Prois Hunting & Field Apparel for Women Announces 2012 Staff Selections
OutdoorHub 09.27.11
Sara Ahrens
We are very proud to announce our 2012 Staff selections. New to Pro-Staff this year is Sara Ahrens. Sara Ahrens has been a law enforcement officer for 15 years and served 11 years in the U.S. Army and Army Reserves as a Russian and Spanish Interpreter. She is currently assigned to the Patrol Bureau and is an adjunct Firearm’s Instructor and Taser Instructor for her department. Sara is certified as a master handgun firearm’s instructor, rifle instructor and armorer. Sara was the first female to make her department’s SWAT team, where she served for four years as a supervisor. During this same time, she ran her agency’s training unit serving as the Range Master for the firearms program and overseeing the armament section. Sara is an avid shooter and deer and turkey hunter. Sara is married to Michael Ahrens, who is also a Sergeant within her agency. They have two children and as a family they enjoy spending time in the outdoors together. Sara is an NRA handgun and personal protection inside the home instructor. She was recently cast on Season 3 of the History Channel’s Top Shot. Thanks to Top Shot, Sara has had several opportunities to participate more actively in youth shooting events within her surrounding community, which she enjoys.
Beth Ann Amico
Also new to Pro-Staff this year is Beth Ann Amico. Beth is a dynamo in the industry. She is a professional dog trainer and breeder, an outdoor writer, a professional outdoor speaker, an avid huntress, and a conservationist. Beth Ann and her husband John own Deep Fork Retrievers in Choctaw, Oklahoma. Their reputation for producing quality hunting retrievers has led avid hunters such as Fox News host Governor Mike Huckabee and former Oklahoma Governor Frank Keating to their kennel, along with sportsmen and professional hunting guides from across the U.S., Canada and Mexico. Her accomplishments are too many to list in one short paragraph and she has won numerous awards in the industry including a John Madson Fellowship from the Outdoor Writers Association a Maxwell Medallion Award, The Dog Writers Association of America’s version of the Oscar. Beth is heavily involved with promoting women in the outdoors and in hunting and shooting sports. She is an instructor for the Becoming an Outdoors Woman (BOW) program in Oklahoma and Arkansas, where she teaches classes about waterfowling, gun dog training, and outdoor clothing for women. She is also the Event Coordinator of the Central Oklahoma Women in the Outdoors Skills Workshop, an outreach program of the National Wild Turkey Federation (2008 and 2009). Beth has 15 years’ experience hunting upland game, waterfowl and big game. Beth Ann Amico has appeared on several TV shows and has been interviewed numerous times on the radio and in print. She is already a Pro-Staff member of many notable companies including but not limited to Cabela’s and Limbsaver.
Mia Anstine
New to Field Staff this year are Mia Anstine, Kendra Petska, Amy Hanneman, Kelly Heard, Tracey Splechter, and Captain Leslie N. Smith. Mia Anstine has been a longtime supporter and friend of Prois Hunting Apparel. Mia is co-owner of Wolf Creek Outfitters, LLC in Colorado, she writes reviews for the Outdoors Channel and writes a blog, “Adventures with Little Gal,” at the Women’s Outdoor News. She is also on TenPoint Crossbows pro-staff. Mia spends more than 150 days a year in the outdoors hunting, scouting, shooting and fishing. She has hunted elk, mule deer, black bear, turkey, game birds, predators, varmints, hogs, and has many more hunts on her bucket list. Mia mentors women and children hunters and has definitely earned her placed on Prois’ elite Field Staff team.
Kendra Petska
Kendra Petska is a very accomplished huntress having hunted a wide range of wild game including deer, turkey, and waterfowl. She comes from a family of hunters and trappers and at an early age she could be found out with her family chasing whitetails, waterfowl and fishing. She has recently developed a love for Mule deer and took her first buck in 2010. Kendra has written stories for Muley Crazy and Sportsmans News. She will be hunting in Africa this October and she is working to put together a guide service for young girls to go hunting.
Amy Hanneman
Amy Hanneman is talented huntress and has been hunting for the last 8 yeas. She is a member of the Wild Energy Crew of Green Energy Solutions and has appeared on Nosler’s Magnum TV, Eye of the Hunter, and Joe Rossi’s Wildside Adventure. She writes a blog for Bow Hunting Road and has had articles printed in many other publications. She has a very busy hunting season ahead of her and we are very excited to see what she bags! Amy is not only a talented huntress, she is also a RN in the intensive care unit at Saint Patrick Hospital and Health Sciences Center in Missoula.
Kelly Heard
Kelly Heard is also a member of the Wild Energy Crew of Green Energy Solutions. She is a wife, mother and grandmother of three and had been an avid hunter nearly her entire life. She lives and hunts in the beautiful and diverse state of Oregon, which gives me the opportunity to hunt elk (Roosevelt as well as Rocky Mountain), deer (Blacktail, Columbia white tail and mule deer), antelope, black bear, turkey, cougars and coyotes as well as smaller game and upland birds. In addition to these species Kelly has also hunted red stag in New Zealand and British Columbia to hunt moose. She has many more hunts on her bucket list including hunting in Africa. She has also written several articles in bowhunting.net as well as Western Wander.
Tracey Splechter
Tracey Splechter has been involved in the outdoor industry since 1999 with Outdoor Connection, a hunting and fishing travel service. Outdoor Connection has given her the opportunity to travel all over North America and meet many great people. Tracey Splechter is part owner of Outdoor Connection, the outdoor booking agency that we have teamed up with to create proishuntingtrips.com. She is an accomplished huntress and a longtime friend of Prois Hunting Apparel. Tracey enjoys fishing, sporting clays and pursuing big game animals. She was hooked on hunting after her first Kansas turkey hunt. Since then she has hog hunted in Oklahoma multiple times and harvested her first whitetail deer in Saskatchewan. She enjoys whitetail deer hunting in her home state of Kansas with her husband. Tracey’s passion is to get more women involved in the great outdoors. Tracey has two daughters, Alyssa and Alexa, who along with her husband, Adam, reside in southeast Kansas.
Captain Leslie Smith and Issac
Captain Leslie N. Smith is relatively new to hunting but has already had several successes. Leslie was wounded in duty while serving in Bosnia and she is a partial leg amputee, is blind in her left eye, and has lost much of her vision in her right eye. In 2010 she had her first hunting experience when she was invited on an elk hunt for injured female military veterans hosted by American Outdoor Heritage Fund and the Paralyzed Veterans of America in Pagosa Springs Colorado. The Elk hunt was filmed for the TV show American Outdoorsman which airs on The Outdoor Channel. Leslie harvested a beautiful bull elk with one shot which was an experience she will never forget. This experience led to a turkey hunt for female injured veterans in Mississippi which was filmed by Mississippi Outdoors. Even though she was coping with recent additional vision loss in her right eye when she was already blind in her left eye she was able to shoot a beautiful Tom. Leslie’s background is in public speaking, public relations, and writing. Leslie has been an unstoppable advocate for injured female veterans and is a very talented public speaker. She serves as soldier spokesperson for the American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial that is being built in Washington DC. She has tirelessly worked to raise awareness for wounded veterans and this much needed memorial. Since her injury she worked on President Bush’s Wounded Warrior Commission in 2007 and spoke at the Republican National Convention for Senator McCain’s campaign in 2008. Through all of these experiences her service dog Issac has been by her side. She is a well-educated, motivated, and an extremely inspirational person. We are incredibly proud to have Leslie as a member of our Field-Staff Team.
We couldn’t have asked for a more worthy group of women to join us on our staff team at Prois this year. Our only regret is that we didn’t have more spaces to fill given the incredible group of applicants. We are so honored to be a part of such an amazing group of women. Prois is not just about clothing. It’s about women having the gear they need to pursue their passions. It’s about the amazing fellowship of women who hunt and enjoy the outdoors. It’s about helping women feel confident and capable in the outdoors. Most of all it’s about taking pride in not being one of the guys!
