Nevada Youth License

We want kids to be happy and healthy, which means we need to make it easier for them to spend more time on their phones, tablets and playing video games (said no one ever). Kids need to spend less time on screens and more time outside, having fun, enjoying activities like fishing. Not only is it good for their health but learning to cast, hooking into a big fish that snaps the line, and digging through a box of worms for the first time are the types of formative memories kids make when they go fishing with family and friends that last a lifetime.

So why are fewer kids going fishing these days? I’d like to blame it on cell phones and other electronics but it’s a lack of free time, not having places to go fishing nearby, and cost. The trick is figuring out the best way to eliminate or reduce those barriers. The answer we came up with here at NDOW is reducing cost by offering kids a free youth combination license (fishing/hunting) through a new program called the Nevada Youth License Fund.

Nothing in life is free, and the same goes for this new program, but thanks to generous donations from various organizations and many of you, over 3,500 kids received a FREE youth combination license (fishing/hunting) in 2023! Of those kids over 70% of them had never had a license before, and it’s the first time since 2020 that youth license numbers are going up, rather than down!

Long story short this program works, and it’s incredibly simple. The fund is 100% donation-driven and all the money donated to the fund goes directly towards covering the cost of youth combination licenses which ordinarily cost $15 and are good for one year. Anyone 12-17 years-old who wants a youth combination license and doesn’t have one already is able to get one online, at a NDOW office, or anywhere else licenses are sold to the extent that funds are available. Kids that want to go fishing can go that same day and kids that want to use it to go hunting can as soon as they complete hunter safety.

Now that you know what it is and how it works, I have one big favor to ask of you. Please support the Nevada Youth License Fund! Tell your family, friends, and people in your community about it so that more kids know about it and support the program by donating to the fund!

Bobby Jones

Outdoor Connection Coordinator

Nevada Department of Wildlife