10-year-old Sawyer Olson shot his first buck during KAMO's deer hunt at the Mackenzie Environmental Education Center.

Hello friends,

This week I am writing to you about the 3rd annual KAMO deer hunt, which was just held for 17 very lucky kids at the MacKenzie Environmental Education Center at Poynette (Columbia County) as well as local private lands.

KAMO is Kids And Mentors Outdoors, which is an organization that was started by you, the readers of this column, back in 2007. KAMO takes kids on outdoor experiences (kamokids.org).

We currently have four chapters in Wisconsin: the Ladysmith area, Florence, Wisconsin Dells, and Necedah/New Lisbon, and we are working on our fifth which will be based out of La Crosse.

The planning for an experience like this requires almost year round work, and much of it is done by Joe Stecker-Kochanski who is a member of The Baraboo River Chapter of KAMO, which is also the chapter that sponsors this event.

Back in October, all 17 of our young hunters went through a three-hour hunter and tree stand safety class. Permission from private landowners is obtained and shooting lanes are cleared at Mackenzie.

Our volunteer cooks, Jeff and Patti Rouse and Marlene Shaw, order enough food to feed 45 people for three days and the work list goes on and on!

Saturday, Dec. 10
High 25, low 4

With the wind chill, it was minus-two at 6 this morning as 17 young hunters and their mentors hit the woods. In about a third of the cases, some of our KAMO members would be hunting with children from their own families and the other 12 kids are from families that have sought out KAMO to introduce their kids to Wisconsin's outdoors.

This morning I would be sitting with my 10-year-old daughter, Selina, in a tree stand overlooking two ravines on the east end of the Mackenzie property. Everyone, even the hunters in heated ground blinds, experienced the coldest morning of this early winter.

By late morning, everyone was back to camp with many stories, of which several were about the cold or falling a sleep. KAMO member Rick Miotke and his stepson Brandon Ross had scored on a young doe and thus our first deer was added to the pole.

Ten-tear-old Sawyer Olson of Necedah hesitated on a shot and a midday break was taken by one and all.

Pete Goethel is a member of The Baraboo River Chapter who sat with his boys the first two years of this hunt. This year, Pete mentored John McMahon and tonight, just before dark, John made a shot on a very large doe. After dark, tracking began by several mentors and John McMahon. The doe was recovered and John's first deer was hoisted up onto the deer pole at camp!

One of my favorite parts of this weekend experience is to watch, as all the kids become a social unit as the weekend progresses on this once in a lifetime hunt.
A lot of playing and laughter are also part of this experience, back at camp and on Saturday night, after the kids each tell about their days experience the adults sit around the fireplace and enjoy the comforts of the lounge chairs in the lodge and the warmth of the fire.

Sunday, Dec. 11
High 46, low 26

As is always the case, our cooks had an excellent breakfast prepared at 5 a.m. This morning more than half of our young hunters would be asleep within minutes of the start of their morning's hunt.

There are dozens of people who should be thanked for their efforts that make this hunt a success. One of them is Bob Nack who supervises the WDNR's State Game Farm and each year does deer drives on both Saturday and Sunday mornings. This morning Bob and some of his helpers pushed a dandy 7-point-buck to young Sawyer Olson and his mentor Jeff Berry. Today, Sawyer did not hesitate and put a bullet in the buck's heart and our hunt ended with a very positive bang!

Folks in the Poynette/Rio area, we need a couple more parcels for this expanding hunt. Only the kids are shooting and we really do not harvest very many deer per property.

Thank you to everyone who helped!

Sunset

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