By Tom Hintgen

Otter Tail County Correspondent

Daily Journal newsroom employee Tom Yuzer enjoyed his years as sports editor and city editor in the 1960s in Fergus Falls. One of his best memories is displayed at the Prairie Wetlands Learning Center on the south side of Fergus Falls.

A goose tag attached to a Canada goose was harvested by Yuzer on Sept. 30, 1967, northeast of Wendell. Banding took place in Hollandale, Mississippi, by the U.S. Department of the Interior in 1957.

“The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service told me the goose was most likely part of a flock that wintered in Mississippi and traveled through the Mississippi Flyway, spending the summers on Hudson Bay in Canada,” said Yuzer, now retired and living in the Twin Cities.”

That’s ten roundtrips for the goose from Mississippi to Hudson Bay and back, from 1957 to 1967, added Yuzer. This represents approximately 1,500 miles each way and close to 30,000 total miles, round trips, over ten years.

Banding data was and still is collected by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) to develop harvest management plans for goose populations. The USFWS works with banders from state-to-state governmental agencies and private organizations. 

This data helps wildlife managers ensure that migratory game birds are harvested sustainably in a way that can be properly maintained.

Friends and news media associates of Yuzer are pleased that information related to Yuzer’s goose harvested near Wendell in 1967 now is displayed at the Prairie Wetlands Learning Center, near the classrooms. Nearby is the original tag and framed photo of two Canada geese. 

Information was provided by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Bureau of Sport Fisheries and Wildlife Migratory Bird Population Station, Laurel, Maryland.

Yuzer served as Daily Journal sports editor from 1964 to 1968 and city editor from 1968 to 1969. He wrote a weekly column, “Enjoying Our Outdoors” to highlight the wide variety of conservation related opportunities in the region and to satisfy his own love of hunting and fishing.

Tom and his wife, Liz, have two daufghters with the oldest  born in Fergus Falls. Tom has a long-time connection to the University of Minnesota.  He earned a B.A. degree in journalism and worked at the U-M Morris campus for one year before coming to Fergus Falls.

Yuzer, after a brief time at Luther College, spent 20 years at the U-M Waseca campus and then concluded his career at the University of Minnesota Foundation as a Major Gift Officer. He was inducted into the Fergus Falls Sports Hall of Fame in 2022, in recognition of his outstanding sports reporting in Fergus Falls.