Oklahoma’s Department of Wildlife Conservation goes viral with silly, brutal tweets

Updated: May 30, 2022 / 11:14 AM CDT

The black-tailed prairie dog, a species found in several states including Oklahoma, is the unofficial mascot of the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation’s Twitter account. The one that greets visitor’s to the OKWC’s account is wearing a bucket hat. (Getty Images)

(NEXSTAR) — The Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation just might be the best Twitter account you’re not following.

The department, which oversees the protection of Oklahoma’s fish and wildlife resources, is taking a somewhat unusual approach to maximizing engagement on social media — at least as far as a state-run agency is concerned.

Ahead of Mother’s Day, for instance, the ODWC shared this sweet gem:

“Get your mom a fishing license because at least it will show up at her house and not be such a disappointment.”

Granted, the majority of the department’s other tweets aren’t nearly as Wendy’s–level brutal as the one above. But most are extremely silly, at the very least.

“Our ultimate goal with all of our social media accounts is engagement,” Kelly Adams, the communication and education supervisor at ODWC, told Nexstar.

Adams explained how the ODWC’s social-media strategy changed back in 2020, after the department went viral with a tweet warning residents to never invite mountain lions into their homes.

“YOU are cold. They have fur. Do not let inside,” the tweet warn e d.

“It unexpectedly went viral and helped our leadership recognize the importance of being relevant (which can sometimes be ‘silly’),” Adams said.

After that, the department hired a social media coordinator to help “develop a voice” for the ODWC, according to Adams. In the years that followed, the ODWC has earned plenty of retweets and “likes” for its memes, its posts about “hot girl fishing licenses,” and its frustration with a local husky that keeps jumping into the water feature outside the ODWC headquarters.

“If we had a nickel for every time an intern had to clean husky hair out of the office pond filter, we’d have two nickels — which isn’t a lot, but it’s weird that it happened twice,” the department tweeted last month.

More recently, the ODWC amassed over 260,000 likes for a post explaining how “bear spray DOES NOT work like bug spray.”

“We would like to not have to say that again,” last week’s cryptic tweet said.

That particular post wasn’t prompted by any specific bear-related incident, Adams told Nexstar. Rather, it was designed as a means to spread awareness for conservation efforts and the wildlife of Oklahoma’s great outdoors.

“We recommend [everyone] follow their state’s fish and wildlife state agency,” Adams said. “If someone has a niche interest like snakes, birding, bats, etc. there is likely a page for that as well.”