Per an announcement from the Boone and Crockett Club (Nov. 6, 2026): the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has completed a comprehensive review of the National Wildlife Refuge System, and the Club is giving it a strong endorsement.
At an event held at Audubon National Wildlife Refuge in North Dakota — attended by Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, Service Director Brian Nesvik, and Club member and Silencer Central CEO Brandon Maddox — the Refuge Review laid out a clear direction for the system’s future: refuges should practice active, hands-on habitat management (including grazing, agriculture, and forestry where it serves conservation goals), shift staff from offices into the field, keep management plans accountable and focused on execution, and strengthen collaboration with neighboring landowners and private partners, since a refuge’s success extends beyond its own boundaries.
Club president Mary Webster put it well: Theodore Roosevelt founded the Refuge System, hunters’ dollars funded millions of its acres, and habitat doesn’t manage itself — the Club now looks forward to seeing the Service carry these recommendations through.
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