I was in the hatcheries world at merger. Mr. Peck, maybe alone amongst all the managers in both agencies, actually planned for the merger. It gave him the opportunity to blow up both systems, create a new one, and significantly rewrite the job specs so that workers now were above food stamp pay. I liked the idea of throwing out both agency's way off doing things and coming up with a new way. I think most of the rest of the folks just sat back and let the waves wash over them.

It was, if one looked closely, a difficult operation. WDW believed that, for the most part, they worked for the license holder while WDF worked for the resource. WDW almost always worked on the cheap, as money was tight. I think that merger of the two enforcement arms was difficult (and Tug should be able to comment) because the WDW officers did lots more than enforce laws. They were quasi-biologists inn doing a lot of the stock assessment (big game), creel checks, and so on. They were much more than enforcement and they dealt with a significantly different clientele.