Pete Heard Presented with the C. W. Watson Award

 NRCS Agricultural Wildlife Conservation Center (AWCC) Director L. Pete Heard was recently presented the prestigious C. W. Watson Award by the 16-state Southeastern Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, the Southeastern Section of the Wildlife Society, and the Southern Division of the American Fisheries Society at the 2007 Southeastern Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies Conference in Charleston, West Virginia. The C.W. Watson Award is the highest award given in the Southeast and is presented to the career individual who in previous years has made the greatest contribution to wildlife or fish conservation.

“Pete has worked his whole career on defining how conservation practices interface with wildlife,” said Alabama’s Director Corky Pugh. “He has a greater vision of how the NRCS can partner with other organizations to assist America’s farmers, ranchers, and other private landowners to conserve and protect wildlife while putting conservation on the ground.”

Following graduation from LSU in 1961, he worked with the (former) Mississippi Game & Fish Commission as a biologist conducting research on small game and later as a deer biologist working with over 700 deer clubs on controversial antler-less deer seasons.  Following this he served as Assistant Federal Aid Coordinator responsible for over one million acres of game management areas.

In January 1966, he joined NRCS as a Wildlife Biologist on the River Basin Staff in Mississippi.  In this first-of-a-kind NRCS position, Pete did reconnaissance work and made recommendations as to watershed protection and development.  He coordinated with State and federal agencies on several river basin plans and the watershed planning (PL-566) program activities.

He next became Florida NRCS State Biologist in 1970 where he managed fish and wildlife technology activities for field offices in Florida and the Caribbean area.  He later became the State environmental coordinator involved with the National Environmental Policy Act process as it relates to numerous agricultural and environmental groups and led workshops on environmental quality, water quality, fish and wildlife, and agricultural needs as it affected Florida NRCS programs.

In 1986 Pete  became Mississippi NRCS State Conservationist where he served until 1995 when he left to lead a team that worked toward the establishment of the Wildlife Habitat Management Institute in Madison, Mississippi, where he was appointed Director in 1996.

In 2005, Pete was named Director of the AWCC in Madison, Mississippi, to continue NRCS efforts to preserve wildlife and wildlife habitat on private lands and develop and evaluate technological tools for fish and wildlife habitat improvements.
Your contact is Jeannine May, NRCS public affairs specialist, at 601-965-4337.