By Randall P. Lieberman

For Jim Schuette, spirituality is synonymous with love of nature.

The Loxahatchee resident came by his love of nature as a boy in Wisconsin. His parents raised hunting dogs and his grandfather was a fishing guide. Schuette loved to spend his summers with his grandfather, learning to fish and trap animals.

Schuette went on to earn a bachelors degree in wildlife management from the University of Minnesota and a masters in wildlife ecology from Oklahoma State.

To get experience between his schooling, Schuette took volunteer jobs throughout the world, working for such agencies as the Bureau of Land Management in Montana, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Kentucky, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association in Alaska, the United States Forest Service in Arizona and the Peace Corps in Burkina Faso.

My favorite was identifying prairie falcon nests in Montana, Schuette said. We would go camping and were provided with a place to sleep and $35 a week to buy peanut butter-and-jelly sandwiches. It makes for great stories to tell your children when they start complaining.

In 1991, Schuette graduated from Oklahoma State and came to Florida to work as a land manager for the Florida Game and Freshwater Commission, now the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. He worked for that organization for 20 years, assigned to the J.W. Corbett Wildlife Management Area in northwestern Palm Beach County.

We managed everything on the 60,000 acres of land, including trying to achieve a three-year burn rotation, he said.

Six years ago Schuette became a board member of the Florida Wildlife Federation, becoming chairman for a two-year term in September 2010. He says he has grown as a person in that role.

We have 25 very strong personalities on the board, Schuette said. It is a challenge to direct all the energies in the same direction. Ive learned to better communicate, coordinate and organize.

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