You can purchase a gift certificate for your favorite angler or hunter that can be used toward the purchase of licenses, tags, or permits. The certificates must be redeemed at a Fish and Game office, but the great thing is that a gift certificate from Fish and Game is never the wrong size or wrong color for those on your list.

Maybe you have a wildlife watcher in the family. Both the “Idaho Birding Trail Guide” priced at $5.00 and the “Idaho Watchable Wildlife Guide” priced at $12.50 make great gifts at great prices. Both guides are filled with beautiful color pictures and a wealth of information about Idaho’s wildlife and viewing areas. And, money generated from the sale of these books supports Fish and Game’s non-game program.

You can also purchase an extraordinary pencil sketch by the late Pocatello artist, Edson Fichter. Unframed prints showcasing various wildlife species start as low as $15.00. All money generated from the purchases of the Edson Fichter prints goes toward the continual maintenance and improvements of the wonderful Edson Fichter Nature Area behind Indian Hills Elementary School in Pocatello.

Now maybe with all the hustle and bustle of the holiday season intermingled with pinched budgets, you may not feel like you can spend much on presents this year. But, it doesn’t take money to simply spend time together as family and friends—and what can be better than spending that time in the great outdoors.

Get your kids or grandkids together for an afternoon of ice fishing or sledding. Build a snowman. Or take your crew out for a game of Outdoor Bingo.

You can make your own Bingo Cards out of small square pieces of poster board— any size works, though I like 6 inch by 6 inch.. Using a permanent marker and a ruler, divide the square up into equally spaced columns and rows. Maybe start off with three rows by three columns, though you can make your Bingo cards larger if you would like.

In each little square on the card, place a picture or a sticker of an animal, plant, or landscape feature you might encounter on your adventure. Though you can reuse pictures for each card, be sure to vary the pattern a bit so that each card is different. And, don’t forget, the center square is labeled “Free Space”—everyone gets to mark that one off.

During your outing, keep an eye out for birds, wildlife tracks, deer, a creek, an icicle, an animal’s burrow—and mark them on your Bingo card. If you laminate the cards, you can use dry erase pens for marking the squares. That way the cards can be used multiple times. Wrap the cards up with ribbon, attach some packets of instant cocoa to enjoy when your game is over, and you have a fun stocking stuffer that promises to deliver on hours of outdoor fun and quality family time.