After years of study, Thomas concluded that a large obstacle preventing many women from participating in the outdoors was a lack of educational opportunities. Over the past six years, BOWworkshops have been held in 47 states. Last year, Minnesota's workshops drew roughly 350 women, and more than 500 are expected to attend this year's offerings. The weekend workshops offer introductions to a range of outdoors activities including hunting, fishing, rock climbing, shooting, and canoeing. They are restricted to and taught mostly by women.
Many women return two or three times to participate in the full complement of activities.
The next weekend workshop will be held September 12-14 at a site near Nisswa. This spring wasn't such a good time to be a wild turkey. And the record gobbler harvest of 3,302 broke last year's record by 461 birds. Gary Nelson, the DNR's wild turkey specialist at Elba, credits the high success rate and harvest to mild weather early in the season and to a growing number of wild turkeys across southern Minnesota. That first season, April 16-20, produced the most of any with 669 birds killed.