David Rainer: WFF’s Harders celebrates 50 years with state

Since the mid-1970s, one thing has remained constant at the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources (ADCNR): Fred Harders is hard at work in the Wildlife and Freshwater Fisheries (WFF) Division.

Harders was recently celebrated for 50 years of service to the State of Alabama, 48 of those with WFF in one capacity or another, the last 24 years as WFF’s Assistant Director. And the Chicago native has no plans to stop anytime soon.

After getting his undergraduate degree in Minnesota, Harders had a choice to further his education.

“When I got out of undergraduate school, there were two places that a fisheries biologist could go,” said Harders, who grew up fishing lakes in Minnesota and the Great Lakes. “One was a coldwater salmon and trout school at the University of Washington. And the warm-water fisheries school was at Auburn. I was interested in warm water, so I came down here. That’s where it started.

“That was quite a culture shock when I first got here. The first summer, I didn’t think I was going to live it was so hot.”

After graduating from Auburn, he spent a short time in another state agency that did not utilize his fisheries degree.

When a position came open in WFF in 1976, Harders quickly took the job in District II, headquartered in Eastaboga. He worked the Coosa River and several state public fishing lakes. He said the staff and equipment were bare bones at the time.

“Back in the day, we couldn’t buy anything,” Harders said. “We had to work with stuff that was older. My first state vehicle was an old Rambler station wagon. My supervisor at the time didn’t tell me that when you got to about 60 miles per hour that the hood would pop. It wouldn’t come all the way up, but it would pop. He just looked and laughed.

“We did a lot of work on redeye bass. We had a backpack shocker that broke down every trip. It’s nothing like they have today. Electrofishing boats were nothing like they are today. We had modified john boats. The generators we used were old and very heavy. It’s a lot different now, but we got the job done.”

In 1980, Harders’ late wife, Sharron, gave birth to triplet boys, which Harders said made their lives significantly more complicated.

“Anybody who has twins, you can make it,” he said. “With triplets, you better get help. We used to take turns feeding and trying to sleep. We had a schedule to write down who ate what and when, but we just couldn’t keep up with it.”

In 1982, Harders loaded up the family and moved to Montgomery as the Public Fishing Lakes Supervisor, which included overseeing the 23 public fishing lakes that were designed to give those in rural areas access to the recreational opportunities and sustenance needed in those areas.

“The State Public Fishing Lakes were constructed in rural areas where they didn’t have fishing for a source of protein,” he said. “That’s how that program got started.”

In 1986, Harders was promoted to the Assistant Chief of Fisheries position and then to Chief of Fisheries in 1989. He said by the time he became Chief, the opportunities had expanded.

“I used to go to different meetings around the country with different fisheries folks to find out what was the latest and greatest, and then come back and try to implement some of that in Alabama,” he said. “That was the time everybody was looking at black bass populations and length limits, and what the shad population had to do with black bass populations. We worked a lot with Auburn, and they gave us a lot of good information on how to sample reservoirs and how many bass we needed to collect. That research was very helpful.

“Back then, we had a stocking program for striped bass and hybrids that was going quite well.”

In 2000, then WFF Director Corky Pugh insisted Harders become the WFF Assistant Director.

“Fred is the ideal Assistant Director for the Wildlife and Freshwater Fisheries Division,” Pugh said. “He brought a technical background to that job. I got the chance to promote him to Assistant Director against his will. He was Fisheries Chief. I’m an administrative guy, that’s my background and education. I wanted somebody on the biological side, and Fred brought that scientific perspective to the office.

“The personal characteristics that made him so well-suited for the job were his backbone, no self-serving agenda and total reliability. I never worried about Fred handling a program and handling it right.”

When Pugh retired, Harders served as acting WFF Director before Chuck Sykes was hired in 2012.

“The first time I met Fred was the first day I got this job,” said Sykes, who came from the private sector. “Fred was on annual leave for Christmas the day I started. Being the professional that he is, he came into the office. He had Wanda (McCullers, assistant to the director) come in to start getting new letterheads and business cards. That told me a lot about Fred and his character.

“It was a big shift for me coming in and not knowing anything about state government. I couldn’t have asked for anybody any better to be in the Assistant Director’s role to help me get through the transition.”

Sykes, who is serving as President of the Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies this year, said Harders relishes the day-to-day activities of his position that include budgeting, equipment acquisition and personnel.

“When I’m dealing with national issues that impact Alabama, and when I’m traveling in that capacity, I don’t have to worry about anything because I know everything here in Montgomery is being taken care of,” Sykes said. “He’s here every day. He knows everything that’s going on.”

Well, that last statement is not exactly correct. Harders was honored recently for his 50 years of service, and all he expected was that a few people would show up and eat cake. This time Harders wasn’t in the know.

“We pulled the dedication off without him knowing the details,” Sykes said. “It’s almost impossible to get anything over on him. We did it once. We may not ever do it again, but we did it once.”

The dedication was a huge celebration and to add the icing on the cake, so to speak, Harders’ sons, Matthew, Michael and John, walked in the door to help him commemorate the day.

“That was a total shock,” Harders said. “The closer I got to the room, there was a lot of noise and a lot of people. Then the family walked in, even my son from Arkansas and my two grandkids came in. I was kind of in shock. I couldn’t believe it. It was a surprise.”

Another moment that caught Harders off guard came when Sykes unveiled a framed sign with Harders’ name on it. The sign showed the renaming of the Clay County Public Fishing Lake to the Fred R. Harders Clay County Public Fishing Lake.

“Not only was the extent of the celebration a surprise and shock, but putting my name on Clay County Public Fishing Lake was over the top,” Harders said. “The lake was in my district and part of the Public Fishing Lake system I later supervised. I fished it with my family and father. It is quite the honor.”

Harders said Alabamians should appreciate the abundance of natural resources the current generation enjoys.

“I remember one of our earlier biologist aides, Paul Maddox, telling me that he could remember when people got excited when they saw a deer track or heard a turkey gobble,” he said. “They were just all excited about that. Yeah, things have changed quite a bit since then.

“Folks don’t understand what the Department and Division did in stocking deer and stocking turkeys because there weren’t any. Most places didn’t have them. Now we have a lot of deer and turkeys. And we have some of the best fishing in the nation.”

Although he is 77, Harders said he plans to show up for work as long as he is able.

“This is what I was interested in, and I was very fortunate to get a job doing what I like doing,” he said. “There’s always something new going on. We’ve got a dedicated staff, and we have young people coming on who are interested in different things. It keeps me excited about being here. As long as I feel like I’m contributing something and my health holds up and the Good Lord says go, I’ll keep going.

“It’s been an honor and pleasure to serve the people of Alabama and the natural resources of this state, because this state has quite a diversity of resources for wildlife and fisheries from north Alabama down to the coast.”