Chrissie grew-up on the emerald coast of Fort Walton  and Destin Florida when those were little more than fishing villages. Immersed between the crystal clear  gulf water, white sand beaches and back bay with its black water bayous, Chrissie could not help but love nature. Her first hunt was with her three brothers when she was a young girl in the piney woods of the Florida panhandle. Later in life she eventually left college to operate her own boat charter service, then became a yacht broker. She sold John a Hatteras Sport Fisherman and fell in love. Her interests in both hunting and fishing have tracked those of her husband, first through leadership in fishing clubs, then through hunting organizations around the world. 

 

Chrissie is the co-founder of Conservation Force and has served as the hands-on CFO for 26 years. She serves as the Foundation’s Secretary and Treasurer and on the Board of Directors. She serves without pay because every cent is needed for conservation.

 

Chrissie co-founded Books for Africa of the CAMPFIRE PROGRAM in collaboration with African Resources Trust, Zimbabwe. As the Coordinator of Conservation Force's Hunting Operator and Community Programs, she has initiated, administered, and monitored thousands of community benefit and development projects and programs across the globe including over one-thousand bush schools, teachers’ houses, water wells, medical facilities and a great deal more rural development. The projects have included many hundreds of wildlife conservation and poaching control activities and programs.  

 

Chrissie heads Conservation Force’s Habitat for Hunting Program, which is Conservation Force’s Land Trust Division (conservation easements,  mitigation banks, and full land ownership). The program has secured as much as one-hundred million dollars of habitat a year for over 20 years.

 

 She also administers Conservation Force’s Marine Projects Division with millions of dollars in projects from rural communities in Sierra Leon, Africa to Panama, SA.

 

Chrissie also administers Conservation Force's Ranching for Restoration Program in Texas. She has distributed and monitored over a million dollars in funding to barasingha, eld’s deer and red lechwe enhancement from India to Namibia. Those projects include funding management planning, population surveys, vegetation surveys, translocation and re-introduction, poaching control, and various community participation strategies to recover and secure threatened listed species in situ.

 

Chrissie redirects the net proceeds from Conservation Force’s Nonprofit Enhancement Permitting Division to needful projects in the primary Elephant, Lion and leopard Range Countries. The same for many millions of dollars of Black Rhino contributions that are fully funneled back to Namibia’s Product Trust Fund. John does the pioneering permitting while Chrissie administers the dedicated funding.

 

Chrissie is the Past Head of the U.S. Delegation of the International Council of Wildlife Conservation (CIC) in Budapest. She served for more than a decade when the CIC was headquartered in Paris, France then Budapest, Hungary.

 

 She is past-President of the Sables of Safari Club International and served as a Vice-President on SCI's Executive Committee for two terms. She also served as President of the Louisiana Chapter of SCI, then the Regional Representative Director. She continues to serve on the Board of the Sables of Safari Club International, +30 years.

 

She is a Life Member of Dallas Safari Club, the Foundation for North American Wild Sheep, NRA, Safari Club International and the Sables.

 

Chrissie received the Sportsman of the Year Award from the Louisiana Outdoor Writers Association for the first of her two IGFA World Record Tarpon. She has been the co-recipient of the Peter Capstick Hunting Heritage Award, IPHA Klineburger Award and the African Professional Hunters Association Selous Award, 2023.

 

 

Chrissie hunts and fishes world-wide. Chrissie hunts with rifle, shotgun, black powder, and bow. Her other hobbies include fishing, boating, silhouette shooting, jogging,  snow skiing, ocean diving , exploring and beach-combing.

 

 A consummate angler, she has won many fishing tournaments and has held several world fishing records including tarpon and barracuda. She's taken many big game animals that are qualified for the world record books, from Boone & Crockett antelope and Pope & Young elk to elephant and Cape buffalo. 

 

Chrissie states, "Few things in all the world are equal to letting an arrow fly at a reeking bull during the rut high in the Rockies. I've made it a permanent part of my life by going every year, as I have Africa 44 times (now 52). Nothing offers my husband and I more as a couple or awakens my senses more as an individual." She has also accomplished a total of 52 hunts in Africa.