The Wildlife Heritage Trust is administered by the Board of Wildlife Commissioners. The money in the account is used for the ‘protection, propagation, restoration, transplanting, introduction, and management of any game fish, game mammal, game bird, or fur-bearing mammal and the management and control of predatory wildlife in this state."

The funds are obtained from bid, auction or partnership in wildlife drawings or from a gift of money made by any person to the Wildlife Heritage Trust Account. The amount of funds available from year to year for projects depends on funds deposited each year and interest earned annually on the account. The department is allowed to expend no more than 75% of the money deposited in the account the previous year, plus any interest earned during the prior year.

The Heritage Trust account started in 1998 and due to the generosity of its participants over the years, the account has now grown to over $5 million. The table below displays the organizations that were awarded Wildlife Heritage tags to auction at their fundraising events. The auctioned tags benefit the Wildlife Heritage Trust Account.

You may also be interested in learning about our Partnership in Wildlife (PIW) program. PIW is a voluntary and optional participation program that offers unique hunting opportunities to hunters for a few statewide big game tags.