting. Then we had a wonderful dinner followed by a one hour training for the mentees put on by the Wisconsin DNR. Saturday morning at dark thirty we ate breakfast and proceeded back out to the woods for hunting. We then returned back to camp for a quick lunch. Followed by another night of hunting. Saturday night the mentees played bingo with a chance to win prizes. We woke Sunday morning ready for breakfast and to give hunting one more shot.
We finished the weekend with 14 deer being taken. Overall I thought we all saw a decent amount of deer. With more deer being seen than a lot of people that hunted the 9 day gun season this year. Kamo Lake Wisconsin would like to thank all of the private landowners that make this hunt possible. We would also like to thank the cooks for keeping us all fed. Thanks to our safety guy, Rick, for taking care of any hiccups that came up, I know there was at least one. We need to thank all the mentors that bring this hunt together for all of their time spent. Big thanks to the Brodeur family who makes a lot of this possible.
The rest of December has been spent talking about how to make Kamo Lake Wisconsin grow as a chapter. We have a meeting set for January 9th at the Poynette American Legion at 6:00 p.m. . Where we are hoping to see some new faces . We also have a gun drawing at 2:00 p.m. on January 4th at Gasoline alley in Poynette WI. With all tickets being sold already. We also have a gun drawing coming up February 1st at 2:00 P.M. with about 20 tickets left.

Meadow Valley – We have a fisherie scheduled for 11 January 2025 at Lake Tomah, back up date 8 February 2025.
Tested 14 deer from the Joe Hunt for CWD, with 4 being positive.
Starting to plan for the spring turkey hunt.
Expanding to Mauston and Tomah schools for scholarship opportunities for individuals majoring in the Natural Resources Field.

Thank You,

Jim

Northwoods – Hello from the Northwoods,
We held our pizza year end meeting in early December, we had a discussion on raffling off the bikes for easter break for the school kids. We also had a discussion on fund raisers for 2025 with a couple new options. Our winter fishing outing is scheduled for February 15th on Lake Emily. The Uphill truck drags event will be on March 8th in which we receive a $500 donation for running the 50/50 raffles. Now that we are in 2025 we need to talk about the statewide weekend at Lost Lake campground and choose a date, thoughts from the group? A couple of folks have reached out to become mentors for our chapter as well, all good things from the north woods other than lack of snowfall.

Johnny Johnson from Florence, WI signing off.