State parks across the midwest attract more than 300 million visits each year

State parks visitors already have an interest in the outdoors and some skills, knowledge, and familiarity with natural places. Since the covid-19 pandemic, attendance at most state parks has increased (in some cases dramatically) straining park personnel and financial resources. Given the interest and abundance of park visitors, we hypothesize that there may be interest in hunting, fishing, and the shooting sports among their ranks parks may be the segue to other outdoor activities. There is a paucity of quantifiable information to evaluate this hypothesis. Similarly, information on park use by hunters and anglers is sparse. Therefore, this project will conduct surveys of park visitors, and hunters and anglers in midwest states to determine the existing level of crossover participation and the level of interest of parks visitors in hunting, fishing, and the shooting sports and vice-versa. The report generated from this survey will identify the resources and tools that could be provided to park visitors to encourage start up and or increase participation in hunting, fishing and shooting sports. The management implications of the results of this first phase will be to design marketing campaigns and implementable actions that may result in more efficient and effective R3.