GREEN RIVER -- Walt Gasson was retired all of one day before he got the call.

The longtime Wyoming Game and Fish Department employee retired from the agency after 31 years on Dec. 3. The next day, he was named the new executive director of the Wyoming Wildlife Federation.

After a yearlong search, the state's oldest and largest sportsmen's conservation organization chose the 53-year-old Game and Fish career employee to help revitalize and direct the Cheyenne-based organization.

"It was a fairly short-lived retirement," Gasson said. "But I'm so excited about this ... It's unseemly for a man my age to be as excited as I am about this."

Founded in 1937 by hunters and anglers, the nonprofit group is composed of a variety of state residents who seek to conserve wildlife and wildlife habitat.

The federation touts itself as the largest statewide sportsmen and conservation organization with a membership of about 5,500 hunters, anglers and other outdoor enthusiasts.

The group's membership has waned in recent years from peak levels in the late 1990s, due in part to the group's endorsement of Wyoming's controversial wolf management plan, Gasson said in a phone interview.

"We have seen membership plateau out, and that's just unacceptable in the 21st century in Wyoming ... and that's one of the things I'm really going to focus on," he said.

"Our resident membership needs to increase, and we need to be more active," Gasson said.

He said the federation plans a series of meetings in 10 communities across Wyoming over the next few months to discuss wildlife issues with members and nonmembers.

"It's my perception that this organization, like lots of organizations, is most effective when it's strong at the local level, and that's one reason why I want to do these meetings across the state," Gasson said.

"We need to be out front on these wildlife issues," he said. "I hope the federation gets larger, I hope we get stronger, and I hope we're a meaningful force in land-use decisions, especially public land-use decisions, and I hope we're working in partnership with more people."

Canary in the mine

Gasson comes brings a load of wildlife management experience to the job.

He is a Green River native and a 1976 graduate of the University of Wyoming.

During his 31 years with the Game and Fish Department, he worked as a habitat unit manager, a wildlife biologist, staff biologist, planning coordinator and special assistant to the office of the director.

Gasson was one of the primary authors of Wyoming's comprehensive wildlife strategy and most recently was in charge of an agency program to train future leaders for Game and Fish.

He has also been a partner in a private consulting firm that specializes in natural resources issues.

Gasson said access to public lands and energy development in Wyoming will continue to be "premier issues" for the federation under his leadership.

"Access to public lands is going to be a huge issue for us always, I think," he said. "And I think things like instream flows -- especially if the ongoing drought and climate change continues to have an impact on Wyoming -- will be a huge issue on the table."

A few years ago, the Wyoming Wildlife Federation split with the National Wildlife Federation on the state's adoption of a dual listing classification for Wyoming's wolf management plan.

"We saw the bottom line as being ... getting wolves delisted, and if it took dual status to get wolves delisted, then so be it," he said. "We saw delisting as the goal and didn't see the necessity in getting hung up on the details of how we get there."

Gasson said the federation will work to avoid the possible listing of the sage grouse under the Endangered Species Act.

"We're absolutely going to be involved in every place we can possibly be involved in ... on that one," he said. "Sage grouse is the canary in the mine for a whole list of sagebrush critters in Wyoming."

Southwest Wyoming bureau reporter Jeff Gearino can be reached at 307-875-5359 or at gearino@tribcsp.com.