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Bruce: Five, four, three, two, one. Welcome to another episode of Whitetail Rendezvous. This is your host Bruce Hutcheon and I’ve been looking forward to this conversation for a long time. I’m sitting here, we’re talking with Luke. Luke, how do you say your last name? I don’t want to butcher it.
Luke: Yeah, you bet. It’s Coccoli.
Bruce: We’re sitting here with Luke Coccoli who is the Conservation Programs Manager of the Boone and Crockett Club. And he also manages the Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Ranch as well as the Rasmuson Wildlife Conservation Center. Guys and girls, here’s a young man, graduated from college and just jumped feet first into the conservation arena and Luke, we’re really happy to have you on the show.
Luke: Yeah, honored to be here, Bruce.
Bruce: Okay, you get out of college and you jump into a job with the Boone and Crockett Club, which is the caretaker of all the records literally throughout the world. How did you get the job?
Luke: Well, actually between my junior and senior year of college, I worked for the Forest Service, close to home called the Rocky Mountain Ranger District, right there in Choteau, Montana. I worked as a biologist field tech so I was out serving for goshawks and amphibians and lynx habitats. And it was right about the time, quite a few of those budget sequesters hit and that following summer or spring when I was job searching, talking with the Forest Service folks, it didn’t sound like the funding was going to be there for the job but one of the folks in the office was kind enough to forward me an email with this job application and the title of the job was actually the Facilities Manager. So it was kind of a more behind the scenes type of role, helping just facilitate, getting gear out, cleaning gear, making sure kids were where they needed to be, ordering supplies, helping out the education director that was formerly working up here full time. So I took the hint. The gentleman said, “I strongly encourage you to apply.” I sent in resume, cover letter. I still had to do a phone interview. I was still in school, just finishing up finals during the process and within about 10 minutes after we got off the phone, they offered me the job and couldn’t have been happier. Only about 45 minutes from the town I grew up in and still living along the Rocky Mountain front so it’s right where I want to be.
Bruce: Let’s talk about briefly about the Boone and Crockett Club and it’s mission and why it stood the test of time. I think you shared it’s over 100 years old.
Luke: Right, the Boone and Crockett Club itself was actually founded in 1886 by Teddy Roosevelt and that was back in New York city. Himself and a group of close friends founded the club and wrote up the initial bylaws. In 1986, the club went ahead and purchased the Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Ranch, which is about a 6,000 acre parcel on the east slope of the Rocky Mountains, north central Montana, only about an hour south of Glacier National Park. And that was purchased to really demonstrate, educate, and research wildlife conservation and conservation management, especially in the west. The ranch itself is a working cattle ranch, so we run about 250 cow calf pairs and we also see an abundance of elk, whitetail, mule beard, grizzly bears. We’ve got coyotes and even wolves that roam across the ranch so that really enabled the Boone and Crockett Club to not only walk the walk or talk the talk but walk the walk in conservation itself and also to elaborate on conservation education both for youth, underprivileged, for women interested in the outdoors as well as even a public hunting opportunity in such a magnificent area.
Bruce: Let’s talk about the Boone and Crockett Club involved in getting youth outdoors and making it a great experience for them.