CHEYENNE – After a 32-year career of promoting all aspects of conservation education with emphasis in his last years on Project Wild and non-toxic shooting education, Jake Hohl will now apply the skills he conveyed to the field full time.

The Wyoming Game and Fish Department’s well-known conservation education specialist recently retired.

"The Game and Fish will never replace Jake's knowledge or expertise when it comes to teaching kids and adults about shooting sports," said Brian Olsen, the department’s access coordinator for northeast Wyoming. "Jake also had a unique talent of making his workshops interesting for all ages that were attending."

Hohl is an Independence, Iowa native with a bachelor’s degree in biology from Upper Iowa College in Fayette, Iowa. He then earned both a bachelor’s and master’s degree in range management from the University of Wyoming.

He began his Game and Fish career as a special deputy warden in Laramie during the 1973 and 1974 hunting seasons. He then worked the summers of 1974 through 1977 as a communications aide in Cheyenne.

He started his permanent service in August 1977 in the department’s Education Section. Over the years he’s worked with all aspects of the section including hunter education, Project Wild, conservation camps and designing interpretive displays. Since 1991, he’s led the department’s effort as a member of the Cooperative North American Shotgunning Education Program (CONSEP) to educate bird hunters about non-toxic shot, improve shotgunning skills and reduce wounding loss.

"I can’t think of anyone I worked with over the past 30 years who was a more responsible, professional and organized agency representative than Jake Hohl," said Tom Roster, CONSEP consultant. "Jake was a guy who always had everything ready, covered every detail, busted his buns to make sure every Wyoming constituent was treated like the most important individual in Wyoming, and he thus always succeeded in organizing excellent turnouts for CONSEP educational events."

Hohl was also known for his ability to inject the message of human beings sharing the land with other living things into visitor centers.

Hohl was honored as the 1991 "Information and Education Employee of the Year." He was also the UW Range Management Graduate Student of the Year and Sigma Xi Research Recipient. He received Project Wild’s "Coordinator of the Year Award" for 2003-04.

He’s a member of the Society for Range Management, The Wildlife Society, National Rifle Association and National Wildlife Federation.

Hohl is recognized by coworkers and friends as one of those select 10 percent of hunters and anglers who harvest 90 percent of the game. He intends to keep those skills honed by hunting by angling from Alaska to Texas. Between outings, he will continue to reside in Cheyenne.

"And one last thing: Jake was always fun to be around and that goes a long ways to making a tough job easier," Roster said. "Jake Hohl, I salute you."
(contact: Jeff Obrecht)