2009 Fundraiser: What a Night

Once again the 2009 Wild Sheep Society AGM and fundraiser was a great success with members raising over $147,000 dollars over the two day event. The weekend started out with three different workshops being held Friday morning. The Kamloops Indian Band (KIB) held a tour of their land showing off some of the habitat improvements that have been done and that were planned (a habitat improvement burn was done the day before and another was lit the day of the tour). Other workshops included a Sheep Necropsy done by Helen Schwankje (chief veterinarian for the Province) and a Trophy Scoring Clinic (look for these stories in upcoming issues of the Wild Sheep Society Magazine).

During the Friday afternoon session we had four different presentations from the MOE Wildlife Biologists from different regions. Presentations focused on sheep issues relevant to each region. Special thanks goes to Brian Harris (Region 8), Doug Jury (Region 3), Conrad Thiessen (Region 7B) and Rick Marshall (Region 6).

Friday evening concluded with our ever-popular “Friday Night Fun Night”. This gathering is becoming more and more popular with members each year. Close to 125 people jammed the small meeting room to catch up with old friends and meet new ones. Once again Mari Wood (Director) put on her wildlife identification contest and for the first time the WSSOBC had a sheep horn-aging contest. This new contest had all “experts” matching wits over the ages of 12 different sheep heads.

Friday Night Fun Night” and sheep horn aging contest.

Saturday morning started with our Annual General Meeting and ended with a fantastic presentation by Kevin Hurley. Kevin is the Chair for the Western Association of Fish & Wildlife Agencies (WAFWA) Wild Sheep Working Group. A special thanks goes out to Kevin Hurley for travelling up from Wyoming to give us his presentation.

Mari Wood presents Kevin Hurley with a small token our appreciation for coming up and speaking at our annual AGM and Fundraiser.

During the Saturday afternoon session we had two speakers present on two different issues. One was on “Wild and Domestic Sheep issues” (Neil Thagard, Director of Operations, Wild Sheep Foundation) and the other was “Pack Light, Pack Right” (Bryan Martin, Guide Outfitter). Both presentations were well attended and worth seeing.

That evening was our 16th fundraiser and dinner and what a night. For someone that has been to the last 12 Fundraisers I have to say this was the best one so far. We had close to 400 people attend (another sell out) and the prizes and auction items had to be seen to be appreciated. Live auction items included hunts for Polar Bear, Dall Sheep, Bison, and Pronghorn to name a few. Some of the raffle prizes included a sheep camp, zodiac boat, wall tent, Swarovski Spotting Scope and many other items. There was also close to 100 silent auction items.

The night started with a memorial tribute to past president and friend, Glen Kuenzl followed by two keynote addresses by Mel Arnold (BCWF) and Scott Ellis (GOABC). Following dinner the live auction started and as I have already stated the live auction items were the best in years and raised a lot of money for the Wild Sheep Society.

At this time I would like to thank all the people that attended this great event and specifically all the people that donated hunts and other items that were either auctioned or raffled off or used in the silent auction. Without your generous support this event would not have been a success and more importantly, money would not be going to help put “More sheep on the Mountain”. Thanks again.

One of the raffle prizes included this “Sheep Camp”.

“Live Auction” taking place.

““Pyramid Raffle” prizes included this Zodiac Boat.

““Wall of rams greeted members as they came to the Dinner and Fundraiser.

““A full house listen to one of the speakers on Friday afternoon.

2008 AGM info