Entries for March 2013

My first turkey hunt of the season is in the books, but no breasts are in the freezer. Let's just say the birds flipped me the bird in South Carolina.

While I enjoy the taste of chocolate Easter bunnies, Chef Gordon Ramsay (the British guy you’ve seen on Hell’s Kitchen, MasterChef and Kitchen Nightmares) prefers real rabbits. Check out this crazy clip showing how they hunt rabbits across the pond—with ferrets!

Due primarily to the spike in sales of firearms and ammunition in 2012, a record total of $882 million will be distributed to states this year for fish, wildlife and recreation projects, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced Thursday, March 21.

As a full-time hunting magazine editor, I know how much of a pain it can be to lug a big camera around in the field. But with the great cameras on smartphones these days, it's not always necessary. The one problem with phone cameras is limited zoom capabilitites. If you have an iPhone, the MeoPix iScoping Adapter combined with a spotting scope will solve your problem.

I was at Cabela's the other day ... just looking around mostly. One of the things I looked at was the ammo shelves. I say shelves because that was about all there was to look at. The view is the same at the local gun shops around home. All the ammo is gone!

If you hunt in farming and ranching country like I do, you quickly learn that the bigger operations all have a place where they dispose of dead livestock. Around here, the commonly used descriptor is "dead-pile." And although that refers to livestock, if a coyote hunter has one of these in his back pocket, the name can apply to dead coyotes as well. These disposal piles are that productive.

“Choose your hunting buddies wisely.” That advice sounds simple, but if you don’t pick your next hunting partner with ample consideration, you might kick yourself for the chaos to follow.

Thankfully, I know that no matter the weather, turkeys usually act like turkeys. Proof of that can be found in this YouTube video featuring Todd Varner and Jason Cue. Opening day 2012 in West Virginia greeted them with an inch of snow, but they didn’t let a little bad weather ruin a good day.

In some parts of the country, shed antler hunting has been actively underway for a month or more already, while in the Mountain West, antler addicts are patiently waiting for the opportunity to enter winter range in search of prime elk and mule deer sheds. But if you thought you love to hunt dropped headgear during late winter and early spring, we’d like to introduce you to Jim Phillips, also known as The Antler Man.

As you read this, I'm headed to South Carolina to kick off my spring turkey season with fellow North American Hunting Club Life Members at Bang's Paradise Valley Hunting Club. Watch the video below and you'll see that I'm ready to string up some limb-hangers. If you're primed and pumped to chase gobblers, too, then read on ...