Recently Guthrie County Conservation began a new partnership with the Panorama FFA chapter to conduct a hunter safety course. While Conservation Director Joe Hanner felt it was a great course, the number of participants was down slightly from previous sessions. Hanner says he averages about 30-32 students per class, but only had 17 this time.

Despite the lower numbers, Hanner says he was pleased with the group they had and their partnership with Panorama. “It was a great group of kids. When there’s less students like that you can get a little more one-on-one time…We used their (Panorama CSD) bus to bus the kids out to the Lake Panorama Fin and Feather shooting range to shoot one day of the course. It went really well and the facilities were great and logistically it turned out fantastic.”

Hanner isn’t sure why the numbers were lower, though he doesn’t expect that trend to continue in future courses. Anyone born after January 1, 1972 must have satisfactorily completed a Hunters Education Course and must be 12 years old before obtaining an Iowa Hunters Safety Certificate or hunting license. To hear more from Guthrie County Conservation, listen to Hanner on today’s Let’s Talk Guthrie County program.