Alabama artists are invited to enter the 2012 Alabama Waterfowl Stamp art contest, which opens January 1, 2012. The winning artwork will be used as the design of the 2013-2014 Alabama Waterfowl Stamp, which is required to be purchased when hunting migratory waterfowl. Entries will be accepted from Jan. 1 - Feb. 15, 2012. The competition is open to resident Alabama artists only.
 
All eligible entries will be on display February 24, 2012, at the Richard Beard Building, 1445 Federal Dr., Montgomery, Ala., 36107. Following the showing, three judges from the fields of art, ornithology and wildlife conservation will select the winning waterfowl art.
 
“Like the federal waterfowl stamp, revenues from the sale of Alabama stamps are used to procure, establish or improve migratory waterfowl habitat,” said N. Gunter Guy, Jr., Conservation Commissioner.

To date, deer in Alabama have avoided chronic wasting disease, and state wildlife officials want to keep it that way. To do this, the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources (ADCNR) Division of Wildlife and Freshwater Fisheries (WFF) is taking several measures to help prevent the disease from reaching the state.

Diagnostics to confirm the presence of CWD require collecting the skull and neck vertebra from adult age class hunter harvested white-tailed deer. WFF staff work with local clubs and deer processors to collect the necessary samples for CWD monitoring. A minimum of 300 samples have been collected annually statewide for the past 10 years. WFF staff expect to complete this hunting season’s collection and monitoring by Christmas. Collected samples are sent to the State Department of Agriculture diagnostic labs for testing and analysis.

CWD is a fatal disease affecting the central nervous system of deer and elk.

Former National Basketball Association star Charles Barkley is the luncheon keynote speaker at the Defining the Future Leadership Conference Oct. 5 in Montgomery. The conference, which is hosted by the Alabama Community Leadership Network and the Alabama Communities of Excellence, is at the Renaissance Hotel and Spa at the Convention Center Oct. 5-6.

Barkley established himself as one of the National Basketball Association's most dominating power forwards. He was selected to the All-NBA First Team five times, the All-NBA Second Team five times and once to the All-NBA Third Team. He earned 11 NBA All-NBA appearances and was named the All-Star Most Valuable Player in 1991.