The MeatEater: Recent Episodes
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The 1538 distribution of Cabeza de Vaca’s Relacion about his shipwreck and trek across the Southwest marks the beginning of books that tell the stories of the American West to the larger world. Hundreds of thousands of books later, in this episode of The American West Dan, Randall, and guest Dr. Sara Dant reveal their favorite western authors and book choices.
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Ladderstands are popular options for high-traffic deer spots, but they are prime candidates for location burnout. If you want to go this route, learn to think through the details to give your stand sites the best chance of producing all season long.
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This week, Cal talks about the aftermath of Cornell's bear processing brou-ha-ha, a social media reward for whoever "snitches" on a Wyoming wolf hunter, a controversial new deer feeding law in Michigan, and a whole lot more.
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Steven Rinella talks with Dan Moutrie about: the first trail camera; the evolution of trail cameras; fair chase standards; game management and quality deer management; drones and hunting; chronic wasting disease; the evolution of hunting technology; and more.
Presented by Can-Am, the leader in ATVs, SxS, and Utility Vehicles www.can-am.brp.com
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Brent’s got a couple survival stories this week. Not so much as in life and death survival, but situational. One's from a young teen who had a prolonged stay beyond a planned trip. The other is from an adult who adapted to take care of his family. You’re gonna like this one for sure. It’s time for MeatEater’s This Country Life podcast.
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Going public may be the Americans’ only chance of escaping Turks and Caicos—but they’ve been warned that doing so could be a death sentence.
With years in prison hanging over them, Ryan Watson, Bryan Hagerich, Tyler Wenrich, and their families launch a campaign to expose their treatment to the world. Their story goes viral, drawing millions of supporters and the attention of the United States Congress. But publicity is a double-edged sword. As bomb threats shut down airports and strangers circulate the Americans’ locations online, the men and their loved ones begin receiving threats of their own.
In the concluding chapter of Blood Trails: Paradise Prison, the fight for freedom escalates into an international confrontation involving a congressional delegation, the State Department, British officials, and the Turks and Caicos government. Along the way, troubling revelations raise questions about how the law was enforced—and whether Americans were being treated differently from other travelers.
Their strategy has forced the world to pay attention. Now, as the first sentencing approaches, no one knows whether that pressure will bring them home—or provoke the punishment they’ve been fighting to avoid.
Want more Blood Trails? Check out the Case File.
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The MeatEater Crew discuss: state management of grizzly bears; a forward facing sonar study; treating Alpha-Gal Syndrome with acupuncture; wolf watchers are at it again; a carp for the record books; and more!
Presented by Can-Am: maker of the best ATVs, SxS, and Utility Vehicles www.can-am.brp.com
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Before planting food plots or cutting a single tree, where should you focus your attention? Adam Keith, Aaron Warbritton, Bill Winke, and Jeff Sturgis explain how they evaluate a raw hunting property from the ground up. You'll hear how they identify the natural features that consistently produce mature bucks, avoid common mistakes, and decide where future improvements will have the biggest impact. Whether you're buying your first farm or leasing new ground, this episode provides a repeatable system for breaking down any property.
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On July 31, the Bureau of Reclamation released the Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) for the future management of the Colorado River through Lake Powell and Lake Mead. This 10-year plan will replace the 2007 operating guidelines currently in effect.
This marks the first instance of the federal government stepping in to manage the waterway. Previously the seven basin states, Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Arizona, and California, have collaborated on creating long-term plans for the river. But the last three years of negotiations have failed to yield an agreement.
The twenty-year-long “megadrought” currently plaguing the west is likely to blame for the inability to decide on a path forward between the basin states. The Colorado River provides water for more than 40 million people. It also fuels hydropower resources in seven states, serves 30 tribes and two Mexican states, provides for 5.5 million acres of agricultural land, and supports critical ecosystems and species in the West.
Year after year of lower snowpacks and less rainfall are adding up for the Colorado. According to the Bureau of Reclamation, Lake Powell is currently at 22% capacity, and Lake Mead is sitting at 27%—the lowest the levels have been in these two key reservoirs since 1957.
These two reservoirs were built following the Colorado Compact—a 1922 agreement to equally divide the water between the upper basin states (Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, and New Mexico) and lower basin states (Arizona, Nevada, and California.)
This new plan will cut water availability from the lower basin states exclusively, even though they currently use the majority of the water.
According to the DOI, between 2020 and 2024, the average consumptive use was 13.1 million acre-feet. Of that total, the three lower basin states used 6.5 million acre-feet (49%) of the flows, while upper basin states used only 3.8 million feet (29%). Additionally, Mexico and evaporation each account for 1.4 million acre-feet (11%).
How Water is DistributedCurrently, the Colorado is collectively managed by “The Law of the River," a mishmash of compacts, federal laws, court decisions and decrees, contracts, and regulatory guidelines. The Colorado Compact was the first agreement among many to form the Law of the River.
Its biggest flaw? The Law of the River over-allocates how much water is available in the river to both upper and lower basin states as well as Mexico. When flows were originally measured, primitive stream gauges were used during an especially wet decade, leading lawmakers to believe the Colorado had more to offer. It’s estimated that baseline flows average around 13.5 million acre-feet, but the legal framework is based on baseline flows of 16 to 20 million.
This means the states currently have the legal right to use more water than is actually available in the river. The new plan seeks to address this and modify water allocations accordingly.
How States Are Reacting“While the final details are still being analyzed by Upper Division States, we are encouraged that new operating guidelines will better reflect existing water supply, which must underpin any practicable plan going forward,” the governors of the upper basin states said in a joint statement.
On the flip side of the coin, the lower basin states aren’t as excited about the new restrictions they’ll likely face in the near future.
An article from the Arizona Mirror called the new regs “draconian,” claiming the federal plan could mean water cuts of up to 77% for the Grand Canyon State. “Such reductions would devastate Arizona’s water users and its economy,” the Arizona Department of Water Resources said in a statement.
Arizona is likely to be the hardest hit in these new guidelines because water law functions on a general understanding of “who had the water first gets to keep the water last.” The canal system built to carry water from the Colorado over to big cities like Tucson and Phoenix is at the crux of this issue. The 336-mile concrete-lined aqueduct stretching from Lake Havasu to Tucson was declared complete in 1993, making the two desert cities some of the last places with access to the water.
California and Nevada won’t be left out of reductions, either.
“If carried forward, the plan outlined in the FEIS could have devastating economic and environmental impacts on Nevada,” Governor Joe Lombardo said in a press release.
“Nevada has consistently demonstrated that economic growth and responsible water management can go hand in hand, and I remain committed to working with our federal partners and the other basin states to reach enduring solutions that strengthen the river system while protecting Nevada’s future.”
How Will This Impact Fish and Wildlife?This year, the Flaming Gorge reservoir on the Wyoming/Utah border sent one million acre-feet of water downstream to Lake Powell to ensure it didn’t reach the critical low-level minimum power pool threshold of 3,490 feet required to keep the Glen Canyon Dam generating hydropower.
The 91-mile-long reservoir has dropped over 12 feet over the course of the summer, and the Bureau of Reclamation estimates water levels to fall a total of 35 feet by next April. Flaming Gorge is a famed fishery known for trophy lake trout and kokanee. These are cold-water species that rely on deep lake water to remain cold throughout the year.
And that’s only one example of one reservoir slowly being drained to sustain the behemoth water system that is the Colorado.
Before the Colorado Compact, the use was unchecked to the point that the river would dry up before even reaching the Gulf of California. While dams and years of legal fanagling prevent this from happening nowadays, we know that fish and dams don’t get along.
Even with the new management plan, the Law of the Water is designed to allocate the entirety of the river’s resources based on human needs. It fails to take fish, waterfowl, and other wildlife into consideration when dispersing flows.
“The story continues to be about water supply and water management, and how to continue to drain the river to support the growth economy,” Gary Wockner, executive director of the nonprofit Save the Colorado said. “There’s been very little discussion about the ecological health, wildlife, and habitat.”
Persistent drought conditions in the area impact so much more than the flows of the river. Wildfires are more common and intense. Birds might skip breeding cycles without sufficient water available. Springs are drying up, threatening the existence of local invertebrate and amphibian species. Mammals may be forced into areas with increased predation or human conflict in search of water.
The ramifications of a limited water supply reach far beyond the legal battle of who is entitled to how much. While this new plan is a step towards modernizing Colorado River water management, the inevitable impacts of this drought cycle will continue to emerge over time.
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Randall Williams, Seth Morris, Cory Calkins, Maggie Smith, and Omar Lopez.
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This week on Future Wild, Mark's joined by Jim Dau, a former caribou biologist with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, to discuss his unique life lived close to caribou and the alarmingly widespread decline of these animals across the world.
Thanks to our sponsor, Conservation First Bank.
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It's the end of Civil War Summer, and things close out in classic Bear Grease fashion as host Clay Newcomb along with Bear Newcomb and Josh "Landbridge" Spielmaker talk history with live venomous snakes in the same room. Returning guest and "Advanced Snake Enthusiast" Brad Birchfield joins in as the crew breaks down the real story behind Robert E. Lee's surrender at Appomattox Court House which, it turns out, wasn't actually a courthouse. Along the way, stories of a rattlesnake that survived 26 months without eating, some wild tales from the Amazon rainforest, and much more.
Thank you to our sponsor, Tecovas.
If you have comments on the show, send us a note to beargrease@themeateater.com
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We’re very excited to announce the most recent installment of MeatEater’s American History. In this new audiobook original listeners will plunge into the frozen vastness of the Last Frontier, where a diehard breed of hunters and trappers carved out a living from the Alaskan wilderness in the early decades of the twentieth century.
Steven Rinella tells the story of these remarkable frontiersmen. Lured north by the promise of the Klondike Gold Rush, this generation of hunters and trappers stayed put long after their dreams of striking it rich had faded away. Instead, they vanished into the wilderness and took up the rawboned and dangerous occupation of hunting and trapping for a living—shooting caribou to feed themselves, fishing salmon to feed their dogs, and trapping just enough wolf and lynx pelts to sustain their wilderness lifestyle.
Known to some as "sourdoughs," they traveled by dogsled, snowshoes, and homemade river boats, running their traplines in temperatures that routinely dropped to sixty below zero through a landscape where many streams and mountains remain unnamed today. Unlike the generations of rapacious market hunters who came before them, these solitary woodsmen weren't responsible for pushing wildlife resources toward ecological collapse; instead, they dreamed of creating a sustainable existence where they could live for decades in harmony with the wilderness.
Their feats of grit, self-reliance, and bushcraft defined a golden era along the distant edges of the American map—an era that, in many respects, lives on today in America's last pure wilderness.
Available October 20, but you can preorder right here.
Montana officials are warning residents and visitors of unusually high bear activity, resulting from two key factors: drought conditions and a failed berry flush. According to a recent Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks (FWP) press release, bear specialists across the state have been receiving reports of “bears that should be foraging for berries in the mountains...getting into trouble around homes and communities looking for something to eat.”
What’s pushing grizzly and black bears away from their typical habitats for this time of the year stems from a below-average snowpack. “We started seeing spring green-up in January and February, and the bears don’t normally come out until the last week in April and the first week in May,” longtime FWP bear conflict specialist Jamie Jonkel told MeatEater. “So, when the bears came out, they missed out on that important nutritional period.”
In other words, the bears essentially started their years in catch-up mode, and are now facing a significant lack of berries, which they depend on during late summer and early fall. Jonkel says that late frosts in May led to a dismal year for wild berry yields, impacting several types of berries important for bears including chokecherries, service berries, and mid-elevation huckleberries. The failed crop is so bad that Jonkel is calling it “one of the worst natural food failure years on record.”
The lack of natural options is causing bears to look elsewhere for food. “It’s kind of like a hard winter for elk and deer, when cold, deep snow stresses them and causes them to come down into low-elevations and subdivisions to try to feed on grass,” he said. “A bad food year is like that for bears. In the last two months in Region 2, we had almost 300 reports of bears either getting into human-related foods, like garbage, bird feeders, etc., or being observed next to houses. This is crisis behavior.”
While increased bear activity near developed areas seems to be heightened across much of Montana’s bear country, it’s not clear how wide the issue may extend into the broader region. Jennifer Sepulveda, communications manager for the Washington Department of Fish, says that her agency has not “noticed an anecdotal correlation” of a decreased berry yield causing increased bear conflict so far, but that “this is a well-known correlation that occurs.”
In neighboring Gem State, Idaho Fish and Game regional communications manager James Brower said his agency does not consider bear conflict in the state escalated from recent years, except for in the McCall region, where experts have linked “dry conditions to some increased bear conflict.”
In Montana, Jonkel worries that the situation could worsen in the coming months as bears enter a period known as hyperphagia when they begin feeding to put on weight before hibernation, though he’s hopeful that the upcoming high-elevation huckleberry yield will be better than those in mid elevations. He said the bears most susceptible to the negative impacts of the reduced berry yield so far have been female bears with cubs and younger bears in general.
Bear experts stress that the best way to reduce human-bear conflict during periods like this is to secure food, including things like chicken coops. For hunters this fall, this means keeping a clean camp and being quick at field dressing and removing game from the field after killing it.
“This has been a hard year for bears,” Jonkel said. “They’re in desperation mode. They will be more curious than usual about a camp where bacon is frying or where people have been gutting fish down by the creek.”
Feature image via Great Smokey Mountains National Park.
Ask any angler about their favorite lures, and most of them will have a jerkbait at the top of their list. These versatile lures work for everything from panfish to muskie. Jerkbaits rose to prominence after anglers realized these lures could consistently outperform live bait, completely changing the face of angling. Despite their popularity, most anglers don’t know how to fully work them.
Jerkbaits are more than a simple cast and crank lure—they’re versatile tools. With the right technique, you can use jerkbaits to catch fish throughout the entire water column. Here are a few ways to use them to catch more fish.
Twitching On TopPart of what makes jerkbaits so effective is that many of them float. They’re designed to dive and then rise back to the surface when they’re not under tension, making them look like a wounded baitfish. Most anglers utilize this floating action to pause during the retrieve, but you can also get a lot of strikes by not allowing the lure to sink at all.
Bass, pike, crappie, and trout are notorious topwater feeders. With a floating hard-bodied jerkbait, like a Rapala Floating Minnow, you can give your lure some float time before beginning your retrieve. Let it rest on the water for a few seconds until the ripples around it completely disappear. Once the ripples fade, give the lure a couple of quick twitches, and then let it rest again.
Often, the initial splash from the lure hitting the water will attract fish to the floating jerkbait, and the following twitches will trigger a strike. This is an especially effective technique whenever you’re fishing jerkbaits around a hatch of large insects like stoneflies or cicadas.
Sink Them DeepMost anglers only fish jerkbaits in three to 10 feet of water because that’s how far the lures will dive without extra weight. But, if you want to target larger fish like lake trout, pike, and other deep-dwelling predators, you’ll need to sink it deeper.
While jerkbaits, like the Rapala Countdown and Shadow Rap will sink, they don’t always get into the strike zone quickly enough. To speed up the sink rate, I’ll add a bit of weight to my line to get the baits down deep fast.
Tie one end of a barrel swivel to your mainline. Next, add 18- to 24-inches of extra line to the other end of the swivel, leaving a long 3- to 4-inch tag end of line off the knot, and tie on your jerkbait. Depending on how deep you’re fishing, you can add one to three split shot to the tag end of line off the swivel. Once the weights sink your jerkbait, you can bounce them off the bottom as you reel to attract deep water fish.
You can also use this method to target suspended bass, walleye, and trout during the peak of summer when the fish are holding in the cooler water below the thermocline.
Fishing Jerkbaits Fast Traditionally, you slowly and methodically reel a jerkbait through the water with small jerks and pauses along the way. Sometimes, though, you’ll get more strikes by fishing a jerkbait as fast as you can. This is especially effective when you’re targeting fish around baitfish schools or when gamefish are hunting in extremely shallow water after the spawn.
To speed fish a jerkbait, cast the lure towards your target and then start reeling as fast as you can as soon as it hits the water. Once you start retrieving, add a bit of English to your presentation by rapidly jerking your rod as you reel so that the lure darts and bucks like a wounded baitfish. Try to reel fast enough so that your jerkbait mimics a panicked minnow running for cover.
This aggressive presentation is designed to trigger aggressive behavior in fish. If you spot a fish chasing your lure, keep reeling. If you slow down, that fish might lose interest and quit chasing.
Being A Complete Jerk Jerkbaits are designed to swim, dart, sink, and pop. This versatility should help you avoid one-dimensional fishing tactics and, hopefully, getting skunked. Don't be afraid to mix it up.
Two ideas about living in the modern West, bioregionalism and rewilding, emerged in the 1970s and early 2000s, and while neither has gone mainstream they have influenced how residents who prioritize nature have made decisions about a new western lifestyle.
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Clay gives behind the scenes details and answers com viewer questions about his annual bear camp that is featured in the Meateater “12 in ‘26” film series. It’s a film about tradition, camaraderie, tough situations, and the love of the hunt. Hear the details and what happened that you didn’t see in the film.
Watch the film now on MeatEater's YouTube channel.
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Hanging stands in the preseason is never a bad idea, but there are some ways that hunters sabotage their future selves during this process. Learn to avoid them, and you'll kill more big bucks.
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This is the first of two articles on the haunting disappearance of two Wisconsin hunting/fishing buddies who vanished in February 1961.
Ronald Wick, 19, and Carl Stolz, 21, vanished for over 45 years after they went joyriding across a frozen Wisconsin lake around 3 a.m. on Feb. 21, 1961.
The baffling fate of the two hunting, fishing, and trapping buddies sparked decades of rumors, theories, and heartache for the men’s families and friends. A Capital Times newspaper article two years later in March 1963 described the search for Wick and Stolz as one of the most intensive efforts in the history of the Madison Police Department (MPD).
All verifiable reports and investigations indicated the young men were entombed in Wick’s 1950 Ford coupe somewhere on the bottom of a Madison area lake. Unfortunately, that’s no small search area, given that the Madison chain of lakes—Mendota, Monona, Waubesa, Wingra, and Kegonsa—exceeds 29 square miles. The ensuing searches through 1963 involved the MPD, family members, scores of civilian volunteers, the Dane County Sheriff’s Department, Navy and Air Force equipment and personnel, University of Wisconsin-Madison experts, and even a world-famous clairvoyant, Peter Hurkos.
This restored 1950 Ford coupe is the same model of car owned by Ron Wick.
None of them found a solid clue to the car or even a specific lake, though Monona or Waubesa seemed the best bets. In the decades that followed, the sad mystery lived on among law-enforcement investigators, area anglers, and scuba divers. That group eventually included Rick Krueger, who was only eight years old when Wick and Stolz disappeared after a night of bar-hopping in downtown Madison, which covers a half-mile-by-2.5-mile-long isthmus between lakes Mendota and Monona.
Krueger, now 73, spent his adult life immersed in the fishing, diving, and law-enforcement communities. His colleagues dubbed him “Radio Shop Rick” during his career in the city of Madison’s radio communications division from 1985 through 2011. Whenever dive teams or law-enforcement officers needed help searching for sunken boats or drowning victims; or when choosing, installing, or learning how to use sophisticated electronics for their boats, they called Krueger.
Though he grew up fishing Madison’s lakes, Krueger’s interests shifted toward scuba diving as an adult. He liked finding fishing tackle and other underwater “treasures,” and that passion deepened in 2005. That’s when Krueger became one of the first anglers anywhere to mount a side-scan sonar unit in his boat after Humminbird introduced its 987c SI to recreational fishing.
The morning of July 21, 2006, Krueger spotted an unusual object on his new side-scan sonar screen while searching Lake Waubesa for a 14-foot aluminum fishing boat. Four Illinois men had swamped it years before in heavy waves. Though the anglers were rescued, their boat sank in 35 feet of water, Waubesa’s deepest section.
This sonar image from July 2006 shows an upside-down car 35 feet below the surface of Lake Waubesa. The image was captured by Rick Krueger of Madison, Wisconsin, with his Humminbird 987c SI side-scan sonar unit.
Krueger locked in a GPS waypoint for the object and returned in the afternoon with his friend, Mike Michaels, to photograph it with Krueger’s underwater camera. As he lowered his camera to the bottom, Krueger felt it bang into something solid, probably metal. But when he activated the camera and studied his screen, the water proved too murky to identify anything in his photos.
Krueger and Michaels returned early the next morning, July 22, with Krueger’s scuba gear. After diving to the bottom, Krueger found an old car resting upside down at a 30-degree angle, its front hood pressed at least 3 feet into Waubesa’s silty bottom. Though some of the car’s windows were cracked, all were intact, as were the doors. Heavy siltation on the windows blocked any view of the car’s interior.
His excitement building, Krueger moved toward the trunk and rear bumper—the highest point on the wreck. The taillights were intact, so Krueger rubbed on a lens, hoping to find its year of manufacture. When the lens came off in his hand, he hung onto it and moved to the car’s license plate. It had a 1961 expiration date, which Krueger knew was the year Wick and Stolz disappeared.
Over the years, Krueger had spent time searching Waubesa and Monona for this car, and his circle of diving friends often discussed the case. Krueger removed the license plate, brought it up, and contacted acquaintances at the sheriff’s department. Rick Steinhauer, a longtime member of the department’s dive team, matched the plate with Wick’s old Ford.
Days later, during the sheriff’s department’s two-week recovery and salvage operation, divers found some of Stolz’s hand bones just outside the passenger-side door, which was cracked open one to two inches, and some of Wick’s hand bones wedged between the driver-side door and the car’s frame. Once the divers could reach inside, they recovered the men’s remaining bones.
The coroner’s office soon matched the remains with Wick and Stolz through medical records and personal effects like Stolz’s wedding band and Wick’s Wisconsin ID card, still intact inside his wallet. Investigators never found dental records for either man.
Despite being underwater 45 years and five months, the car was mostly intact, and its contents in decent condition. In fact, the coroner’s office told the divers they had recovered more items than what’s typically found at outdoors crime scenes, given how birds, animals, and the elements can chew, peck, and scatter items on the ground.
Crane operators on Lake Waubesa lift Ron Wick’s car onto a barge on Aug. 9, 2006.
When Last Seen…And just like that, Krueger had solved the Madison lakes’ long-running mystery, which began when Wick and Stolz failed to show up for work Tuesday morning, Feb. 21, 1961, at the Wisco Hardware Company near Wick’s home on South Brearly Street on the isthmus. After the young men again missed work Wednesday morning, Feb. 22, Wick’s older sister, Janet Hall, contacted the MPD, which began investigating their movements the previous days.
MPD reports state that Stolz had driven to Madison on Sunday evening, Feb. 19, from his home in Lake Delton, 50 miles to the northwest, where he had spent the weekend with his pregnant wife, Nancy, and infant son. After working Monday, Feb. 20, Stolz agreed to meet Wick that night to go bar-hopping. Wick then visited three young women he knew at their apartment, and discussed the possibility of going fox hunting west of Madison.
Instead, Wick met Stolz downtown, where they bumped into Wick’s old girlfriend at the Shuffle Inn on Park Street. The young woman left the bar with them when it closed at 1 a.m., and later told police she saw a half-empty 6-pack of beer in Wick’s car. She said they drove around a while before Wick parked at the end of South Few Street on Lake Monona’s northern shoreline and walked onto the ice to check it with his flashlight.
Around 1:30 a.m., Wick drove Stolz a few blocks to his parked car on East Main Street. The men talked five to 10 minutes behind Wick’s car while the girl waited inside. She told police she couldn’t hear what they discussed. After leaving Stolz by his car, Wick and the girl drove several blocks to Law Park on Monona’s shoreline, where he again inspected the ice. Police reports said water probably rimmed the shoreline because of recent warm weather.
While driving around with the girl, Wick told her he had driven on ice-covered lakes many times and that Stolz had agreed to join him later that night for another ride. Wick invited her to ride along, but she told him she’d jump out if he drove onto the ice. The girl said Wick repeatedly checked his watch while they talked, and then dropped her off at her apartment after arranging a date for the next night.
Stolz, meanwhile, had walked from his car to nearby South Brearly Street, where a woman he and Wick knew left her car and walked toward her apartment. The woman said Stolz approached and asked to go inside with her. She declined, and later told police Stolz was stumbling drunk. Stolz told her he planned to meet Wick at 2:30 a.m. to drive on “the lake.” She tried talking him out of it, but he walked off minutes later, presumably unpersuaded.
Stolz's and Wick's high school photos featured in the local newspapers.
Icefishing or Joy-Riding?Days later, after newspapers reported Wick and Stolz were missing after going icefishing or joyriding on “the lake,” police received a tip from two women who ran an all-night bait shop a mile north of the isthmus. They said the men pictured in the newspaper articles were in their shop around 2 a.m. on Tuesday or Wednesday night the previous week.
A man they identified as Stolz bought $2 worth of mayfly larvae and asked, “Aren’t we crazy to go out on the lake fishing at this hour of the morning?” The bait-shop owners, Lorraine Atchison and Marjorie Jackson, weren’t certain the man was Stolz. They said his hair was longer than the crewcut seen in the newspaper photo, a reprint from Stolz’s high-school yearbook portrait three or four years earlier.
Still, they said the customer looked like Stolz, and was wearing a zippered, faded-red sweatshirt, which coworkers said he often wore. Police never found the sweatshirt in Stolz’s car, Madison apartment, or Lake Delton home.
Atchison and Jackson also told police the men didn’t say which lake they intended to fish. Likewise, the young women Wick and Stolz met earlier that night didn't know where they intended to go. Either way, it had long been illegal to drive cars or trucks on Madison-area lakes, though the practice remains common today across Wisconsin. But even today, no vehicle heavier than 850 pounds can be driven on Madison’s lakes without a special-use permit.
Therefore, Wick possibly viewed his late-night ice drives as forbidden fruit in 1961, further heightening his joy-rides. Krueger, for one, doubts Wick and Stolz ever intended to go icefishing that night, and the evidence suggests he’s right. When divers on the bottom at Waubesa’s wreck site popped the trunk on Wick’s car in July 2006, they found no icefishing gear. Instead, they found a restored bolt-action 7mm Japanese military rifle and a 12-gauge Remington 870 Wingmaster pump-action shotgun inside a deteriorating soft-side gun case.
Likewise, after the car was hoisted off the bottom and taken to the MPD’s evidence facility in August 2006, the forensics investigator—Marie Burgette-Bach—found no icefishing gear inside, such as an ice-spud, ice-scooper, fishhooks, tip-ups, lead weights, handlines or jigging rods.
She did, however, find ample evidence that Wick was a hunter. Her forensics report listed two wooden duck calls, 18 Japanese “long rifle” rounds, 83 rounds of .22-caliber bullets, six brass shotgun-shell tops, a soft-sided gun case, a pair of mid-calf leather boots, a sheathed hunting knife, and a silver Rayovac flashlight. Neither Wick nor Stolz was wearing the boots when the car sank. Both were wearing low-cut leather shoes, evidenced by their foot bones found inside.
This onX Maps image shows where Ron Wick left Libby Road and drove onto Lake Waubesa in February 1961, and where his car was found in July 2006.
First Impressions ConfirmedThe location of Wick’s car also confirmed investigators’ original belief that Wick and Stolz had died on Lake Waubesa. After all, Wick had told at least one co-worker how excited he was about finding a good access point on Waubesa from a road near an uncle’s adjacent farm. Wick told the co-worker the road dead-ended on Waubesa’s western shoreline and that fishermen launch small boats there in summer. (The site was later improved and is now the William G. Lunney Lake Farm Park boat launch.)
Six days after Wick and Stolz vanished, MPD detective Robert Ferris used that tip to check out Libby Road, just north of a point named Hog Island. After arriving Feb. 27, 1961, Ferris followed a blacktop strip that angled left off the end of Libby Road. Where the blacktop ended, Ferris found tire tracks heading eastward across 20 feet of sandy shoreline toward the lake’s receding ice. Soon after, investigators learned the make of Wick’s tires when interviewing the man who sold him the car, but its tread didn’t match the tracks in the sand. Detectives later learned the tracks were made by a neighbor.
Meanwhile, Ferris contacted undersheriff Jack Leslie, and they met at Libby Road the next morning, Feb. 28, 1961. They had seen open water 200 yards offshore to the north, and Leslie and his crew spent the day dragging the bottom with a grappling hook. They finished the futile search at 4:30 p.m., but knew Wick and Stolz could have punched through Waubesa elsewhere. Temperatures had been warm the previous six days, and water from melting snow atop the ice was increasingly obscuring cracks and holes.
The investigators also knew Wick and Stolz had other options for joyriding. They might have driven onto Lake Monona, roughly three miles north of Waubesa, or even Lake Mendota, a half-mile north of Monona, just across Madison’s isthmus.
Therefore, the MPD and sheriff’s department asked the U.S. Air Force at Madison’s Truax Field to help search the lakes by helicopter the next day, March 1. That search found Lake Mendota remained mostly ice-covered except for expansion cracks and two large openings, one near Governor’s Island and the other along the isthmus at what’s now James Madison Park. Coordinated ground searches, however, found no sign of a car near either site, and scuba divers found nothing when searching waters off the park.
When searchers turned the helicopter east to inspect Lake Monona, the crew reported one-third of the lake was now open water. Further, power-generating turbines at the Madison Gas and Electric Company on the isthmus keep a large stretch of Monona ice-free all winter. The helicopter crew reported the lake’s remaining ice looked “very thin,” worse than it had been Feb. 21 when Wick checked two sites on its northern shoreline after 1 a.m. Detective Ferris thought Wick wouldn’t have gotten far if he had driven onto Monona’s ice that night.
The Air Force helicopter then searched Lakes Wingra, Waubesa, and Kegonsa before ending the initial search phase.
In the weeks that followed, the search continued as volunteers and diving clubs responded to pleas and reward money offered by the families of Wick and Stolz. And 30 months later, in early August 1963, the famous psychic, Peter Hurkos, led a two-day search that drew national attention.
To learn about those futile searches and how dive teams recovered Wick’s car and the missing men’s remains, read Part 2 of this series, dropping next week.
Feature image via Dave Burgess.
New York Mets superstar Pete Alonso joins Steve in Colorado to hunt for mule deer bucks. Pete shares insights from the major leagues, while Steve dispenses hunting tips. Presented by Busch Lite
It's not every day that we see brand new hunting season get put into existence. This coming October the state of Louisiana will be having it's first ever hunting season for black bellied whistling ducks. It's an exciting time for hunters, but there's a much bigger story at play here. The black bellied whistling duck is historically a tropical species that occupied mostly central and south America. What are the implications of it expanding it's range into much of the southern and eastern U.S? Also, can a hunting season potentially be the much needed management tool that the state of Louisiana has been looking for?
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It’s creepy crawly season in most places and that means, among other things, that ticks are on the prowl. Aside from staying indoors, there’s really no avoiding these obnoxious little parasites. Brent’s talking about a time 20 years ago when they were at nightmarish levels and so bad, in fact, that he got sick from a bite! With the potential threat of the many diseases and illnesses that ticks bring, Brent's giving an overview of how to deal with these stinkers to help both you and your dogs. Grab a partner because it's time to check for ticks on MeatEater's "This Country Life" podcast.
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Hosts Randall Williams, Janis Putelis, and Cory Calkins field your questions in this pre-recorded show with some help from special guests Jason Phelps, Chester Floyd, Rich Froning, Tyler Jones, and Jordan Budd.
Watch the live stream on the MeatEater Podcast Network YouTube channel.
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This week, Cal catches up with Hal Herring at the Backcountry Hunters and Anglers Rendezvous. Hal is the host of the Podcast & Blast Podcast, and he may be the only man in the country who knows as much as Cal about public lands, conservation, and what we need to do to protect the wild places we love. Give it a listen, and while you're at it, subscribe to BHAs Podcast & Blast.
This episode was recorded by the Backcountry Hunters & Anglers Podcast & Blast, hosted by Hal Herring.
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Jason and Dirk get back together again after a busy spring and shoot the breeze about their bear hunts. Jason and close friend Tyson, hunt bears in Idaho. Dirk hunted black bears in the great state of Alaska on an invite from Christensen Arms. They discuss the highs and lows of bear hunting and throw in a few bear hunting tips.
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This week on the show I’m joined by big game hunter, outdoor adventurer, and film maker Donnie Vincent, to explore his personal journey to embrace a more old school approach to hunting and what the rest of us us might be able to learn and enjoy by embracing something similar.
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Trail cameras don’t always take pictures of that nice buck that’s on your hit list for this fall. In fact, sometimes they can capture strange and downright funny moments in the woods when no one is looking.
So we want to see the most hilarious frames your trail camera has snapped. You can upload them right here in the comment section or email them to radio@themeateater.com. To view the official rules of the contest, click here.
The winning photo will be debated and ultimately chosen on MeatEater Radio Live on June 26 by judges Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, and Seth Morris.
The winner will receive two Edge 2 First Lite Specter Camo Edition Moultrie Cameras with 10W Solar Power Pack Bundles, a $250 gift card to the MeatEater Store, a $250 gift card to First Lite, and a MeatEater Edition Sawtooth Slicer from Montana Knife Company.
Now, we know from our inbox that plenty of people seem to venture in the woods in the nude (for whatever reason). But let’s keep this contest PG-13. Please blur out anything that would make you explain the birds and the bees to young eyes.
In this episode of the Bear Grease Podcast, Clay Newcomb introduces the characters of the little known Trappers' War which took place in 1936 in St. Bernard Parish, Louisiana. You’ll meet filmmaker David Dubos, Isleños Trappers' War descents Paul Lagarde and “Wimpy” Seringe, and the unlikely star—the muskrat. Additional content from Louisiana native and political commentator, James Carville.
If you have comments on the show, send us a note to beargrease@themeateater.com
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This week, Tony takes a deep dive into dog genetics to explain not only how they affect aesthetics, but also all sorts of positive and negative behaviors we might not fully attribute to their bloodlines.
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Janis Putelis, Max Barta, Alec Zimmer, and Sarah Delany.
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Whether you have a retriever puppy you’re hoping will bring you a decade’s worth of greenhead limits, or a ride-or-die mutt that will spend the summers at the lake with you, getting a dog comfortable with boats can be an interesting experience.
You could take some puppies on a speedboat when they are eight weeks old and it would’t phase them. Others might lose their minds the first moment your fishing boat slips away from the dock in dead calm waters.
The problem is, you won’t know which kind of dog you have until you try. And if you have the scared-to-death version, you might foster a complete and utter fear of all watercraft. That’s not ideal if you want a duck dog, an adventure dog, or just that companion dog to spend the evenings on the pontoon with you and the family.
A better, safer bet, is to consider their introduction to boats.
Land-Based Basics I’m friends with one of the best retriever trainers the world has ever seen, and he has an entire process for introducing duck dogs to boats. He starts with a flat-bottom on dry land, where he leads them into and out of the boat with a leash.
Then he does some retrieving drills from the boat, again on land. After a pup is comfortable with that, he’ll move the boat to the edge of a small pond (but still keep it on land). From there, it’s more retrieving work (he’s already done a water intro at this point). After that, he’ll eventually take the dog out in the boat for a short paddle. Then he’ll work up to bigger boats, the kind with outboard motors or mud motors. It’s a weeks-long process, and it works.
You might not have quite the same dedication, or training locations, or boats with which to work. That’s okay, you can still ensure your pup is a sea-worthy companion.
Positive Associations Dog training is largely a lesson in establishing positive connections to commands and tasks. When it comes to boats, a positive association won’t happen if there is a heightened sense of fear involved. Think about a puppy like an infant human. You wouldn’t, at least if you have the common sense of a toad, take a newborn baby and hold it four feet away from an outboard and then get on plane to race across a lake at 50 mph.
You also wouldn’t let a six-month-old child crawl around your bass or duck boat in a way where they might just go headfirst into the drink. A puppy that experiences a loud outboard motor the first time you carry it into a boat might become the kind of dog that pisses itself at the sight of any boat. If you do manage to get a puppy on the boat and it falls off, the same rules apply.
A quiet and calm introduction matters. Incorporate some treats if necessary, dole out the praise, and make it fun. Go easy the first couple of times, avoid nasty waves or too much activity with other boaters, and allow the pup to realize that when they get into a boat, it’s fun and safe.
Anticipate Accidents When your four-legged buddy starts joining you on boating excursions, remember a couple of things. They’ll chew on fishing lures if you’re not paying attention, and that can be a nightmare scenario that is not only expensive and dangerous, but can ruin a dog for watercraft forever.
If you have a retriever, you might think that you’re set after a couple of laps around the lake with your trolling motor. But the moment you toss an anchor out at your favorite crappie spot, or maybe the first time you cast a topwater for smallies, that retrieving instinct might kick in. More than a few duck hunters have learned this lesson the hard way while setting decoys with their dogs in the pre-dawn darkness.
Sometimes, dogs get scared for reasons only they know, and it seems like their reaction is to just jump from the boat without a whole lot of consideration for how fast you’re going. This is a bad deal, so make sure your dog is leashed or under your control somehow, if it’s even a remote possibility they’ll bail on you.
It’s also a good idea to try to wear a young dog out before bringing them on any boat for the first several times. A high-energy pup in a confined space is usually a recipe for something to go wrong. Make sure that if you do run some drills or take your dog for a long walk before getting into the boat, you provide a water dish for them so they don’t decide to take a drink from the lake, which is a prime opportunity to go ass over apple cart into the water.
Slow & SteadyAbout 90% of the problems most people have with dog training involve consistency and moving too fast through the lessons. When it comes to getting a youngster comfortable with a boat, kayak, or canoe, this is absolutely true.
Take your time with them and try to read your dog as it gets more exposure to the boat life. You don’t want a duck dog that’s terrified of your flat-bottom any more than you want a companion dog that refuses to step paw on your family fishing rig. Go slow, anticipate problems, and establish that positive connection.
Once you do, it’s generally there for life, which is the goal.
Thousands of years ago Native people in the West chose, among all the possibilities, the coyote as the deity animal in their various stories of North America’s creation. Then they proceeded to fashion thousands of stories around “Old Man America,” the oldest literary figure in America. Long described as a Trickster, the deity Coyote actually was a human avatar whose stories richly conveyed human nature in both its admirable and not-so-admirable forms. As part coyote and part human, deity Coyote stands in a progression of human gods, one whose insights into human nature have allowed him to survive into the modern age.
Thank you to our sponsor Velvet Buck.
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This week Reid and Dan host Grammy-winning artist, Lukas Nelson out in God’s Country. If you’re looking for an episode that covers everything from hunting to busting out into song at any time this is the one. Lukas shares what his life looks like in Maui, including axis deer hunting and recovering from the devastating fires that recently swept the island. He discusses what growing up as Willie Nelson’s son looked like and how it lead him to sobriety in his 30s. The three of them dive in on his new record, American Romance, and his Gravorite will make a grown man cry.
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On this week's show, Tony explains how most of us hunt off of memories while hoping for success, instead of working toward our deer goals all summer long.
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How far is too far to take an ethical shot on an animal? However you answer that question, some in Wyoming are calling on lawmakers to step in and decide.
Long-distance hunting has become more and more popular over the past several years, and MeatEater has lots of coverage about squeezing the most out of your bullet velocities, scope magnifications, reloading presses, ballistics calculators, and all the other dozens of variables and tools that separate a hit and a miss.
However, lawmakers in Wyoming say that pushback is growing as the shots on animals get farther and farther away. In 2018, a hunter in Fremont County, Wyoming, recorded himself killing an antelope from 1,954 yards, prompting an outcry from some for the legislature to limit long-distance hunting.
On June 6, Wyoming’s Joint Travel, Recreation, Wildlife and Cultural Resources Committee opened the floor for discussion of the issue, with most agreeing that the trend has been worrying their constituents.
“I seek to focus today on the ethical use of long-range weapons,” said Rep. McKay Erickson. “The growing concern is that we are so busy trying to keep up with the latest weaponry, gadgetry, and accoutrements, we are failing to seriously predict its impact on Wyoming hunting and fair chase. We need to consistently address the need to maintain broad public acceptance by both consumptive and non-consumptive wildlife enthusiasts.”
Erickson said he has spoken to the members of the Wyoming Fish and Wildlife Commission, who agreed that this issue should be addressed. However, they asked that the solution be left to the commission rather than the legislature.
“Kudos to them as to their response and the professionalism that they have,” Erickson said. “However, I do not want to get behind on what I consider to be an urgent responsibility of Wyoming residents.”
The lawmaker worried that long-range hunting is harming the public image of hunters. “I contend we may risk further wounding our image of sportsmen while catering to big money companies that promote it as well as cloud our young people to what hunting really is,” he said.
Committee leadership appeared open to the discussion. Co-chairman Rep. Andrew Byron of Jackson agreed that this is a topic his constituents are raising with him. He relayed an account from a hunter who tried to line up a shot on an animal at 400 yards. Byron explained what happened next: “The animal they were staring at tipped over and they heard a loud ‘bang’ from somebody that was about 400 yards behind them.”
Several at the Wyoming hearing mentioned the issue of fair chase: giving an animal the chance to use its senses and wits to stay alive. If a hunter can stay so far away that there’s no chance of a mule deer seeing or hearing anything suspicious, they said, then the interaction that defines hunting eventually breaks down. Part of the skill of hunting, the fun of it, is developing the ability to get in close.
So, how far is too far? Shots that seemed outlandish and unethical with iron sights in 1955 are layups for many people with magnified optics in 2025. Still, a variety of factors make consistent long-range shooting extremely difficult, if not impossible.
A lot can change between the moment a bullet leaves a muzzle and when it arrives at its destination several seconds later. Even if you were theoretically able to hit a tick feeding right over a deer’s vitals at a half mile, that deer could take a couple steps and walk that tick–and its vitals–right out of the target area.
Wind also plays havoc with accuracy and is almost completely out of a shooter’s control. Once distances get much past 600 yards, cold statistics should make even the most skilled and well-equipped hunter think twice.
Of course, all these points remain in the arena of ethics–it’s a different story to codify those guidelines into law. Do we say 600 yards is legal and 601 is illegal? How do we enforce that? Require everyone to submit a rangefinder readout or GPS coordinates of shot and animal location?
“It seems like to me we’re trying to regulate kind of an ethic, and it’s one I think that is possibly difficult,” said Rep. Robert Wharff.
For his part, Erickson pushed back on the idea that such regulations are unenforceable. He pointed to the regulations around scouting for game animals from the air and argued that the regulations restricting that practice have been effective.
“I was heavily involved 15 plus years ago when we dealt with flying for and identifying big game animals, and the proponents of that said, ‘You'll never be able to enforce that.’” he told the committee. “I'm here today to tell you that that has been drastically decreased in at least western Wyoming, the flying for big game.”
Wyoming legislators agreed that arriving at a good bill might be impossible, but suggested other solutions, including potentially opening special seasons for shorter-range technologies like iron sights or pistols. In fact, neighboring state Utah just imposed a law that restricts scope magnification during specific seasons.
“If we can’t regulate the technology, do you limit the opportunity for the use of the technology?” asked Senator Larry S. Hicks.
While Erickson was not presenting a particular bill or set of regulations to the committee, this is an issue he’s passionate about and plans to pursue further. Whether those regulations come from the legislature or the wildlife commission, Wyoming residents will have an opportunity to weigh in and influence the outcome.
Every year in the United States, taxes on sporting goods sales generate around $1.5 billion for conservation initiatives via the Pittman-Robertson and Dingell-Johnson acts. Together, these bills levy a 10% tax on most fishing equipment and an 11% tax on firearms, ammunition, and archery gear (see the exact breakdown here). In recent years, however, an increasingly large loophole has been growing—one that allows direct-to-consumer sales from foreign manufacturers to fly under the radar.
To understand the issue, MeatEater spoke with Mike Leonard, Vice President of Government Affairs at the American Sportfishing Association—an organization that has been lobbying for a bill in Congress to address the problem.
Leonard describes a typical scenario in which manufacturers are able to bypass the conservation tax. “Say you go onto Amazon, you look up fishing reels, and about half the brands that show up are known—either U.S.-based or have a U.S. presence—like Penn, Shimano, Diawa, Shakespeare, and so on, that we have every reason to believe are paying the excise tax. But the other half will be these hard-to-pronounce names—you know, all capital letters—mostly Chinese manufacturers that exclusively sell to the U.S. through online platforms like Amazon, Alibaba, Temu, or any of those. And because those transactions are essentially directly from the overseas manufacturer to the U.S. consumer, there’s no excise tax being collected.”
In response, advocacy groups—including the American Sportfishing Association—are garnering support for a bill in Congress, titled the Sporting Goods Excise Tax Modernization Act. In essence, it would treat online retailers in the situation outlined above as both the importer and the seller, and levy the standard conservation excise tax on them. The tax would apply only to fishing gear and archery equipment. It would not apply to firearms and ammunition, which are regulated by the ATF and therefore don’t have the same issues with foreign, online sales.
Notably, the bill doesn’t include any provisions as to how exactly the taxes would be collected from online retailer platforms. Most likely, it would happen on the back end, and the consumer would see new prices with the tax built in—as is the case with all other sporting-goods sales, both online and in brick-and-mortar stores.
Even for legitimate products, the fees are levied so high up in the supply chain (typically to the wholesale retailer) that most consumers don’t even realize they’re paying toward conservation programs every time they purchase fishing tackle or bow equipment. However, the conservation impact of the revenue is tremendous. On average, from 2007 to 2023, the fees on fishing and archery gear generated about $200 million annually, the bulk of which is returned to state wildlife agencies. (For more details on how the money is used, check out this article).
Unfortunately, there’s no estimate on the amount of revenue lost annually through the loophole, though the number is suspected to be at least in the single-digit millions. Technically, as the law is currently written, consumers who purchase foreign, untaxed sporting goods are supposed to file a Form 720 with the IRS to pay the excise tax. However, a government report published last year indicates that it costs the IRS $3.94 to process a form, which in many cases exceeds the tax revenue collected from a product like a $2 lure or a $20 fishing reel. As such, the IRS has effectively been ignoring the statute, and pretty much nobody is even aware of it.
“When this was all created back in 1950, no one anticipated living in a world in which you can go on the internet and buy a product from China, and then it shows up at your doorstep in a day or two,” Leonard said. “The term we’ve been using to describe this is ‘slippage,’ because it’s not necessarily tax ‘avoidance.’”
The new bill is an effort to bring online retail in line with the rest of the industry, and with Congress’s original intent with the Pittman-Robertson and Dingell-Johnson acts. It will also help stymie unfair foreign competition undercutting U.S. manufacturers' prices that reflect the tax.
Currently, the bill is being considered as part of the Senate budget reconciliation package. Idaho senator Mike Crapo—also chairman of the Senate Finance Committee—is sponsoring the bill, and at a time when Congress is scrambling to maximize revenue sources, the legislation seems like a no-brainer. The next few weeks could be make-or-break for the bill, at least for now.
Tony Peterson travels to North Dakota to hunt whitetail deer on public land with his bow. It's mid October and Tony returns to one of his favorite public land areas. Tony's hunt is filled with action, from glassing up deer and elk in broken canyon bottoms to alluring a mature buck into bow range with a snort wheeze. Presented by Moultrie
This week, Cal tackles a renewed effort to sell public land, a mushroom murder trial, and a family of raccoons that took over an Airbus manufacturing facility.
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Steven Rinella talks with Danny Thompson, Jeremy Smith, Tony Peterson, Brody Henderson, Seth Morris, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics Discussed: Getting stung by a lion fish; collared doves; backing in; debating live sonar; the future of using tech in fishing; and more.
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Editor's Note: Since this article was first published, the Senate has amended the original version of this legislation to allow to sale of federal lands under grazing permits. That changed added over 130 million acres to the original total. So, the original estimation we published was 120 million acres, but it’s now exceeding 250 million.
A total of 250 million acres could be available for sale under the Senate’s version of the budget reconciliation bill, according to new analysis by the Wilderness Society.
The public lands advocacy group published a map and table detailing all the Bureau of Land Management and Forest Service land that could be subject for disposal in 11 states. The map does not include all BLM and Forest Service land in those states because the bill describes a variety of exclusions. It is also unlikely that all 250 million acres will be sold or disposed of.
However, the map still paints a striking picture of the millions of acres that would be eligible for disposal, most of which is not around major cities and would not be suitable for “local housing needs,” as the bill’s authors suggest. It's also important to understand that the bill does require between two and three million acres to be sold over the next five years, all of which will come from the green and orange areas below.
The public land sale provision was included in the so-called “one, big, beautiful bill” by Utah Senator Mike Lee during a session of the Senate Energy and Natural Resource Committee. The bill requires and fast-tracks the sale of between 0.5-0.75% of BLM and Forest Service land in 11 states, but it also includes a variety of exclusions. According to the bill, these lands cannot be sold:
- National Monument
- National Recreation Area
- A component of the National Wilderness Preservation System
- A component of the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System
- A component of the National Trails System
- A National Conservation Area
- A unit of the National Wildlife Refuge System
- A unit of the National Fish Hatchery System
- A unit of the National Park System
- A National Preserve
- A National Seashore or National Lakeshore
- A National Historic Site
- A National Memorial
- A National Battlefield, National Battlefield Park, National Battlefield Site, or National Military Park
- A National Historical Park
In addition, the bill excludes lands that are subject to mining claims, mineral leases, or rights of way.
These exclusions incorporate millions of acres, but there are still millions more that could be disposed of.
| State | Total Acreage Available for Sale | USFS Acreage Available for Sale | BLM Acreage Available for Sale | | Alaska | 82,831,388 | 15,944,525 | 66,886,862 | | Arizona | 14,423,967 | 8,421,847 | 6,002,121 | | California | 16,682,607 | 11,170,196 | 5,512,411 | | Colorado | 14,352,632 | 9,384,415 | 4,968,217 | | Idaho | 21,685,823 | 13,287,959 | 8,397,864 | | Nevada | 33,580,624 | 3,527,280 | 30,053,344 | | New Mexico | 14,312,074 | 6,479,502 | 7,832,572 | | Oregon | 21,745,380 | 9,889,298 | 11,856,082 | | Utah | 18,746,709 | 6,096,360 | 12,650,349 | | Washington | 5,371,690 | 5,027,438 | 344,252 | | Wyoming | 14,940,234 | 5,311,119 | 9,629,116 | | Total | 258,673,128 | 94,539,939 | 164,133,190 |
The bill states that land managers are supposed to prioritize parcels that are suitable for housing, but it adds a number of loopholes that would allow officials to sell any of the acres identified on the map above.
For example, the bill requires officials to prioritize lands that are nominated by a state or local government, are adjacent to developed areas, have access to existing infrastructure, and are suitable for residential housing. But at the bottom of that list, it also adds lands that would “reduce checkerboard land patterns” or “are isolated tracts that are inefficient to manage.”
The bill does not explain what it means by “isolated” or “inefficient,” which would give officials latitude to sell virtually any acreage that is not one of the above designations or operating under an existing lease or permit.
I used to give whitetails a lot more credit than they probably deserve. This led me to be a little neurotic, and often, plan my summer stand-hanging missions during rainstorms. The logic was pretty simple, really. I figured that the rain would cover up my intrusion, and more importantly, wash away all of my scent.
That may have been true, I don't really know. What I do know is that heading to the woods during summer rain showers kept producing sightings and encounters in places I didn’t expect.
Then it all kind of clicked.
We often time our trips to the woods when the weather is as favorable as we are going to get in a 10-day forecast, at least if it jives with some available free time. This kind of mirrors a lot of us and our rut-hunting habits, where we are more prone to going to the woods when it’s supposed to be cold and crispy outside than 75 degrees and dead calm.
The thing is, deer live in the outdoors and react to weather all year long. If you hunt private land that is managed well, you might be in a position to only hunt when things line up perfectly. The rest of us should learn to hunt in all types of conditions. This should start right now with our scouting trips and trail camera work.
Full FrontalGame animals move before weather fronts hit, and after. This is no secret, but where they move might be. If you spend a little time glassing for bachelor groups in the summer in the 24 hours before and after a front hits, you’ll learn a lot.
You’ll witness peak activity periods, watch big deer, and get a glimpse into how you should hunt the early season when similar conditions are about to roll through. You’ll also get a chance to spend some time out there in the rain, like I mentioned earlier, and if you want a cheat code to killing big bucks in September and early October, that’s it.
Just like you want to get to the edge of a field in spring turkey season when it starts to rain, the same rules apply for deer. Soybeans are like magic in an early-season rain, but deer will hit other food sources, too. They’ll also just move more as long as it’s not a real frog-choker of a downpour, meaning you don’t need to post up on an ag field to kill one in your rain gear.
Digital Realities There is nothing more beneficial than watching a big buck do what a big buck does, in person. Summertime scouting is the best opportunity for this that you’ll have all year. But, you can’t be out there all the time.
This is where our trail cameras come into play, but we often severely underutilize their recon when it comes to pattern matching with the weather. This can be accomplished with a traditional, non-cellular camera, but it is much easier with a cell camera.
When pictures show up, pay attention to what’s going on weather-wise. Some camera apps already do a lot of heavy lifting here for you, but you have to understand how to use those features. Either way, when you get a picture of your target buck, or a bachelor group moving nice and early in the evening, make a note of what is going on weather-wise.
Is it just a random, cool evening when it makes sense for them to leave their beds early to start munching on some greenery? Or is there a warning on your weather app about severe thunderstorms headed your way? What was the wind doing?
All of this intel matters to your hunting season, even if it’s still a few months away. This is almost (notice I said almost) a shortcut to developing solid woodsmanship. Think about it this way–an ol’ timer with several decades of bowhunting under his belt could probably tell you on any given day whether the deer movement is going to be heavy or light, just by stepping outside.
Most of us don’t get as much time in the woods, in or out of the season, as we’d like. That’s where you develop serious deer skills, but there are other ways to get better. And one is to scout during inclement weather in the months leading up to the season. The other is to really try to understand what your trail cameras are telling you, which is usually a hell of a lot more than a buck just walked through a specific location at a specific time of day.
Hosts Brody Henderson, Seth Morris, and Cory Calkins chat with Danny Bolton about off-roading in Hawaii, throwback to some memorable times had in f*cked up old trucks, reminisce about Father's Days of the past, and meet Captain Josh Miller and his one-of-a-kind co-captain.
Watch the live stream on the MeatEater Podcast Network YouTube channel.
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Father's Day is this week, which means it's time for a celebration of family. In this week's episode, Brent invites you to be a part of his own family celebration as it involves every This Country Life listener. Then, he celebrates his father's life by reflecting on some personal journal entries he wrote over the last few months of his father's life. Brent views the connection of his memories and observations as being a lot closer to each listener than what they may think. This Country Life is all our country lives.
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On this episode Tyler Jones, K.C. Smith & Greg Latham talk about rattling tactics and how pressure affects big bucks. Tune in to see what the fellas have to say!
Ground Hunting Ruttin' Bucks in the South
Literally a Moose!- KC's Kansas Buck
10 Yards From the Ground in The South!
Tyler's KS BUCK
IDK If Deer Hunting Gets Much Harder...
1 Trip. 2 States. 3 Bucks. Hunting Road Trip
Welcome to MeatEater Radio Live! Join Steve Rinella and the rest of the crew as they go LIVE from MeatEater HQ every Thursday at 11am MT! They’ll have segments, call-in guests, and real-time interaction with the audience. You can watch the stream on the MeatEater Podcast Network YouTube channel, or catch the audio version of the show on Fridays.
Today's episode is hosted by Spencer Neuharth, Steve Rinella, Janis Putelis, and Phil Taylor.
Guests: Renown whitetail photographer Matt Hansen and journalist Mitchell Black with the Post and Courier.
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"Everyone loves camping!" "Most people like camping!" Ok, some people go camping and Brent’s experiences in that endeavor put him somewhere in the midst of one of those statements. Pitch the tent, light the fire, and get ready for camping stories on this episode of MeatEater’s “This Country Life” podcast.
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This week on the show I’m joined by Jim Bouchard, an outdoor writer and northern Michigan deer hunter, to discuss rut hunting and gun season tactics for low deer density areas.
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Dirk and Derek Miller from Eastern Oregon Outfitters recap Dirk's Mt. Emily hunt. Dirk quizzes Derek about being an outfitter with Pendleton Whisky's Q&A.
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The details surrounding the imprisonment and death of Seminole War leader, Osceola, are so unusual that you may find yourself saying, "I didn't see that coming." Listen along as author and historian Dr. Patricia Wickman talks with host Clay Newcomb and elaborates on how his death was just the beginning of a story shrouded in mystery.
If you have comments on the show, send us a note to beargrease@themeateater.com
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Ryan Callaghan, Randall Williams, Cory Calkins, Alyssa Smith, Matt MIller, Tressa Croaker, and Nate Mason.
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On this week's show, Tony discusses not only managing dog energy, but more importantly, managing our own energy when we work with our pups.
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This week Reid and Dan host international superstar, Dylan Gossett, out in God’s Country. Dylan dives in with one of our most passionate “What Ya Mad At's” in regards to college football. They dive in on the swift life swap that’s occurred for Dylan over the last 18 months and how he’s learned to navigate his new normal of touring, music full time, and everything in between. Dylan plays “Coal” and another tune that you don’t want to miss!
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On this week's show, Tony explains how he puts together a plan to hunt the lockdown phase, and what it takes to arrow a good one this time of year.
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Blackened is a classic Cajun preparation where fish (or other protein) is generously coated in a mixture of seasonings that, when added to a skillet of hot butter, becomes black. There’s no shortage of flavor with this treatment. Redfish and catfish are common, but walleye, or similar works, too. I avoid using smaller panfish, such as bluegill or crappie, because they can get lost in all the seasonings and may not hold up well in the pan unless you keep them on the bone.
Blackened seasoning can be made to taste. While this version does have some heat, it’s by no means the hottest. Adjust the amount of cayenne pepper to your liking. You can also double or multiply the recipe to coat more fish.
Sweet potatoes go deliciously well with the heat of blackened fish—it’s one of my favorite combinations. If you double the recipe, divide the potatoes between two cookie sheets. They won’t get crispy if the cookie sheet is too crowded.
It’s not “weights in fish,” but it’s pretty close.
A 27-year-old Arkansas man named Andrew Riels has been cited by the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries (LDWF) for poaching a buck and then entering it into a big buck contest.
Louisiana officials first got a tip from the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission (AGFC) Enforcement Division that Riels may have illegally harvested a 15-point buck near Crossett, Arkansas. The man allegedly shot the buck during “illegal hours” on September 8th, though it’s unclear if he committed any other violation.
The same day he killed the monster, he decided it would be a good idea to enter it into the Simmons Sporting Goods Big Buck Contest in Bastrop, Louisiana. This contest offers a grade prize of a $10,000 shopping spree at the sporting goods store, and Riels apparently thought his buck stood a chance of winning.
The buck scored 171 ⅛, according to a photo of Riels’ contest entry obtained by MeatEater. Simmons Sporting Goods hasn’t posted entries for all divisions yet, and officials haven’t said what weapon he claimed to have used to kill the deer. But 171 ⅛ would have been enough to win the Open Archery division and put him in the running for Crossbow and Primitive Weapon.
Riels is being charged with crimes related to hunting contest fraud as well as interstate commerce because he took the buck (or its rack, at least) across state lines. Hunting contest fraud brings up to a $3,000 fine and one year in jail. Violating interstate commerce regulations carries a $900 to $950 fine and up to 120 days in jail.
Louisiana hunters would like to see even greater penalties, but they’re skeptical Riels will even get the maximum.
“This is why people continue to break laws. What is max $3950 fines and you know he won’t serve jail time. Someone does something this stupid–take license and hunting rights. Done. If they do it once, they’ll do it again,” Zach Chauvin posted on Facebook.
Kevin Burge, another commenter on the LDWF Facebook post, said Riels should lose his hunting privileges for at least three years, but Nolan Bates doesn’t think Riels will even see a tenth of the maximum penalty.
This week, Cal talks about bear attacks, how to get informed and involved with conservation groups, and where the eagles went.
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Steven Rinella talks with Ron Kendall, Brody Henderson, Cory Calkins, Corinne Schneider, and Phil Taylor.
Topics discussed: More on cowboy hats in airports; spearfishing in Montana; explaining environmental toxicology; the treats to the Bobwhite quail; the boll weevil; coveys of quail; buzz bombs; the art of wing shooting; fire ants; Operation Idiopathic Decline; eye worms; mating inside the eye; caecal worms; surpassing the cycle; Quail Guard; and more.
Outro song "Hunters and Hounds" by Allen Wayne
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Steven Rinella and Tony Peterson head to Oklahoma for a challenging whitetail deer hunt on public land. After the hunt, Tony joins us back at MeatEater HQ for an in-depth post-game analysis, breaking down their strategy, successes, and lessons learned. Presented by Moultrie
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On this episode Tyler Jones, K.C. Smith tell the story of calling in Tyler's giant public land buck!
Literally a Moose!- KC's Kansas Buck
10 Yards From the Ground in The South!
Tyler's KS BUCK
IDK If Deer Hunting Gets Much Harder...
1 Trip. 2 States. 3 Bucks. Hunting Road Trip
Welcome to MeatEater Radio Live! Join Steve Rinella and the rest of the crew as they go LIVE from MeatEater HQ every Thursday at 11am MT! They’ll have segments, call-in guests, and real-time interaction with the audience. You can watch the stream on the MeatEater Podcast Network YouTube channel, or catch the audio version of the show on Fridays.
Today's episode is hosted by Steve Rinella, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, and Phil Taylor.
Guests: John Koprowski (aka The Squirrel Doc) mammalogist, Dean and Professor of the Haub School of Environment & Natural Resources at the University of Wyoming, Gaspar Perricone, Co-Chair of Colorado’s Wildlife Deserves Better, and wildlife capture specialist and hunting guide Cody Fahrion.
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Opportunity knocks in some form all the time. How we handle it sets the course of our daily lives. Taking advantage or choosing to abstain can have big and long lasting impacts on you and those around you. We’re talking about the choices we make and how we deal with them this week on MeatEater’s “This Country Life” podcast.
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The .30-30 Winchester is perhaps the most famous lever-action cartridge of all time, but that hasn’t stopped cartridge designers from trying to improve upon its legendary deer-killing performance.
Ken Waters was one such designer. A gun writer whose 50-year career included four books and hundreds of articles in magazines like Gun Digest, Waters was the quintessential gun guy. In 1976 he set out to improve upon the .30-30 by necking down the cartridge to accept a 7mm bullet, and by 1984 the 7-30 Waters was born.
The 7-30 Waters is a fascinating cartridge tailor-made for lever-action rifles. In some cases, it even beats out the .30-30 Winchester. But it failed to garner much commercial success in the 80’s, and today many hunters have never heard of it. Should it remain in obscurity, or does it deserve a second look? Keep reading, and you can decide for yourself.
7-30 Waters History and DesignWaters’ goal with the 7-30 was to give lever-gun hunters a bullet with more velocity, better trajectory, and more long-range killing power than the .30-30. He used the .30-30 as the parent case (presumably to give handloaders an easy way to obtain brass), but he necked it down to accept a 7mm bullet. He also increased the shoulder angle from 15 degrees to 17 degrees and moved that shoulder forward to increase case capacity.
The result is a cartridge that looks a lot like a .30-30 but features a lighter, narrower bullet and slightly more case capacity. Waters’ original design used a 139-grain bullet traveling 2,600 feet-per-second (fps), which is about 200 fps faster than the .30-30’s 150-grain bullet.
In 1984, Winchester released a Model 94 lever action rifle in Waters’ cartridge, which coincided with the release of Federal’s factory load. Federal engineers made a few dimensional changes and opted for a 120-grain bullet, but they retained Waters’ original vision: that light, 7mm bullet hit speeds of 2,700 fps from a 24-inch barrel.
A Better Lever-Action OptionThe result was indeed a cartridge that can produce more velocity and a flatter trajectory than the .30-30. For example, these 150-grain .30-30 loads leave the muzzle at 2,390 fps, and drop 6.5 inches at 200 yards and 15 inches at 250 yards. Federal’s current 120-grain 7-30 Waters offering, by contrast, drops about two inches at 150 yards, five inches at 200 yards, and 12 inches at 250 yards.
The difference isn’t enormous, but since both bullets carry enough energy to take down a deer-sized animal at each distance, hunters might reasonably prefer a bullet that requires less holdover.
The 7-30 Waters produces more velocity and a flatter trajectory, but its biggest selling point is that it does both while producing less felt recoil. This is always mentioned in accounts of the cartridge. Writing in his famous tome, “Cartridge of the World,” Frank C. Barnes opines that “the light recoil of this cartridge makes it an excellent choice for a woman, boy, or anyone who is recoil sensitive.” Phillip Massaro also notes in “American Hunter” that “many writers of that era touted the new cartridge for its mild recoil, allowing a younger hunter to accurately place his or her shots.”
Very little recoil data exists on the nearly defunct cartridge, but what is available appears to confirm this reputation. Chuck Hawks recoil table notes that a 120-grain 7-30 Waters produces about 10 ft.-lbs. of recoil energy while a 150-grain .30-30 kicks with 10.6 ft.-lbs. This is no great shakes, but the 7-30 rifle used in testing clocked in at 7 pounds, while the .30-30 weighed 7.5 pounds. That puts the Waters even farther ahead in the recoil category, and that lead grows even larger when we start talking about 160- and 170-grain .30-30 loads.
Falling Through the CracksWith a flatter trajectory and milder recoil, the 7-30 Waters appeared destined to replace the venerable old Winchester in America’s deer woods. But it had a fatal flaw. That higher velocity could only be achieved with a 24-inch barrel. A big selling point of a lever-gun is its short overall length and easy maneuverability in the woods. Guns designed to get the most out of the 7-30 Waters were longer than those that Big Woods hunters preferred, which is a major reason it failed to gain much traction.
“The majority of .30-30 lever-action shooters prefer the short carbine, since most are woods hunters,” Barnes explains. “The 7-30, with its light 120-grain bullet, is unlikely to best the .30-30, .32 Special, .38-55, etc., with shots at close range. Also, it is not going to be the answer for the long-range plains or mountain hunter. When fired from a 20-inch barrel, its performance is considerably reduced.”
Another reason the Waters never really caught on is that Winchester only produced a Model 94 chambered in the 7-30 for four years between 1984 and 1988. It’s unclear whether the Waters would have continued to gain popularity if factory-new rifles had remained available, but the bigwigs at Winchester apparently didn’t see enough upside after three years to continue production.
This is a standard Winchester Model 94, but the only one chambered in 7-30 Waters was the XTR-AE.
Jack of No Trades, Master of OneThe reasons the 7-30 Waters failed are obvious enough, but an argument can still be made for the old (former) wildcat as an excellent lever gun cartridge.
Its light recoil is a major selling point. There’s nothing better than a soft-shooting lever gun, and limited recoil can allow even a novice hunter to make an accurate, ethical shot.
The 7-30 would also shine on the kinds of landscapes where many, if not most, hunters pursue game. Eastern hunters might spend an entire season in the woods, and western hunters need better long-range capability. But many pursue whitetail on properties that include a mix of close and open country. The Waters’ ability to reach out to 200 yards is handy for a shot across a pasture, while the lighter, 7mm bullets aren’t overkill at close range. Those rifle-length barrels are a little less convenient than carbines, but they’re not totally unmanageable at short distances.
“The 7-30 is at its best in broken country, with shots varying from patches of brush and trees to open areas with shots ranging from 75 to 175 yards,” Barnes explains.
Last ShotThe Waters still lives on today, but perhaps not in the form its inventor originally envisioned.
After Winchester stopped production of their 7-30 Model 94, one of the only companies to take up the quirky cartridge was Thompson/Center in their Contender line of single-shot break-action pistols. Those firearms allow hunters to use pointed bullets, and even though the shorter barrels don’t take advantage of the 7-30’s ballistic potential, its light recoil makes it a nice option for handgun hunters.
For factory ammo, those Federal loads mentioned above are pretty much the only game in town (Hornady used to offer the 7-30 in their LEVERevolution line, but they don’t currently list it on their website). If you aren’t able to find factory loads online, it’s easy enough to handload with a set of dies and some fire-formed .30-30 brass.
The 7-30 Waters didn’t revolutionize the lever-gun space, but it still represents what makes gun and cartridge designers great: a relentless pursuit of better, faster, and more effective in the field. If you’re lucky enough to stumble upon a Model 94 in the 7-30 Waters, don’t let it slip through your fingers. You won’t find a more pleasant rifle to shoot, and it’ll take the biggest buck in the woods.
When I first started saddle hunting I thought the money I spent on the gear bought me an instant level-up. If you’ve hung in a saddle for any amount of time, you know this isn’t the case. Sometimes too much freedom leads to paralysis or over analyzing, and this is especially true for saddle hunting. Just because you can theoretically hunt any tree, doesn’t mean you’ll have a sure shot at a big buck—even during the rut. You still have to read the deer sign and interpret how deer use the landscape. If you can’t implement that kind of woodsmanship, it won’t matter what tree you climb.
This especially applies to the rut. It can be tempting to go into autopilot mode, set up in a traditional rut funnel, and expect a big buck to appear. With enough time you might get lucky, but if you’re banking on the rut and a pile of saddle hunting gear to punch your tag, get ready for disappointment. Saddle hunting and finding success, like any other hunting style or strategy, depends on how you implement it. Here’s a few ways to maximize your saddle hunting strategy during the rut.
Don’t Be Afraid to Move…AgainAt this point, mobile hunting has become a cliché phrase, and one that saddle hunting companies use to stir your big buck hopes and dreams. Saddle hunting is infinitely adjustable when it comes to tree setups. But, that doesn’t just apply to the first tree you find. Sometimes you need to adjust your setup, and that might mean moving trees during a hunt.
For instance, if you’re hanging in a rut funnel and notice the deer traveling just outside of range, it’s time to move. After all, that quick mobile setup does make it easy to do this. It’s not the most convenient task, and it requires effort. However, if you don’t make the necessary adjustments you might as well be birdwatching from your butt hammock.
Don’t Jump Ship Too QuickSaddle hunting gives you the freedom to finetune your setup or pull up shop at any moment. This is an incredible advantage, but it can also be a stumbling block for the impatient hunter. Knowing when to bail on your rut setup requires years of hunting and a little gut-trusting.
Moving your setup also depends on the area you hunt. If you’re in a low deer density area, you might want to give your spot the time it deserves. This might mean a few all-day sits or diligent morning/evening hunts. When you’re saddle hunting, it can be tempting to abandon your post too quickly or spot hop just because you can. If you’re hunting an area with a higher deer density and you’re not seeing any action, moving is probably the right call. Just make sure you put in the time so you don’t miss out on a cruising buck.
Higher Isn’t Always BetterLightweight climbing sticks and aiders make it possible for hunters to climb more than high enough with a limited amount of equipment. Climbing as high as possible sounds like a great advantage, but it presents its own challenges as well. Anything above fifteen feet starts to create problems for shot angles. Not to mention, shot windows decrease as you climb above small, high stem count trees. I get it. Climb high enough and you won’t have to worry about a deer busting you when you draw or move, but you will have to worry about steep angles and pesky limbs, especially if you’re hunting new spots or public ground where trimming isn’t allowed.
Aside from the mobility, saddle hunting’s other claim-to-fame allows you to hide behind the tree. Instead of climbing into the canopy, use this to your advantage. If you set up correctly, you can position yourself to draw when the conditions are in your favor. Yes, it requires more stealth and creativity, but you’d be surprised at what you can get away with at just ten feet.
If you’re hunting the peak rut, like full blown chasing, fighting, etc., this bodes well for those lower setups. The deer are a bit distracted, and while I wouldn’t recommend doing jumping jacks, you can certainly get away with a lot more within reason.
Saddle UpJust because you’re hunting from one of the best tree saddles doesn’t mean you’re next in line at the taxidermist. Like other hunting gear, tree saddles are tools. Figure out what the deer are doing and then plan your strategy. Not the other way around.
Jason sits down with Luke Horak, the owner of Arrowhead Rifles. They discuss the recent advancements in muzzleloaders and what’s required to get them to shoot and perform. They go over everything from ignition systems, bullet selection, powders, performance and what one should expect from their modern day muzzleloader.
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This week Reid and Dan are dropping a bonus episode that covers everything from Facebook marketplace finds to Justice for Peanut the Squirrel. They give some fan shoutouts to some hysterical “What Ya Mad At” submissions and Reid shares his favorite bro hunt story with Dan. It ends with some fall hunt tips and excitement for the rut in Tennessee.
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This week on the show John Eberhart and Greg Godfrey detail their recipe for success for hunting pressured bucks during the peak of the rut.
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There is simply nothing like the grouse woods in the fall. The fire of color, the explosion from thick cover, and the taste—ah, the taste—ruffed grouse rivals that of all game birds. But bringing the king of game birds to the table is no easy task.
Ruffed grouse have spent thousands of years evolving to avoid every predator, us included. To hunt them successfully, especially in the eastern and midwestern parts of the country, you need to be smart, skilled, and a tad bit lucky. But don’t worry, below are some top strategies to help put the odds in your favor so you can put the King in your game bag this fall.
Understanding Habitat: The Foundation of Grouse HuntingWhen it comes to grouse hunting, learning habitat is the most important element for a successful hunt. Grouse favor forests with a variety of species and age classes. Young forests with high stem density, where saplings and underbrush provide cover from predators from above and below, are essential.
However, ruffs also need a mix of evergreen trees nearby for thermal cover as it gets cold. They rarely move far from their home area, so having all these features available nearby is crucial for their survival. Keep that in mind as you begin your scouting.
Using onX Maps is incredibly helpful. The app’s tree layers and terrain overlays allow you to identify grouse habitat, like timber cuts, young aspen stands, thermal cover, and grouse management areas, depending on your state. Young aspen, beech, and alder thickets are especially productive, but dense undergrowth where grouse feel secure traveling on foot is also essential in these covers—so always ultimately put boots on the ground to feel more confident in a potential cover.
Finding Food Sources: A Seasonal MindsetThe second most important aspect of successful grouse hunting is pinpointing food sources in these covers as the seasons shift. In early fall, look for tight, overgrown gravel roads and areas rich in clover, young greens, mushrooms, and berries. As fall deepens and the first frosts arrive, grouse shift to high-energy foods like birch and aspen catkins, which provide essential protein and nutrients for the long winter ahead.
Understanding this seasonal shift and identifying what’s available in your local covers will help you locate birds throughout the season as their behaviors change. Remember, though, without good cover, food is irrelevant. Grouse will always choose good cover first and then find what’s available to them there. The best grouse covers have a healthy abundance and variety of both.
Hunt Smarter: Prime Locations and Times of DayRuffed grouse hunting requires a strategic approach that leverages the bird’s natural tendencies. Here’s how to make the most of your hunting time:
Edges and Big Cuts: Grouse love edges where dense, young trees meet a different age class or tree species, as these transitional zones offer quick escape routes and a place to warm in the sun, especially after a good rain. Larger cuts can be especially productive, but instead of walking straight through the center, try working the edges first. Working the perimeter keeps you closer to where grouse feel more secure. Walking the edges allows you to stay near the cover that birds will use as a safety net if flushed, increasing your shooting odds and giving you better access to birds that may otherwise flee deeper into the cover at the first sound of approach.
Two Tracks: Old, overgrown logging roads that are now only accessible by foot are ideal for grouse hunting. These trails wind through thick cover and provide natural edges and borders that grouse feel comfortable near. They also provide grit that grouse need to digest their food and sometimes clover. Because they’re challenging to access by vehicle, the birds here tend to be less pressured. Move quietly along these paths, particularly where they intersect, as these junctions are hot spots and provide multiple escape routes for grouse.
Time of Day: Timing is especially critical for grouse hunting, especially as the season moves into winter. Early in the season, birds are still in family groups, are more active, and tend to feed more freely throughout the day. But as winter approaches and the leaves fall, they move less to avoid aerial predator detection, sticking to the mornings and afternoons for feeding. By late winter, grouse in some areas can be mostly inactive until the waning hours of the afternoon, when they emerge to gorge quickly before roosting for the night.
Sharpening Your ShootingIn grouse hunting, reaction time is everything. These elusive birds burst from cover with little warning, demanding quick instincts and practiced accuracy. A smooth, reliable gun mount and the right shooting equipment are crucial to consistently hitting your target in the dense grouse woods. Mastering your mount and choosing the right gauge can make all the difference, giving you a split-second edge when it counts most.
Mounting Practice: Grouse rarely give hunters much time to react. Developing a natural, smooth mount is crucial, so practice at home until it’s second nature. One of the best methods is to practice in front of a mirror, which allows you to observe your form, speed, alignment—and, of course, how good you look in that new flannel.
The more you practice mounting in a controlled environment, the faster you’ll respond in the field. Grouse hunting is all about instinctive shooting, so build muscle memory by practicing frequently—both dry mounting and live shooting at the range in the off-season.
Gauge and Shotshells: Any shotgun gauge is suitable for grouse hunting, so choose one that’s comfortable and easy to maneuver for your frame. I prefer shorter barrels, as they don’t get snagged in thick cover. Many hunters prefer sub-gauges, but a 12-gauge can work just as well.
I recommend using a more open choke, like an improved cylinder or skeet, to maximize your spread at close range, which is key in thick woods. Shot sizes 6 to 8 provide the right balance of spread and power for grouse, ensuring you have both range and stopping power without sacrificing coverage.
There is almost too much to say when it comes to my love for hunting ruffed grouse. One thing is for certain, you will learn something new every time you’re out in the woods. Be a student, keep a journal, practice your swing, talk to those who have been around a time or two, and if you really want to have fun—get a nice dog. They’ll bring the bird to the table and keep you warm by the fire.
Bad ideas aren’t so bad until they start to get contagious. That appears to be what’s happening with one of the worst public land viruses infecting our nation today.
Four western states have thrown their support behind a Utah lawsuit that could transfer millions of acres of public land into private hands. In an amicus brief filed last week, Wyoming, Idaho, Alaska, and the Arizona State Legislature endorsed Utah’s request to have their case heard by the Supreme Court. They argue that it is unconstitutional for the federal government to hold land that it has not “appropriated” for a specific purpose. They say national monuments or national forests are fine, but they argue that the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) should be forced to dispose of its unappropriated land.
Huge swaths of BLM land in these states would fall under Utah’s definition of “unappropriated.” In Idaho, for example, 17% of the entire state, or more than 9 million acres, would qualify. In Utah, that number is 18.5 million acres. Proponents of this idea would have you believe that these acres would simply become state parks and recreation areas.
“If the federal government were required to dispose of these lands, the States could own and manage them and conduct the same sorts of activities that the federal government currently does,” the authors of the amicus brief write.
Nothing would change, they imply. These properties would still allow hunting, grazing, and extraction–they would just be better managed under local, state control.
The problem is that this isn’t what would happen at all; at least, not in the majority of these acres. The key word is “dispose.” The BLM’s process for divesting itself of its property is often done via auction, not a simple transfer of ownership to the state. Selling off BLM land in an auction would allow private interests to swoop in and turn what was protected wildlife habitat or hunting grounds into whatever those developers could imagine.
The amicus brief authors point out that the Constitution only allows a state to regulate and dispose of public lands, “not indefinitely retain lands within a State.” But they fail to acknowledge the reason the Framers did not feel the need to include a specific retention clause: the federal government (and therefore the American people) already owns the property. They need the power to dispose of the land, but they do not need the power to retain it because they already do.
What is true is that whether the lands ended up in private or state hands, the states would be the ones that benefit. The amicus brief filers admit as much when they say a successful lawsuit would, “increase their sovereign authority to use and develop land within their boundaries.” It’s not just about doing a better job managing wildlife habitat. It’s about getting their hands on public federal land they’ve always wanted to develop but so far haven’t had a chance to.
New Lawsuit, Old ArgumentsWhile state leaders in Utah, Wyoming, Idaho, Alaska, and Arizona believe the current makeup of the Supreme Court gives them a unique opportunity for success, their arguments are nothing new. Every decade or so, there is a renewed push to privatize federal public land, and the current advocates are making the same arguments they always have.
One of the most common is that private owners would do a better job managing the acres currently under federal control. They point to the wonderful ways many private landowners manage their properties to try to convince their constituents that the same could be true of the 640 million acres currently in federal hands.
But this isn’t a fair comparison. Federal public land must, by law, be managed for many people pursuing many different goals. Private land, on the other hand, can be directed towards a limited number of goals and can be controlled by a single person.
When someone says that private lands are managed better, my response typically is, “I should hope so!” You have the easiest job in the world compared to what a public land manager has to do.
I think of it this way: Imagine two neighboring properties in a suburban setting. One is occupied by a single individual, while the other is home to a family with three kids. The goals of both are to produce as much food as possible and maintain an immaculate lawn. The single individual can pursue those goals using the most efficient methods. He or she can choose what animals to raise, what vegetables to plant, and how to fertilize the lawn.
The family, on the other hand, has to balance many competing interests. The kids want pygmy goats (who wouldn’t?), but the wife wants a miniature dairy cow. The husband tries to keep the yard looking nice, but the kids need somewhere to play, so he sets up a swing set. The grass doesn’t grow under the trampoline, and the son wears a path to and from his archery target.
The individual does a better job meeting the goals, but would anyone argue that the family should be forced to transfer ownership to the individual? Because he does a “better” job managing it? In the same way, federal lands that are managed for timber, livestock, recreation, extraction, and green energy production shouldn’t be given away just because crop farmers or ranchers do a “better” job managing their properties to meet their goals.
Sport Shooting and Public LandHunters aren’t the only group that should be wary of efforts to privatize federal land. Millions of American sport shooters rely on public shooting ranges to exercise their Second Amendment rights and hone their skills, and putting those opportunities at risk could have serious implications for conservation funding.
A 2021 survey by the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) found that while the majority of sport shooters utilize private gun ranges, 39% shoot on public land mostly or about half the time. What’s more, public land shooters report a better experience than their private land counterparts. The survey found that 57% of public land shooters rate their experience as “excellent or good,” while only 40% of private land shooters felt the same.
That’s likely because public shooting ranges address the concerns that sport shooters report as being important to them. The survey found that crowding is the number one consideration when sport shooters select a range. No one wants to visit a crowded gun range, and the large number of public ranges allow sport shooters to spread out without overcrowding any single one. Diminishing the number of public ranges, as this lawsuit eventually would, should concern anyone who appreciates access to a free range.
Speaking of cost, the NSSF survey found that cost is the top issue that impacts sport shooters’ enjoyment. Public ranges are free, and so state leaders should be doing more to increase, not decrease, the number of them.
Jeopardizing access to public shooting ranges could have even broader impacts. Gun owners contribute over $1 billion to conservation every year via excise taxes on firearms and ammunition. Limiting the opportunities for 40% of sport shooters could take a serious bite out of that funding because, without a place to shoot, it’s unclear how many of those shooters will continue pursuing their hobby.
Land for AllOf course, even if this lawsuit is successful, those 9 million acres in Idaho and 18 million acres in Utah won’t turn into condos overnight. Most of it would remain undeveloped, at least in the short term, and the officials in these states understand as well as we do that outdoor recreation is a major part of their economies. But this amicus brief highlights the fact that for these state leaders, money is the real motivation. They dedicate a large portion to explaining how federal lands siphon money away from state coffers, and they want to see those billions under state rather than federal control.
What they don’t want to acknowledge is that their residents own that land as much as the residents of other states. Local ranchers, timber, and mining companies benefit from the BLM’s multi-use mandate, and local outfitters make a living guiding hunters. Federal public lands, in other words, aren’t a resource drain on a state and its residents. They’re a public benefit, but they might not be if the BLM is forced to sell them off to the highest bidder.
They also don’t acknowledge a little thing called wildfire. The federal government funds firefighting at a way higher ratio than local state governments do. One bad fire season would bankrupt any of these states. Nobody mentions that.
Unfortunately, this idea has spread beyond Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, Idaho, Alaska, and Arizona. In total, 11 briefs have been filed with the Supreme Court by various groups, states, and politicians, including Iowa, which spearheaded a brief signed by attorneys general from Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Carolina, South Dakota, and Texas.
This is not new ground. This is something that pops up about every ten years. I have no idea why the sporting community has such a short memory, but a lot of the vitriol that we’re seeing right now, we’ve already rehashed. Let’s reject the false choices politicians are pushing, like the one between public lands and the Second Amendment, and force our elected officials to do what’s best for the many, not the few.
The whitetail rut can be some of the most exhilarating action one can experience with a bow. The Element's, KC Smith, pursues whitetail deer in the wide open plains of Kansas. Spotting deer is one thing out here, but the bucks know how to hide and it can be difficult to get within effective archery range. Success and failure are relative to how you measure them and the lessons learned eye-to-eye with giant bucks stick with you. Presented by Moultrie
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On this episode Tyler Jones, K.C. Smith the story of K.C.'s 2 big bucks in 3 days. Can rattling be effective? Find out!
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Welcome to the TENTH episode of Rut Fresh Radio for the 2024 Season! In each episode, K.C. and Tyler interview deer hunters from across the country in search of the latest information on whitetail buck movement and hear stories of hunting success. This week we talk to Scott Harness in Arkansas, Jared Larsen in Wisconsin, Phil Tuttle In Illinois, and Zack Lewis in Texas. Powered by First Lite Gear
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Welcome to our brand new MeatEater Radio Live! podcast. Join Steve Rinella and the rest of the crew as they go LIVE from MeatEater HQ every Thursday at 11am MT! They’ll have segments, call-in guests, and real-time interaction with the audience. You can watch the stream on the MeatEater Podcast Network YouTube channel, or catch the audio version of the show on Fridays.
Today's episode is hosted by Spencer Neuharth, Ryan Callaghan, Randall Williams, and Phil Taylor.
Guests: Dr. Bronson Strickland from Mississippi State University, Janis Putelis with Rene Cross of Cypress Cove, Corinne Schneider, andRyan Beierman of Wisconsin.
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Brent followed his father’s footsteps in a lot of the Reaves family hunting traditions. Deer hunting however, wasn’t one of them. Brent’s dad was not a deer hunter but had some encounters that Brent’s gonna tell you about. You’ll also hear a listener story about another parent and son deer hunting tradition that’s not so traditional. It’s time for MeatEater’s “This Country Life” podcast.
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This week on the show we’re discussing advanced hunting strategies, with Bobby Kendall, such as the difference between hunting offensively vs defensively, and the Jenga approach to killing big bucks.
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This recipe comes from the “Fall” chapter of our newest book release—Wild + Whole. To preorder a copy of the book, click here.
When I was learning how to process deer, I did it all by trial and error. I looked at a lot of butchering diagrams, but most of the muscles on a hindquarter were simply labeled as “roasts,” and I wasn’t sure what that meant exactly. Is it a noun, or a verb, or does it imply both? It’s avague term commonly used to describe a large cut of meat, and what makes it more confusing is that not all roasts should be cooked the same way. Some are best braised, but what if you want that rosy-red meat? I developed this recipe for anyone who wants to successfully “roast their roast,” so it turns out similar to a juicy, meaty beef prime rib.
If you’re concerned that you don’t have the cooking chops to serve something like this, don’t worry—this recipe is practically foolproof! Use a cut that’s very tender and shaped in a way that ensures it will cook evenly. In fact, there are only two cuts I would use for this recipe: the inside round and the sirloin tip.
The sirloin tip is a football-shaped muscle in a deer’s hindquarter that serves a similar function as the quadriceps in your thigh. It sits above the kneecap and has to be carved off the femur. Technically, it’s composed of three small muscles; don’t try to separate these muscles to take out the two pieces of silver skin that divide them. This silver skin holds the roast together, and there’s a good deal of fat and flavor worth saving between it and the meat. (But do go ahead and trim the silver skin on the outside.)
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Janis Putelis, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Alyssa Smith, Garrett Long, and Logan Dove.
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Welcome to the FIFTH episode of Rut Fresh Radio for the 2024 Season! In each episode, K.C. and Tyler interview deer hunters from across the country in search of the freshest, most current information on Whitetail Buck movement and hear stories of hunting success. This week we talk to Colton Roberts in Texas, Reid Strobl in Indiana, Ben Shuptrine in Tennessee and Tony Peterson in Minnesota.
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In this episode of the Bear Grease podcast, we celebrate MeatEater’s Whitetail Week with another collection of deer stories from Tennessee, Missouri, Arkansas, and Mississippi. Listen along as contributors Mitch Sikes, Keith Polk, Bob Wilson, Gerald Brewer, Henry Susong, and Moe Shepherd share memorable moments searching for the crown jewel of the North American woods—the Whitetail Deer.
If you have comments on the show, send us a note to beargrease@themeateater.com
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In this episode, Tony takes a look at what we know about the history of hunting big game with dogs, and how it still plays a major role in today's whitetail hunting culture.
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On this episode, Tony explains what it takes to kill big bucks consistently, and why most hunters will never be able to do it.
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This week Reid and Dan host Mr. BG Nation himself out in God/s Country. Brantley Gilbert dives in head first with what he's mad at and turns out, it's little league baseball parents. He shares his journey of music, sobriety, being a landowner, and becoming a dad. The guys share their tattoo stories, including how one of Reid's is completely upside down, but he didn't realize it until it was too late. The episode ends with a Jamey Johnson cover and Brantley's One That Got Away, which had all three of them in tears to end the show.
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Steven Rinella talks with Diane Boyd, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics discussed: Diane Boyd’s new book A Woman Among Wolves; a tame pet pigeon with the bird sitter; when Diane was on Ep. 166: Hunting with Teeth; it’s MeatEater's Whitetail Week!; F*cked Up Old Shitters calendar is here; a good use for a tandem outhouse; "a retraction never gets the traction of the reaction to the original action"; Sonoran hotdogs; if you could snap your finger and get rid of CWD, would you?; the first wolf reintroductions; lady wolf trapper; where are wolves tolerated?; bringing home any Mexican wolves that wander out of their area; being a lumper of a splitter; why wolves don’t kill people; average age of wolf death; and more.
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In this episdoe, Tony explores the idea that we can all definitievely age deer just by looking at them. He breaks down why this is not only not easy to do, but how damaging it can be for some hunters.
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This week, Cal covers a whale of a crime story, a 12-year-old who defended his dad from a bear attack, a deer hunting controversy in Michigan, and so much more.
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October Madness is back! This year, we're picking the greatest deer rifle of all time. And by "we," we mean "you." Scroll down to the poll at the bottom of this article to cast your vote, and the rifle with the most votes by 11:59pm on Tuesday, October 1st will advance to the next round. If you'd like a little more information before casting your vote, check out the cheat sheets on each rifle below. And feel free to explain your vote in the comments (or why the other side is dead wrong).
Vote HereDon’t forget to vote in the other matchups, which you can do here.
Marlin 336 Cartridge Offerings Originally offered in .30-30 Winchester and .32 Special, the Model 336 is also famous for being chambered in .35 Remington, which was added to the lineup in 1953. Its tubular magazine limits its offerings to round-nose cartridges, but the rifle has nonetheless been available in a huge variety of cartridges (many of which have become obsolete). Today, Ruger offers the 336 in .30-30 only.
.35 Remington .30-30 Winchester .219 Zipper .307 Winchester .32-40 WCF .32 Special .338 Marlin Express .356 Winchester .375 Winchester .38-55 Winchester .44 Magnum Vote Here History Among the most famous lever-action rifles in American history, the Marlin Model 336 has been in continuous production since it hit gun store shelves in 1948. The company sold its 3,000,000th Model 336 all the way back in 1979, and the current figure is obviously much higher. The 336 is the brainchild of famous gun designer L.L. Hepburn and traces its lineage to the Models 1893, 1936, and 36.
What distinguished the 336 was a round breech bolt in place of the rectangular bolt of previous designs. Marlin claimed in marketing materials at the time that this “massive locking bolt” assured smooth feeding and was “virtually jam proof.” The design also promised greater strength and durability to handle what were at the time high-powered rifle rounds.
Remington Arms Company purchased Marlin in 2007, and Ruger bought the company from a bankrupt Remington in 2020. Ruger has since released their own take on the legendary design–the Model 336 Classic–which retains much of what Marlin fans loved (and some of what they didn’t) about the original rifle.
Features The 336 has been offered in a huge variety of models and configurations. The original Model 336C sported a 20-inch barrel while the Model 336A featured a 24-inch barrel. The stock has a more vertical pistol-style grip rather than the Winchester 94’s straight grip stock. In 1956, Marlin began offering the 336 drilled and tapped for a scope (its side-ejection system made it an ideal candidate for this), and the famous gold trigger was added in 1959.
Original Marlin 336’s did not incorporate any kind of safety, but the infamous cross-bolt safety was added to Carbine models in 1984. This safety mechanism has been criticized by many as unnecessary and confusing, but Ruger decided to maintain it in its reintroduction.
But they also made some excellent improvements. Ruger-made 336’s feature a cold hammer forged barrel, a thinned forend, and various design and manufacturing tweaks to make the rifles more durable. For more info, check out our full review of the Ruger-made Model 336.
Availability It’s not difficult to find a Marlin Model 336 on the used market, most of which can be had for less than $800. If you want a factory-new rifle, you may have to wait a bit longer. The demand for Ruger-made 336’s has been stout, and I’ve heard from readers lamenting the fact that they can’t be found for love or money. My best advice? Get on the waiting list now. Ruger is churning these things out every day, so it’s just a matter of time before you get your hands on one.
Ruger No. 1 Cartridge Offerings Like the Model 70, Ruger’s No. 1 offered a host of cartridges throughout its lifetime. The company currently runs limited models each year, but here are a few of the most popular or intriguing offerings.
.204 Ruger .218 Bee .250 Savage .257 Roberts 6.5 Creedmoor .264 Win. Mag. .270 Win. .280 Rem. 7.62x39mm .30-06 Sprg. .35 Whelen .375 Ruger .404 Jeffery .475 Turnbull .480 Ruger Vote Here History Introduced in 1967, the Ruger No. 1 is one of the best single-shot rifles ever made. With a tang-style safety and falling block action, this rifle developed a die-hard following, despite the popularity of bolt-action rifles during the time. Its introduction might have been a gamble, but it’s one that has certainly paid dividends.
Features The action separates the two-piece stock, and Ruger offered the fore-end in three distinct styles: Mannlicher, beavertail, and the Alexander Henry. To run the action, you simply work the underlever, which lowers the breechblock and forms a sturdy and definitive locking position. The underlever and action design makes the rifle completely ambidextrous. While its single-shot capabilities might seem antiquated, the Ruger No. 1’s reliability (and popularity) has endured.
Availability While Ruger still churns out No. 1s every year, the company typically does so in limited cartridge offerings and models. So while it might not be hard to find a Ruger No. 1, finding a specific model or cartridge offering might prove difficult. These limited runs and offerings add to the rifle’s value, but they don’t exactly bode well for consumers. New rifles run over a couple grand, while you can expect to pay over $1000 for a used No. 1 in good condition. That’s a lot of cash for a single-shot, but for die-hard fans or hunters in straight wall states, the Ruger No. 1 is the poster child for simplicity done right.
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It’s the first big hunt of Arkansas’s fall season for Brent and the bear camp faithful. They’re struggling with dry conditions, dropping acorns, and the Arkansas heat that just won’t go away. They managed to “scratch a few out” as Brent would say, but the biggest trophy carried home had nothing to do with a bear. It’s time to head to the bear camp on this week’s episode of MeatEater’s “This Country Life” podcast.
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Welcome to our brand new MeatEater Radio Live! podcast. Join Steve Rinella and the rest of the crew as they go LIVE from MeatEater HQ every Thursday at 11am MT! They’ll have segments, call-in guests, and real-time interaction with the audience. You can watch the stream on the MeatEater Podcast Network YouTube channel, or catch the audio version of the show on Fridays.
Today's episode is hosted by Janis Putelis, Ryan Callaghan, and Brody Henderson, and Phil Taylor.
Guests: Patrick Berry, CEO of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers, Papa Janis Putelis Sr., and Wyatt Seep of Old Northwest Timber & Habitat.
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This week Reid and Dan host Josh Kelley and Charles Kelley, of Lady A. The episode is a full blown riot of brother wars, harmonies, and storytelling that had the guys laughing for an hour straight. All of them compare upbringings and their musical journeys that led them to Nashville, which are eerily similar. Charles reveals their first brother band name and Josh relives losing the junior masters, from shooting an 8 on the last hole, when he was 10. The episode ends with them all on fire covering Bruce Springsteen.
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On this week's show, Tony explains why the first part of September is one of the most important weeks for whitetail hunters to scout.
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On this episode, Janis Putelis is rifle hunting mule deer in Montana. Janis puts all his chips into the last week of the rifle season with hopes that colder weather will align with the mule deer rut. But wintry weather can have its challenges. After a few days in the fog and a few miles on his feet, Janis finally glasses up what he came for. Presented by Silencer Central
Brent's wrapping up his series on safety by giving more examples of how he tempted fate and luckily came through unscathed. Not everyone gets a second chance however, and Brent has a firsthand account that reminds him to stay ever vigilant. Brent's hoping you'll hear this one and take away the same lesson he did. It's safety first, always on this week's episode of MeatEater's "This Country Life" podcast.
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Welcome to our brand new MeatEater Radio Live! podcast. Join Steve Rinella and the rest of the crew as they go LIVE from MeatEater HQ every Thursday at 11 am MT! They’ll have segments, call-in guests, and real-time interaction with the audience. You can watch the stream on the MeatEater Podcast Network YouTube channel, or catch the audio version of the show on Fridays.
Guests: Seth Walk of Hauling' Ass Backcountry and Alaska grizzly attack survivor Tyler Johnson
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As the old saying goes, “There’s a time for everything,” and yes, that includes running shots. Yet, the thought of shooting at running game sparks rage in plenty of hunters and overzealous keyboard warriors who are quick to raise questions of ethicality and intellect (poor deer-dog hunters of the South will never catch a break).
The concept appears outdated, especially in an age of precision rifles and ultra-specific scopes that require an encyclopedic amount of knowledge to operate. But if there’s anything we can learn from a century’s worth of big woods rifle designs, it’s that running shots were expected. Cool as they look, pump, semi-auto, and lever action rifles weren’t meant for the bench. They were designed for quick, close-range shots or necessary follow-ups that accompany still-hunts, man drives, or deer-dog runs.
Whether you jump a bedded buck or whiff on the first crack, it helps to feel confident when you shoot at running game. Sure, there are times when you have no business shooting at a running animal, but that doesn’t mean you should never do it. You might think you’re above shooting at a deer that’s running—until you jump a big buck from his bed at fifteen yards. Rather than botching the opportunity or wounding the animal, you can practice the running shot and prepare yourself when the opportunity arises.
PracticeLike stationary shots, the ethicality of shooting at running game depends on the situation. The question isn’t if you should take a running shot but when. I know many people write them off altogether. Most folks claim that they’re irresponsible and a sign of bad sportsmanship. But, is it less ethical to take a running shot when you’ve spent several sessions practicing at the range? Or is it more ethical to shoot a deer that’s standing still when you only shot three rounds to make sure your scope was still “on” from last season? What about us bowhunters? We’re quick to pass judgment and just as quick to try and thread the needle in the closing minutes of shooting light.
Many hunters don’t take running shots because they never prepare for them. If this is you, kudos for exercising self-control. Unfortunately, the same is true for hunters that regularly wound or miss running game. Regardless of which camp you fall in, more intentional time at the range can help prepare you.
It might be difficult to simulate a running animal if you don’t have access to moving targets, but there are other rifle drills to help with this. For starters, you should practice shooting offhand (you should be doing this anyway). Try shooting targets at 50 and 100 yards while standing up. You should take multiple shots so you can get comfortable cycling your rifle’s action. Too often, hunters just shoot from the bench. This is great if you need to zero your rifle, but it doesn’t exactly translate to awkward offhand shots that occur in the field.
Beyond that, you can replicate these same running shots by safely conducting dryfire drills or using a shot timer. You can even practice shooting offhand by starting with your rifle at your side, shouldering it, and then cycling a few rounds. Your first few groups might be discouraging, but the more time you spend doing this, the better they’ll get.
The RundownWhen it’s actually time to shoot at a running animal, there are a few ways to do this. If you’re in open country like an ag field or vast prairie, you’ll want to use a sustained lead or swing-through method.
A sustained lead requires you to track the animal with your sight or crosshairs on the vitals and continue to swing your rifle through the shot after you pull the trigger. If you stop your swing, you’ll shoot behind the deer. This is ideal for slower-moving animals and a method that deer-dog hunters typically implore. Whether you’re using one of the best red dots or an LPVO scope, you’ll want to practice keeping the rifle moving after the shot.
Another option is the swing-through shot. For this maneuver, you’ll need to consider how far and fast the animal is moving. It requires you to swing in front of the animal, pulling the trigger just as the sights pass in front of the target. Because you’re waiting on the timing of the swing rather than the specific placement of the animal, shots in areas with high stem count are less ideal.
If you’re hunting in timbered areas, your best bet is to pick a window and wait for the animal to get there. Otherwise, you’ll kill a few saplings. Keep your sights on an opening that you anticipate the deer to run through. You’ll want to keep both your eyes open so you can still keep track of the deer in your peripherals. With your sights lined up in the window, pull the trigger as soon as the deer comes into your sight picture.
All of these methods require instinctive shooting that can only be learned through repetition. Practice these shots enough, and they’ll feel second nature. That way, when you bump a deer on his feet, you can feel confident if you decide to take the shot.
Feature image via Matt Hansen.
As we embark on our elk hunting trips to the backcountry mountains and lonesome plains, the thought of having an equiptment failure is at top of mind. From loose bolts to stretched strings, "Murphys Law" can sideline an elk hunt at any time. Today, Dirk talks about bullet proofing your bow with Cory Miller from Darton Archery and Blackagle arrows before you take to the field, so you can hunt with piece of mind.
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This week, Cal talks with Eric Crawford, Trout Unlimited's Director for the Lower Snake River Campaign. We talk breaching of the four lower Snake River dams, invasive fish passage, what success would mean in numbers, treaty rights, and what it would actually take, hydropower replacement, barge replacement, downstream irrigators, and so much more.
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This week on the show I'm joined by Tony Peterson and Dan Johnson to breakdown our goals, hopes, and hit lists for the 2024 deer season.
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When I reached out to the MeatEater crew earlier this year to ask about their favorite elk cartridges, I was eager to get a recommendation from certified elk killer Jason Phelps. But his response wasn’t what I expected.
“I personally shoot what many would consider a ‘wildcat,’” he told me. “I don’t know if we would want to talk about a somewhat unconventional round, but I can definitely justify why I shoot it.”
Since we take cost and availability into account when we develop our “best of” lists, I decided not to include Jason’s recommendation in that article. Still, I wanted to learn more. I’m a big fan of unusual and obsolete cartridges, and I like highlighting good designs that have been relegated to wildcat status.
Turns out, Jason knows what he’s talking about when it comes to elk-killing ballistics. He built a rifle chambered in 7mm Remington Short Action Ultra Magnum (SAUM) as his lightweight rifle, but he’s really excited about another cartridge that hits with even more power: the .338 Edge.
“It shoots amazing,” Jason said. “With handloading, you can easily get a 300-grain bullet going 2960 feet-per-second. It’s not a speed demon, but it’s a hammer.”
HistoryIf you’ve never heard of the .338 Edge, you’re not alone. The cartridge is a true wildcat—meaning, there are no factory options available, and it hasn’t been standardized by SAAMI. Rifles must be built custom and cartridges must be hand-loaded, but several reloading companies make dies, and .300 Remington Ultra Magnum (RUM) brass cases can be resized to load .338 Edge rounds.
The .338 Edge was invented by Shawn Carlock in 2001, according to Carlock’s website. He developed the cartridge by taking a .300 RUM case and necking it up to accept the wider .338-caliber bullet.
“I choose this option for the 338 Edge for several reasons,” Carlock explains elsewhere. “First, the round had to run through a Remington 700 long action, use a standard magnum bolt face, and launch very high-BC .338 bullets. I settled on .338 caliber for the Edge early on for its BC and weight.”
He developed the .338 Edge after Remington released the .300 RUM, but before the ammo giant came out with the anticipated .338 RUM. When they did, it turned out that the .338 RUM had a slightly smaller case capacity than the Edge, which is why Jason prefers Carlock’s design.
“Since most people building custom guns are handloading, you can really take advantage of that extra case capacity on the bigger round,” Jason said.
The Edge’s eight percent greater case capacity increases velocity by 120 to 150 feet-per-second (fps), which, ironically enough, is why some estimate that the wildcat Edge is actually more popular than the standardized .338 RUM.
BallisticsCustom rifles and hand-loaded ammunition can get expensive, so why would an elk hunter invest in such a bougie cartridge? In a word, ballistics.
“The ballistics are incredible,” Jason said.
There isn’t a huge amount of published data on the .338 Edge (at least as compared to other cartridges), but what does exist is impressive. Jason’s rifle sports a 31-inch barrel, which can push a 300-grain bullet nearly 3,000 fps at the muzzle and produce a whopping 5,837 (ft.-lbs.) of energy.
For comparison, a 180-grain .300 Win. Mag. produces about 3,500 ft.-lbs. of energy at the muzzle, and the Edge has flown over 600 yards before its energy has dropped to that level. To put it another way, from a bullet energy perspective, shooting an elk at 600 yards with the .338 Edge is the same as hitting that animal point-blank with a .300 Win. Mag.
The Edge gives hunters the ability to use a high-BC, heavy-for-caliber bullet, which is crucial for long-range shots in windy conditions. Jason uses a 300-grain Sierra MatchKing bullet with a BC of .768 in his hunting loads, which he says performs phenomenally with H1000 powder, Remington brass, and CCI 250 Magnum primers.
“I can get a standard deviation of six,” Jason said, referring to the average difference between bullet velocities over a string of shots. “When you’re dialing a gun for longer range shots, you have a high level of confidence. Lethality, long-range capability is tough to beat in that .338 caliber.”
Part of that lethality is due to the minimal bullet drop and wind drift the .338 Edge offers. With a 100-yard zero, the Edge only drops about 10 inches at 300 yards and 41 inches at 500 yards. With a 10 mph crosswind, the bullet only drifts three inches at 300 yards and 10 inches at 500 yards.
“Another thing that’s great about this cartridge is that wind drift is an issue, but it’s not as much of an issue, so we’re able to make a more confident wind call,” Jason said.
Not everyone agrees that using a MatchKing bullet for hunting is a good idea, but Jason says the .338 Edge’s ballistics help the projectile “behave."
“This 300-grain bullet has such a high sectional density that we’re getting a perfect two-inch in, two-inch out hole, almost like you would with a swift A-frame or Nosler partition,” he said. “You get that long-range ballistic coefficient, but you also get a bullet that’s very well-behaved when it comes to expansion. It doesn’t just blow up in the animal.”
Some might argue that it’s better to dump bullet energy into the animal rather than having the projectile retain its mass and come out the other side. While that may be true, the proof is in the pudding. Jason reports that in eight years of hunting elk with the rifle, he’s never had to take a follow-up shot.
“The gun does what it does, you hit it where you need to, and things have died right away,” he said.
Downsides?The perfect cartridge doesn’t exist, and the .338 Edge is no exception. Besides the high cost and effort of getting into the wildcat, the rifles tend to be heavy.
“The big downside to my gun is that it’s a heavy gun. It’s a pain to pack around,” Jason said.
Jason’s single-shot rifle weighs a hefty 14.25 pounds, so it’s not practical for long backcountry hunts. Jason says it usually stays in the truck or close to camp and can be deployed if the situation is right.
Guns chambered in .338 Edge can be built to be lighter, but they also come with downsides. One is recoil. Your high school physics teacher is still correct–every reaction produces an equal and opposite reaction. The Edge has been described as a “medium-bore magnum,” so it’s not the worst Big Boy cartridge to shoot. But a lighter gun necessitates a muzzle brake to control recoil and maintain reasonable comfort.
Some hunters might also wonder why anyone would go through the trouble of hunting with a .338 Edge when there are so many cheaper, more readily available cartridges that can kill an elk just as dead. This is largely a personal decision. Some hunters enjoy learning about and tinkering with unusual cartridges that offer unique advantages in the field. The .338 Edge fits into that category, but you don’t need it to kill a nice bull.
Every AdvantageStill, there’s also no denying that this cartridge gives hunters the ability to take elk in situations that most other cartridges would struggle with.
For example, a few years ago, Jason drew an elk tag in eastern Washington and spotted a bull with about 45 minutes left of daylight. They had to drop about 2,000 feet down the mountain to take a shot, and even then, the animal was 630 yards away and across a canyon.
“If you didn’t have the ability to shoot that far, you would’ve had to come back the next day, which is an acceptable option,” Jason said. “But with the capability to shoot across the canyon, we elected to move forward and take that shot.”
He didn’t do so lightly. He’d practiced with his rifle extensively, and just the week prior had posted four-inch groups at 800 yards. He was confident that his holdover and windage adjustments were good, and he knew the cartridge had more than enough juice to take the bull from that distance.
Other magnum cartridges could’ve taken the same shot, but the odds of success wouldn’t have been as high. Ethical hunters only take a shot they’re highly confident they can make, and the Edge gave Jason that confidence in that situation. He hit the elk broadside and packed it out that night.
Last ShotThe argument for the .338 Edge as an excellent elk cartridge is the same argument MeatEater’s Janis Putelis made for the .300 Winchester Short Magnum.
“In the case of hunting bulls, I don't want to have to wait for the perfect shot. I want to let the lead fly at almost any angle, and I want to know that the bullet will penetrate and do the job,” he said.
If you’re going to hunt one of America’s largest game animals, you might as well give yourself the ability to take advantage of whatever situation presents itself–and the .338 Edge gives you that in spades.
Three times, they tried to push the herd out onto the ice, and three times, they failed. Scent alone wasn’t working. The wind dipped and swirled, and the daytime thaw and nightly freeze made the crusted snow impossibly noisy for stalking. The day was quickly turning to night and still they waited, watched, and hoped.
It was the youngest hunter who had the idea. Two hundred yards down the shoreline, a cluster of alders leaned out over the frozen lake. Those brushy trees formed a nearly perfect square with just enough room between the bases for two hunters to wait, spears and bows at the ready. The other hunters, five of them, would skirt the boggy south shore and appear in the open across the bay, 500 yards away from the elk browsing along the sandy point.
No time to waste now. Darkness was coming on quickly, and the heavy spring snow they’d expected was beginning, coming straight down now as the wind calmed. When the five hunters showed themselves, the elk lifted their heads and slowly moved down the shoreline, straight toward the natural birch blind with just enough room for two hunters.
It was nearly dark now, and they were still too far. The lead cow knew something wasn’t right. She led the herd out onto the ice, fifty yards from the alders. Close enough for arrows, but with darkness upon them, they didn’t want to track wounded elk and race wolves to the kill. That’s what happened two nights ago when they had arrowed a spike bull. The hit was slightly too high. By the time they found the kill, wolves had stripped the carcass of all but the bones. No, this time, it would have to be spears. They must anchor the elk in place. No delay, no tracking, no wolves.
The main group of elk stayed just out of spear range, about 40 feet for the experienced hunters. But one young cow lagged, drifting closer to the shore, and the lone bull was with her. The cow and the bull wandered closer to the alders. The hunters tensed. Their hearts raced. None of them had eaten much in two days, and that was only a bit of marrow from the spike they’d lost to the wolves. It would be a cold night and a colder morning for all of them if they failed. The massive bull elk, with six heavy tines on each side, was more interested in the young cow than he was in the birch trees.
At 12 yards, two spears thumped into his right shoulder blade. He tried to run but could only skid along the crusted snow as the rest of the herd, noses held high, shrieked and ran. The struggle ended quickly on the end of flint knives, and blood pooled on the surface of the frozen lake. The other hunters raced across the ice and whoops of joy and triumph echoed all the way back to the cold families huddled around a small fire in the lee of a hill a mile away.
That scene, or one like it, played out on a northern Wisconsin lake centuries ago. How do we know? Because in the summer of 2005, a youngster wading in the waters of Middle Eau Claire Lake in Bayfield County, kicked something embedded in the sandy lakebed in about four feet of water in front of Quentin and Helen Ruprecht’s Silver Beach Resort. Curiosity got the better of the young wader, and he reached down and dug it out of the sand.
It was bigger than he’d expected and heavier, too. He struggled to drag it to shore. Half an elk skull, stained with centuries of tannin and with a heavy six-point rack still attached, became an immediate sensation around the lake.
When more kids returned to the spot and rooted around in the sand, they found the other half of the skull. Then they found something even more amazing—a broken spearpoint made of jasper taconite. Now that was really something, and it didn’t take long for University of Wisconsin archaeologist Dr. Jean Hudson to hear about the find.
When Dr. Hudson visited Silver Beach in June of 2006 with a crew and gear necessary to survey the underwater site, they soon found more of the huge bull’s skeleton. And they noticed something intriguing. On several of the bones, they saw tiny slashes that could only have been man-made. Butcher marks from ancient hunters. The scapula, much bigger than an average modern elk scapula, emerged from the sand. The two clear holes punched clean through the bone. The holes matched the size of the spearpoint exactly.
The most likely scenario from 500 years ago was that the bull was struck by the spears and immobilized on the frozen lake surface. It was then butchered on the spot, and with the spring thaw, the bones settled on the bottom together in a tight group. Missing from the skeleton is one entire rear quarter and most of the other; possibly taken back to the hunter’s camp whole by members of the party while the others stayed to do the fine work of removing every useful bit of the animal.
All told, there are cut marks in nine different places on the bones, including cuts on the right lower jaw and the bridge of the nose. In addition to the holes in the scapula created by two spears, there are wounds on two ribs directly behind the scapula. The power with which those spears were thrown was immense, but the accuracy was most impressive. The ancient hunters knew exactly where to hit the animal to bring it down on the spot, and both spears hit within four inches of each other.
This astonishing accuracy with a throwing spear was not unique to these northern Wisconsin hunters. Archaeological evidence from kill sites around the world show that ancient people consistently hit large game in that same spot on the shoulder blade, knowing it would quickly immobilize the animal.
At the Silver Beach Kill site, as it became known officially, there was one more mystery. That broken spearpoint found with the elk bones was a large, fluted projectile. What remained of the point was nearly four inches long and finely crafted. But it was a Gainey (Clovis-type) point of a style much, much older than the five-century-old kill.
Was it mere chance that a projectile that dates to approximately 11,000 years ago was found with the carbon-dated 500-year-old elk remains? That would be some coincidence.
Or was it a repurposed point, held onto and handed down for thousands of years, from hunter to hunter to hunter? The romantic in me likes to think so.
The Silver Beach elk remains are currently on display at the Barnes Area Historical Society Museum in Barnes, Wisconsin, near where they were discovered. The antlers were Boone & Crockett scored (unofficially) at 354⅜”. The current location of the spearpoint is not known.
It's the heat of the elk rut in New Mexico and bulls are going nuts with bugles echoing off of the desert hills. K.C. puts his calling skills to the test, but the bulls find ways to make it difficult. Elk are everywhere and opportunities are endless, but getting that ideal shot opportunity proves difficult. Presented by OnX Maps
On this episode of the Bear Grease Render, Clay Newcomb and the Render Crew—Misty Newcomb, Brent Reaves, and Josh "Landbridge" Spielmaker, are joined by distinguished guests, Misty Langdon of the Remnants Project, Lake Pickle of OnX, and Kyle Plunkett of the Ozark Podcast, as they discuss Ozark legend Eva "Granny" Barnes Henderson's life and legacy on the Buff'lo. There's even a little friendly competition as everyone plays a game of "Granny" Henderson Trivia. And, hear more about the proposed re-designation of The Buffalo National River to a national park.
If you would like to help restore and preserve historic structures on the Buffalo National River, please visit https://bnrpartners.org/joindonate to donate to the Buffalo National River Partners and support all they do.
Be sure to watch the Bear Grease Render on the MeatEater's Podcast Network YouTube channel.
If you have comments on the show, send us a note to beargrease@themeateater.com
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia, with Clay Newcomb, Mark Kenyon, Jordan Budd, Brent Reaves, Maggie Hudlow, KC Smith, Tyler Jones, Tony Peterson, and Jordan Sillars.
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Although cacciatore is most often prepared with chicken today, it’s an apt recipe for rabbit. After all, “cacciatore” does mean “hunter” in Italian. This tomato-based stew is delicious over polenta, rice, or couscous.
You might see other cacciatore recipes that include the addition of olives and/or mushrooms. You can certainly add these ingredients if you like, but I prefer a simple tomato gravy.
One tasty ingredient that I have discovered recently is Trader Joe’s Italian-style Soffrito Seasoning Blend. If you happen to have it, add ½ teaspoon of it in step three and skip the red pepper flakes.
A petition earlier this year by the Seattle-based Wild Fish Conservancy to list select Chinook (AKA king) salmon populations in the Gulf of Alaska as “threatened” or “endangered” species is gaining traction. In January, the nonprofit submitted a document to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) highlighting declining king populations across southeast Alaska and the south side of the Alaskan Peninsula. It was the first step in the citizen-initiated process of getting a species listed under the Endangered Species Act (ESA).
Emma Helverson, executive director of the Wild Fish Conservancy, explains the process: “Essentially, you just need to provide the bare minimum data to show that these populations need a closer look. The ESA really empowers the public, and any citizen can bring forward a petition and ask the government to review it.”
Helverson’s team, including biologist Conrad Gowell, put together the 67-page report using publicly available data from the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADFG) and NOAA.
“We’re just presenting, for the most part, raw data,” Gowell said. “All these rivers were continuing to miss escapement year after year.”
Escapement is the target number of returning spawning salmon on any given river and is set by ADFG. In the report, the team points to numerous reasons for the decline, including changing ocean conditions, habitat loss, and predation on the species—from both animals and people.
NOAA and the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) reviewed the petition and decided that there was substantial basis to warrant a more in-depth review of Gulf-of-Alaska kings. Now, the federal agencies have one year (starting when the petition was submitted) to conduct a detailed assessment, including breaking down kings into geographically and genetically distinct subpopulations to determine which ones might be at risk of extinction.
The state of Alaska, however, is not happy with the petition or NOAA’s decision to look into the issue more closely. In a press release, Commissioner Doug Vincent-Lang wrote a scathing critique: “[The petition] is rife with significant factual errors, omits important data that are widely available, and does not accurately describe the status of Chinook salmon in Alaska. It is mind-boggling that NMFS could make a positive finding based on cherry-picked data to support a predetermined viewpoint. I am concerned that this decision will encourage more frivolous petitions in the future.”
And while NOAA concurs that the document contained a plethora of errors, they still determined that Alaskan kings are in dire enough condition to potentially warrant action. “We found that the information present in the petition contained numerous factual errors, omissions, incomplete references, and unsupported assertions and conclusions,” the federal agency wrote in its decision notice. “Still, we concluded that the petition contained enough information for a reasonable person to conclude that the petitioned action [ESA listing] may be warranted.”
As with anything having to do with salmon, however, it can be difficult to isolate the biology from the politics. It’s generally agreed that king populations are not doing well across the state. However, the commercial fishing industry is worried that an ESA listing could restrict harvest opportunities, not only on kings but also on other species like sockeye and pinks that have concurrent fishing seasons. The state is also concerned that a listing would turn management over to the feds, making it harder for ADFG to do their job and work with fishing communities on the local, individual level.
Helverson and the Wild Fish Conservancy recognize these concerns, but also note that a listing wouldn’t have as dramatic of an impact as the media is generally portraying. “There’s a lot of misinformation about the ESA process, and that this is going to shut down every fishery in the Gulf of Alaska. This idea that there won’t be any fishing is an overstatement and fearmongering. We still have fishing on stocks that are listed under ESA [in the Lower-48, though Incidental Take Permits]. That’s where the communities need to come together to work on plans.”
Aside from the outspoken commercial-fishing industry, though, a lot of local Alaskans recognize that action needs to be taken to protect king populations—according to Helverson. In just one generation, people have watched king runs crash, and that’s not a legacy they want to leave for their kids and subsequent generations.
Willard Lind, a native resident in Chignik, Alaska, tells an all-too-common story in an interview with NPR: “When I was a kid, there was a place we called ‘Shallow Water’ in the Chignik River, and that place used to be loaded with kings. Holy cow, they’d be swimming all over the place. But nowadays, you don’t see one king in that Shallow-Water hole anymore. I’m all for the petition to stop these king-fishers.”
Currently, NOAA is in the process of reviewing all available data to determine what actions might be appropriate. There is a public comment period open now through September 6th.
If you were to look at the world as a living being that thinks and grows just like every other creature, then salmon would be its lifeblood. For millions of years, these magnificent fish have made their way up the veins of great rivers, bringing nutrients distilled from the Pacific Ocean along with them as they struggle upstream to spawn and eventually die. An infinite number of creatures benefit from the salmon’s sacrifice, from microscopic insects to the largest trees in the world.
Humans have also benefited in countless ways from the salmon swimming in our rivers. From being a healthy and dependable food source to the enriching timber and soil needed for building civilization, we may, in fact, owe much of our very existence and continued prosperity to the salmon swimming in our rivers. Yet, at this very moment, we’re standing on the brink of losing it all.
Losing a Keystone SpeciesSalmon populations across the Pacific Northwest are rapidly disappearing, with a few isolated populations in danger of becoming completely extinct. This is a major concern, not only for obsessive salmon anglers who depend on the fish for both food and sport, but also for the community at large as the salmon’s presence in a river affect everything around it.
“Salmon are the ultimate keystone species,” fisheries scientist Gary Marston, who works as a scientific advisor for Trout Unlimited, said. “The loss of salmon for these watersheds affects the entire community and the ecosystem. From the trees, which get nitrogen from the fish after they spawn and die, to the otters, bears, bobcats, raccoons, eagles, and hawks that rely on the fish for food. It’s an entire community effect, and all these things suffer when salmon are not abundant.”
The loss of salmon has a ripple effect, one that spreads to every tiny corner of the salmon’s world and causes a chain reaction of loss. The rivers and streams that salmon migrate to are generally very infertile, making them places where life tends to struggle, so they depend on the nutrients that salmon bring with them from the ocean. Without the fish, water-borne insects like stoneflies and mayflies that rely on salmon for food don’t get the same nutrients that they had in the past, which makes the insects smaller and their hatches sparse. In turn, the animals that eat the bugs, such as birds and bats, begin to struggle, and so it goes on up the line.
“I’ve read several studies about areas where the lack of salmon is affecting songbirds,” Marston told MeatEater. “Their body conditions grow worse in areas where there were suddenly no salmon or even declining salmon. They also have smaller clutches of eggs because they lack the nutrients from the insects that feed on dead salmon. But it goes so much further than birds and bugs. These ecosystems have evolved in tandem with the salmon, so we're talking about everything from microscopic algae all the way up to vast old-growth forest communities where healthier and larger trees are being depleted by the lack of nitrogen and other minerals provided by the salmon.”
This trickle-down effect extends beyond just the lack of salmon in the rivers and streams that they spawn in and is even being felt out on the open sea. Dozens of marine predators such as sharks, seals, orcas, and even lamprey feed on the fish during their time in the salt water and their loss is being felt. The Southern Resident killer whale population, which once thrived in the waters between British Columbia and California, is an example of this as their population has dropped alarmingly in recent years, with the whales being added to the endangered species list in 2005. Salmon are an essential part of the whale’s diet, and the drop in both the salmon population and their overall size has been one of the biggest contributing factors to the orca’s collapse.
A Salmon Free Fishery is An Empty FisheryIt does seem obvious that the people suffering most from the loss of salmon are, of course, salmon fishermen. Both anglers who love hooking these giant and powerful fish on rod and reel, as well as those in the commercial industry who depend on salmon returns for their livelihood, are feeling the loss of the fish already. However, even if you’re not a salmon angler and prefer fishing for other species, the salmon’s disappearance can still be felt as they influence so many of the other fish around them.
“Without salmon in these waters, you won’t have steelhead or trout,” Pacific Trout Unlimited Communications Director Greg Fitz said. “The species are just so dependent on one another, with trout and steelhead smolt feeding on both the salmon eggs and the insects that feed on the dead salmon. Without the salmon, all the effort and time and money that we’ve put into restoring other species like steelhead will have been for nothing.”
The symbiotic relationship between salmon and other gamefish has been well documented, but many anglers don’t realize just how deep these relationships go. In many cases, other fish species are almost entirely dependent on salmon being in the river, and losing them could devastate many world-class fisheries.
“Throughout the different studies I participated in, we found a lot of connection between rainbow trout populations and salmon,” Marston told MeatEater. “Salmon eggs make up a big part of their diet, to the point where we’ve found up to 900 eggs in one rainbow, and salmon eggs are about 3 times more energy-rich than insect larvae, which allows fish to grow larger.”
But the presence of salmon doesn’t just mean bigger fish, it also ensures the survival of more fish.
“In addition, we saw juvenile survival rates of rainbows increase by a huge margin compared to where there were no salmon,” Marston said. “In places where pink salmon come into a river, we found that 30% of the food source for juvenile trout, steelhead, and salmon are actually sea lice falling off the pinks. It’s these little things that can push the fish over the edge, give them a little bit of edge, and help them survive. In short, where the salmon were, we saw other salmonids thrive.”
However, on other rivers that Marston and his team visited, the results were not always so bright. On one river, they saw firsthand what can happen to other fish when salmon runs disappear.
“By contrast, one of the most interesting things we found on one particular river we studied was that summer chum salmon actually declined pretty significantly during the study,” Marston said. “We went down from a healthy run to about 100 to 150 salmon per mile. This is not a large population and a huge drop from what it had originally been. By the end of that study, we were unable to capture enough trout to even do a population estimate. The trout population had declined that much because the salmon just weren’t there.”
Even in areas where salmon aren’t completely lost, the style and tradition of salmon fishing are often forced to change.
“I grew up in Alaska, and fishing in Alaska meant we were targeting big trout and char with eggs and flesh flies,” salmon biologist and avid angler Haley Ohms said. “When I moved down to the lower 48 and started chasing trout around Oregon and Washington, those egg and flesh flies simply don’t work because those big resident salmon just aren’t around in the same numbers. It really drove home the losses we’ve experienced in the Pacific Northwest because that sort of fishing used to exist here.”
The Fight for FishDropping salmon populations are nothing new, as salmon stocks have been in decline for nearly 180 years. Since the 1850s, logging, mining, and overfishing combined with flooding and general mismanagement have led to many salmon stocks falling. However, in the last 50 years, the construction of dams, lack of understanding of salmon behavior, and climate change have seen some runs reduced to less than 10% of their historic numbers, and some populations have even disappeared altogether.
Now, it’s not all doom and gloom as many of the struggling salmon runs are being supported by hatcheries that are at least maintaining populations. Yet, even fish hatcheries may not be enough to stop the tide of decline as they cost billions of dollars to build and maintain and simply aren’t cost-effective in many places. In addition, hatchery salmon behave differently than wild salmon and often don’t grow as large, which in turn has an adverse effect on the species and the environments that depend on them. These fish also compete with wild salmon for food sources and interbreed with them, causing further declines in wild stocks.
“Often the reason behind installing a hatchery is the simple reason that populations are declining, and we install them to stop extinction, maintain a population, or to keep up a treaty with a native tribe that requires a certain number of fish,” Ohms told MeatEater. “While they do help in maintaining fish populations, they are certainly not a long-term solution. Hatcheries cost a lot and hatchery salmon are just different from wild fish. They return at different times than wild populations, generally earlier, and at younger ages, which means that they’re smaller and are possibly not as nutrient-rich as the natural fish.”
Ohms’ work focuses on the evolution of salmon and their life history. She has modeled population dynamics of different species from Alaska and Oregon to Idaho, Washington, and California. Over the years, she has witnessed the decline of wild salmon populations and the worrying effects that it’s having on the environment. She believes that in order to save the fish and reverse the effects, we need to act now.
“It’s like the ship is sinking, and at the moment, we’re almost helpless to stop it,” Ohms told MeatEater. “I think we need as a culture to recognize that we’re sort of at a turning point and that we really need to light a fire under ourselves to take care of the big issues like dams, salmon harvest, and hatcheries if we want to save salmon. I think we need reform, and it needs to happen now. We’re in this window of time where we’re losing genetic diversity, and when your diversity is so low, the fish will get on a trajectory that makes extinction inevitable.”
Ohms and other experts believe that to save the salmon population, the focus needs to be on wild fish, which are better suited to reverse environmental decline as they have evolved over millions of years to do so. With a united front of communication between groups that are removing dams and improving salmon habitat to help wild fish numbers and those advocating for hatcheries and hatchery-raised fish as a subsidy to keep salmon fishing alive, we can perhaps find the ultimate solution.
“I think there are many small situations where hatcheries can be useful,” Ohms said. “When you have a salmon population on the brink, a hatchery can be a way to sustain them until the problem is fixed. However, where we go wrong with hatcheries in 99% of cases is that we use them to prop up a population entirely instead of fixing the problem. If we used hatcheries as a temporary solution until we fix A, B, and C, that would be one thing, but that’s almost never how we use hatcheries, and in their own way, they’re contributing to the problem of losing wild salmon.”
“What we need, I think, is for all these people to decide whether or not salmon are important enough to focus on,” Ohms said. “I mean, we’ve seen the complications that can arise from the Salmon River dams in Idaho. Yet, as a society, we all need to come together to make real changes before we start to see improvements.”
One of the biggest reasons that more emphasis isn’t being put into saving these wild fish populations is that it will take a lot of sacrifice and above all patience from the salmon-loving public to see any results.
“I think a big part of salmon declines is a lack of focus on all the threat factors that are encroaching on salmon,” Marston told MeatEater. “We really need to focus on all the things at once, like closing fisheries and not using hatcheries, and then watching the impacts these things have on wild fish. There’s been a big lack of coordination, especially when all the recovery actions take time. But it’s essential that we give the salmon the time needed for changes to take effect. The average chinook salmon takes four years to return, and it may take 12 years or more for these populations to completely rebound. Yet many Washington state hatchery practices shifted and increased the number of smolt they were stocking because they weren’t seeing immediate effects from fishing closures. It’s going to be really hard to make improvements if we're unable to immediately see the benefits.”
Making the LeapThe fact is that if we want to save wild salmon populations and, subsequently, the environment around them, we must act now and do whatever is necessary to help them along. It may mean helping to improve habitats and advocating for dam removal, and it also may mean that we have to give the fish a chance to recover by putting our salmon rods away for a while.
In the end, such sacrifices will be worth it because we will be helping the salmon of the Pacific Northwest continue to do what they have been doing since the beginning of time—returning from the sea and ensuring that the pulse of the world continues to beat.
Every whitetail hunter owns a few deer calls, but using the right ones at the right time is the only way to talk mature bucks into range. In this episode, Mark Kenyon and Tony Peterson explain how and when to use grunt tubes, rattle bags, and snort wheeze calls - and how to gauge a big buck's likelihood of committing to your calling. Presented by Moultrie.
On this week's show, Tony explains the importance of building in a ground-blind plan for your fall to ensure that you can hunt hot sign no matter where you find it.
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This week Reid and Dan chat with the Camouflage Cowboy himself, Drew Parker. The guys dive in head first talking about dad life (shocker) as Dan and Drew both have babies less than one month old. Reid shares how he scarred his daughter and how she is now terrified of dog poop. Drew gives us the guys his rundown of how he was still working in the radiology department at the hospital when his first #1 song for Jake Owen topped the charts and what his final shift felt like. The guys discuss fishing baits, deer hunting, and getting Drew prepped to bow hunt this 2024-25 season. The episode ends with a Travis Tritt Gravorite that will bring a grown man to his knees.
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Diehard waterfowlers almost always possess an unrealistic and overly rosy view of their duck dogs. To be fair, this isn’t a trait that afflicts only folks with a serious affinity toward mallards. Upland hunters, hound fanatics, and pretty much everyone who owns a working dog will hold a biased opinion of their canines.
In the case of duck hunters, this overly charitable view can lead to some dicey situations during the season. Certain duck dog behaviors can test the patience of the most tolerant waterfowlers, while other behaviors can put the dogs themselves in danger.
Most of these undesirable behaviors can be avoided through proper training, and they should be. This tends to start with steadiness, or a lack thereof.
Hold, Hold, Hold…A steady duck dog is a good duck dog. A dog that will jump from the blind (or the boat) into the drink at the slightest hint of someone shouldering a shotgun is not a good duck dog. Not only can this cause ducks to flare out of range and strain friendships in the process—it can be dangerous.
While it’s rare, a duck dog that is prone to jumping into the water at the wrong time is one that could get in front of a shotgun barrel. This only gets more likely if there is a cripple on the water that needs a quick dispatch.
If your Lab is prone to getting an early start on retrieves, you’re going to want to keep him tied up when you hunt. You’re also going to want to work on steadiness drills, a lot. We often condition retrievers to believe that they’ll get their release command within a few seconds of us tossing a dummy. This is fine, until it isn’t.
Dogs aren’t known for their patience, so they need to learn that they don’t get to go until we give them the okay. Make your dog wait during retrieving drills. Vary up the time between tossing a bumper and sending your dog. Watch its body language as it waits. You’ll see your dog start to relax when it learns that it will no longer get to bolt the second the bumper hits the grass or the water.
Then, pay really close attention during your hunts. No one knows your dog better than you. If you sense a break coming, leash him up or tie him up. It’s often a good idea to unload your shotgun and let your buddy do the shooting on the first couple hunts so that you can work your dog. This isn’t easy to do, but it’s how steady dogs are created.
You get bonus points here if you train from an actual blind or boat, and try as closely as possible to create a scenario that mirrors hunting. The more you can give them the been-there-done-that feeling, the less likely they are to totally lose their minds in the field.
It’s also worth noting that the most steady-during-training dogs can also become breakers during a hunt when another dog is in the mix. The competition for a retrieve can cause the best of dogs to forget their manners. If you haven’t trained for a two-dog duck hunting scenario, anticipate some attrition in steadiness.
Please Shut Up, PleaseThere are two reasons dogs whine. The first is that they learn it gets them some attention from us. The other, which is one that comes out in duck dogs, is an unconscious response to an exciting situation.
With the latter, it’s like they don’t know they are doing it. That makes correcting whining a tough proposition. You don’t want to fire up the e-collar when the dog has no idea why. That can create all kinds of problems, and it’s just not fair to the dog.
To even have a chance to mitigate whining, you have to try to take the edge off of the dog. Plenty of exercise and mental stimulation between hunts can help. This is also another reason to train like you hunt. If you can closely create training scenarios that have almost all of the excitement of an actual hunt, you can shave some of the pure excitement off the top.
This can help, but finding a cure for a vocal (but not barky) dog, is really tough. Some dogs just can’t handle it, which is part of the reason why British Labs have become far more popular. Across the pond, they aren’t allowed to make a peep during trials. This produces bloodlines that are more prone to staying quiet, even when the adrenaline is ramped up.
Do the best you can. Just understand that you might have the kind of dog where you need to hunt solo with them most of the time, so your duck hunting partners aren’t tempted to tie an anchor to your hound and toss them into the river.
For more waterfowling info, check out these articles: How to Kill Ducks at Midday, What You Need To Know As A New Duck Caller, and The Best Waterholes That Duck Hunters Ignore.
Waterfowl in the Klamath Basin have been hit with a one-two punch of avian botulism and bird flu. So far, at least 5,000 birds have been found dead as a result. The Klamath Basin National Wildlife Refuge Complex is comprised of six wildlife refuges across Southern Oregon and Northern California. The target of this recent disease outbreak is the Tule Lake Refuge, located in California, on the southern end of the refuge system.
The Klamath Basin Refuge Complex serves as a vital feeding and breeding ground for tens of thousands of birds in the Pacific Flyway. Over 75% of the region has been converted to agriculture, leaving these wetlands as a solace for migrating birds. But a key factor in the health and success of wetlands is ensuring that they do, in fact, remain wet—well, most of the time, that is. Having enough water in the area not only keeps birds happy and well-fed; it also mitigates the diseases that have so far killed thousands of waterfowl.
“Wetlands are designed to temporarily go dry, it’s actually beneficial to them in many ways,” Fish and Wildlife Service Biologist for the Klamath Basin Refuge Complex, John Vradenburg, told MeatEater for a previous article. “But the problem we see with this sustained drought in the Klamath, is the more they dry out, you lose the carbon storage ability of the wetlands, then subsidence of the highly organic material, then you lose that vegetative structure that made it so important to water birds originally.”
The Klamath Basin is no stranger to water issues. Two years ago, Teddy Roosevelt’s first National Wildlife Refuge went bone dry. Dam removal on the Klamath has been a hot topic in the news in attempts to restore struggling salmon and steelhead populations. And at the top of the watershed, the Upper Klamath Lake must maintain a certain level of water in order to ensure the survival of endangered c’waam and koptu suckers—species that are found only in the area and vitally important to Klamath tribes.
The core issue plaguing the region—and much of the rest of the country—is prolonged drought.
The impacts of this long-term water shortage came to an ugly head in 2020 when 60,000 ducks, geese, and shorebirds died from a botulism outbreak. According to the USGS, avian botulism is caused by the soil bacterium Clostridium botulinum, which causes paralysis and death in birds. Birds can become infected with botulism after ingesting decaying organic matter or live invertebrates that have been infected with the toxin.
Two types of botulism have been found in birds: Type C, which occurs during warmer months across the U.S., and Type E, which is found primarily in the Great Lakes. While these types of botulism have not been shown to impact humans, its effects are devastating on our feathered friends.
“Death by avian botulism is gruesome. Poisoned birds lose their ability to walk, then to control their wings. Unable to hold up their heads, poisoned ducks often drown in the water that should have given them life,” Jefferson Public Radio reported in 2020.
This recent outbreak started with the discovery of avian bird flu (H5N1) in a few hundred dead and dying eared grebes. Researchers determined that the culmination of decomposing bird carcasses in drying wetlands with shallow, warm waters created a perfect storm for botulism breeding grounds.
The devastation of 2020 was a learning lesson for managers of the refuge system, and they now know that the best way to deal with an outbreak like this is to stop it before it starts. Unfortunately, the cart is already rolling down the hill in this scenario. The best means of hitting the brakes? More water.
Waterfowl advocates like Ducks Unlimited, California Waterfowl Association, and Klamath Water Users Association (KWUA) have all called on the Bureau of Reclamation to divert water to the refuges immediately to minimize the damage of this botulism outbreak. Colder water temperatures could slow the growth and spread of the botulism bacterium, while more water availability would allow birds to disperse over a larger area—which would also help mitigate the spread of the bird flu.
Where would this water come from? The Upper Klamath Lake. Luckily, this last spring was a wet one. While there is typically more demand than availability of water in the lake this time of year, the level is one foot above the end-of-season threshold required by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s analysis. It’s crucial the water doesn’t go below the established threshold because it supports the endangered suckers in the lake, salmon in the rivers, crops in the field, and waterfowl in the wetlands. Every aspect of this region needs water, and it’s meticulously allocated to provide some semblance of balance. The amount of water needed to make an impact in the wetlands would lower the overall level by about an inch.
Like most wildlife management issues, there is no simple, short-term solution to this problem; water allocation amidst drought is a convoluted issue where fragile ecosystem needs must be balanced between agricultural demand and water availability.
But folks are actively seeking solutions. In fact, this last spring, the Bureau of Reclamation diverted additional water to the refuges to avoid creating unsafe conditions while dam removal on the Klamath River is underway. It resulted in “the highest and most diverse waterbird population we’ve had on Tule Lake in three or four decades,” according to Vradenburg.
Cooling seasonal temperatures should also help slow the progress of botulism, and the overall success of the wetlands this year indicates that populations won’t be seriously impacted.
“The wetlands are extremely productive right now, and they should be even better next year as water quality continues to improve,” Vradenburg said. “There’s good stuff happening along with the bad stuff.”
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On this episode Tyler Jones, & K.C. Smith,
talk about the early season preparation for the upcoming whitetail season. The break down scenarios other hunters may encounter in the woods and how to deal with it. In this special episode, they also break down their favorite pieces from First Lite. They break down their whitetail kits and talk about all their favorite pieces. Be sure to go check out the "Season Opener Sale" over at First Lite to get your early season needs.
Spot and Stalk Hog Hunting! Brian Arrows a Hog!
Why You're Not Successful Deer Hunting ( New Video live Now)
Our Arrow Set-Ups with Janis Putelis
Our Biggest Trail Camera Bucks Ever!
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia, with Clay Newcomb, Mark Kenyon, Jordan Budd, Brent Reaves, Maggie Hudlow, KC Smith, Tyler Jones, Tony Peterson, and Jordan Sillars.
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On this week's episode, Tony explains the process for keeping all dogs at a healthy weight throughout the year, even when activity levels fluctuate and caloric needs fluctuate.
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In this episode, Clay Newcomb shines a deeper light on the land acquisition for the Buffalo National River in 1972, including a rare glimpse of the woman who was the face of the resistance, none other than icon of the Buffalo River, Eva Barnes "Granny" Henderson. In an original recording, "Granny" describes life on the Buff'lo in her own words, including a historical-turned-modern conversation with her granddaughter, Jane Kilgore. The discussion goes on with accounts of pressure and intimidation tactics used on landowners to force them to vacate their property.
Misty Langdon of the Remnants Project and Dr. Brooks Blevins return and provide context on the surrounding events that transpired to keep the river from being dammed, while at the same time affecting so many lives.
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I’ve been driving through antelope country my whole life, often on the way to hunt other game. I’d see them out there, walking through the sea of grass, staring blankly into the distant horizon. And not just one, but hundreds. It almost seemed like they weren’t worth pursuing for fear of ease, as if I should just pass by to pursue more challenging game.
I figured they’d be there when I decided to give them a go. Just waiting on me. Those years of casual observance built an undeserving confidence in my ability to close the distance on them as a predator. But they’re a prey species perfectly made to survive in barrenness. They always seemed so nonchalant. Careless. Less than wary.
I’m a die-hard archery hunter—a little overconfident with a lot of will to make it happen.So when the opportunity to chase pronghorn antelope came up, I thought, “Why not?”
Have you ever been so loose for the big game or an important presentation that you went out there and got walloped without knowing what hit ya? That was me. It was all cut-ups and smiles as we drove to eastern New Mexico. The grass was tall and green for August, water holes were full, and everything from bug to bovine was in good shape from a rare wet summer.
As we heard the familiar vrrrrrrrrp of a well–used cattle guard, a beautiful, heart-shaped charcoal face buck greeted us not 90 yards from the two-track, tending his small harem. A perfect start to a presumably easy hunt…
I’m never hunting antelope with a bow again. They're impossible! Their eyes are too good, their senses too keen, the terrain too difficult, and the temperatures too hot. The stalks are bound for failure. The days are so long. It is an endless supply of worthy targets with an absurd probability of not hitting the mark. Days on end of the same exact scenario will drain your existence, boiling you down as a hunter. All that's left after a week is muscle memory and a drive to succeed.
Ok. Thinking about it way, I'll definitely be back next season.
Appropriate gear decisions improved an otherwise very difficult hunt. Good boots, appropriate layering, and some quality optics are key aspects for attempting to harvest a pronghorn with a bow. The Wick Hoody is the perfect mix of sun protection, camouflage, and heat management. It along with some other great gear are on sale right now for First Lite’s Season Opener Sale, click here to check it out.
Want to learn more about hunting antelope? Check out these articles: Bowhunting Pronghorn 101, A Guide to Hunting Pronghorn Antelope, and 5 Best Antelope Cartridges.
The third edition of our Campfire Stories audiobook series is out in the world. It’s got more of the close calls you’ve come to love, plus stories about amazing finds and revelations in the outdoors.
There’s a story about a helicopter crash, the tale of a hunter whose remains were lost for more than fifty years, an Ice Age archeological find, and more.
One of the stories in the collection came our way via a call to the First Lite store. It involves one of our jackets, some bad weather, and a whole lot of bad luck. We’re offering up the complete story as a free excerpt, so take a listen below.
Want to hear more? MeatEater’s Campfire Stories: Discoveries, Revelations & Near Misses—available now wherever audiobooks are sold.
Which method of mobile whitetail hunting is better: Tree Saddles or Tree Stands. They are both one of the most effective ways to stay concealed in the deer woods, but which tactic is best for you? In this episode, Mark and Tony break down the key differences with pros and cons to hunting from both saddles and hang-on stands. Presented by Moultrie
This week Reid and Dan chat with multi-hit songwriter and artist, Ray Fulcher. The guys reminisce on hunting with their dads as young kids and how those memories are ones that will last a lifetime. Ray dives in on what it's like being a landowner for the first time and tells the story of what he did to make sure he got rid of his trespassers for good. They dive in on Ray's journey to Nashville and how it went from sellin' cars to writing multi-platinum songs and playing stadiums. As always, the episode ends with his Gravorite and a special Luke Combs sing-along.
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On this week's episode, Tony explains how to avoid having average results by training yourself to think differently from most hunters.
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Today, August 20, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) released its 2024 Waterfowl Population Status Report. The report includes data from surveys and population estimation methods conducted by the USFWS, Canadian Wildlife Service (CWS), along with other state and provincial partners. In a massive conservation win, the results mark the first increase in the total number of breeding ducks surveyed since 2015.
The estimate for total breeding ducks in the traditional survey area was 34 million, a 5% increase from the 2023 estimate of 32.3 million and only 4% below the long-term average (since 1955).
Although it’s exciting to see an increase since last year, overall population levels remain below the long-term average. This reflects the lasting effects of multiple years of drought in the Prairie Pothole Region. Conserving habitats across diverse geographies has revealed its value, though, as breeding areas outside the prairies helped maintain or increase population levels for some species.
“This year’s report suggests that some duck populations had better production last year than expected, with good carryover to spring of this year,” Ducks Unlimited Chief Scientist Dr. Steve Adair said. “While estimates were down in the prairies, population levels were up in northern breeding regions. We heard reports of an early spring, with ducks migrating through when the prairies were still dry and likely overflying to the Boreal Forest. This is a pattern we’ve seen many times before, and it appears to have been the case again this year.”
Here’s a look at how the ten most abundant duck species showed up in the survey over the last two years:
Here’s how seven prominent duck species fared in the eastern survey area:
Although most of the species in the eastern survey saw an increase in numbers, mallards and wood ducks did see a slight decrease. Overall, however, the waterfowl and May pond numbers showed a positive increase in the survey.
The Importance of the Prairie Pothole RegionThe prairie pothole region has massive implications on waterfowl numbers. Why? Well, it’s known as the “Duck Factory” for a reason. Each year, the region supports more than half of the continent’s breeding ducks.
“The health of the Prairie Pothole Region is directly reflected in this annual report,” MeatEater’s Director of Conservation Ryan Callaghan said. “Keeping this region productive is tied directly to massive conservation policies like the Clean Water Act and the North American Wetlands Conservation Act. These acts are spearheaded by countless conservationists at the federal, state, and non-profit levels, who recognize and continue to fight degradation to this region such as habitat loss, drain tiling, and development.”
So what can you do to help ensure future habitat for healthy waterfowl numbers?
“Be sure to buy your duck stamps and understand where your ducks come from,” Cal said. Getting involved in boots-on-the-ground conservation efforts never hurt either.
In addition to habitat and native grassland loss, drought has plagued the region for the last few years. Luckily, the region saw more precipitation this spring than it has in a while.
“Although pond numbers fluctuated in some regions, rains that fell immediately prior to the survey boosted prairie pond numbers more than many anticipated,” Adair said. “Rains continued well after the surveys were conducted, bringing life-sustaining water to large portions of the prairies. While not fully reflected in the survey results, these improved wetland conditions should have benefitted late-nesting waterfowl, renesting, and brood survival.”
Survey Origins and Hunter ImplicationsThis survey began in 1947 and is recognized as the world's most thorough and accurate wildlife survey effort. Its primary purpose is to provide annual information on spring population size and trajectory for 19 North American duck species (or species groups), Canada geese, and swans and to evaluate prairie breeding habitat conditions by estimating the number of May ponds.
To collect this data, the USFWS and CWS send air and ground crews out every spring into the two-million-acre survey area, which stretches from Alaska’s Seward Peninsula to the shores of Newfoundland and south nearly to the Nebraska-South Dakota border. The Canadian Wildlife Service also operates three helicopter aircrews that survey portions of eastern Canada. For weeks, teams fly, drive, and hike survey routes across vast landscapes and a variety of waterfowl habitats to obtain data.
The data collected from the survey informs hunting regulations in the United States and Canada and provides vital information for researching relationships between waterfowl and their habitats—these are critical to effective conservation planning.
According to the companion Adaptive Harvest Management report released simultaneously with these survey results, the USFWS will again recommend a liberal duck season framework for all four flyways during the 2025–26 season. Additionally, duck hunters may have the opportunity for a three-pintail daily limit next year for the first time since 1997.
With the current estimated population of 4.6 million, the recommended regulation for early teal season in 2025 for the Central, Mississippi, and Atlantic flyways will now be a 9-day season with a 6-bird daily limit. “Production states” in the Central and Mississippi flyways that don’t select an early teal season will be offered 2 “bonus teal” during the first 9 days of the regular season. However, this recommendation doesn’t affect season lengths and bag limits for 2024. Always check your local and state regulations for details before you head out into the field.
To learn more about the Adaptive Harvest Management Report, check out the USFWS website.
To view the full 2024 Waterfowl Population Status Report, click here.
Featured images and charts via Ducks Unlimited.
This week Cal talks about phasing in and out, how e-tech could put too much pressure on the places we love, grizzly bears and the US Fish and Wildlife Service, wildlife crime, and so much more.
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Steven Rinella talks with Charles Whitman and John Stallone of HOWL, Ryan Callaghan, Maggie Hudlow, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Our new video series, Whitetail EDU with Mark and Tony; tune into our brand new, live-streamed podcast, ME Radio, Live!; Turks and Caicos walks its law back; two different correct pronunciations of “Roosevelt”; bipartisan support for the expansion of nuclear power; Chetiquette on how to deal with a nuisance turkey; a wolf saga in Wyoming and wanting to see ethical predator management; being a tree-hugging hippy redneck; how you can’t bring a harvested mountain lion from another state into California; the problem of ballot box biology; Sarah McLachlan’s hits; manipulative anti-hunter billboard campaigns; conservation vs. convenience; the Land Back Movement; coming from different angles but landing at the same conclusion; the difference between feral and wild horses; management practices and balance; the merits of salvage requirements; and more.
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From reptiles to rodents, we're talking about all of what could wind up on your supper table. Brent's sharing a story from his brother Tim's kitchen and telling about some friends of his up north who are making the most out of their trapline. Come on in, it's supper time on MeatEater's "This Country Life" podcast.
New England Naturals
Riley DeBow
New England Naturals Jake and Riley DeBow
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There are a lot of reasons bowhunters lose deer. Very few of those reasons stem from true equipment issues. Most of the time, it’s just us doing our jobs poorly because our brains can’t handle the moment of truth (or we rush through the blood-trailing process).
While the talk about broadhead failures has died down from the days when mechanicals really started to take off, you still hear about them just not doing their job. My role as an Equipment Editor for a bowhunting magazine was timed perfectly with the rise of broadheads with moving parts, so I got to try a lot of them out.
A few failed, for real. In fact, I watched my arrow bounce right off of the ribs of a doe one evening while hunting from the ground in Minnesota. When I picked my arrow up, the broadhead grooves were stuffed full of hair. It was wild.
I tried a lot of different broadheads in that time period of my life, and most performed as advertised. That’s when it started to dawn on me that we sometimes overstate the importance of broadhead choice when it comes to whitetail hunting.
The Tradeoff DebateThere are two factions of bowhunters when it comes to broadheads. The first wants the biggest holes they can get in their deer, which necessitates expandable with serious cutting diameters. This is nice for obvious reasons, but it comes in real handy if you pull your shot and hit a deer in the guts. Or if something happens where you accidentally hit too high, too low, or really anywhere marginal.
The other faction is terrified of a buck’s shoulder and highly suspect of any moving parts on the business end of their arrows. They want a bombproof fixed blade that will make it through bone and into the good stuff. They reason, correctly I might add, that they’ll kill a deer just fine with a gut shot as well, it just might take a bit longer. They also know they might not get horror-movie-gore level blood trails, but they don’t care. Reliable is good, and dead is, well, dead.
If there is a third category of broadhead loyalists, I’m in it. I want my broadheads to be constructed out of high-end materials, and I want them to fly really well. I honestly don’t care a whole lot whether they are mechanicals or fixed-blade heads. I want them to be durable, super sharp, and to hit where I aim.
How To Choose The Right Broadhead For You If you want durable (you do), then the easiest way to filter through broadheads is to spend up. I hate to use price in any advice, because immediately, people will push back on the idea that a $50 broadhead is any different than a $15 broadhead. While the argument could be made you’re paying up for a brand name associated with quality, the truth is that durability comes with better materials. Better materials allow for more durability, and they also allow for tighter tolerances.
Just like with match-grade rifle ammo, all of the arrows in your quiver need to fly the same way. The tighter the tolerances on your broadheads, the more likely this is to happen. I look at this like I look at the shotgun shells I buy for pheasants. Cheap target loads need not apply. For maybe $50 bucks a season, I have a bit of insurance on tough, late-season birds that do their best to burrow in the cattails if they don’t die quickly enough.
Broadheads are similar. There are a lot of ways to save money on bowhunting gear, but broadheads are not a category where you want to be a cheapskate. Skip the bottles of doe pee, forget the scent-eliminating sprays, do what you need to. Don’t go cheap on broadheads if you don’t have to.
The benefits are many and won’t amount to much of an extra spend on any given season. Plus, if you’ve ever had a cheapie fall apart or just not work the way it’s supposed to, you know how much you would have paid for a better option at that moment.
How To Test Broadheads YourselfFixed broadheads with replaceable blades, or those that can be hand-sharpened at home, are awesome because you can shoot them into targets and see how they fly. Some mechanicals allow you to lock down blades and practice with them as well. Seeing how well every arrow flies with a broadhead screwed in is an eye-opener, and an absolutely necessary pre-season step, in my opinion.
But that’s just part of the equation. You also want to take a long look at how they perform when you shoot deer. Are you getting two holes, no problem? Or are your arrows getting hung up in the chest cavity of normal-sized whitetails? How are your blood trails? The real performance of your setup is how they fly and how they go through deer. It’s that simple.
Pay attention to your broadhead’s performance. It’s easy to look at things in a rosie way if the deer died, but do a necropsy. Check out the broadhead’s blades after the shot. Pay attention to all aspects of performance. This will inform your choice in the future on whether to stick with what you have or branch out to something that might perform better for you.
For more bowhunting info, check out these articles: How to Develop a Reliable Pattern on Summertime Bucks, 6 States to Target Velvet Bucks, and Practice Like A Deer Hunter, Not A Target Shooter.
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On this episode Tyler Jones, & K.C. Smith,
talk over the phone about where K.C. is heading for a few days. The Element stumbled upon a good opportunity where big deer are found every year. They will be teaming up with Mark Kenyon this fall in hopes to shoot a midwest giant. Tyler and K.C. discuss what that will look like and how they are preparing for this hunt. With just a few weeks left until deer season kicks off in some places, it's a great time to get out, hang trail cameras and start taking inventory on the bucks you're after! Thanks for listening and be sure to check out our YouTube channel below.
K.C.'s Favorite Hunt From Last Year
Why You're Not Successful Deer Hunting ( New Video live Now)
Our Arrow Set-Ups with Janis Putelis
Our Biggest Trail Camera Bucks Ever!
Randall Williams guest hosts MeatEater Trivia, with Spencer Neuharth, Janis Putelis, Ryan Callaghan, Cory Calkins, Tressa Croaker, Reva Hansen, Logan Dove, and Alec Zimmer.
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This week on the Bear Grease Render, the BG Headquarters is taken over by Render crew members Josh "Landbridge" Spielmaker, Brent Reaves, Misty Newcomb, Bear Newcomb, and special guest River Newcomb, while host Clay Newcomb is gone in Alaska on a mountain goat hunt. Bear shows off his latest creation in his self-bow journey, Brent gives his opinion on goat's milk, and Misty talks about how River Newcomb got her name. Listen along as the crew discusses the first Buffalo River podcast and its impact on them.
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We’re thrilled to announce our newest addition to the MeatEater games universe: MeatEater Crossword Puzzles! If you’re a fan of MeatEater Trivia, the only game show where conservation always wins, then these puzzles are for you.
Every Wednesday morning, we’ll drop a new crossword right here on our website. It’s totally free, and you don’t even need an account to play (although by signing in, you’re able to save your work and finish on another device).
Each crossword puzzle has 20 clues, and the site will track your time and score. The topics are similar to what you get in MeatEater Trivia, with the first three themes being outdoors, national parks, and hunting. And no worries if you’re stumped by a clue: The assist button will reveal a single letter or whole answer, depending on how stuck you are.
You can play the first MeatEater Crossword Puzzle right now! The next one will be available in one week.
This week, Reid and Dan host multi-hit artist Chase Rice out in God's Country. Chase tells the story behind his latest Barrett Jackson purchase, and the reason he chose that truck. The guys dive in on Western hunting, backpacking, and Chase shares some great stories recapping his time elk hunting. Chase unpacks his new album and what he hopes his fans get from it, since it is a new sound for him. The episode ends with a "ballsy" hunting story and an episode Gravorite.
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On this week's show, Tony explains why he believes the first few days of the season are the best bet for arrowing a big buck, and how he goes about building a plan to do just that.
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Ducks Unlimited recently released a roundup of the 2024 results from state agency breeding waterfowl surveys. These data provide insights into the status of regional waterfowl habitats and populations in the Pacific and Mississippi Flyways.
While these state-led surveys are often overshadowed by the more prominent May Survey, or Waterfowl Breeding Population and Habitat Survey (WBPHS), they play a crucial role in informing waterfowl management decisions, particularly through adaptive harvest management (AHM) frameworks.
The 2024 state survey results include:
- California reported a breeding duck population of 374,000, marking a 25% decrease from 2023 and placing the numbers 30% below the long-term average (LTA). Mallard populations were down by 12% from last year.
- Washington reported a breeding duck population of 160,000, reflecting a 22% decrease from 2023. Mallard numbers were down 15% from last year.
- Oregon reported a breeding duck population of 303,000, a 53% increase from 2023. Mallards saw a modest 4% increase from last year.
- Wisconsin reported a breeding duck population of 502,000, a 4% decrease from 2023 but still 13% above the LTA. Mallard numbers dropped by 8%, while blue-winged teal and wood duck populations remained stable.
- Michigan reported a breeding duck population of 674,000, up 394% from 2023's record low. Mallards were estimated at 251,000, up 203% from 2023. Canada geese also saw a 29% increase.
- Minnesota reported a breeding duck population of 445,000 (including scaup), a 10% decrease from 2023. Mallard populations declined by 37%.
Each year, survey data from the WBPHS and these state surveys are carefully analyzed and used to inform AHM recommendations by state agencies and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), ensuring harvest frameworks align with the long-term health of waterfowl populations.
"This year’s state numbers present both challenges and reasons for optimism, but we’ll have a clearer picture later this month when the USFWS survey report is released,” said Ducks Unlimited Senior Waterfowl Scientist Dr. Mike Brasher. “In the meantime, we extend our gratitude to our state and provincial partners for their unwavering commitment to the conservation and management of these incredible birds, which for over a century have united us in a cause greater than ourselves.”
This year's state waterfowl survey results highlight progress and ongoing challenges in waterfowl populations, underscoring the need for sustained investments in population monitoring and habitat conservation. Ducks Unlimited continues to charge forward in wetland conservation in North America, recently announcing a milestone of delivering one million acres of conservation in a year. This includes long-term and permanent projects, such as conservation restorations and easements, and short-term or annual efforts, such as agricultural cover crop programs, as well as both new and revisited project sites.
You can read the full state survey roundup on Ducks Unlimited's website for a more detailed analysis.
Feature image via Chris Jennings | Ducks Unlimited.
Not long after Vice President Kamala Harris selected Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate, the Harris campaign released what they say is the “most iconic political hat in America.”
A certain red-hatted former president might contest that lofty claim, but the message behind the camo “Harris/Walz” headgear is clear: Tim Walz is a hunter, and he’s proud of it.
In this, Walz joins a long line of politicians who have leaned into their backgrounds as hunters to make themselves more appealing to that subset of American voters. “I’m just a regular guy like you,” they say, “and my hunter’s orange vest proves it.”
Problem is, a lot of them are full of crap. Walz has identified as a hunter and angler throughout his political career, and his last few years of social media posts indicate that he at least participates in the annual Governor’s pheasant and whitetail hunts. But not all politicians have done even this. From two-hour photo ops to gun control PR, our representatives in D.C. have used hunting for almost everything except as an opportunity to appreciate the natural world.
John Kerry, 2004In 2004, presidential hopeful John Kerry went goose hunting in Ohio. At least, that’s what he wanted voters to believe.
The urbane Massachusetts senator began his excursion by walking into a grocery store in the Buckeye State and asking, “Can I get me a hunting license here?”
Things went downhill from there.
The two-hour cornfield hunt was reportedly a tightly choreographed event, with Kerry’s hunting companions doing most of the shooting and bird-carrying. When the lifetime politician got some goose blood on his hand, he was careful to tuck it into his jacket before speaking with the two dozen invited reporters.
NBC News reported at the time that Kerry had hunted the previous year in Iowa, but that event was also a campaign photo op. He said elsewhere that he’s “shot birds off and on through my life” along with small game and deer, but he doesn’t appear to have mentioned his deep and abiding love of hunting after losing the 2004 presidential election.
Mitt Romney, 2007John Kerry isn’t the only milquetoast politician to stretch the truth in an effort to secure the hunt vote. In 2007, Utah Senator and former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney (what is it with Massachusetts politicians?) caught some flack for calling himself a lifelong hunter even though he’s never purchased a hunting license or owned a gun.
Romney made the remark at a campaign stop, which his team had to walk back the next day. They admitted that Romney had only been hunting twice in his life: as a teenager in Idaho and again in 2006 with GOP donors in Georgia. But rather than letting the story die, Romney came back the next day and contradicted his own campaign.
“The report that I only hunted twice is incorrect,” Romney said in a statement. “I've hunted small game numerous times, as a young man and as an adult. I'm by no means a big game hunter. I'm more Jed Clampett than Teddy Roosevelt.”
This is how Romney tried to get around the fact that he never bought a hunting license in any of the states he’s lived in. Michigan, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire did not require a license to hunt small game, so there wasn’t any way for his claims to be confirmed via public record.
“I've always been a rodent and rabbit hunter, small varmints, if you will,” he added. “I began when I was 15 or so and I have hunted those kinds of varmints since then. More than two times.”
Congratulations to everyone who’s been hunting three times. You can be a lifelong hunter and run for president.
The Clintons, 1995, 2008Bill and Hillary Clinton may not claim to be lifelong hunters, but that hasn’t stopped them from using the pastime to advance their own political agenda. In 2008, Hillary responded to a question about gun control with a previously unknown anecdote about shooting a banded duck in Arkansas.
“I've hunted. My father taught me how to hunt. I went duck hunting in Arkansas. I remember standing in that cold water, so cold, at first light. I was with a bunch of my friends, all men. The sun's up, the ducks are flying and they are playing a trick on me. They said, 'we're not going to shoot, you shoot.' They wanted to embarrass me. The pressure was on. So I shot, and I shot a banded duck and they were surprised as I was," Clinton said.
Just a few days previously, Hillary had leaned into her experience as a hunter to argue that criminal violence can be limited without infringing on gun rights. In this, she was taking a page from her husband’s playbook. In 1995, Bill went on a duck hunt in Arkansas to prove to sportsmen that the recent gun control bill passed by Congress would not limit opportunities in the field.
“We all shot them with weapons, I might add, that were not affected by the crime bill,” he told the gathered reporters. “I just want to make that point to all the sportsmen and women that are watching this.”
Bill comes across as more knowledgeable about hunting than some of his colleagues, but he, like many politicians, isn’t shy about using hunting to justify further restrictions on gun ownership.
Jesse Reising, 2022Most recently, a congressional candidate in Illinois found himself under the microscope during the 2022 midterms when he posted videos and images of himself toting a shotgun and wearing an orange vest.
Jesse Reising was running for Illinois’ 13th congressional district. His identity as a hunter wasn’t central to his campaign message, but he did include a brief shot of himself out in the field. Unfortunately for him, the intrepid journalists over at 5 On Your Side could smell a forgery from a mile away (or they got a tip from his opponent). They submitted a Freedom of Information Act request to the Illinois Department of Natural Resources, which confirmed, sure enough, Reising didn’t have a hunting license.
“We shot a shot that day,” Reising told 5 On Your Side. “We were out doing some pheasant hunting with the crew. I didn’t actually go out that day. But we got the…got the photos and then that’s what they are.”
Turns out, Reising hadn’t been hunting since he was a kid. He had sustained a serious neck injury in college, and he hasn’t been able to hold and fire a shotgun since then. When asked whether the ad portrays him in a false light, he responded, “No, I don't think so,” he said. “I grew up hunting.”
Illinois voters apparently didn’t agree. He lost his primary by 1.7%.
Hunting > PoliticsHere’s a hot tip for all the political animals out there: hunters can see a poser coming from a mile away. If you’re a genuine hunter, great. We need more of those in Washington.
But if not, don’t use our way of life—not to mention our natural resources—to garner rural support, push for gun control, or punch your ticket to the White House. As we’ve seen over the last twenty-odd years, it’s more likely to backfire than anything else.
*Feature image via Bossa Nova Strategies.
On this week's episode, Mark Kenyon and Tony Peterson break down the mysteries of mature buck travel. Understanding how big bucks cross openings, cruise through the timber, and relate to soft edges is information that can help any hunter level up his or her game in the whitetail woods. Presented by Moultrie.
This week Cal talks about RFK's bear trouble, implications of MPA expansion in California, famous wolves make bad business, and so much more.
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Steven Rinella talks with Mark Kenyon, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics discussed: Don’t perpetuate the misinformation spread; more of “Steve Reads Books So You Ain’t Got To”; can you really breed CWD-resistance into deer?; the importance of a healthy, balanced deer population on the hunting experience; more arguments for and against governor's tags and raffles; equal right vs. equal opportunity; grease; are governor's tags un-American?; what's actually better for the resource; no more auction allocation for tags in Arizona; Cal's mic drop; and a sneak peek story from our new Campfire Stories 3: Discoveries, Revelations & Near Misses.
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The news media, as of late, has been abuzz with well, a lot. One constant, however, seems to be talk of Project 2025. With its ominous-sounding name, whispered mentions of the deep state, and shadowy backers, it can almost feel like part of a Dan Brown novel come to life.
So, let's start with the basics.
What Exactly is Project 2025?To understand Project 2025, we need to start with the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank founded in 1973 to promote conservative policies and legislation. Starting in the 1980s with Ronald Reagan's first term, the Heritage Foundation began publishing its “Mandate for Leadership,” essentially a wish list of laws and legislative actions it hoped to have enacted during presidential terms.
The first edition was a sprawling, 3000-page document with over 2,000 suggestions on how to reshape the government toward its goals. It was instrumental in shaping the policies of the Reagan administration. Mandates like these are a fairly common practice among think tanks and advocacy groups designed to shape policy in America. For instance, The Society For Conservation Biology has continued to publish a document called “Governance Principles for Wildlife Conservation in the 21st Century.”
Over the years, several new editions of the Mandate have been published. In 2016, the 7th edition was published just after Donald Trump's election. The Heritage Foundation claims that 60% of their proposals were used in Trump’s administration in some way. In April 2023, the ninth edition, Mandate for Leadership 2025: The Conservative Promise, also known as Project 2025, was published. For reference, the entire document can be seen on their website here.
The Trump campaign recently disavowed the project and its director has stepped down. But it’s still worth diving into for what it might tell us about the future of the Republican public lands agenda.
Who is Involved with Project 2025In drafting Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation partnered with a vast array of other right-leaning think tank groups and cites on their author and contributor list a number of people who have been long at odds with public lands conservation.
What makes Project 2025 different than its predecessors, however, is that while those earlier mandates were more focused on specific policies, Project 2025 envisions a dramatic reshaping of how the machinations of our federal government work. Perhaps the most consequential of these goals is the plan to replace long-time agency staffers with people they believe to be loyal to the administration’s agenda.
According to the Project 2025 website: “our goal is to assemble an army of aligned, vetted, trained and prepared conservatives to go to work on day one to deconstruct the administrative state.” The “Personnel” section of their website offers a myriad of training courses as well as an application portal to be included in a roster of ideologically aligned hopefuls eager to work in the next conservative administration should this plan be put into effect.
At its heart, Project 2025 is a road map for politicizing even the most mundane of civil service positions within federal government agencies. Chris Marshall, a spokesperson for Accountable.US, expressed concern that this was a “concentration of power into the executive branch, and an erosion of the system of checks and balances.”
Project 2025 and Federal EmploymentThis is how we get to the potential impacts of Project 2025 on our public lands. Our public lands are held in trust and managed for us by various federal government agencies. These agencies are staffed by civil servant employees, clerks, biologists, scientists, foresters, and people working in other specialized trades and professions. Agencies like the Bureau of Land Management, US Forest Service, and US Fish and Wildlife Service have long been among the largest employers of resource professionals in the country.
In addition to concerns about politicizing these roles of scientists and staffers, there is a worry that this could send agencies into a tailspin after hemorrhaging workers and dissuading future resource professionals from pursuing careers in forestry or biology for fear of losing their jobs with changing administrations. These are positions designed to be life-long careers attained through merit, not jobs that change with whatever way the political breeze is blowing.
There is talk of a real risk of unforeseen consequences this could have on our resources, our taxpayers, and the people who work in these fields. Ryan Busse, the Democratic candidate for governor in Montana, says that if Project 2025 is brought to fruition, it will be “an unmitigated disaster for public lands and wildlife. Experienced career professionals, including many biologists and scientists, would be replaced with people who are loyal to a person instead of the resource.”
Project 2025 is divided into five major sections, with chapters in each dedicated to outlining The Heritage Foundation’s plans for restructuring government agencies, from the Department of Defense to the Federal Communications Commission and everything in between. The three chapters poised to have the most impact on public lands and conservation are those of the USDA, DOI, and EPA.
Department of the Interior ChapterThe chapter most concerning is chapter 16 regarding the Department of the Interior (DOI), authored by the notorious “sagebrush rebel” and former acting deputy director of the Bureau of Land Management, William Perry Pendley. Pendley has been a long-time advocate for the disinvestment of federal lands, and just last month, he published an op-ed pontificating on how we could solve the housing crisis by selling off our public lands.
However, explicit mention of these divestment and selloff plans seems conspicuously absent from the document. Instead, Pendley and The Heritage Foundation seem to focus on regulation, or more accurately, de-regulation in favor of resource extraction. Pendley himself admits to enlisting the help of oil and gas industry executives like Kathleen Sgamma, the president of Western Energy Alliance, to write the section pertaining to oil and gas extraction on public lands.
Pendley begins his chapter by laying out a list of grievances against the DOI before diving into his specific policy goals and agendas, some of which have merit. For instance, he talks of the need for wild horse and burro reforms, which has long been an uncomfortable topic but is something that needs to be addressed if we are serious about protecting habitat for native and vulnerable species in the arid west. Additionally, there is equally uncomfortable but necessary talk of some of the language around the Endangered Species Act (ESA) and what successful recovery looks like for species like the grizzly bear and grey wolf.
Grizzly bear delisting has been a bit of a political football over the last few years. It briefly was delisted in 2017 before the Supreme Court reversed that decision in 2018. Since then, the case continues to be made that both the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem and Northern Continental Divide Ecosystem populations should be delisted. Pendley leaves out any discussion of other grizzly bear recovery zones and simply calls for the delisting of the two places where they have arguably met or exceeded recovery goals.
Some of his ESA proposals are fairly surgical and precise, like the grizzly bear delisting. But, others seem needlessly broad, such as calling for a delisting of wolves across the continental United States. There is justification for pursuing delisting across several population segments of wolves, but a nationwide delisting is much harder to defend. He goes even further and risks throwing out years of collaborative, bipartisan work in favor of granting western states jurisdiction over greater sage grouse management. Sage grouse populations have long been hovering at concerning levels, and management has been a thorn in the side of some oil and gas industry lobbyists. Pendley demands that sage-grouse conservation should not “interfere with public access to public land and economic activity.”
Other policies, however, are fairly alarming and have raised hackles across the conservation sphere. Most of the policies are aimed at streamlining oil and gas development, from calling for expanding drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, fast-tracking lease approvals, reducing royalty fees and bonding requirements for leaseholders, and broadly increasing both on and offshore oil and gas lease sales. “This is a huge deregulatory handover of our public lands to the oil and gas industry.” Chris Marshall, at Accountable.US, said. “We are handing the keys to our public lands over to industry.”
Many of the people who have been tasked to write this document have already been influential in the management decisions made in Trump’s first term. Kathleen Sgamma and the Western Energy Alliance, for instance, were behind the bulk of the recommendations that made it into Trump’s policies regarding sage grouse management. In a letter to Trump during his first year in office, Sgamma wrote a letter claiming that the accepted, bipartisan sage grouse management plan would cost the oil and gas industry 9,000 jobs and up to $2.4 billion in revenue. It was later found out that Trump officials accepted 13 of the 15 proposals put forward in that letter.
Pendley aggressively and unsurprisingly goes after national monument designations, demanding a downgrade in size of designations, a review of all current monument decrees, and then calls for the Antiquities Act to be dismantled (p. 532), which caused Utah Governor Spencer Cox to bristle in a recent press conference. “I don’t support a complete repeal, I think the Antiquities Act has value,” Cox stated before expressing some concern with how it has been used recently.
In a section regarding the “30x30” plan, Pendley seeks to dismantle the entirety of the “America the Beautiful” initiative by calling for a new president to “vacate that order.” In addition to reviewing resource management plans to eliminate management decisions that “advance the 30x30 agenda,” Pendley also asks that the new president reinstate a Trump-era rule that requires state and local governments to approve of federal land acquisitions purchased using Land and Wildlife Conservation Fund dollars. If a private landowner were interested in selling or donating a property to the federal government as part of an LWCF project, both the governor and county officials would need to sign off in support of an otherwise private real estate transaction.
What may be most damning of all isn’t what is written in the plans for Project 2025, but what isn’t. “This plan only contains prescriptions for resource development and none for conservation,” Chris Seager, an advisor to Accountable.US said. “Not that extraction and conservation are incompatible, but it’s telling that there is nothing about conservation in here.” The plan explicitly aims to shift public lands management away from a system of balanced multiple uses, towards one of maximum yield with minimal oversight and low return to taxpayers.
Other items of concern in the section on the DOI include:
- Abandoning the withdrawals of lands from leasing in the Thompson Divide of the White River National Forest, Colorado; the 10-mile buffer around Chaco Cultural Historic National Park in New Mexico, and the Boundary Waters area in northern Minnesota (p. 532)
- Relocating the BLM headquarters to Grand Junction, Colorado (p. 524)
- Expand the controversial Willow Project in Alaska (p. 530)
- Rescind the Roadless Rule in Alaska’s Tongass National Forest (p. 531)
- Approve the Ambler road in Alaska’s Brooks Range (p. 530)
- Reinstating 2020 era Environmental Impact Statement regarding oil drilling on the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge (p. 530)
Most of the items concerning hunters and anglers fall within the chapter on the DOI, but the chapters on the USDA and EPA also carry proposals that stand to have an effect on our wild places.
Department of Agriculture ChapterThe chapter on the Department of Agriculture (USDA), written by Daren Bakst, the director of the Competitive Enterprise Group, focuses mainly on farm subsidies, SNAP benefits, and school lunch programs, but it does contain some elements affecting hunters and conservation. The US Forest Service, which falls under the umbrella of the USDA and is one of the largest land management agencies in the country, is only briefly mentioned. The section highlights the risks of wildfires and ties that to a need for increased timber harvests.
An alarming section in the chapter calls for the complete elimination of permanent federal conservation easements. This affects “our best conservationists, the landowners,” said Whitney Tawney, executive director of Montana Conservation Voters.
Large-scale landscape conservation measures like easements and acquisitions are some of the most important and effective ways of partnering with private landowners to protect wildlife habitats in rural and front-range communities. An “attack on protecting places has a larger effect than on just the land,” she said. As much as they protect landscapes, these easements allow farmers and ranchers to keep their lands in their family and in production as working farms or timberlands, and inserting state and local government control into these agreements introduces a level of uncertainty that is worrying.
Most striking of all, however, is where Bakst states the need to “champion the elimination of the Conservation Reserve Program.” The CRP is one of America’s longest-running and most successful private land conservation programs. The CRP is a cost-share and rental program where farmers are incentivized to take certain lands out of agricultural production and leave them as cover providing diverse, native habitat for wildlife and often access for hunters.
Bakst writes that farmers should “not be paid in such a sweeping way to not farm their land.” But in many agricultural areas, CRP lands provide the only islands of intact native habitat such as hedges, native grasses, and shade trees in an otherwise sea of mono-crop farmlands.
Environmental Protection Agency ChapterThe chapter pertaining to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was written by Mandy Gunasekera, Trump’s former chief of staff at the EPA. Gunasekera has previously cited resistance from career staff within the EPA and unpreparedness within the administration as major hurdles to enacting policy goals from Trump’s first term. She lays out a clear vision for creating what she calls a “conservative EPA” by establishing a framework for downsizing the agency she once led through eliminating the standalone Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assistance, “terminating newest hires in low-value programs, and removing or consolidating a number of offices under the EPA umbrella.” She also focuses on gutting regulations on air quality standards, greenhouse gas reporting, and pollutants.
Under the EPA, the Office of Water is tasked with safeguarding drinking water and maintaining oceans, watersheds, and aquatic ecosystems. It also implements the Clean Water Act and Safe Drinking Water Act. Gunasekera takes umbrage with the perceived infringements on private property rights under the CWA and Waters of the US rule.
Within her list of new policy proposals, she asks for a new WOTUS rule that includes a far narrower interpretation of what a “navigable” waterway is than what is currently accepted. It’s not clear if that narrower reading of the definition of “navigable” could affect stream access laws across the states. She then goes so far as to ask that the next president codify the definition in the Rapanos v. United States decision, which would eliminate protections for ephemeral water bodies such as prairie potholes.
She also aims to further weaken the CWA by not allowing the EPA to consider potential future threats to waterways when issuing discharge permits, not requiring discharge permits to be issued at all for discharge into non-navigable waters, as well as imposing a timeline for monitoring the discharge of point source pollution into waterways.
Trump’s Actual Agenda?While this list of goals and the intentions behind it are certainly concerning, there isn’t any guarantee that these policies will happen. This document serves as a wishlist for a cadre of think tanks and lobby groups, many of whom do enjoy a level of closeness with the former president. But these suggestions are not part of any official policy within the Trump campaign or the Republican party platform.
Trump has disassociated himself from Project 2025, writing on Truth Social, “I have not seen it, have no idea who is in charge of it, and, unlike our very well received Republican Platform, had nothing to do with it.”
However, a recent Washington Post article shows an image of the former president in a private jet with Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts. The jet was en route to a Heritage Foundation conference where Trump delivered the keynote address and said “they’re [the Heritage Foundation] going to lay the groundwork and detail plans for exactly what our movement will do."
The Washington Post also reported that Trump campaign staffers have become “furious” that the Heritage Foundation has continued to promote Project 2025, and the think tank is getting the message. The project’s director recently stepped down, and Heritage says they’re winding down their policy operations.
Trump strategist Chris LaCivita has said that people involved in the project will be barred from a second Trump administration.
Still, according to CNN, at least 140 people who have worked for the former president are involved, including six former cabinet secretaries. Given Trump’s history of deference on policy and staffing to groups like The Heritage Foundation and oil and gas interests, conservationists are understandably concerned that at least some of these people, and some of these policies, may find a home in a second Trump administration.
There are three things you can do better to be more consistently successful on public land. Number one, improve your e-scouting.
It might sound counterintuitive, but to be better at e-scouting, you have to put dirt under your boots. By combining e-scouting on the maps with seeing it in person, you’ll begin to correlate the map and the landscape with more ease and efficiency. Then, when you get back home and are scouting maps late at night in bed before you go to sleep on a weeknight, you'll know what to look for.
People often ask me about how to locate bedding and native food on maps. First, I go find it in person, and then I see what it looks like on the map. I’ll mark it, and once I get home, I can scour the map and find every habitat just like that and assume it's the same.
It’s surprising how often those things correlate and how often you can find a certain flora, pin it on the map, and go back in person later to confirm your assumption was correct. We often use this technique with persimmon groves, which works well in the early season all the way up to the rut.
You can do it with certain types of warm-season grass habitats or lowland wetland habitats. You can also correlate pretty accurately how tall these grasses are in the same general area. It can help you know if it is a suitable cover for a whitetail or if it's something that they’re going to want to stay out of during the daylight.
Another tip: I leave my topo lines on almost 100% of the time. It helps me to understand how big or wide a draw is or how many lines it takes to visually hide a deer from cars on the road or other human activity. You might also quickly figure out how steep that next hill is (which should give you an idea of how many guys are going to want to walk up it).
More commonly, topo lines help you infer ways that deer might travel around the easiest topography, so I always keep them on. It helps me a ton, whether I'm in the field or just on the maps at home. There are a million different reasons to have topo lines on while perusing the map.
Lastly, you have to spend as much time on the maps as possible if you want to get better at scouting and better at hunting. It's just like anything: if you want to get better at it, do it as often and as much as you can. If you want to get better at shooting your bow, you go out in the yard and shoot all summer. If you want to be a better football player in high school, you go out and practice all the time. Map scouting is no different. The more you do it, the better you’ll begin to understand correlations between the outside world and what’s displayed on the map, and the more success you’ll have this fall.
For the other two tips, watch the video below and then go have a blast finding deer!
Steven Rinella talks with Mark Kenyon, Tony Peterson, and Brent Reaves.
Topics discussed: First Lite's new reengineered whitetail system; Elevation, angles, leaning, positions; chasing specific deer; when you can’t chose the perfect tree; stalking the spot you wanna be in; number one reason why folks miss or wound deer; never shooting under and always missing high; target panic; the wait time to expiration; hot tips of before and after the shot; and more.
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People collect all sorts of things for all sorts of reasons. We know all about Brent's collection of knives, but this week, he's sharing a story about how he acquired a special shotgun for his gun collection, as well as telling stories of other people's collections. From old guns to loose change, we're talking Collections on this week's "This Country Life" podcast.
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Gun nuts love to argue, and one of our favorite arguments pits the traditional against the modern. Modernists think that newer is always better, whether it’s a polymer frame, carbon fiber barrel, or titanium suppressor. The traditionalists, on the other hand, won’t give up their wood and steel until Al Gore’s political ghost rises from the crypt and pries it from their cold, dead hands. (If you don’t get that reference, click here.)
Historically, Springfield Armory has leaned into the modern with their Model 2020 Waypoint and Redline bolt-action rifles. But not all hunters like a detachable box magazine or a competition-style stock. Some prefer more traditional lines, and that’s what they get with the newest addition to the Model 2020 stable: the Boundary.
The concept behind the Boundary, like that famous Old El Paso meme, is, “Why not both?” The Boundary combines the hinged floorplate and traditional sporter-style stock of your grandfather’s deer rifle with all-modern features and components. The result is a lighter, more streamlined version of the 2020 Waypoint that, Springfield hopes, will appeal to the Charlton Heston-types who wouldn’t be caught dead in the woods with anything that smacks of the newfangled.
Springfield just released the Springfield Model 2020 Boundary last week (bottom), several years after their original Model 2020 Waypoint (top).
Specs and Features (Test Model)* Caliber: 6.5 Creedmoor * Color: Rogue Camo * Barrel: 22" Carbon Fiber, 1:8, Tactical Grey Cerakote® H-227 * Receiver: Model 2020 Stainless Steel, Tactical Grey Cerakote® H-227 * Optic Mounting: Picatinny Mount, Rem 700 SA Pattern, 6-48 Screws * Bolt: Fluted 4140 Tool Steel, Nitride * Stock: AG Sportsman, Carbon Fiber, M-Lok®, QD Cups * Trigger: TriggerTech Adjustable, 2.5 - 5 lbs * Muzzle Device: SA Radial Brake, Tactical Grey Cerakote® H-227 * Magazines: 4-Round Internal * Weight: 6 lbs 15 oz * Length: 43" * MSRP: $2,599
Other chamberings: .308 Win., 6.5 PRC, .300 PRC, .300 Win. Mag., 7mm Rem. Mag. or 7mm PRC
First ImpressionsThe Boundary was just released last week, but I’ve had a sample for the last two months. This one is chambered in 6.5 Creedmoor and features a 22-inch carbon-wrapped barrel (you can save about $400 by opting for the steel fluted barrel).
I've had a blast putting the Boundary through its paces.
At just a hair under seven pounds, the Boundary isn't exactly a featherweight, which is surprising given its all-carbon features. Still, its heft absorbs recoil and makes it comfortable to shoot in most field positions. The 22-inch barrel is also a good length for a 6.5 Creedmoor. It’s long enough to squeeze about 2,700 fps out of the cartridge, but it isn’t so long that a suppressor makes it feel like shooting a broomstick.
The gun is fitted with Springfield’s proprietary Model 2020 action–the same one on the Waypoint and Redline. It features a 90-degree bolt throw, removable bolt head, dual locking lugs, and a fluted bolt. I prefer a shorter throw for quicker followup shots, but it’s a smooth action, and I haven’t had any trouble with loading or extraction in the months I’ve had it.
The Model 2020 action is Springfield's proprietary design.
Like many rifles these days, the action, picatinny rail, floorplate, and trigger are all patterned after the Remington 700. This allows you to swap out the stock or trigger with anything that fits a Remmy 700, which is convenient for sourcing aftermarket products.
Springfield bills the rifle as “custom-grade," which I believe is a reference to its premium components since "custom-grade" isn't a real category. But if I'm right, they aren't wrong. The BSF barrel on this rifle is $750, and the AG Sportsman stock is about $700. Springfield isn't paying these prices, of course, but if you were to build a similar rifle by yourself, those components are three-quarters the cost of the Boundary. Buyers can derive comfort from the fact that, if nothing else, Springfield isn't ripping them off.
Digging DeeperBut are those premium components worth the squeeze? That depends on who you ask, but there’s no use pretending that this is an inexpensive firearm. The older Model 2020 Waypoint has the same MSRP as the Boundary, and that rifle can be found on the street for right around $2,000. For most hunters, that’s the most they’ll ever spend on a rifle, and they want to be sure they’re getting their money’s worth.
The receiver is constructed from stainless steel and Cerakoted in H-227 Tactical Gray. Cerakote has long been the industry standard for protecting metal firearm parts from the elements, so hunters need not worry that the rifle’s most important part will succumb to rain, snow, and rust. Same goes for the fluted bolt, which is constructed from 4140 tool steel and finished with a nitride coating process.
The receiver is Cerakoted to protect against the elements.
Carbon fiber barrels have become fairly common, and there’s a reason. Wrapping a barrel in carbon fiber gives it the same profile as a bull barrel with a weight closer to that of a sporter barrel. This, theoretically, produces a more accurate rifle without having to carry a competition gun through the woods. The knock on carbon fiber barrels has always been that they don’t dissipate heat well, but the barrel on the Boundary mitigates against that in several ways.
First, it’s jacketed in a roll-wrapped carbon fiber sleeve and loaded under tension. According to Springfield, this means that 95 percent of the carbon fiber sleeve doesn’t contact the barrel, which provides cooling air gaps. In addition, the barrel is also fluted under the sleeve, which reduces weight and increases surface cooling area. Most hunters don’t worry about long shot strings in the field (unless they’re having a very, very bad day), but the Boundary’s barrel avoids some of the mistakes that previous generations of carbon fiber barrels have made.
Is carbon fiber worth the added cost?
The question, of course, is whether a carbon fiber barrel is worth an extra $400. That’s the only difference between the two models of 6.5 Creedmoor Boundary rifles, and the all-steel rifle only weighs two ounces more. For high-mountain backcountry hunters, two ounces on a rifle might be worth it; for others, not so much.
Carbon fiber barrels have their detractors, but I don’t know anyone who doesn’t like a carbon fiber stock. The Boundary uses a 100 percent carbon stock from AG Composites called the Sportsman. It has a 13.5-inch length of pull, and includes two quick-detach cups for mounting a sling along with a one-inch Pachmayr Decelerator Pad. That shooting pad isn’t necessary for a 6.5 Creedmoor but would definitely come in handy for hotter cartridges.
Most importantly, the stock saves weight. The AG Sportsman only weighs about 27 ounces, which makes it one of the lightest sporter-style stocks on the market. Aluminum pillars also keep shots on target, and AG Composites says that no bedding is required to achieve ½ MOA accuracy.
The stock reduces overall weight and offers a durable home for the receiver and action.
I also appreciate the addition of a TriggerTech Field trigger. The Field model is user-adjustable between 2.5 and 5 pounds, and the model I received clocked in at 3.5 pounds. The trigger is adjustable via a small Allen-wrench-style set screw located underneath the action, which can be accessed without removing the action from the stock.
The trigger has zero creep, takeup, or grittiness. It doesn’t move at all until it breaks, and the break is clean and consistent. TriggerTech’s Frictionless Release Technology paired with hardened 440C stainless steel internal components also helps resist corrosion in the field. The Field is the most budget-friendly of TriggerTech's offerings at about $130, but it's still a useful and effective product.
The Field is TriggerTech's base model, but it still offers excellent performance.
I’m personally ambivalent about the hinged floorplate magazine, but I understand why some hunters prefer this style. It’s less likely to get snagged on a branch and fall out than a detachable box mag, and it gives the rifle a cleaner, more streamlined appearance. Still, you can usually find a flush-fitting box mag, and I much prefer popping out a box magazine than popping open a hinged floorplate and hoping I catch all the falling cartridges. Box mags are also easier to load.
In either case, it’s unlikely that you’ll unintentionally disengage the magazine on the Boundary. The mag release is tucked inside the trigger guard and requires a good amount of force to depress. Springfield’s design is also pretty slick. Rather than have the magazine box be a separate piece, they integrated the box and bottom metal. This provides one universal bottom metal setup for short-action calibers, and keeps everything together if you decide to take it out.
Are you a fan of the hinged floorplate or removeable box magazine?
I do have one or two gripes. The radial muzzle brake successfully reduces recoil, but it’s loud as all getout. That’s true of most muzzle brakes, but radial brakes have a cost that directional brakes don’t: they blast dirt and debris into the air when shot from the prone position. The advantage of a radial brake is that it doesn’t have to be tuned–it has holes around the entire circumference, so it doesn’t matter where it ends up tightening down. But those holes that end up on the bottom cause a minor dust storm if you’re ever unfortunate enough to shoot the rifle from the ground in a dry environment.
The good news is that the brake can be removed easily, and the Boundary comes with a thread protector if you don’t have your own muzzle device or suppressor to use.
Not a big fan of these radial muzzle devices.
At the RangeI was excited to get the Boundary to the range and confirm Springfield’s accuracy guarantee, which remains one of the best in the business: 0.75 MOA, or about three-quarters of an inch at 100 yards. Of course, as with most accuracy guarantees, there’s some fine print, but Springfield doesn’t try to hide it. It’s listed on their website and in most marketing materials as, “for a three-shot group at 100 yards with quality match-grade factory ammunition, in the hands of a skilled shooter.”
That’s a lot of caveats. Most accuracy tests are conducted using five-shot groups. That number is somewhat arbitrary, but for good or ill, it’s become the standard by which rifles are compared. What’s more, most hunters don’t hunt with match-grade ammunition, so an accuracy guarantee with match ammo isn’t worth as much. And the definition of a “skilled shooter” is anyone’s guess.
A bad day at the range is better than a good day at the office.
Still, for a hunting rifle, a three-shot group from a cool barrel is a fine test. That’s as many shots as most hunters will take on a single animal. If a rifle can put three shots in a row in the same place, you can be sure it’ll perform well in the field.
With that in mind, I shot five, five-shot groups with each type of ammunition, but I also recorded the size of each group after the first three shots. As you can see, the fourth and fifth shots of most groups are where the group size started to expand.
A solid five-shot group from the Boundary with these 130-grain loads from Sig.
| Ammo | 140g Open Tip Match | 140g Accubond | 130g Controlled Expansion Tip | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Three-Shot | Five-Shot | Three-Shot | Five-Shot | Three-Shot | Five-Shot | | Small Group (in) | 0.4 | 0.9 | 0.5 | 0.9 | 0.5 | 0.7 | | Average Group (in) | 0.62 | 1.02 | 0.66 | 1.07 | 0.61 | 0.98 | | Average Velocity (fps) | 2690 | 2638 | 2743 |
(All groups were shot from 100 yards using an MDT CKYE-POD and rear bags. Velocities were recorded with a Garmin Xero C1 Pro Chronograph.)
I'd say that the Boundary holds up Springfield’s accuracy guarantee. Nearly every three-shot group clocked in under an inch, and 75% of them measured less than 0.75 inches. I saw these results whether I used match-grade or hunting ammunition, which is great news for anyone who takes this rifle into the field. Some hunting rigs are picky about their ammunition, but the Boundary handled everything I threw at it (or, more accurately, threw with it) about the same.
The Boundary would also be a great suppressor host.
The five-shot groups tended to be larger. While the gun is certainly capable of sub-MOA accuracy, I wouldn’t say it’s a three-quarter-inch gun using the five-shot group test. At this price point, that’s a knock on the Boundary. True sub-MOA guns–meaning, guns that shoot less than an inch on virtually every group–are less common than the gun forums would have you believe. Still, I’ve tested and reviewed hunting rigs that are lighter and cheaper than the Boundary and do a better job handling five consecutive shots in a row.
I didn’t test every type of 6.5 Creedmoor ammunition, of course. While the rifle shot all three ammo types well in a three-shot group test, the Boundary might shoot better five-shot groups with a different bullet weight or powder. If you pull the trigger on a Boundary, keep testing ammo until you find one that it shoots to your standards. Considering the quality of its parts, I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that it can improve upon my results.
The Boundary uses a simple two-position safety.
Whatever you think about the rifle’s accuracy, the gun is a pleasure to shoot. It doesn’t produce a great amount of felt recoil (even sans muzzle brake), it’s natural to shoulder and fire off-hand, and the trigger helps keep shots on target. I was able to ring six- and eight-inch steel plates at 400 yards from field shooting positions, which, for me, is an accurate real-world test of the rifle’s capabilities in the field.
Last ShotI often think about how spoiled we are for hunting rifle selection these days. It wasn’t that long ago that wood-stock bolt guns were the only game in town. Now, whether you’re a traditionalist or a modernist, you can find a gun that floats your boat and shoots the lights out, to boot. The Model 2020 Boundary offers plenty to love for both camps. It uses space-age components but fits them into a shape your grandfather would recognize. Whether it’s worth the cost is a personal decision, but if you’re in the market for a premium rifle, it’s at least worth a look.
Everyone is interested in the Boundary rifle, including roosters that Tractor Supply assured me were hens.
I would argue I've learned more from my mistakes than from my successes when it comes to elk hunting. In this episode, Jason gives his opinion on ten common mistakes that may be hindering success for you this fall. He touches on calling your way into elk, unwillingness to change the plan, calling to small as well as not spending enough time in the woods. Jason hopes you can learn from the mistakes he's made to shorten up the learning curve.
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This week on the show we’re wrapping up our series exploring the habits, mindsets, methods, and routines of the best deer hunters in the world. Up next is Andy May.
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October 1 is right around the corner, but if you’re itching to get back in the saddle (or stand), a few states offer the chance to target a velvet buck almost two months early. Sure, early archery openers have anything but typical whitetail conditions. But they do offer opportunities on deer that haven’t been pressured all season.
You’ll have to wade through the creepy crawly critters and brutal temps, but that’s a tradeoff for the lack of competition. Velvet seasons have grown in popularity, but they’re nothing like the crowds of November. If you can grind out the mosquitos and sweat fests, you have a legitimate shot at arrowing a fuzzy antlered buck.
Not every state has an early archery season. Some, like my home state of Mississippi, only offer brief (two- to three-day) seasons and limit tags to residents only on private land. Depending on their draw application dates, some of these destinations might be off your list this year. However, a few states offer OTC or quota tags, so make sure you do your homework before considering these five states for killing a velvet buck.
KentuckyThe Bluegrass state offers one of the earliest archery openers with affordable license and tag fees for non-resident hunters. For $335 ($150 license and $185 deer permit), you can harvest one buck and, depending on your zone, multiple does.
This year, the season kicks off September 7, 2024. Some bucks might have shed their velvet by this point, but you should still have a solid chance to kill a whitetail buck on opening day if you put in the work. The western part of the state probably gives you the best chance, given the numbers and habitat conditions, but make sure you prep for 90+ degree temps.
MontanaIf you’ve got your sights set west, Montana’s archery season opens the same day as Kentucky’s. Non-residents will have to submit for the lottery draw before April 1. If you are drawn, be prepared to spend $709 for your general deer hunting license and permit. That’s a steep price for a whitetail tag, but with most folks chasing bugles this time of year, you could find yourself hunting relatively unpressured whitetails in Big Sky country.
WyomingWyoming is known for its muleys, but it’s kind of a sleeper state for whitetail junkies. Unlike the Midwest or East, whitetails aren’t exactly at the top of the totem pole in Wyoming or most western states, for that matter. For this reason, access to public and even private hunting opportunities abound.
You’ll have to draw Wyoming, and their application deadline closes May 31. However, if you are successful, their archery season opens on September 1, which leaves you plenty of time to try and bag a western velvet buck. At around $400 for licenses and fees, the cost shouldn’t put too big of a dent in your hunting budget.
North DakotaIt’s no secret that North Dakota is an early-season destination for whitetail hunters. With almost four million acres of public lands and limited tags, there’s plenty of elbow room. While it’s a lottery draw for non-residents, the state allows hunters to purchase any remaining tags on a first-come-first-serve basis. This year, the season opens on August 30, and with license and permit fees, you can book yourself an out-of-state hunt for around $300.
South CarolinaThe Iodine State might not seem like a whitetail destination, but with a booming herd and unique lowland hunting opportunities, non-residents can hunt as early as Aug 15. However, these dates only apply to Zone 4 and on private land, so while the acreage might be limited, the deer numbers aren’t. South Carolina offers a variety of tag and license options that are all fairly affordable, and non-residents can even purchase up to four buck tags.
NebraskaNebraska is another state known for its early (September 1) archery season. The state offers OTC tags at a reasonable $335, and you’ll need to purchase the $25 habitat stamp as well. It doesn’t boast the public acreage of other states, but it does offer plenty of walk-in opportunities on private lands.
You’ll need to do your homework and e-scout ahead of time to have multiple options when you inevitably run into other hunters. As is the case with most western or prairie destinations, you’ll benefit from one of the best spotting scopes to cover all that open country.
The DrawSummer-like temps might not draw you to the deer stand like cool mornings in October. Then again, most folks would rather stay at home than sweat it out. And some early-season clothes, like FirstLite’s Yuma or Trace gear, can help you stay hidden and cool while you’re chasing velvet bucks.
For more information on targeting velvet bucks, check out these articles: The Best Setups for Killing a Velvet Buck, How to Care for Vension in Hot Weather, and How to Kill a Whitetail Buck on Opening Day.
Feature image via Matt Hansen.
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia, with Janis Putelis, Ryan Callaghan, Randall Williams, Cory Calkins, MacKenzie Elmquist, Maggie Smith, Anthony Finissi, and Matt Miller.
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On this week's show, Tony not only explains proper water introduction for young pups, but also some considerations for taking all ages and breeds of dogs swimming throughout the summer.
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On this week's show, Tony explains how the hierarchy in all deer herds influences whitetail behavior in ways that can help hunters better predict future deer movement.
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This week, Cal talks about the genetics behind Florida's appropriation of black bass, black bears causing car problems, otters causing angler friction, wildlife crime, and so much more.
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Steven Rinella talks with Chris Denny, Charlotte Crosmer, Ryan Callaghan, Tony Peterson, Randall Williams, Chester Floyd, Austin "Chilly Chleborad," Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics discussed: Please support Chris Denny's new album HERE; a terrible duck hunting accident; Steve’s favorite song, “Ride On” by Chris and his album, "If the Roses Don't Kill Us"; cautionary tales about drinking; why you shouldn't trade the first shotgun you ever bought yourself for a guitar; Koe Wetzel lickin’ his finger; Tony Peterson's note on why you need to stop believing you live in a big buck black hole; animal moms attacking Coloradans; the Makah tribe finally gets a waiver under the Marine Mammal Protection Act to exercise their treaty right to hunt grey whales again; how JT Van Zandt used to be Chris Denny’s manager; life is forgiving and time heals; the ace up his sleeve; too much hiking for the poodle; vulnerable talk about addiction and recovery; having masters degrees in chamber music and violin; a live performance; how to contribute to Chris' kickstarter campaign; and more.
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Last week, Senator Alex Padilla (D-Calif) and representatives Ryan Zinke (R-Mont.) and Don Beyer (D-Va.) introduced legislation in Congress to create a program addressing wildlife migration problems in the West. The Wildlife Movement Through Partnerships Act is essentially a legislative extension of work that’s already been happening for the last five years—via an order from the Secretary of Interior. But funding has been tenuous, and year-to-year, which the new bill seeks to remedy by creating a permanent program for wildlife migration research and initiatives.
Specifically, the bill would create a Wildlife Movement and Migration Corridor Program; fund state, federal, and tribal research; provide money for habitat and connectivity work; and continue migration-route mapping projects currently being conducted by the USGS. Over 50 organizations have already voiced their support, including the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, Boone & Crockett Club, Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation, and Backcountry Hunters & Anglers (BHA).
“Big game species such as pronghorn, elk, and mule deer rely on established movement and migration routes to access seasonal habitat. The Wildlife Movement Through Partnerships Act would build on successful and innovative partnerships between government agencies, private landowners, and conservation organizations to benefit these and other species,” Kaden McArthur of BHA said in a press release. “This legislation will further prioritize critical resources to conserve habitat and reduce obstacles to wildlife movement.”
The bill, however, is not an end-all solution to migration problems in the West. Mule deer and pronghorn populations are down across the board, but winter and summer range connectivity is only part of the problem. “We cannot forget the seasonal habitat—the summer range and the winter range—because whether you have connectivity or not, if those two seasonal ranges aren’t in good shape, aren’t productive for the animals in question, you’re not even going to have the animals to use those corridors,” said Casey Stemler, former advisor to the Department of Interior’s previous migration work.
In conjunction with the Wildlife Movement Through Partnerships Act, another bill was introduced in May, sponsored by congressmen Ryan Zinke (R-Mont) and Gabe Vasquez (D-N.M.), alongside senator Martin Heinrich (D-N.M). The legislation, called the Wildlife Corridors on Working Lands Act (“Working Lands Act”), is intended to incentivize western ranchers to make their rangelands more friendly to wildlife—both resident and migratory.
The bill (as with the Partnerships Act) has gained bipartisan support, as well as endorsements from a handful of conservation and sportsmen groups as well. If passed, it will provide payments for costs associated with planning, design, materials, equipment, installation, and maintenance of infrastructure on eligible grasslands enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Program, which was first established in 1985. It’s part of a recent push to establish more voluntary, locally-led, producer-driven conservation measures rather than forcing top-down solutions on ranchers.
Enrollment in the conservation programs proposed by the Working Lands Act will be entirely by choice but heavily incentivized with money. Similar measures have already been piloted in Wyoming, with the Migratory Big Game Initiative, with success. The pilot program protected 11,830 acres of land as open space for migrating wildlife through conservation easements (both short- and long-term) and helped ranchers modify fencing and conduct weed control on their properties.
In terms of physical modifications that aid migrating wildlife, a common example involves replacing the bottom strand of a barbed-wire fence with smooth wire along pronghorn migration routes. Pronghorn often slip under fences, rather than jumping them like elk or deer, so smooth bottom wires significantly ease the strain of migration, especially if the animals are crossing hundreds or thousands of fences. Modified H-braces—with less wire—is another modification, but like anything having to do with fencing these days, it isn’t cheap.
In addition to funding for fencing modification, the Working Lands Act also provides funding for research and development of “virtual fencing”—think invisible fencing for dogs, but applied to cattle. A perimeter is set using GPS and reception towers, which transmit to collars on the cattle. When a cow hits the perimeter, the collar beeps. If the cow doesn’t stop, it then receives a mild shock. Early tests of the technology show that it’s surprisingly effective.
The main benefit of virtual fencing, of course, is that it necessitates less physical fencing on the landscape (perimeter fences are still required, but virtual fencing can help eliminate interior fence lines). But there could be other benefits as well, under the right applications and scenarios. Research from Oregon State University has shown that virtual fencing can also help create fire breaks in vegetation by forcing cattle to graze in small, focused areas at strategic locations.
Overall, the new measures—from both bills—are set to benefit wildlife while making it easy for ranchers to implement conservation measures. It’s unclear whether either bill will be pushed through in this session, as they were both introduced so late, but the pressure is on from dozens of groups, lobbyists, and organizations.
Feature image via Wyoming Game and Fish Department.
To pattern deer is to create a world for them in which human intrusion is minimal and leaves them largely unbothered. Or, you can play the scarcity game while running a stealth scouting pattern. The former option is available to anyone who controls a decent chunk of land and can grow deer.
The latter is the option for the rest of the whitetail crowd.
Deer are most vulnerable when it comes to limited resources. This might be a lack of quality bedding cover, water, or as is often the case throughout the late summer—some type of highly desirable food source.
Understanding Scarcity in Groceries When I first set up out on a western river bottom years ago to glass whitetails, I could see a private alfalfa field and several hundred acres of public land. The amount of deer that exited the minimal riverside cover to walk straight toward that lush field was unreal. I’d never seen anything like it. The following morning, I watched the whole thing play out in reverse as bucks left the buffet to head back to the sage flats and patches of willows to bed.
It was a lesson in limited resources. Sure, the bucks would browse along their routes, but the movement was highly predictable. That behavior, when combined with an early September opener, created the most predictable hunting I’d ever seen. The pattern was obvious, and it held up due mostly to a lack of other options.
This has been my experience with hunting the big woods, as well, except for the obvious part. Where deer aren’t easy to see, they aren’t easy to pattern even if you run dozens of cameras. One single hayfield, or truly fresh clear-cut, can change that though. It just requires plenty of scouting.
In areas with plenty of ag and likely mast options, patterning a bachelor group is a different story. It might seem like identifying a scarce but highly desirable resource is a lost cause, but it’s not. You just have to think things through.
Where Are They, and Why? One of the farms I hunt on features a 100-acre field. It’s bordered on two sides by roads. One is a lightly used gravel road. The other is a well-traveled county road. While the whole field could be a deer draw, and probably is at night, during the daylight hours, it’s a different story. The biggest bucks almost always hang out near a waterway lined with cottonwoods. It’s also just a bit lower and more tucked away than much of the rest of the field.
While the food might not be scarce there, the places bucks can feed while not being visible are very limited. You might identify a loose pattern from some light scouting, but dialing an exact ambush spot takes some effort. You want to find the precise locations that are most appealing to deer and understand why that is (and what could put them off of their pattern).
Maybe the whole beanfield on your lease is secluded, and so there is no reason for bucks to concentrate in any one area to avoid being watched. What else might be in high demand? Shade, water, a low spot with green beans while the rest of the field yellows up?
One of the best spots I’ve ever found for patterning bucks was a private piece I had permission on for a few years in north-central Minnesota. It was a 40-acre parcel with a big cattail slough in the middle. On the north and south borders were hayfields. They would probably have had equal drawing power over the local bucks, but the southern field also featured a small pond 50 yards off the edge.
The bucks bedded all over that slough and fed all over that field, but they would almost always hit that pond first. In the morning, they’d hit it last. In this case, they had two limited food options, but only one of them had a small pond right next to it.
The beauty of a setup like that is that while the field might become less desirable if it gets cut or there’s just a bit too much hunting pressure around it, the pond is always going to be highly desirable.
When you’re trying to keep tabs on bucks this summer in the hopes of turning that pattern into a filled tag opening weekend, ask yourself what it would take to put those deer off. Ask yourself if there is something else, a fence crossing, a section of field edge with white oaks along the edge, some water source, that would keep them consistent even if destination food source changed. Those details, the extra spot-on-spot thinking, is what kills good bucks.
Somewhat Consistent Is Good EnoughAs someone who has more shoulder mounts on his walls from September than November, it has become clear to me over the years that it is very rare to get on a perfect big buck pattern. Even those western riverbottom deer will travel slightly differently given the conditions, and whatever influence from predators they encounter.
In this case, don’t let perfect be the enemy of good enough. If you have a few target bucks hitting the corner of the field three nights a week, you’re onto something. If your trail cameras show some good deer traveling a ridge toward a fresh clear-cut every few days, you’re onto something.
The biggest mistake a lot of folks make when trying to pattern summer bucks and kill those deer early is not hunting because their intel shows inconsistent movement. Deer travel is an inexact science. If you put in the requisite work to tease out a pattern built around some type of scarcity, get ready to hunt even if you believe it’s a coin flip on whether he’ll show. Those odds are a hell of a lot better than you’re going to get at almost any other part of the season.
Plus, when you figure out how to hunt something rare that the deer really want, your target buck might not show–but his big brother might.
For more information on summer scouting, check out these articles: 5 Summer Lies Deer Hunters Tell Themselves, 3 Locations You Need To Put Trail Cameras This Summer, and 5 Ways To Prep For Deer Season This Summer.
Welcome to our brand new podcast, MeatEater Kids! It's a fun, educational, and engaging podcast for all of you outdoor kids. Learn about science and history from Steve's "Why It's the Way It Is" segment and impress your friends with your newfound knowledge, develop your ear for animal vocalizations with our "Guess that Critter" segment brought to you by Katie Rinella, and play long during "Kids Trivia" with host Spencer Neuharth.
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A recent visit with new friends has shown Brent that some of the old ways are alive and well. There's still some good country living taking place and families with enough desire can make it just fine living close to the land. From catfishing to milking goats, this episode has something for everyone. It's time for MeatEater's "This Country Life" podcast.
Riverstead YouTube: https://youtu.be/4BSdGDdrqSc?si=7X-5yCuAmEpqtq6q
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I always get a good chuckle when the media describes the police as confiscating a criminal’s “stockpile” of ammunition. Usually, that means said criminal had a few boxes squirreled away in his glove box or basement drawer, but “stockpile” sounds better in a headline, and we journalists are nothing if not creative.
After the pandemic-fueled ammo shortages of the past few years, law-abiding gun owners know that having some ammunition on hand for the dry times isn’t a sign of paranoia or sociopathy. However you define “stockpile,” it’s smart to maintain a good supply of ammo–whether you hunt, shoot competitively, or just enjoy a day at the range with friends.
The problem is, ammunition has an expiration date. Its metallic and chemical components break down over time, and that degradation can render the ammunition useless–or, more concerning, dangerous.
Whether you have 50 or 5,000 rounds stowed away for a rainy day, how do you make sure they’ll last long enough to be used when you need them? Keep reading to find out.
Heat, Humidity, and YouTo help me answer this question, I reached out to Sean McGee, the Vice President of Operations for Sig Sauer’s ammunition department. McGee said that under ideal conditions, ammunition can last as long as 20 years. Unfortunately, many gun owners fail to keep that ammo in those ideal conditions.
First, McGee encourages gun owners to keep ammo in its original packaging. It can be more space-efficient to dump loose rounds in an ammo can, but that destroys the information about the lot and date of manufacture. Even if you store ammunition in a climate-controlled environment, you won’t know when 20 years are up if you don’t know when this or that round was manufactured. (It’s also worth noting that the date of manufacture is different from the date of purchase.)
According to McGee, the most common mistake gun owners make is storing ammunition in hot or humid conditions. Heat and humidity are two of the biggest threats to well-functioning ammo, so it’s important to keep it in a cool, dry place.
“Powder has a limited number of high heat cycles that it can endure before chemical decomposition begins,” he explained. “Every exposure over 120° F has a cumulative effect and accelerates chemical decomposition of powder. If you have a habit of throwing a box of ammo in the front window of your pickup, replace it every year.”
Cars can reach 120° after just 40 minutes on an 84° day, according to the National Weather Service. If you keep a loaded firearm in your car, you should replace the rounds in those magazines at least once a year.
Attics are also a bad place to store ammo. Depending on where you live, attics can easily heat up beyond 120°, and unventilated attics can hit 170°. Even if you store your ammunition in sealed containers, those rounds will still get too hot if they’re left in these environments.
Humidity can impact virtually every ammunition component except the bullet.
“Humidity causes surface oxidation, which over enough time can compromise case integrity,” McGee said. “Long-term exposure to high humidity can also cause deterioration of primer and powder performance.”
You know you’re storing ammunition in a too-humid environment if you start to see green oxidation on the case. Also called verdigris, this is the same process that causes rust on iron. It happens when the brass case is exposed to an oxidation agent, usually the oxygen in water.
It could also be due to exposure to chemical agents. McGee discourages gun owners from storing ammunition in the same container as bore cleaners and other cleaning agents or anything that contains or releases ammonia.
“Exposure to ammonia is a killer for ammunition. Never allow cleaning agents or animals near stored ammunition,” he said.
A little green on a case doesn’t mean the ammo is worthless or dangerous, and it can be polished off if it bothers you. However, excessive green oxidation is “always a bad sign,” McGee said. It can indicate a deterioration of the case, which can be very dangerous.
“Case separation or splitting, unpredictable pressure, hang-fire, and squibs can all occur. Each one of those failures can lead to dangerous situations,” McGee said.
If in doubt, the safest bet is to get rid of the ammo by taking it to an approved disposal site. In many towns and cities, this is the local police station, but some landfills, gun stores, and gun ranges also offer ammunition disposal services. Searching “ammunition disposal” and then the name of your town and state on the Google machine should send you in the right direction.
Storage SolutionsOf course, no one wants to throw away ammunition, especially at these prices. The best ammunition storage solution is also the simplest: keep it in its original packaging and in a cool, dry place.
For most of us, that means inside the house. Central air conditioning systems keep homes cool and dry, which means ammo can be stored in boxes in a closet. If you’re concerned about security, those boxes can be stacked in a locked cabinet or safe.
If you (or your significant other) would prefer not to store ammo inside, the solution gets a bit more complicated. Garages, workshops, and basements are common places to store ammo, but you’ll need to jump through more hoops to make sure it stays relatively cool and dry.
How hot the ammo gets depends on where you live. Most regions in the U.S. don’t reach 120° outside, but a poorly ventilated shed or garage can get nearly as hot as an attic. If you’re unsure, use a thermometer to check the temperature of wherever you want to store ammo on a hot day.
Humidity also depends on where you live, but you can do more to mitigate its impact. McGee recommends military ammo cans for ammunition storage in part because they offer protection against humidity.
“Military ammo cans have been time proven and tested and offer excellent protection if the integrity of the can and seal are good,” he said.
As an added precaution, you can add silica gel desiccant packs or rechargeable mini dehumidifiers. Combined with a good seal, these will ensure that even if the cartridges get a little warm, they’ll stay dry (just be sure to replace the desiccant packs about every year, depending on how humid the environment is).
Last ShotAmmunition, much like firearms, is an investment: not necessarily a financial investment, but an investment in convenience, camaraderie, and enjoyment.
Having your favorite hunting rounds on hand means you won’t have to scramble to find them before next hunting season rolls around. Collecting handgun ammunition lets you invite new gun owners to the range without making them purchase their own ammo, and having plenty of practice ammo means you can keep shooting during the next shortage (there’s a presidential election coming up, after all).
The point is, you don’t have to be a wild-eyed prepper to keep a supply of ammunition in your home, basement, or garage–and keep it in good working order. If you like to hunt or shoot, it’s really just common sense.
This week on the show we’re continuing our new series exploring the habits, mindsets, methods, and routines of the best deer hunters in the world. Up next is Tony Peterson.
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This week Cal talks with Rex Martensen of E-plus, the New Mexico private land public access and landowner habitat incentive program. On this episode we get the program perspective from Rex Martensen, retired program director at NMDFG and current Outfitter at Love of the Hunt Outfitters.
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In this week's bonus episode, Reid and Dan dive deep into southern whitetail hunting and where they're prepping for their 2024-25 deer season. They take on the hot takes of crossbow hunting, Bruce Springsteen's "Born To Run" album, and how acorns are the ultimate deer attractant. They also go into how kid birthday parties have gotten out of control, the current state of the music industry, and what Olympic sport they think they could win gold at.
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31 days until September! Are you ready? Want to learn how to become a more proficient elk caller? In this episode, Dirk dives deep into making elk vocalizations. He starts with fundamental sounds, then shifts into turning those sounds into cow calls and bugles.
Link to see videos of Dirk making these calls: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLmts0qLfo7ZzXMW-ssBUr7gful9S6cT1A&si=-Z4Eaf7-cOROFhhI
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This sandwich is inspired by “coronation chicken,” a dish served at Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation luncheon in 1953. This simple salad of diced poultry and creamy curry sauce is still popular in the United Kingdom. So, when I traveled to London in spring 2023 to see King Charles’s coronation, I had to have one. I bought the sandwich to-go at Waitrose to fortify myself while standing in the rain for 10 hours at the Mall. The sandwich was filling and delicious. For a chicken salad, the touch of curry was unique.
This recipe works well with wild turkey, as long as you brine the turkey first to help tenderize and keep it moist while roasting. Some recipes include sultanas or golden raisins, but I find they make the salad too sweet—the chutney is enough. Don’t skip the almonds, though, which provide crunch.
The amount of brine below is enough for an entire wild turkey breast, in case you want to maximize your time. Save enough meat to enjoy this salad the next day, and eat the remaining right away for dinner.
When I started hunting in middle school, I was lucky enough to cut my teeth on classic deer rifles. On Saturday mornings during deer-dog season, my grandfather and dad would load me up, and we’d head to their camp and wait for the dog handlers to show up. I have distinct memories of my grandfather’s Toyota pickup and the floorboard of his truck, which always had a pile of gravel, Gatorade bottles filled with wads of chew, chipped arrowheads, and his Marlin 336 wedged between the passenger seat and center console.
Of course, he wasn’t the only one. Other folks at camp toted similar rifles like Winchester ‘94s, the reliably-unreliable Remington 742s, and my dad’s personal favorite (which he still carries), a Remington 760 in .35 Rem. So, I’ve always had an affinity for big woods rifles, especially lever actions.
However, it wasn’t until I went to college and started working in a gun store that I discovered the Savage M99. It would be another three years after that before I laid my hands on one. As soon as I did, it only took about ten seconds for me to decide that the money I was saving to buy a pawned Honda Shadow would be better spent on a rifle. After all, I’d save money and probably my life.
Since I bought that M99 in .308 Win., I’ve owned or killed deer with some of the best lever-action hunting rifles like the Marlin 336, Winchester ’94s, and the highly utilitarian Marlin 1895. While I like them all, none of them top the M99. Yes, the Savage 99 reigns over your Winchester ’94 and its rattling action. It’s also superior to the Marlin 336 (JM or otherwise), though I would never say this in front of mine.
Backstory and DesignThe Savage Model 1899, named after the year of its inception and eventually shortened to M99 in 1921, was a highly innovative hunting rifle for the turn of the twentieth century. Unlike its contemporaries, the 99’s rotary-style magazine allowed for spitzer-style bullets, so it wasn’t limited to flat nose cartridges like the tube-fed Winchesters or Marlins. It also sported an internal hammer, cocking indicator, and brass round counter on the side of the receiver. The M99 was no photon blaster, but it was lightyears ahead of the competition.
Internally, the 99’s lever connects to the breech block that locks the action as the lever is closed. This solid action allowed for high-pressured cartridges. Rather than a typical “brush gun,” the Savage 99’s design made it a lever action capable of then impressive ballistic feats.
Cartridge OfferingsWhile the 99 was initially introduced in .303 Savage and .30-30 Win., Savage eventually rolled out more cartridge offerings like the .250-3000 and .300 Savage. While the .250-3000 (.250 Savage) and .300 Savage were the most popular cartridge offerings during their time, the rise of the .308 Win eventually killed the .300 Savage, and other modern cartridges like the .243 Win., 7mm-08 Rem., and even the .284 Win. took the spotlight among others.
Heck of A RunAlmost a century later, Savage discontinued the M99 due to company struggles and increased costs to make the rifle. But that wasn’t before Savage produced over a million of their famed lever actions in various model numbers, renditions, and cartridge offerings.
For instance, if you were to stumble across one in a pawn shop today, it might be a carbine model with a straight stock, or it could be a sporter with a pistol grip. Savage made takedown models of the M99, one of which includes a .410 barrel. Earlier models don’t have scope mounts. Later ones do. The same goes for the traditional lever locking safeties and the later version, which featured a tang safety. Savage even produced a run of M99s that had detachable box magazines as a way to reduce costs. There are so many iterations of this rifle available that you’d have a tough time coming across two that were exactly the same.
My boss at the time gave me a steal on that rifle. Now, you’ll likely pay north of a grand for a M99 depending on the condition and model. Though, the $800 range seems to be the average. For most folks, that’s a lot of cash to spend on a rifle that begs to be carried in the woods.
ImmortalizationYou can’t buy a new M99 like you can the Ruger-made Marlin 336, but there’s something about the M99 being discontinued that adds to its appeal. I make it a point to still-hunt with my M99 at least once every season. It’s a blast to carry and shoot, and I still can’t bring myself to swap the Williams’ peep sight for a scope.
I’ll admit that nostalgia plays a huge role in my love for the Savage 99. But that doesn’t change the fact that its century-old design remains relevant and effective today. I wouldn’t bet on the M99 making a comeback, but as long as there are used ones floating around, it isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
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On this episode Tyler Jones, & K.C. Smith,
Are joined by Michael Stoll and Nick Gonzalez.They go over the new whitetail system out now at first lite> they talk new features, what they like, and what they don't. They also talk about the meet up on Monday with Jesse Griffiths at Archery Country in Austin. To round the episode out with a quick Q&A is the perfect way bro get you Pumped for deer season.
K.C.'s Favorite Hunt From Last Year
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Our Biggest Trail Camera Bucks Ever!
In this episode of the Bear Grease Render, Clay and the Render crew members Brent Reaves, Bear Newcomb, and Josh "Landbridge" Spielmaker are joined in the BG Global Headquarters by the man, the myth, the legend, and the featured guest of the last three Bear Grease podcasts, Russ Arthur. Russ also brings along his 9-year-old grandson Kash to share some of his stories. The conversation gets lively as they discuss bobcats, self bows, disabled box turtles, outlaws, turkey hunting, and the monster buck that got away. Russ and Brent talk about the "good old days" of undercover operations.
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia, with Janis Putelis, Randall Williams, Max Barta, Corinne Schneider, Cory Calkins, Matt McCormick, Brady Davis, and Nate Mason.
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Four Florida men have been arrested and charged for defrauding hunters looking to kill Osceola turkeys.
Larry William Collins, David Preston Mills, Paul Neil Beckham and Vernon Robert Flowers were charged with multiple felonies, including organized fraud, conspiracy to commit organized fraud, cheating and the unlawful use of a two-way communication device, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.
“Collins knowingly and intentionally represented his captive-raised turkeys as Osceola turkeys for unsuspecting hunters to pay large sums of money to hunt the Florida Osceola wild turkey,” said Lt. Col. Randy Bowlin, FWC Deputy Director of Law Enforcement over North Operations and Investigations/Intelligence.
Investigators say these four fellas raised birds to look like wild Osceola turkeys and then tricked unsuspecting clients into thinking they were hunting the real deal. They defrauded 10 clients out of a total of $25,362 from March 2020 through March 2022, including one client who paid for a hunt with “$2,000 in bartered dental work,” according to an affidavit obtained by MeatEater.
Collins operated the Razzor Ranch Blanket Hunting Preserve in Hardee County, and Mills managed a game farm in Charlotte County. Mills bred the fake Osceola turkeys, and Mills and Beckham acted as guides.
Because no story like this would be complete without a shady taxidermist, Flowers mounted the fraudulent turkeys as the owner of Skins and Scales Taxidermy. Collins completed the laundry cycle by receiving a 10% kickback from Flowers for referring the taxidermy business.
Their troubles began when one of their clients took his bird to a different taxidermist. That taxidermist noticed that the color of the bird was not what he normally observed for an Osceola. The bird was also abnormally large and with short legs like a domestic turkey, and the feet were large and deformed like a domestic breed. When he cut the bird open, he noticed that the bird was much fattier than a normal wild turkey.
These images from the taxidermist show the differences between a wild Osceola (top) and the captive-raised domestic fraudulent turkey (bottom) that was brought in, including cream-colored terminal bands and tail covers as well as a large body and neck with excess fatty tissue on the breast.
The client complained to the FWC, and the agency launched an investigation. Law enforcement officers sent the bird to a DNA lab, which determined that the bird was a genetic mix between a domestic turkey and a bronze turkey (another type of domestic turkey).
Razzor Ranch Blanket Hunting Preserve has scrubbed any mention of Osceola turkeys from its website, but a little Internet sleuthing on the Wayback Machine reveals that, sure enough, the website used to advertise Osceola turkey hunts. They had a section on the “Turkey Grand Slam Quest in Florida” and called Osceola’s “the most coveted and sought after game bird species in Florida and around the world.”
For non-turkey hunters, this might sound like much ado about nothing. Passing off pen-raised birds as wild birds is obviously sketchy (and illegal in Florida in some instances), but who cares what subspecies of turkey they were?
One of the ultimate goals of most hard-core North American turkey hunters is to complete a Grand Slam. This is when a hunter harvests all four subspecies of turkeys that live in the U.S. These are the Eastern, the Rio Grande, the Merriam’s, and the Osceola, also called the Florida wild turkey.
Osceola turkeys only live in Florida, and so they’re one of the toughest subspecies to get. You can see how hunters chasing a Grand Slam would be willing to lay down some cash for a chance to get one of these Florida birds, and maybe overlook some discrepancies with the way the “hunt” went down or what the birds looked like.
You can also see how upset they’d be to learn that an outfitter played on their desire to achieve a Grand Slam and that their work hunting the birds was for naught. Talk about adding insult to injury.
David Mills poses with a client and a “faux-Osceola.”
Osceola turkeys look like Easterns, but they’re smaller and darker in color and have wider black bars on the wing feathers. However, those distinctions can be difficult to notice, and that’s especially true if these birds were raised to look like Osceolas and the clients are unfamiliar with an Osceola’s morphology.
Razzor Ranch claims on its website that as a licensed hunting preserve, it is legal for them to release captive-reared game birds to restock the area for the season. However, according to an affidavit obtained by MeatEater, Collins was told by an FWC representative that, “A captive reared turkey, whether native to the State or not, with domestic turkey lineage is not considered a game bird.”
“This fraudulent scheme not only deceived hunters but also exploited a revered species of Florida’s wildlife,” said Bowlin. “We want public, private, and tribal landowners to know that we are working diligently to ensure that captive raised, nonwild turkeys will not be released near their lands. Hunters can be reassured that the opportunity to hunt a wild Osceola turkey will remain, and legitimate outfitters will not have competition from unethical and fraudulent turkey guide services or outfitters.”
The charges filed against the defendants are as follows:
- Larry William Collins (DOB: 12/8/1965) of Punta Gorda: Organized Fraud, Conspiracy to Commit Organized Fraud, Cheating, Unlawful use of a Two-Way Communication Device.
- David Preston Mills (DOB 7/9/1967) of Arcadia: Organized Fraud, Conspiracy to Commit Organized Fraud.
- Paul Neil Beckham (DOB 6/3/1975) of Punta Gorda: Organized Fraud, Conspiracy to Commit Organized Fraud, Cheating, Unlawful use of a Two-Way Communication Device.
- Vernon Robert Flowers (DOB 07/28/1952) of Naples: Organized Fraud, Conspiracy to Commit Organized Fraud.
A representative from the FWC Division of Law Enforcement said that this isn’t the only outfit running this kind of confidence scheme. Those other violators are being identified, investigated, and arrested as warranted.
FWC determined two out of three turkeys in the feature image were not Osceolas. Images via affidavit obtained by MeatEater.
Whitetail hunters obsess over rubs and scrapes, but there is another type of sign that can be highly valuable - deer droppings. In this episode, Mark Kenyon and Tony Peterson, explain how to evaluate the recency and the concentration of deer scat to make informed hunting decisions in real time. Presented by Moultrie
On this week's show, Tony explains his strategy for playing the long-game with summer cameras in an attempt to identify big buck sanctuaries, so that he can use that info during his November sits.
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This week Reid and Dan Isbell sit down with Music Row legend, Michael Heeney. He's the man behind some of your favorite songs, including "These Boots" and "Love Your Love The Most" by Eric Church. The guys dive in with Heeney on the current status of music row, an epic story that includes him passing out with a few country music legends, and what it has been like having a hit song, every decade, for the last five decades. The episode ends with the "Isbell Twin" world debut, a song written by Michael Heeney himself honoring Reid and Dan.
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Steven Rinella talks with Tracy Collins, Ronnie Collins, Greg Fonts, Asa Jackson Clark, and Austin Chleborad.
Topics discussed: What a bayou is; fishing oysters by hand; Steve’s self-improvement; ways to catch turtles; sacks of oysters; how water source changes the flavor of the oyster; oyster thieving; shrimp heads falling away; looking for the po’ boy spot in the hospital; when a porpoise flips you a fish; the snail situation; getting digested in stomach bile and then sucked out of your shell; a special gumbo recipe without sausage; eating over a dozen dozen oysters in an oyster-eating competition; and more.
Outro song “Liquid” by Adam Patrick
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In this Bonus Episode of the Bear Grease podcast, Retired US Forest Service Agent, Russ Arthur, tells host Clay Newcomb one more unforgettable story of one of his first undercover jobs infiltrating a wild group of outlaws stealing Atlantic White Cedar along the Apalachicola River in Florida. Russ uses his construction background to assimilate into their group and gain their trust, but little do they know that the trap is being set for an arrest story worth making a motion picture about.
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This week, Cal tackles more angry HOA presidents, animal attacks, and what's happening over in Washington, D.C.
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Welcome to our brand new podcast, MeatEater Kids! It's a fun, educational, and engaging podcast for all of you outdoor kids. Learn about science and history from Steve's "Why It's the Way It Is" segment and impress your friends with your newfound knowledge, develop your ear for animal vocalizations with our "Guess that Critter" segment brought to you by Katie Rinella, and play long during "Kids Trivia" with host Spencer Neuharth.
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Brent's taking us on a trip to the Case Knife factory in Bradford, Pennsylvania. He's also teaching us a game he used to play with his friends in elementary school that got his personal knife collection started. Leave it to Brent to have toothbrushes and pocket knives playing pivotal roles in one activity. All that and a homecoming story you don't want to miss on MeatEater's "This Country Life" podcast.
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This week on the show we’re continuing our new series exploring the habits, mindsets, methods, and routines of the best deer hunters in the world. Up next is Dan Infalt.
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We've all heard that classic three-note bugle, which is typically a go-to for most folks while calling elk. This week, Dirk talks about non-typical elk vocalizations and how he uses them while calling to bull elk each September. Dirk also answers "Pendleton Whisky's Listener Questions" about topics ranging from fall bear hunting tactics while hunting elk, to making a backpacking game plan, to hunting Idaho's remote Frank Church Wilderness.
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This week Cal talks with Bill Hoffman, Ben Gahagan of Mass Fisheries, and Chris Borgatti of BHA chat citizen science, State of the Atlantic's striped bass fishery, catch and release mortality, circle hooks vs. J hooks, and how you can get involved and see the data. Join for a deep dive into fisheries science in Massachusetts and the mid-Atlantic.
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This week on the show we’re continuing our new series exploring the habits, mindsets, methods, and routines of the best deer hunters in the world. Up next is Andrae D'Acquisto.
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On this episode Tyler Jones, & K.C. Smith,
sit down and answer your questions with the help of Michael Stoll. They talk all about whether or not summer scouting is beneficial in their neck of the wood. They also talk about arrow setups and whether or not they will be changing anything for the upcoming year. Whether or not you've been getting out or not this podcast is bound to get you pumped out for the deer hunting that's to come.
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Mackenzie Elmquist, Cory Calkins, Garrett Long, Chilly Chleborad, and Anthony Finissi.
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In this episode of the Bear Grease Render, retired US Forest Service Law Enforcement Officer, Joe Liles joins Clay Newcomb and Render crew members Brent Reaves, Misty Newcomb, Josh "Landbridge" Spielmaker, and Bear Newcomb. Joe's career with the Forest Service overlapped with the end of Russ Arthur's and he confirms the legendary stories told on the Bear Grease podcast. Bear shows off his latest self bow, Misty talks farming, Brent explains what nets to catch catfish with, and Clay even permits a little fly fishing talk.
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On May 12, 2023, Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW) received a report of a young female mountain lion with signs of severe hind leg ataxia and paresis in a residential area of Douglas County. The cat was experiencing limited mobility due to an inability to bear weight on its hind end. It was dragging itself with its front legs and was responsive to stimuli. Wildlife officers tranquilized the cat and then euthanized it with a gunshot to the chest in order to preserve neurologic tissue.
The cat was then sent to Colorado State University College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences for a postmortem investigation, including necropsy, histopathology, immunohistochemistry, molecular diagnostics, and metatranscriptome sequencing to investigate potential causes of the disease.
According to the study published on Emerging Infectious Diseases, researchers identified a rustrela virus variant in the mountain lion’s nervous tissue samples. The virus, RusV (Rubivirus strelense), was recently identified as the cause of staggering disease, a disease documented in domestic cats since the 1970s.
Sweden, Austria, and Germany are known hotspots for staggering disease in domestic cats. A 2023 Nature article states, “The most prototypic clinical sign of ‘staggering disease’ is hind leg ataxia with a generally increased muscle tone resulting in a staggering gait. In addition, a broad range of other neurologic signs may occur, including the inability to retract the claws, hyperaesthesia and occasionally tremors and seizures. Behavioral alterations include enhanced vocalization, depression, becoming more affectionate, and rarely aggression.”
However, the study's results demonstrated the presence of a RusV variant in North America that is somewhat genetically divergent from those previously described in Europe. Researchers hypothesize that rodents could be a host for RusV, but further study is needed to confirm or deny this.
According to a CPW press release, Dr. Karen Fox, the study's lead author and former CPW wildlife pathologist, said the diagnosis of staggering disease was challenging. The final confirmation was only possible through collaboration with researchers at the Friedrich-Leoffler-Institut in Germany. Staggering disease has been closely studied in Germany for decades as it has been spread through domestic cats and other mammalian species, including equids, mustelids, rodents, and marsupials.
Fox emphasized that scientists don’t yet know how widespread the virus is in either domestic cats or wildlife populations. “Now that we know what we’re looking for, it should be easier to find new cases if they are out there,” Fox said. “With continued collaboration, we plan to learn what we can from our colleagues in Europe while we continue to look for new cases of staggering disease here in Colorado.”
While neurologic diseases are highly concerning, it’s hard to discern if this will become a more robust threat for mountain lions and other species until more research is conducted. However, if you see any animal struggling to walk, dragging its hind end, or behaving erratically, don’t hesitate to contact your local wildlife officials.
Feature image via CDC.
In this episode, Mark Kenyon and Tony Peterson break down how to identify and understand deer tracks. Most hunters can tell the difference between a deer track and a raccoon track, but to better understand each print left behind, you need to get down and dirty. Mark and Tony share their tips and techniques for being able to read each track like a book. From which direction a deer is walking to using track and trails to locate travel routes for ideal hunt setups. Presented by Moultrie
Series: Whitetail EDU
On today's show, Tony explains how there is usually some limiting factor in a buck's life that will push him to make riskier decisions, and how it's our job to scout until we find those things.
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This week out in God's Country Reid and Dan host one of their favorite vocalists and people in Nashville, Dillon Carmichael! Dillon dives in on what it was like growing up with his uncles John Michael Montgomery and Eddie Montgomery (Montgomery Gentry) in the spotlight and what other artists inspired him to chase the neon rainbow to Nashville. He also explains that his first gig in Nashville was working security in downtown Nashville and some rowdy stories that accompanied the gig. The guys all bond on the therapy that is bass fishing and how there's no better feeling in the world than a bass on the end of a line. Dillon ends the episode with a Gravorite performance that shows off why he has one of the BEST voices in Nashville!
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In a world where technology continues to make our lives more and more convenient, hunting and fishing remain inherently challenging. To be successful, you have to be willing to at least take a short walk outside. Of course, there are still a lot of ways to make the outdoors a bit easier on yourself. Hiring guides, hunting on game ranches, or fishing in stocked ponds, and using things like trail cameras and other electronics all help make you as efficient as possible. Yet, there are still a lot of outdoorsmen and women on the other side of the coin who choose to do things the hard way.
These adventurous souls head into the outdoors to pursue the most challenging species in some of the most difficult places and often utilize techniques that make their goals innately more difficult. Whether they’re waiting for years to draw a tag, hunting with a bow during rifle season, or choosing to fly fish despite knowing that they’ll catch more fish with a worm, some folks just seem determined to make their lives more difficult. The question is, though, with so many easier paths to success out there, why do these hunters and anglers choose to challenge themselves?
Testing Your MettleWhether you’re trying to climb K2, stepping into a boxing ring, or openly questioning your in-laws' cooking, we all seem to have an innate desire to push boundaries and find out what we’re really made of. For many hunters and anglers, that test comes by taking on the most challenging quarry in the most challenging of places and discovering what can be and must be endured. It’s the sort of determined and joyous agony where the reward of success becomes all the sweeter, and even failures are worth remembering. Winter steelheaders and backcountry elk hunters understand this phenomenon, but perhaps no one can identify with it more than sheep hunters.
“Sheep hunting is all about learning to enjoy suffering,” Mont Mahony, owner and operator of Alaska Dall Sheep Guides in Anchorage, Alaska, said. “That’s one key thing. Now, I know nobody actually enjoys suffering, but at the same time, on a sheep hunt, you’re going through something significant that takes a toll on your mind and body. It’s like the ultimate test of perseverance. And while you’re miserable for most of it, after you accomplish it, you think that it’s great. Almost every client I’ve ever taken for sheep says the same thing to me at the end, ‘That was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but it was great.’”
Sheep hunters will spend thousands of dollars and wait for years for different tags, only to spend a week or more torturing themselves. With success rates for drawing a tag being around 2% on average, over 10,000 hunters try their luck at winning sheep lotteries across the US every year in hopes of undergoing the brutality of the hunt. Yet often, it is that brutality, not just the sheep, that these hunters want to experience.
“You put things into a sheep hunt that you didn’t know you had,” Mahony told MeatEater. “You can prepare all you want, but it still tests your endurance, your will, and your spirit like no other hunt can. It’s not an easy deal. You’ve got to put out a lot, yet even if you don’t get your ram, you still get something out of it. Sheep are such a beautiful animal and they live in the true cathedral of God’s country. I think that’s why so many people go for the tag. They want to see what they’re made of, and in the end, sheep hunting just does something to you that I can’t quite put my finger on—it just blesses your life.”
Cracking the CodeWhile testing yourself in a tough place is a big part of why many outdoors folks choose to pursue more challenging species, for others, it’s more about solving the puzzle. Certain species just become a riddle wrapped in an enigma in the minds of hunters and anglers that can’t quite be solved. These species are elusive and intelligent, allowing you to think you have them figured out one minute, only to have them slip away from you the next. It’s the kind of game that leaves you flustered but completely obsessed. Hunters chasing Coues deer and anglers fishing on spring creeks may experience this enigmatic fascination every time they go out, but no one understands the obsessive need to solve the puzzle better than a permit fisherman.
“If you’re thinking about going permit fishing, don’t do it,” permit guru Will Flack, head guide of Tres Pescados Fly Shop in Belize said. “Because once you start trying to crack the permit code, you’ll never want to fish for anything else. I mean, I grew up chasing steelhead. I’ve caught bonefish and tarpon, but it was just all a progression to permit fishing and trying to solve that ever-changing puzzle.”
Permit are considered to be the world’s most difficult gamefish. Every year, thousands of anglers flock to crystal clear ocean flats all over the world in hopes of notching their fly rods with one of these mysterious fish. However, most who try to land a permit end up going home empty-handed because they simply can’t figure them out.
“Permit just don’t readily eat flies and they’re spooky and hard to find, so there’s really only a handful of anglers who are catching them consistently,” Flack told MeatEater. “It’s just such a game of subtle changes where you have to find that little niche in a great big sea where a permit is going to eat. You just get beat up by them because they’re so mysterious and wary. You can go days and days on end without seeing a permit, or you can find hundreds of them, but they reject all the flies in your box. But at the same time, that’s why we like fishing for them.”
Finding a permit and figuring out what they’ll eat has become a complete obsession for many anglers. Often it comes to the point where they’ll even skip fishing for other easier-to-catch quarries just to go out and get their butts kicked by the wary and elusive fish swimming just out of reach in their minds.
“I’d rather go out and get beat up by a single permit than catch twenty bonefish or even a big tarpon,” says Flack. “The reward is just so much more. It’s like going into the ring with Muhammad Ali. You got a game plan, and then it changes after the first punch, and then it changes again. Yet you’ve got to solve that puzzle. You lie in bed at night and think of what you did wrong and then wake up and try something different. Catching a permit is one of the most special things in fishing. It makes you feel awesome at the end of the day, and that fuels the fire. Then you feel like complete shit for a couple weeks because you can’t get another one. It’s these fleeting moments of ecstasy where you get the right tide, the right flat, and the right fly that make the game worthwhile. The rest of the time, you’re just getting your face beat in, but it always keeps you coming back for more.”
Preserving TraditionSolving a puzzle is part of the appeal of the outdoors for so many hunters and anglers, yet others choose to challenge themselves because it’s the way it has always been done. Many sportsmen find purity in a technique or weapon that has gone out of fashion or was used by our ancestors in the past. Instead of utilizing modern methods, they choose to hunt and fish in a way that they believe reconnects them to the very heart of the sport. Muzzleloader hunters, catfish noodlers, and even panfish anglers understand this primal need for tradition and reconnection, but perhaps no one understands it better than big buck trackers.
“I grew up tracking from the time I was about 9 years old or 10 years old,” renowned big game hunter and registered Maine guide Rick Labbe of Big Woods Bucks said. “It’s how I learned to hunt, and even though I’ve now hunted in 19 different states and Canadian provinces and chased all sorts of different species, I still think tracking whitetail bucks in the big woods is the most challenging and rewarding way to hunt there is. It’s just a pure way to kill a buck.”
Labbe and many other big buck trackers reject more popular ways to whitetail hunt. They don’t sit in tree stands or ground blinds beside agricultural fields or food plots because, despite having a better chance of success, they feel that the tradition of tracking and the skills required better connect them to their quarry.
“I love being on a buck track and learning about him,” Labbe told MeatEater. “Every buck you track is a little different in the way they act. They all have their little tricks, and you’ve got to figure out whatever that trick is to kill him. You just don’t get that when you hunt from a stand. I mean, it’s still challenging having to sit and wait on the buck and figure out where he’s coming and going, but you lose that cat-and-mouse game. You lose the exploration and figuring out the terrain and all those small aspects of being a predator that made our ancestors so successful in the woods.”
The fact is that, like making and using stone arrow points or catching and keeping your own fishing bait, tracking is almost a dying art being pushed aside by modern techniques. Many trackers hope that by continuing to follow footprints in the snow, they’re keeping an ancient tradition alive and well. In addition, many hunters believe that learning how to track whitetails sharpens your hunting skills and helps you be successful with other species.
“No one else in my family was a tracker, but it was somehow in my blood,” Labbe said. “It’s just one of those things that appeals to a certain type of person and is something that we need to keep doing and need to pass on to keep tracking around. Tracking in the big woods has just taught me so much about hunting in general. I’ve hunted elk for 20 years in Wyoming and Colorado, and I’ve killed the majority of my big bulls tracking them down in the snow as well. I just think tracking big bucks in Maine helped me be a better hunter everywhere I go. It’s the toughest way to hunt there is, but that’s why I do it, I want to keep the tradition alive.”
Making it WorthwhileTradition is so important to many hunters and anglers that they’ll often ignore other, more productive methods to hunt and fish their way. Yet there are others out there who choose more difficult techniques because they feel leveling the playing field brings them closer to what they love. By choosing a difficult hunting or fishing technique, you can find more time to appreciate your quarry and the world they live in and often only find success by reinserting yourself into the natural rhythms of that world. Traditional bow hunting, ice spearing, and Spey casting all carry aspects of this immersion into nature but no other technique better reflects the need for connection and appreciation than dry fly fishing for steelhead.
“Fishing with a dry fly for steelhead is not about catching a lot of fish, it’s about the process,” Idaho and Oregon fly fishing guide Chris Gerono, owner and operator of Boise River Guides said. “It’s about the preparation, the execution, and it is about being able to witness nature in a special way. Because each run of steelhead is finite, with a beginning of the run and an end of the run, your time on the water fishing for these fish is special and calls for a special technique.”
Though there are much more effective ways to catch steelhead, such as nymphing or trolling with large jerkbaits and other lures, steelheaders like Gerono continue to pursue the elusive fish with dry flies because they believe that it is the best way to connect with both the fish and the river itself.
“Sure, you can catch a sluggish, tired steelhead by repeatedly drifting a stonefly or other flies and lures in front of its nose,” Gerono said. “But fishing for steelhead with a dry fly is more like searching one out. You’re covering as much water as possible in the most efficient way and searching for a high-energy steelhead that is more willing to play. The process of fishing this way lends itself to observing nature in its process. If you enjoy dry fly fishing for steelhead, you enjoy the time between fish. You enjoy the cast, you enjoy watching the mink run along the bank, you enjoy watching the birds of prey searching for fish. You enjoy becoming a part of it all, and that makes you appreciate your time on the water all the more.”
One of the great concerns for steelhead anglers everywhere is that the fish are becoming harder to find. Between bad management practices, dams, and overreliance on fish hatcheries, catching a wild steelhead is becoming more of a challenge than ever, and so many anglers choose techniques that give the fish a better chance. A steelhead that is willing to hit a dry fly usually has plenty of energy and is unlikely to die from the experience of being caught and so by fishing this way, anglers are both helping to preserve the species while still pursuing them.
“Today, the process of wild anadromous fish in the Pacific Northwest is blocked by dams, nets, seals, and fisherman,” Gerono told MeatEater. “Because of all these factors, the Pacific Northwest steelhead are just squeaking by. So, instead of just going out and trying to catch a steelhead by any means necessary, why not choose a method that gives them a better chance? I mean, the bite may be slow but that just gives you time to better appreciate steelhead and the world that they live in. If it’s the right time of year, and the fish are in the water, go out and skate a dry fly because you never know what you might see. It might be a bear, it might be a golden eagle, and it might even be a streak of chrome trying to steal your skated dry fly. And it’s in those moments that making it just a little harder on yourself becomes completely worthwhile.”
There’s No Such Thing as An Easy ButtonPerhaps the most unanimously appreciated thing about hunting and fishing is that success is always relative. While we all want to go out and get what we’re after, a good day outdoors can still be had when we come home empty-handed. No one goes hunting or fishing just because they want to harvest an animal or catch a bunch of fish. You do it because you love and appreciate the outdoor world and all the beauty, wonder, and challenge that it provides.
Challenging yourself in the outdoors isn’t about making things harder or showing off how great of a hunter or angler you are. It’s about finding a way to better appreciate the outdoor world on your own terms. The fact is that whether you’re climbing the highest peaks in pursuit of a mountain goat or taking a casual stroll down to the pond for bluegill, you’re always facing a challenge. In this modern world of traffic, video games, and binge-watching Netflix, every hunter and angler out there is stepping up to the trials of keeping the appreciation and love of the outdoors alive and well for generations to come.
This week, Cal talks about the exotic pet trade, rest stops, pant snakes, and fly fishing. Plus so much more.
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Welcome to our brand new podcast, MeatEater Kids! It's a fun, educational, and engaging podcast for all of you outdoor kids. Learn about science and history from Steve's "Why It's the Way It Is" segment and impress your friends with your newfound knowledge, develop your ear for animal vocalizations with our "Guess that Critter" segment brought to you by Katie Rinella, and play long during "Kids Trivia" with host Spencer Neuharth.
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Brent's taking us back to the tomato fields of his youth. You'll hear how he spent a lot of his summers battling the heat on his family's South Arkansas farm and he'll tell about an epic adventure he and two others set out on that didn't quite go as planned. We know. Big surprise, right? Thankfully, the participants are all still here and Brent's sharing their story on this week's episode of MeatEater's This Country Life podcast.
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What's an Orienne? More conservation groups you should know. Cal talks with the CEO of the Orienne Society.
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This week on the show we’re continuing our new series exploring the habits, mindsets, methods, and routines of the best deer hunters in the world. Up next is Ben Rising.
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Bill Vanderheyden returns to the podcast to discuss new findings from the University of Colorado study, which looked at accuracy, stability, drag, wind drift, spin up, and sound. He offers tips for improving flight with broadheads. We also talk about the new heads he has coming out at Iron Will.
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On this episode K.C. Smith and Michael Stoll sit down and discuss the generational gap between Millineals and Gen Z. Mainly they talk about the differences in how they were raised in the outdoors. They talk red Ryders, bowhunting and how media will dictate to future of hunting in search of finding out how big the gap between generations really is.
Our Arrow Set-Ups with Janis Putelis
Our Biggest Trail Camera Bucks Ever!
Florida Keys Fishing
KC'S South Dakota Buck
Tyler's 50 Yard Shot on a Giant!
Russ Arthur entered his post with the US Forestry Service in 1985 with a dedication to protecting the lands he was taught to cherish and appreciate back when he was a young child, but little did he know the twists and turns it would take him down. In this episode of the Bear Grease podcast, Clay Newcomb interviews this Bear Grease veteran as he recalls some wild stories of attempted murder, high-speed chases, and illegal drug rings. His storied career and commitment to law enforcement will amaze you!
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On this week's episode of Houndations, Tony breaks down the long history of how wild canines became domesticated, and just what that meant for us over the last several thousand years.
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Chester Floyd, Hanzi Deschermeier, Chilly Chleborad, Mackenzie Elmquist, Christine Sawicki, Alyssa Smith, Cory Calkins, and Logan Dove.
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On today's show, Tony explains how we sabotage our future hunting selves by not running through deer hunting scenarios during our summer scouting sessions.
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This week out in God's Country Reid and Dan host the #1 "My Place" artist, Ashley Cooke! They all deep dive in on Ashley's journey to Nashville, what it was like growing up around child actors, and how she took control of her own destiny when COVID shook the music scene in 2020. Ashley goes into a thorough description of "Jeep Life" and what it has been like creating music around the TikTok artist stigma. The episode ends with the best rendition of Rascal Flatts's you have heard from Reid, Dan, and Ashley!
Catch Dan and Reid playing live as The Brothers Hunt @ Chiefs in Nashville on July 19th: Get Tickets
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This week, Cal talks about Cicada poaching in Wisconsin, there goes dad's walleye, ruff news for dogs, and so much more.
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Steven Rinella talks with Larry Ramsell, Ryan Callaghan, Chester Floyd, Brody Henderson, Seth Morris, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics discussed: Books by the reel musky expert; the man at the end of the line; if we didn’t have catch and release for muskies, we’d have fried them all; all muskies all the time; two different species?; the best way to handle a musky; the world record wars; contextualizing and challenging the "musky manifesto"; photometry; how live sonar can educate; standing against spearing and catching through the ice; tiger muskies; and more.
Outro song "Fishing Lures" by Peter Block.
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Welcome to our brand new podcast, MeatEater Kids! It's a fun, educational, and engaging podcast for all of you outdoor kids. Learn about science and history from Steve's "Why It's the Way It Is" segment and impress your friends with your newfound knowledge, develop your ear for animal vocalizations with our "Guess that Critter" segment brought to you by Katie Rinella, and play long during "Kids Trivia" with host Spencer Neuharth
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Just when you thought Brent had talked about every kind of hunting dog, he shows up with another one. This week he's giving us an introduction to decoy dogs, how they're hunted, and for what purposes. He's also sharing a 4th of July story from a listener that involves strawberry jelly and a pink flamingo. There's a lot going on this week on MeatEater's "This Country Life" podcast.
Check out Decoy Doggers on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTEKz-HCuwegpOmZ_CSpd4A
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This week on the show we’re kicking off a new series exploring the habits, mindsets, methods, and routines of the best deer hunters in the world. Up first is John Eberhart.
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On this week's interview drop, Cal talks dogs with Tony Peterson. Tony is a serious dog guy who is anchoring the new Houndations podcast, right here on the Cal of the Wild feed.
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Dirk and three other world-champion elk callers, Tony Gilbertson, Jermaine Hodge, and Erik Berglund, discuss the 2024 RMEF World Elk Calling Championships. They also talk about the elk hunt the three guests shared last fall, which is on YouTube now, and the process of designing their new signature elk diaphragms that are included in the new All-American 3-Pack.
Watch their hunt film on YouTube now: Band of Brothers
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On this episode Tyler Jones, & K.C. Smith,
sit down in the Texas heat and discuss important topics. It’s 100° and some change right now, so the best work we can work on is working on ourselves. In this podcast, we dive into some of the important qualities that we value in people and also take note of the things that we should stay away from.
Our Arrow Set-Ups with Janis Putelis
Our Biggest Trail Camera Bucks Ever!
Florida Keys Fishing
KC'S South Dakota Buck
Tyler's 50 Yard Shot on a Giant!
Janis Putelis guest hosts MeatEater Trivia with Spencer Neuharth, Tony Peterson, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Max Barta, Christine Sawicki, Reva Hansen, and Chester Floyd.
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In this action-packed episode of the Bear Grease Render, Clay Newcomb and Render crew members Brent Reaves, Gary "Believer" Newcomb, and Josh "Landbridge" Spielmaker are joined by Capt. Jeff Brown (Ret.) and Lt. Joe Alexander of the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation. Hear more of the behind-the-scenes efforts to bring Oklahoma Paddlefish poaching to an end. Also, listen along as the whole crew does a live caviar tasting. Plus, for the first time ever, watch this one live on video on our MeatEater Podcast Network YouTube channel.
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Quite a few years ago, I passed on one of my older bows to a friend of mine. He had expressed an interest in bowhunting and had already killed a few deer with a rifle, so it seemed like a good idea.
That feeling faded after about the fifth mystery blood trail.
While he was more than enthusiastic about entering the ranks of archery hunting, he couldn’t keep his act together on a deer. Not only did he shoot poorly, he almost always seemed to hit deer instead of whiffing clean.
After a few seasons of dealing with his post-shot issues, I realized something—he almost always shot too far forward or too far back. Rarely did he shoot high or low. I started thinking that maybe he was trying to peek around his rack of pins to see more of the deer, so I convinced him to switch to a single-pin sight. His results changed almost instantly, and he has never gone back.
Sometimes, a fix for our shooting woes is obvious, sometimes, it’s not.
Painful MemoriesWhile my buddy was a shoulder or gut shooter, my problem for a lot of years was different. I almost always hit too high or missed over the top of deer. This issue plagued me, and it got to the point where I wanted to quit.
While it wasn’t fun to think about, some reflection led me to a likely culprit. My buck fever caused me to punch my trigger the moment I saw enough of the deer in my sight window. In fact, it was during my first few rifle hunts where I shot high that this occurred to me. Just like with my buddy, I dumbed down my sight window to one pin and then forced myself to think through my entire shot process. It took a summer’s worth of shooting, but when it all clicked, the arc of my deer hunting career changed.
This is not that easy to do. We don’t like reality, when the comfort of slight delusion is so warm and fuzzy. If you almost always zip your arrow through the vitals, this might not be for you. Most hunters don’t, though. They need to think about their shots and what is going on.
What happens when you miss or make a poor shot? I mean, besides looking for an excuse like the deer ducked the string or an unseen twig sent your arrow on a less desirable path. Where does the arrow tend to go versus where you want it to go?
Tucked into the embarrassment of flubbing a few shots is usually a pattern. If you can tease it out, you can fix it, but probably not how you expect.
It’s Not The GearI’m a huge advocate for dumbing down the shot process to account for the inevitable adrenalin dump of shooting at an actual deer. In that way, gear matters. Where it doesn’t is when you’re sitting there in the mid-summer, thinking about another practice session while reflecting on your past mistakes.
This is when the ego creeps in and whispers to us that it must be an equipment issue. If you just buy a new bow, or a new limb-driven rest, or heavier arrows, or whatever, your issues will disappear. There’s nothing wrong with a summertime upgrade, but it won’t fix what is between your ears.
The easiest way to understand this is to think of how many times you could shoot at a relatively close 3D deer target in a row before you’d miss completely. At 20 yards, might be able to shoot 1000 arrows, or more, before you make a really bad shot.
How many live deer would it take for you to make a mistake at 20 yards? Probably not nearly as many. The gear performs just fine on the range; why not in the treestand at last light? Because there’s something going on in your head that is causing panic.
The simplest way to beat this is to shoot in a way that helps you build trust with yourself. Second-guessing your abilities is a big problem, and it’s most prevalent when a 135-incher is on his way down the trail. During practice sessions, the goal should be to believe that once you put the pin where it needs to be and execute the release, the results are predictable.
You have to practice with the intention to become not only more physically efficient but also more mentally competent and confident. Reflect on your past mistakes and then shoot to give yourself the earned confidence of someone who can reliably do this. The more you convince yourself that you’re capable on the range, the more that will translate to the field.
That’s an easy answer. Often, it’s not enough, but it is a start. The more you shoot in August in a meaningful way to truly increase your confidence, the better you’ll be in the stand this fall when the crux of your entire season trots in and poses up at 27 yards.
For off-season deer hunting information, check out these articles: 3 Locations You Need To Put Trail Cameras This Summer, 5 Ways To Prep For Deer Season This Summer, and 3 Off-Season Chores Every Deer Hunter Should Do.
This week out in God's Country, Dan and Reid Isbell host ARMY Reserve member and hit song singing artist, Craig Morgan. The guys dive in with Craig and get him to share stories from the battlefield, his journey to the Nashville music scene, and his memoir, "God Family Country." Craig shares why it is more important than ever for young citizens to consider enlisting into the armed forces and shares why he decided to re-enlist in the Army Reserve. The guys take a deep dive into some of Craig's iconic songs such as "Almost Home," "Redneck Yacht Club," and "That's What I Love About Sunday." Stay tuned until the end to hear all three of them join in for Craig's #Gravorite.
Catch Dan and Reid playing live as The Brothers Hunt @ Chiefs in Nashville on July 19th: Get Tickets
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On today's show, Tony discusses how a change in mindset and an acknowledgement of our personal advantages in whitetail hunting, and lead to a more enjoyable and successful season.
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Deer camps embody some of the best things about hunting, especially community. Some of my favorite hunting memories include my grandfather’s hunting camp, where I rabbit hunted, learned how to deer hunt, and heard my first turkey gobble. Aside from hunting and work days, members of the camp often gathered for fish fries, cookouts, and community events. Hunters killed big bucks every year, and every now and then, someone would kill a really big deer.
While no deer camp is perfect, the folks in this one unselfishly made it an enjoyable experience, and everyone benefitted. Unfortunately, some deer camps, clubs, leases, (or whatever you prefer) don’t understand this. Luckily, these camps typically have practices that should deter you from joining their ranks, if you know what to look for.
If you’ve never been a club member, these warning signs might not seem so apparent. Since you’ll be spending a significant amount on yearly dues, it’s important to understand what you’re signing up for. Whether you’re shopping around for your first club or someone has invited you to a deer lease, here are a few red flags that should inform your decision.
Quick TurnoverInvitations aren’t always a bad thing. If someone asks you to join their camp or lease, it’s probably an indication that your friend, coworker, in-law, etc., thinks you’re a good fit and hunter for their camp. Kudos to you. However, some invitations come from desperation. For example, the camp or lease is like a revolving door, and no one stays for more than a year. Sure, private hunting land isn’t cheap, and it isn’t getting any cheaper. But good hunting camps—regardless of price—don’t have issues finding members. If there’s good hunting, someone will pay.
The turnover in a hunting camp isn’t necessarily an indictment of the members, either. It could be the lease situation and location. If the camp borders other camps or hunting ground, there’s probably a ton of pressure. Also, most leased camps are owned by timber companies whose main interest is growing and selling timber—not hunting. While these timber practices can benefit the deer or turkey populations, they certainly aren’t motivated by habitat management. Some companies are more strict than others on what they allow too. For instance, some leases allow you to make some habitat alterations and plant food plots. Others do not.
No DoesThis practice is probably a vestigial fear from the days of low deer numbers, but it’s still something I see from time to time. The misconception that more does equal more bucks still pervades some deer camps.
Unless you live in a deer desert, shooting does is a must if you want bigger bucks and to not exceed an area’s carrying capacity. This doesn’t mean you have to shoot your state’s bag limit, but not shooting any does is bad news. Not to mention, filling the freezer becomes exponentially harder when you take does out of the equation. Also, if you have kids that hunt, do you really want to tell them they’re only allowed to shoot legal bucks? What if you’re in a one-buck state? It’s not exactly the best bang for your buck.
While this red flag isn’t a norm, it’s still alive and well. If you’re considering a camp that has a no-doe policy, it’s probably a sign that they have other misinformed practices as well.
Locked or Reserved StandsIn high school, I dated a girl who came from a family of hunters. Her dad and brother were members of a camp near their house. While I never got an official invite, they gauged my interest on the prospect of joining this camp. It was a modest-sized camp, but the proximity and price made it intriguing. However, the only kicker was that every member was only allowed two stands that had to be placed before the season. Established members were granted the “best” spots, while new members were dealt the leftovers. Suddenly, the cheap yearly dues made sense.
I’ve seen it spun in other ways, too. I once got an invite to a buddy’s camp where some of the shooting houses had literal locks on them. This is a prime example of greed and selfishness. He had no idea until after he joined the camp that members were allowed to put locks on shooting houses that they placed. I’m not talking about a ladder or hang-on treestands that someone hung in a spot that they scouted. These were camp shooting houses overlooking food plots. You could spot these from a distance because you’d notice a swanky shooting house with a ground blind or ladder stand right next to it. The epitome of petty.
It’s no coincidence that these locked stands appeared in places where mature bucks were killed or showed up on camera. This hardly means such folks locked up the best spots. After all, they’re either chasing dead bucks or ones that showed up during the witching hour. Still, it’s more of an indication that certain members see these spots as exclusive. And those can be tricky waters to navigate.
Pinned Spots OnlyWhile not all clubs are like this, some are very particular about where you can actually hunt. For instance, some places only allow you to hunt designated stand locations. To be fair, sometimes this comes down to a safety issue and preventing others from walking through your spot (though this will still happen). However, if you’re in a 3,000-acre deer camp and you can only hunt spots with actual stands or food plots, you’re just overpaying for limited access.
After a week of the general gun season, deer activity will drop drastically, especially on food plots or historical stand locations. If you’re not allowed to get mobile and adjust your setup, even a hundred yards, you’re basically hoping to get lucky. For this reason, it’s a good idea to ask if mobile hunting is allowed. If there’s even a hesitation, or it’s allowed but frowned upon, you might want to consider another club.
Final ThoughtsNever assume anything, especially when it comes to hunting. It’s always best to ask as many questions as possible so you’ll know what to expect. These are just a few red flags (there are plenty more) that should sway you from having a bad experience. Hopefully, you’ll find a club or camp that’s worth the dues for years to come.
Feature image via Matt Hansen.
Tamara Thomsen has spent three decades diving and documenting shipwrecks in the Great Lakes, the coastal waters off North Carolina, and Canada’s Bay of St. Lawrence.
She helped study the Civil War ironclad U.S.S. Monitor in its watery grave off Cape Hatteras in 2000. She also dived on the wreck of the RMS Empress of Ireland, swimming among the skulls and skeletons of crewmen and passengers entombed in the ship since 1914.
Thomsen has also put 58 shipwreck sites into the National Register of Historic Places, and in 2011, served as team leader for the RMS Titanic’s 100th anniversary survey project by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.
But when asked about the most memorable work of her career, and the “Holy shit!” moment that made it so, the Wisconsin Historical Society’s (WHS) state underwater archaeologist said it began in June 2021 with some old wood she found on the bottom of Lake Mendota, just a half-mile east of her lakeside home in Madison. Three years later, that incidental find climaxed with the documentation of at least 10 ancient dugout canoes in the surrounding sand and marl of the 9,740-acre lake.
Accidental ArchaeologyThomsen’s landmark dive that June morning three years ago was “mostly for fun.” After anchoring her dive-boat among the sailboats moored offshore of John C. McKenna Park, Thomsen splashed into the water and set off. After steering her underwater “scooter” into the depths, she saw what looked like the end of a log embedded in Mendota’s bottom 25 feet down.
The partially exposed “log” probably wouldn’t have drawn a second glance from most recreational divers, but maritime archaeologists are never really off the clock. Thomsen moved closer and studied it through her dive-mask. She soon felt confident the wood was fashioned by human hands, and the log was a dugout canoe.
Thomsen surfaced and shared the news with her friend in the boat, Mallory Dragt. Thomsen’s scuba tank was low on air, and Dragt had afternoon plans, so they returned to shore. Thomsen called her colleague Amy Rosebrough, now the state archaeologist for the WHS, and persuaded her to set aside her office homework and join her on the water for a closer inspection and second opinion.
Once onsite, they agreed it was a dugout canoe. Though surprised, Thomsen still wasn’t wowed. For all she knew, the dugout was simply an abandoned Boy Scouts project from the 1950s. Still, they brought a chunk to the surface and then to the USDA’s forest products laboratory in Madison for radiocarbon-dating tests.
Those tests showed the dugout was 1,200 years old and carved from a white-oak log. That placed the dugout’s origins in southern Wisconsin’s “Woodland Tradition” period, which spanned roughly 500 B.C. to the 1200s. That meant the dugout was likely made by the native Americans who built effigy and burial mounds on bluffs farther east above Lake Mendota.
Thomsen knew then she had opened a historical window dwarfing her previous work. This was a career achievement on an already extraordinary resume that includes induction into the Women Divers Hall of Fame 2014, and project leader on exploratory dives deep into flooded caves in Missouri’s Ozarks and southern Wisconsin’s lead and steel mines.
The dugout’s builders were ancestors of Wisconsin’s Ho-Chunk Nation. These people, formerly called the Winnebago tribe, carved the canoe about A.D. 850, roughly 800 years before French explorer Jean Nicolet became the first European to reach Wisconsin. In fact, the canoe’s carvers lived 1,000 years before Eben and Rosaline Peck became Madison’s first white settlers in 1837. In contrast, only 187 years separated Thomsen’s dive from the Pecks’ arrival in what became the state capital and home to the University of Wisconsin.
Tamara Thomsen, the third diver in line, helps bring ashore a dugout canoe she found in May 2022 on the bottom of Lake Mendota in Wisconsin.
Knapped Net WeightsThe dugout’s floor also held a cluster of five rocks, which hadn’t simply washed in over the canoe’s shallow sides. Rosebrough noticed slight notches in the rocks, which she recognized as knapping by tribal fishermen to make net weights. Once knapped, the rocks were wedged between the fish-net’s strands, which were made from grasses, flaxes, or other fibrous plant materials. Those nets, of course, had long rotted away.
In late October 2021, four months after finding the dugout, Thomsen and other WHS divers excavated the dugout from Mendota’s bottom. A few days later, after rigging flotation bags beneath the dugout, they raised the dugout to the surface on Nov. 2 and brought it ashore with help from Dane County sheriff’s department divers.
Even then, Thomsen assumed the dugout was a “one-off” to add to the Wisconsin Dugout Canoe Survey Project, a statewide inventory of dugouts she is building with archaeology Professor Sissel Schroeder at UW-Madison.
In Spring 2022, Thomsen returned to the McKenna Park mooring field to resume her search, and possibly learn if her find had been a fluke or a beginning. In May 2022, she found a second dugout about 100 yards from where she found the first.
Thomsen could now say, “Holy shit!” with reverence. Two dugouts so close together meant she had likely discovered evidence of an ancient lakeshore village, inhabited when the lake was 20 feet shallower than today. Thomsen said she found the canoes along the edge of a slowly descending bottom, just before it plunges to 40-foot depths.
She said the region’s climate was drier 1,000 years ago, and Mendota’s ancient shoreline likely receded farther during prolonged droughts. In fact, geological records from 6,000 to 12,000 years ago indicate the Yahara River, which enters Lake Mendota on its northern tip and departs from its southeastern corner, sometimes dried up and stopped flowing.
In September 2022, four months after Thomsen found “canoe No. 2,” the WHS announced the discovery when archaeologists and a team of skilled volunteer divers brought it ashore, generating another wave of international attention. Tests on wood samples revealed this second canoe was made from an ash tree about 3,000 years ago, or roughly 600 to 1,000 B.C., making it the oldest dugout ever found in the Great Lakes region by 18 centuries.
Archaeologists theorized that the ancient people cached their dugouts in about 5 feet of water each autumn to protect them from freezing, cracking, and splitting over winter. However, given a hole in the first canoe’s bottom, it’s possible it simply sunk and the owners abandoned it. Either way, the dugout’s owners likely moved inland each fall to more sheltered areas and, for whatever reason, never put these dugouts back into service.
Researchers found a cluster of knapped rocks still on the floor of this 1,200-year-old dugout. The rocks were likely used as weights in the webbing of ancient fishing nets.
Full-Time FunWith two ancient dugouts to her credit, Thomsen had even more explaining and story retelling to do as news outlets came calling. She truly hadn’t been hunting ancient history when diving among Mendota’s anchored sailboats and finding the first dugout.
Yes, Thomsen had spent two decades as a respected underwater archaeologist, but her profession evolved from her love of scuba diving, not vice versa. She graduated college in 1991 with a bachelor’s degree in horticulture and agronomy, and in 1993 earned a master’s degree in genetics. But in 1994, she opened her Diversions Scuba dive shop and diving school in Madison, 10 years before the state historical society hired her as its underwater archaeologist and historic preservation specialist.
No matter her job or duties, Thomsen devoted much of her free time to scuba diving, routinely exploring lake bottoms and underwater caves not far from home. And that’s why she and Dragt went diving off McKenna Park that morning in June 2021, just down Mendota’s southwestern shoreline from the home her grandfather built.
Why McKenna Park? Had she heard rumors of possible native American relics around the park or just offshore? After all, what about those burial and effigy mounds to the east, long studied by Rosebrough, her WHS colleague?
No. Being a longtime local, Thomsen just viewed the park as a safe, convenient place to dive because of its “mooring field” about 100 yards offshore. Sailboats tie off there through spring and summer, their mooring lines snapped to large buoys linked by cables to heavy anchors 25 feet below. All those buoys and sailboats serve as obstacles, providing a haven for divers and fishermen from tubers, jet-skiers, water-skiers, wake-boaters, and speeding motorboaters — some of whom ignore or overlook dive flags and no-wake buoys.
Ironic ConvenienceThomsen’s usual swag from such dives includes lost anchors and fishing lures, an occasional spinning rod, rarely a tackle box, and usually bottles, beer and soft-drink cans, and other trash.
But finding those two ancient dugout canoes made McKenna Park’s mooring field an accidental archaeological site; a watery example of “streetlight effect” research. The “streetlight effect” concept comes from a joke about a policeman who helped a man look for his lost car keys beneath a streetlight across the road from his car. After failing to find the keys, the cop asked the man why he wasn’t searching by his car. The man replied, “Because the light is brighter over here.”
In Thomsen’s case, the wave action of motorboats and wake-boats turning to avoid the mooring field might have had an ironic, coincidental impact. Waves from those turning boats possibly disturbed enough bottom sediments to reveal the dugouts.
Thomsen mentioned yet another irony: While the mooring station creates quiet, inviting waters for anglers and divers, those folks inadvertently damaged the dugouts below when dropping their anchors to fish or explore.
“I’m not pointing fingers, because I’ve dropped my anchor in there plenty of times, and might have caused some damage, too,” Thomsen told MeatEater. “But there’s no doubt boat anchors did some damage. Canoe 2 (found in May 2022) was broken and suffered anchor damage. We found a couple of places where an anchor tine dug into it.”
Ironic or coincidental, Thomsen’s discoveries launched extensive, scientifically coordinated searches over the next 20 months, not only by scuba divers but also by Ho-Chunk historians using ground-penetrating radar from atop Mendota’s ice in winter 2023. And in mid-May this year, after finding and analyzing results from those searches, the Wisconsin Historical Society announced the biggest news yet from that mooring field:
Archaeologists had located at least eight, and possibly nine, more submerged dugouts in an area roughly 800 feet long. Radiocarbon-dating tests of wood samples revealed the youngest dugout was about 800 years old and the oldest 4,500 years—yet another record-age for dugouts of the Great Lakes region.
The three oldest dugouts—3,500 to 4,500 years—were made from elm logs, and the youngest dugout (800 years) was made from a red oak log. Also, a 2,000-year-old dugout was made from cottonwood, and four to five dugouts (1,000 to 1,800 years) were made from white oak.
Techniques for building dugout canoes changed little over time, and typically included fire, hatchets, and scrapers, as depicted in this 1590 painting by Theodore DeBry.
Why all the Hardwoods?The archaeologists were mildly surprised that 10 out of 11 of the Mendota dugouts were built from hardwoods. Although cottonwood is a hardwood, its wood is relatively soft, more like the softwood logs from pine, spruce, and hemlock trees used for dugouts from northern Wisconsin and elsewhere.
Professor Schroeder said UW-Madison’s statewide dugout canoe survey—which excludes birchbark canoes—has found 101 dugouts since former student Ryan Smazal started crisscrossing Wisconsin in 2018 to document dugouts for his senior thesis. Schroeder said about two-thirds of the state’s dugouts were built from softwoods. The rest were built from elm, ash, hickory, butternut, cottonwood, white oak, and red oak. In contrast, of 174 eastern North American dugouts identified by wood species, Schroeder said 92% were made from softwoods.
So why are the Mendota dugouts made exclusively of hardwoods? “They used what was available where they lived,” Schroeder told MeatEater. “Why else would anyone hollow out an elm log? It was probably the only straight log they had at the time. Details like that tell us a lot about the climate, forests, and habitats where they lived during a given time.”
Straight logs from red or white oaks probably grew in crowded woods, where oaks won’t sprout many branches until growing tall. Elm and ash, however, grow consistently straight with few lower limbs. As foresters say, those species grow tall and straight “unless they have no other choice.”
The only state to document more dugouts than Wisconsin is Florida, with over 400 dugouts on record, including 101 cached along the shorelines of Newnans Lake near Gainesville in 2000. The oldest canoe from the Newnans Lake cache dates back 5,000 years, and the earliest Florida dugout is nearly 7,000 years old. Schroeder said the world’s oldest dugouts were found in Japan, roughly 7,500 years old, and France, 9,000 years old.
When Smazal started his Wisconsin survey in 2018, the state had only 11 known dugouts. Smazal’s travels quickly built the inventory to 34 dugouts. Thomsen and Schroeder continued that work after 2020’s Covid-19 lockdowns. To compile the inventory, researchers scan, measure, and photograph each dugout using iPhones with LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) scanning technology. After processing the images and data through photogrammetry software, they can create 3-D models of the dugouts for viewing with virtual-reality glasses.
Most Wisconsin dugouts range from 16 to 21 feet long and 22 inches wide, with the smallest measuring about 7.5 feet in length and the longest nearly 50 feet. Schroeder said the big one was probably built by Lake Superior voyageurs during the fur trade era of the 1650s to 1850s. Shorter dugouts were likely used on oxbows and small lakes and the longer ones on rivers and large lakes.
Now five years into the project, Wisconsin researchers keep locating dugouts by reading newspaper archives, and visiting rural and small-town libraries, museums, historical societies, old barns and garages, and Smithsonian collections. The inventory also includes a dugout found in the garage attic at a state park, and three from the Ho-Chunk people, and four from the Menominee Nation.
Ryan Smazal, a former student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, located, measured, and photographed nearly three dozen dugout canoes in 2018 for his senior thesis.
Universal TraitsThomsen readily credits Smazal for helping her recognize the first dugout in Mendota. She said she had studied so many of his dugout photos the previous three years that she recognized telling details in the “log” at McKenna Park.
In fact, dugout canoes worldwide share many similarities in size, design, length, and construction techniques. Schroeder said no Wisconsin dugout has oar stations, all had flat bottoms, and most have low sides. In fact, Thomsen said the Mendota dugouts more closely resemble modern paddleboards than modern canoes. “They could have poled or paddled them with their legs hanging over the sides,” she said.
Then again, how many ways could anyone of any era shape and hollow out logs to create functional watercraft? Whether the builders used fire, clam shells, stone awls, a Dalton adze (stone scraper), stone axes, steel hatchets, steel chisels, or long-handled claw hammers, their finished dugouts from the Great Lakes look much like dugouts built in Florida or the Solomon Islands of the South Pacific.
And building a dugout, even in more modern times with steel tools, seldom goes fast. The 1961 book “PT-109: John F. Kennedy in World War II” by Robert Donovan details how native islanders paddled dugout canoes to rescue the future president and his surviving crew from an island after a Japanese destroyer rammed and sank their boat on a dark, moonless night in August 1943.
Donovan said the islanders carved dugouts from hardwoods, writing: “Dugout canoes are thick, sturdy craft, hewn with an adze from the trunk of a single tree, preferably a goliti tree. When the natives set out to make a canoe they put a coconut on a stick nearby, and traditionally the job is supposed to be finished when the coconut sprouts in two months.”
Sixty years later, the goliti tree, a hardwood, is still considered the only “truly good tree for making dugout canoes” in the Solomon Islands.
Meanwhile, research continues at Mendota’s dugout site, and on the 10 to 11 dugouts already found. The archaeologists want to pin down whether they found eight or nine dugouts in their follow-up searches the past two years. Because each dugout is fashioned from individual logs, radiocarbon-dating tests and strontium-isotope analysis of wood samples—roughly of football to basketball size—should reveal if the canoe(s) came from one or two tree species, or perhaps one species growing in different eras or different regions.
The Mendota dugouts found since 2022 won’t be brought ashore. They remain where they were found, largely out of respect for their ancestral builders, but also because researchers think they’ll learn everything necessary from samples already ashore.
ConclusionAnd what about the two dugouts Thomsen found in 2021 and 2022? Both remain secured in storage at the Historical Society’s state archives facility in Madison. Both dugouts began a preservation process in February 2024 that uses polyethylene glycol, or PEG, to stabilize the wood. The treatment is expected to conclude in 2026.
The dugouts will then be sent to Texas A&M University to be freeze-dried, so they’re stable and solid for public display. The dugouts and stories about their ancient builders will be shared when the new Wisconsin History Center opens in 2027.
Steven Rinella talks with Tony Peterson, Ryan Callaghan, Randall Williams, Brody Henderson, Janis Putelis, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics discussed: Steve reads "A Vaquero of the Brush Country" so you don't have to; terrorizing the neighborhood with a slingshot; listen to our new HOUNDations podcast covering all things dog with Tony Peterson on Cal's podcast feed; reading entries for the first MeatEater Podcast essay contest; what's happened to the Gulf; the future Fish Shack South; join Steve and the crew for some fishing with MeatEater Experiences in Venice, LA and waterfowl hunting with MeatEater Experiences in Kansas; Jani's Gould's turkey; a public service announcement for hunters in New Mexico; hog hunting bans; bonus points for kids; and more.
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I dread the first few weeks after I set up a new bow. It’s a first-world problem, I know, but it’s also true. While this might be considered simply a break-in period with the idea that the first few hundred shots will help a fresh rig find its rhythm, there’s more to it.
It’s a new beginning, and that means it’s time for me to break myself in as well. That might seem crazy, but think about your personal target practice routine. Do you shoot as consistently in January as you do in August? Probably not.
Most bowhunters put their bow away at the end of the season, and if they don’t pull it out for spring turkeys, it might not see the light of day until mid-summer. Even if they are shooting an old, reliable rig that has been with them for 10 seasons, they’re starting over for the year.
In both of these cases, the best bet for being a stone-cold killer in stand is to lay down a solid shooting foundation first.
Test Your SkillsWe all know that great archers strive for repeatability. Executing the exact same shot over and over is the goal because it removes the variables that send arrows where they aren’t meant to go. We also know that this isn’t achieved through a couple of practice sessions a week in the days leading up to the season.
Yet, we convince ourselves we are good enough.
After all, if an arrow, or a group of arrows, ends up more or less where we want them, isn’t that proof we are doing our job correctly? Probably not. While a loose group in the vitals on a 3D target in your backyard might seem like evidence of good shooting, that illusion tends to fall apart on real, live deer.
A good way to understand that you have the fundamentals really down, is to ask yourself how scared you are to shoot small bullseyes at, say, 20 yards. If you’re not worried about busting nocks while grouping arrows in a bullseye at close range with a modern compound, you’re not shooting that well.
Make Each Shot CountWhen you think about proper form and shot execution, you’re thinking about a single event that consists of many parts. Drawing, anchoring, aiming, releasing, and then following through, are all steps to the proper bow-shot dance. If any one of them happens differently than it’s supposed to, the whole thing suffers.
We often gloss over this during summertime shooting sessions by shooting too much. If you plan to launch 50 shots in a session, is any single shot all that important? Probably not. It’s easy to wave away an errant arrow when you know you have plenty more to send downrange. This allows us to also ignore what we didn’t do that caused the errant arrow.
A better bet is to shoot more sessions but with far fewer arrows. Make every shot matter. Try to shoot a dozen, where every single shot goes where you want it. If you have one or two that don’t, ask yourself what happened. What can you do to keep that from happening again?
There’s A Time For FunThe problem with spending a few weeks shooting a limited amount of arrows at easy ranges is that it gets boring. While you’re reinforcing muscle memory and shoring up each part of your overall shot process, it’s easy to feel like you’re not making any real progress.
It’s kind of like dumping 15% of every paycheck into ETFs or mutual funds in your retirement account, versus yoloing a big chunk of change in a meme stock. It’s more fun to play the lottery than to play the long game with calculated risks. It’s also far more likely you’ll become wealthy through the mundane route.
To be a good shot is to work through the phase, where the goal is to just be a technically near-perfect shooter. When it’s no longer a question that shooting tight groups will result in busted arrows, then you know that you’re executing. Then you can have some fun.
Build in longer-range shots, shoot from different positions, challenge yourself. Do it in a way that allows you to keep shooting like you’ve reinforced, and you’ll have the best of both worlds. But remember, without the foundation of a proficient shooter, you’re not going to suddenly crush it at long ranges or, more importantly, on live bucks in the woods when the adrenaline is coursing and the window to fill a tag threatens to close at any moment.
For more information on archery gear, check out these articles: What To Look For When Purchasing A Youth Bow, The Best Bow Sights, and Archery 101: How To Choose A Bow.
This week, Cal covers hog contest cheaters, the rescue of 38 hounds from a Mississippi lake, a controversial water access ruling in Wisconsin, and so much more.
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We're after flatheads this week and Brent's gonna tell you about a fun way to catch them. He's also gonna tell you the story of a different way to catch them without nets or hooks. His uncles employed this method back in the day, and it's very efficient but not recommended. All that and more on MeatEater's This Country Life podcast.
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On this week's interview, Cal chats with two Montana hunters about a controversial proposal to shorten Montana's mule deer and elk seasons.
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On this week's show, Tony talks with New Jersey bowhunter, Greg Litzinger, about a tree stand fall he experienced that nearly took him out of the game forever.
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Sorting through internet jargon and opinions to figure out what's the best arrow set up for hunting elk is a daunting task. In this episode, Dirk sits down with long time friend and arrow expert, Cory Miller of Darton Archery, at Total Archery Challenge in Big Sky, Montana. They talk pros and cons of today's popular arrow setups.
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Tony Peterson, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Seth Morris, Corinne Schneider, Hilary Byrne, Cory Calkins, and Hanzi Deschermeier.
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By the 2000’s, the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation had paddlefish poaching largely under control, but it wasn’t long before a new group of poachers hit the scene. In this episode of the Bear Grease podcast, Clay Newcomb continues his conversation with retired Oklahoma game warden, Jeff Brown, as he recounts the details of “Operation Russian Snag,” and the lengths that this group went to in order to acquire paddlefish caviar.
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General veterinary visits aren’t cheap. The annual checkups, blood work, vaccinations, and whatever else can add up. While it’s fun to gripe about services that seem expensive, the usual stuff is a small price to pay to keep a pup healthy.
Emergency veterinarian visits are a different story. If you have a real injury to deal with, or something goes wrong at midnight and there’s only one clinic in town that accepts overnight patients, you’re going to pay for it.
Expense is obviously not the only reason to try to keep a pup out of the vet’s office. No one wants to pick up a fresh recruit and watch it suddenly get hurt, poisoned, or worse. Our job as dog owners is to keep them safe and anticipate potential dangers.
When it comes to puppies, we often focus on the obvious dangers like traffic, falling into deep water, or jumping off of the tailgate of a truck and breaking its landing gear. While the world can be a harsh place for puppies, it’s often the things we don’t anticipate or don’t recognize as dangers that can alter the course of a young dog’s life. One of these is something that owners encourage all of the time, but they shouldn’t.
Dog’s Don’t Say Hi Whether you take your pup out to the local park to socialize it or show it off, remember this one thing—your dog does not need to meet other dogs. People think this is universally a good thing and that it’s cute as hell. It can be, but it’s also true that puppies have the manners and social acumen of a methed-up hillbilly.
Their favorite move is to jump up on other dogs’ heads, or bite jowls, ears, or whatever they can get their teeth on. Most dogs will correct them with a nip or remove themselves from a pup’s orbit. Some dogs, often big males but not always, will do worse.
An adult dog that corrects a puppy might do so verbally, or it might take action. If it takes action, the odds of your pup taking a tooth to the eye or needing some stitches increase in an instant. It’s just not worth it. Socialize your dog with people so they learn manners, but be very cautious of strange dogs. The pup meet-up is almost always a net-neutral to net-negative experience.
Adorable Garbage DisposalsNot all dogs are food-driven, but most are when they’re puppies. They experience their world through their mouths, and anything remotely edible has the chance to go down the gullet. When this happened to one of my Labs about a decade ago, a pound of raisins disappeared into an animal that most definitely shouldn’t eat raisins.
It cost me over a grand in veterinary fees to get her over that hurdle, and it was worth it. It was also avoidable. The more free roaming time your pup has, the more likely it’ll be to get into something. This might be some type of people food that is toxic to them, or it might be a cord to a lamp. While it’s fun to try to grant a young dog more independence, this comes with the risk that they’ll do something really stupid with it.
Crate training is a great way to prevent a puppy from getting into trouble. It allows you to keep them in a safe, comfortable environment when you can’t give them your undivided attention.
Hot Pup-TatoIt might not seem like much, but a drop of two feet with a 10-week-old puppy is no joke. This is also about the height at which a lot of kids will hold a new puppy. A little nip from sharp puppy teeth or just a little too much wriggling to get away, and a kid will drop a pup fast.
If they’re playing in the grass, it’s usually not a big deal. But a drop of even a foot or two on concrete or gravel can result in a real injury. This is far more common than a lot of potential dog owners realize.
Avoid this by having anyone who you don’t trust fully to hold onto your pup to sit down, and then hand them the dog. Not only will this prevent a potential dropping scenario, but it also teaches the puppy that people will come down to its level instead of it having to jump up to theirs.
For more dog training info, check out these articles: How To Keep Your Pup Off The Naughty List, Dog Genetics: Pick A Litter, Not A Pup, and Why Your Bird Dog Sucked Last Season.
Vietnamese cabbage salad, or slaw, is a staple at gatherings. This crunchy, refreshing dish strikes a balance between salty, sweet, spicy, and sour, thanks to a traditional Vietnamese dressing made of fish sauce, lime, and chili. Shredded chicken is the most typical protein, but duck is wonderful as well.
One ingredient I did omit is Vietnamese coriander. I love it, but even in Omaha, it can be difficult to find. If you’re lucky to live near a well-stocked Vietnamese grocer, add a few leaves to the salad for a more authentic flavor. Cilantro and mint make a perfectly acceptable substitute.
If you don’t want to make fried shallots—I have a penchant for burning them—or can’t find them pre-made in a container or bag at the Asian grocery store, you can use French’s crispy fried onion. It’s the same idea and won’t hurt the salad.
On today's show, Tony talks about how most hunters don't practice enough throughout the summer. He breaks down why a little extra effort, and an attention to the conditions, can help most bowhunters level up their accuracy game during the off-season.
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Steven Rinella talks with Matt James of Colossal Biosciences, Janis Putelis, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, and Randall Williams.
Topics discussed: Explaining de-extinction; bringing back the woolly mammoth, dodo bird, and Tasmanian tiger; why should we?; and more.
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This week, Cal covers a real-life Lassie, the "shroom boom," and landowners trying to shut down access to public trails.
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The title of this episode was a question posed to Brent by his youngest daughter, Bailee. It was a fair question and one that took him a while to answer. His response may surprise you. You’ll also hear about his mind-reading abilities that peaked in Army basic training. Bet you didn’t see that coming on MeatEater’s This Country Life podcast.
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On today's episode, guest host Tony Peterson talks to New York whitetail hunter, Tim Kent. In the last decade, Kent's wife has battled cancer twice, which has forced him to reassess his priorities in life, as well as his approach to the outdoors.
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This week Dan and Reid Isbell host hit-making artist Michael Ray out in God’s Country. Ray shares his thoughts on keyboard warriors, how Joe Diffie impacted his life, and how he mentally recharges from life in the spotlight. He shares some crazy alligator-hunting stories from his upbringing in Florida and how music has been a part of his life from the time he was born.
Catch Dan and Reid playing live as The Brothers Hunt @ Chiefs in Nashville on July 19th: Get Tickets
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On today's show, Tony talks about how whitetail hunters are losing opportunities in a way that we've only really previously seen out west, and why we should all be paying attention to this trend.
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Steven Rinella talks with Shayne Burke, Chloe Burke, Janis Putelis, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, and Randall Williams.
Topics discussed: When your wife is an EMT and is there to help when you get mauled by a grizzly; when you go from catching and selling pigeons to raising baby pigeon chick pets; shed hunting and getting a stick in your eye; brain surgery; a honeymoon in WY; a momma bear with cubs; biting down on bear spray; a confiscated can; getting saved off the mountain; and more.
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Steven Rinella talks with independent presidential candidate for the 2024 election, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Topics discussed: Brain worms and bonding over parasites; getting mercury poisoning from eating all the fish you harvest; raising homing pigeons at age 7; being a master falconer; fighting polluters to keep water clean; making a list of every bad thing you ever did; focusing on what matters to people; government-subsidized vs. free market energy sources; Secret Service security; and more.
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This week Cal talks about the $100,000 bass, new CWD studies, TPW and the RK Trophy Ranch, black bear confirmed in California death, plus so much more.
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Brent's talking wild hogs this week and sharing his brother Tim's story that could've turned tragic. You'll hear why so many put so much value on pigs in the past and how they've affected not only the environment, but also a lot of the creatures that share the habitat. Say it with us, "WOO PIG SOOIE!" It's time for MeatEater's This Country Life podcast.
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For this week's interview, Cal and Jordan Sillars talk predator mitigation with Ellie Lane Gage of the Western Landowner Alliance. They cover the struggles of producers, why poison is bad, how beef prices don't reflect beef work, and so much more.
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This week, Tony talks to 9/11 survivor, Will Jimeno, about his struggle with survivor's guilt and how his experience changed him fundamentally as a father, husband, and as a bowhunter.
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Elk season is right around the corner and everyone is starting to think about it. On this episode, Jason fields questions from the Elk Addicts Facebook page. Cold calling, gutless method, what you can get away with when an elk is in range, and how often Jason calls are just some of the topics covered on this episode.
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It’s the time of year that we all love: planning season! On this episode Tyler Jones, K.C. Smith talk about how people are drawing tags across the country and others are planning their adventurous over-the-counter hunts. We do a deep dive on the lessons we’ve learned about how to stay in a hotel, camp truck, and backpack way back in the wilderness and still survive. Hopefully, you can learn from our mistakes!
Check out The Element Youtube Channel and go watch these other great hunting and Fishing Videos!
Our BIGGEST Trail Camera Bucks EVER!
Florida Keys Fishing
Unreal SoDak Deer Hunting 2023
Huge 8 Point Buck from a Hay Bale Blind
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Seth Morris, Christine Sawicki, Max Barta, Alyssa Smith, and Logan Dove.
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This week Dan and Reid host ACM New Male Artist of the Year Nominee, Kameron Marlowe. They share what it was like being “artists” at the iHeart Fest and spill the details of what goes on behind-the-scenes. Kameron dives in on his new album “Keepin’ the Lights On” and explains where he drew inspiration from when creating this sophomore album project. They close with a rendition of a Keith Whitley song that undoubtedly will bring you to tears.
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On today's show, Tony explores the idea of embracing low odds hunts, and holding yourself accountable for your hunting decisions even when it would be easy to quit.
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My parents are fond of telling anyone who will listen how I had an affinity for amphibians right out the gate. The house we lived in during the first five years of my life sat on a dead-end street where the asphalt ended just short of a small pond.
As soon as I could walk, they like to say, I was on my way to the water to try to catch frogs. They talk about how often they’d lose track of me only to see their tow-headed toddler stalking Kermits at the water’s edge—an equal testament to my obsession and the kind of parenting style that leads to quasi-feral kids.
There must be something genetic there. Perhaps I come from a long line of frog eaters. I don’t know, but what I do know is that my daughters (and most kids) are fascinated with frogs and toads. There are few more enjoyable ways to entertain a youngster than a good frog-catching session, but you have to have the right stuff first.
Nets & BucketsIf you have a black belt in frog snatching, you might not need a net. You might have the skill set to sneak up heron-like and then use your fast twitch muscles to grab a bullfrog from the muck. You might also be delusional when it comes to your skills. It doesn’t matter either way because young kids don’t have what it takes to fill up a bucket with frogs without a net.
A good, sturdy net that is built for the task is a huge plus. Combine that with a bucket or a plastic tote, and you’re pretty much geared up and good to go. The next thing to do is develop a frog-catching strategy.
Frog Scoops & DrivesIn gin-clear water, spooked Kermits will usually swim far enough to get away from you. In stained water or water with good frog cover (weeds), they seem to feel safe enough to swim a short way and then try to hide. The strategy here is to walk along until you flush one and then stand perfectly still until it pokes its eyes above the surface. When it does, scooping toward its nose is the best bet because it’s harder for them to get away when they are facing the net.
If your hunting grounds aren’t conducive to this style, you’ll likely need to do a frog drive. Just like with some people, frogs aren’t known for their critical thinking skills. They tend to focus on what they perceive to be the biggest threat. If they are on land sunning themselves like leopard frogs love to do, it’ll seem like they are just hopping randomly to get away. Which, they are.
You can use this to your advantage by waiting for a frog to stop and then having your child position the net almost vertically in front of them. Frogs tolerate slow movements, so advise accordingly. Then, it’s your job to sneak up behind and bump the frog in the direction of the net. They’ll usually do most of the work for you by hopping straight into the net, but they also often veer just out of the way of your trap. Follow, reset, and try again.
Ground Rules My gene-deep love of frogs means I don’t want them to suffer. From the time my daughters were barely old enough to walk, we caught frogs and toads like crazy. We also had a rule that if anything we caught got injured or worse, the session was over. Like a new OSHA rule, this was borne after watching one of my young daughters roll a baby toad between her hands, which did not do him any favors.
The girls were also allowed to build little habitats, but as soon as the frog-catching fun was over, everything had to be released. We went into it knowing that this was a temporary pet situation and nothing more. This went for everything else we caught as well, from minnows and snakes to salamanders.
The other rule I had, which was for myself, was to explain as much as I could. If there are tadpoles around, you can explain the life cycle of a frog. Maybe you’ll see some snails or some dragonfly larvae that deserve some attention. Just like with any hunt, the end goal is a nice motivator, but the experience is what matters.
This applies to a lot of things we do as adults, but also to an hourlong foray along the edge of a pond where slippery, jumpy adventure awaits.
For more information on how to get kids interested in the outdoors, check out these articles: What to Look for When Purchasing a Youth Bow, Lessons From Trout Fishing With Kids, and How Not to Introduce Your Kids to Guns.
Steven Rinella talks with Doug Duren, Karl Malcolm, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, and Randall Williams.
Topics discussed: The Aldo Leopold Foundation; a diamond anniversary; how “A Sand County Almanac” remains powerfully relevant today; celebrating the 100th Anniversary of the Gila Wilderness; Aldo Leopold quotes; the object and its shadow; get a chance to be part of our MeatEater Podcast recording by joining ME Experiences in Cypress Cove; our Trivia board game is back in stock; when the kid has a bully body; It’s-Better-When-You-Don’t-Get-One-Jani; bird watching with opera glasses; Aldo Leopold: His Life and Work; how you can’t put Aldo Leopold in a box; killing the things we love; Doug’s non-profit organization, Sharing the Land; and more.
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This week, Cal talks wild horse contraception, whale diving, wolf poisoning, and why ChatGPT uses a lot of water.
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Brent's back from the Canadian bush of Manitoba and he brought a big color phase bear with him. Hear the tale of that hunt and get a teasing glimpse into a family that lives their lives close to nature. More on those folks in a future episode. Right now we're bear hunting and the bear hunting is good! All that plus a listener-submitted story showcasing the teamwork of three generations of turkey hunters on MeatEater's "This Country Life" podcast.
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Steven Rinella speaks with Patrick Hanley and Daniel Horner from Sig Sauer, Janis Putelis, Garrett Long, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics discussed: When a guy dares to do a "stick 'em up" robbery of your dad's veterinarian business; getting schooled at shooting competitions; the Sig Cross; the "man bun" caliber; left-handed Clovis hunters; how Steve just wants a folded stock; MOA or MIL; the new long range record holder; image stabilizing binoculars and rangefinders; and more.
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Last October, I had the opportunity to hunt and harvest my second melanistic white-tailed deer on our family ranch in Central Texas.
Our tracking and census process on the ranch is a meticulous one. We run trail cameras year-round and study every image in August and September to conduct an accurate census count. We also record stand counts and incidental observations during that time and forward the data to our county’s wild game biologist.
In recent years, we have had at least one melanistic deer in the group. In 2023, we had two melanistic does and one melanistic fawn. The two does were two and three years old. The fawn was the twin of a typical-looking white-tailed deer from a typical-looking mother.
By mid-September, our biologist sent us the harvest recommendations for our Managed Lands Deer Program (MLDP). The program allows us an extended season, beginning on the last day of September until the last day of February. We were issued five buck tags and 10 doe tags for the 2023-2024 hunting season. I decided that if the three-year-old melanistic doe was without a fawn, she could be harvested.
On the afternoon of October 1, I arrived at the ranch with my close friends, Matthew Mitchell and Jon Herbster, to begin working towards our doe harvest numbers. After we made sure our rifles were true out to 300 yards, Matthew took Jon with him to sit in one of the property’s deer blinds.
Jon had been alongside Matthew on a successful hog hunt during a work trip a couple months prior, but that was the extent of Jon’s experience in the stand. Jon was now armed with his hunter’s education certificate, his first hunting license, and was excited for the opportunity to hunt a doe.
Within twenty minutes, Jon and Matthew had a mature doe step out around 165 yards. Jon picked up his 30-06 rifle, and put the crosshairs behind her shoulder. After a few minutes, he brought the rifle back inside. Matthew asked him what was going on. “I’m not sure—it feels early in the hunt. Let’s wait a little bit and see what else shows up,” he said. Eventually, the first doe walked off. Other deer appeared, but they had fawns with them, making them off-limits.
In the last few minutes of legal light, Matthew caught some movement at the end of the far-right lane. Four does were at the edge of the field, eating. He identified one as the three-year-old melanistic doe. Jon was going to take the first shot unless it was a mature buck or the melanistic doe. Matthew wasted no time shouldering his rifle. With light dwindling and with the group packed together, Matthew was unable to make an ethical shot. He brought the gun back into the blind, and they packed up their gear.
Why Are Some Deer Melanistic?Melanism is “an unusual darkening of body tissues caused by excessive production of melanin,” which affects the skin, feathers, and hair. It can give animals a very dark, almost black appearance. Melanism has been recorded in deer herds in 60% of the country, and this region of Texas has the highest concentration.
In fact, a study by John Baccus and John Posey of Texas State University found that 21% of the white-tailed deer in this specific region are “abnormally” dark. It has been reported that there are more melanistic deer in the surrounding eight-county region than the rest of North America combined. It is believed that 9% of the total population in this region carry the trait.
Some have questioned if hunting melanistic deer might have a devastating effect on the population, but an article released by the National Deer Association answers that question:
“Melanistic and normal whitetails do coexist in the same area. Hunters of free-ranging whitetails cannot change population genetics through harvest choices, so harvesting or passing a melanistic deer will have no measurable impact on the frequency of this anomaly.”
After hunting my first melanistic buck on Veterans Day in 2016, I wrote an article documenting the experience. Shortly after it was published, a professor at Texas Tech who studied melanism in white-tailed deer reached out to ask me some questions.
His first was, “Do you have dry or wet creeks running through your property?” I explained that our entire northern boundary was a large creek, and we also had many smaller ones cutting across the property. He explained that the areas where he found there to be a higher number of melanistic deer were always on properties with prolific creek systems.
“They seem to survive better in that environment,” he said.
I told him we witnessed a great deal of hoof traffic in the creeks and along the banks. He thought the creeks provided better safety from predators, and they might benefit from being better camouflaged amongst the shadows under the canopy of trees. We believe the natural terrain and the many habitat restoration and conservation projects we have done (NRCS & CRP) in the last 15 years have undoubtedly helped increase numbers, and sightings, of melanistic deer on our ranch.
Once in a Lifetime…TwiceNone of us had any luck the next morning of our hunt, so we decided to switch things up that last evening, and Jon sat with me. With roughly an hour left in the hunt, we saw five deer moving across the middle-left lane, 175 yards away. Two were mature does with their fawns, and the last was a solo mature doe. After waiting a while for her to separate from the group, I asked Jon if he was ready. He took a deep breath and fired. I was filming the hunt and could clearly see the doe was hit before it took off into the woods. I told Jon to reload in case it crossed into the next lane. She never did.
As Jon settled down a bit from the excitement, he asked me if the shot looked good. I told him, yes, but we could check the camera. We scrolled frame by frame to see if we could tell where the bullet had made an impact. It appeared to us that the shot might have been a bit further back from where he aimed, but we were not certain. Usually, I would wait thirty minutes before tracking an animal, but if it didn’t hit the main vitals, it might need more time. We texted Matthew and told him we were going to stay until dark, then we would all go search together.
That meant that Jon and I both had more time to second-guess our second guessing. We spent the next forty minutes reviewing the footage, trying to make a better determination. Suddenly, I caught some movement down the middle right lane. Three does came out of the woods, and then a fourth emerged behind them. It was the three-year-old melanistic doe. The first two moved towards us, while the melanistic doe began moving along the edge of the woods, with another doe right behind her. I ranged them at 218 yards. I picked up my .280AI chambered rifle, got as comfortable as I could, and moved the safety off.
Right at that exact moment, we heard an army of coyotes sounding off nearby. Had they found Jon’s deer? Or were they only responding to the distant train horn, as they had done so many times before? The deer seemed very nervous. All the noise and the chorus of coyotes yelping and barking away made me think they were about to bolt. I got my shot lined up, placed the crosshairs behind the front shoulder, and took a deep breath.
As the shot rang out, deer ran in every direction, and the dust rose from their excitement. The melanistic doe took off to the left, before circling back towards the stand, and coming to her final rest, about 160 yards away from us. I reloaded in the event I needed to take a second shot, but it was clear she was down.
With about 10 minutes of light remaining, we quickly grabbed the camera and made our way over to the melanistic doe. After taking some photos, I took a moment to let it hit me. I had just taken my second “once in a lifetime” animal on my family ranch. I bowed my head, put my hands on the doe, and said a prayer of thanks.
We picked up Matthew and walked back to the spot where Jon had shot his doe. We put on our headlamps and looked around. After close to ten minutes, we hadn’t found any blood—not a good sign. We decided to expand our grid search out to one hundred yards. I dipped down into a dry creek bed about seventy yards from where we started looking. I turned and saw something white behind a tree. I walked over and saw it was a sun-faded shed antler. I picked it up and looked around to see if there was a matching set. I didn’t see another shed, but I did catch a glimpse of something else…Jon’s doe!
We couldn’t see any evidence that it had been shot, and there was not one drop of any blood anywhere near the deer. When we rolled her over, it was very evident that Jon had made a perfect heart shot on his first-ever animal. Why had I ever doubted him?
Back at camp, Matthew guided Jon on how to butcher the doe while I began meticulously skinning mine. I took my time removing the cape. I had plans to get a shoulder mount of the melanistic doe to put next to the shoulder mount of my melanistic buck. We eventually got everything in our coolers to bring home to our respective families and then celebrated with a well-deserved meal.
I am still amazed that Jon and I harvested such memorable deer. I love sharing these experiences with my friends and family on our ranches. My uncle and grandfather taught me so many lessons here—what it means to take care of our property, how to be a responsible and ethical hunter, and how to be a conscious conservationist. I’m at a stage in my life where I thoroughly enjoy passing on the knowledge and skill sets I have acquired from so many important mentors and teachers. These experiences and stories that we collect in the woods, the memories we make with family and friends, and the delicious wild game meals we put on the table are truly the real reward.
Most of the time, fishing is a calm, quiet, and innocent recreation. We head out on the water to commune with nature and make our first casts with the gentle hope that perhaps today is the day we might get lucky. It’s a beautiful and serene sport that gives us a chance to slow down and bask in the magnificence of the outdoor world—unless you’re fishing for pike and muskie.
Fishing for pike and muskie is like hunting in the tall grass for a lion—you’re constantly on edge because somewhere just beyond your sight, something lurks. Catching one is a bloody knuckle, war-cry type of angling success that feels like being victorious in The Colosseum and leaves you wanting more.
Both pike and muskie have created their legions of dedicated and obsessive anglers who fall in love with the predator fishing game. However, while the two species are similar to one another and are often lumped together, there are some distinct differences between the two fish that have created their own individual mystics for the anglers.
Esox BasicsNorthern pike and the muskellunge are part of the pike family and the genus Esox. Just like their smaller cousins, the pickerel, pike and muskie have long, torpedo-shaped bodies and flat, duck-billed jaws full of razor-sharp teeth. In the lakes, rivers, and reservoirs they haunt, pike and muskie are the dominant predators with diets consisting of everything from rough fish like suckers to other game fish like bass and trout. Their aggression is such that amphibians like frogs and salamanders, as well as turtles, ducks, goslings, and even small mammals like muskrats, can regularly end up on the Esox menu.
“They’re just killing machines,” avid pike and muskie angler Samuel Brown said. “I’ve caught pike with whole ducks in their stomachs. I’ve seen big muskie T-bone and rip chunks of flesh off spawning chinook salmon. Wherever pike and muskie swim, they’re the boss, and nothing in the water is safe. That’s why fishing for them is so much fun! You’re almost going on a safari of sorts where you’re challenging a predator on its home ground.”
Due to their similar appearance, size, and aggressive nature, most pike and muskie anglers use the same heavy action rods and similar large, flashy lures, massive streamers, and monster live baits when fishing for both species. However, while the two fish may look the same, share the same water, and are actually closely related enough to cross-breed and create tiger muskie, their similarities stop there. Muskie and pike have different habits, different qualities, and even different catchability that, when you’re fishing for them, almost makes them feel like polar opposites
The Many vs. The FewPopulation may be the most obvious difference between pike and muskie. With a range that extends across the US and Canada, pike inhabit most of North America, while muskie populations are isolated to only a few regions. While you can find and catch pike in almost every state in the US, muskie can only be pursued in the Midwest, Northeast, and parts of Appalachia. Yet there is much more to their population differences than just range, as pike simply breed more. Female pike will drop eggs in every suitable bay and estuary that they can, occasionally spiking pike populations to the point where they completely take over a body of water.
“There are a lot of places that just have too many pike,” Minnesota fishing guide Wil Neururer said. “In some ponds and smaller lakes, there can be so many pike that they reach sexual maturity too young and end up stunted with nothing to eat. Their success in their breeding and their ability to populate create these fisheries where there actually needs to be less of them for the pike population to be healthy and grow.”
Muskie, on the other hand, tend to spawn in smaller, more segregated areas, so their populations remain balanced and more isolated in most bodies of water where they’re found.
“You can have a lot of big lakes with not a lot of muskie in them,” Neururer said. “And the muskie that are in there can only be found in one or two spots. It makes muskie a fish that has to be hunted and sought after, whereas pike can be anywhere and everywhere and will come to you. The need to cover water and find muskie makes them a different animal from pike, and they both require a different sort of fishing game.”
The differences between catching pike and catching muskie extend well beyond just their population. Both species overlap in a lot of places, and though there are plenty of occasions when you can catch a pike and a muskie in the same day, targeting them individually often requires distinct changes of strategy.
Moody vs. AggressiveThe fact is that pike are simply easier to catch than muskie. While this is partially due to their population as there are more pike in more places, it’s mostly due to their natures. Both fish are dominant predators, yet they go about it in different ways.
Pike are voracious and will chase down and eat anything from small minnows to panfish and basically everything that moves. This makes lure and bait selection easier as northern’s will eat just about anything put in front of them. Muskie are more selective and eat only one or two extremely large meals a day. This pickiness, along with their notable sensitivity to fishing pressure, just makes them much more difficult to catch.
“Muskie have sort of created their own mysticism around catching them,” said fishing guide Drew Price, owner and operator of Masterclass Angling Guide Service. Drew fishes and guides for both pike and muskie on Lake Champlain. “The fish of 10,000 casts is a well-deserved nickname for muskie because they behave differently than pike. Pike are always available and always willing to take a fly or lure. Muskie, on the other hand, have two modes where they either slowly follow your baits back to the boat and then turn away, or when they’re hungry, they come in super aggressively with an ‘I’m going to grab immediately’ sort of ferocity. You never know what kind of mood a muskie is in where pike are almost always hostile.”
In most fishing circles, muskie have sort of pulled away from pike because of their different behavior. Muskie are slower growing and eat only a couple times a day, so catching a big one is a rare occurrence. Anglers pursue them with giant lures, flies, and baits that they cast and fish for hours and even days at a time, just hoping for a strike. This has caused muskie to be put on a pedestal by much of the angling community, to the point where many hardcore muskie anglers look at pike with disdain and almost consider them to be a trash fish.
“I’ll never understand why some anglers love muskie and hate on pike,” Price told MeatEater. “I mean I understand the muskie obsession. There’s just a quality about muskie that’s a little different. They invoke the imagination and once you see a big one follow, it’s just all over. Yet at the same time, pike are great because they are more than willing to take a fly or lure, and they’re always available. One of the things that I find cool about pike is that they are the most widely distributed freshwater fish in the world! The pike here are the same ones in Germany and Russia, and that’s super cool!”
Like many other anglers, Price believes that pike can and should be just as coveted a prize as muskie as they are a quality game fish and that the favoritism many anglers have has more to do with the muskie’s scarcity rather than the pike’s negative qualities.
“Muskie might be a little more acrobatic when they’re hooked, but nothing hits like a big pike,” Price said. “Pike have a vicious strike and they’re so strong. I’ve had a 35-inch pike tow my boat around and that’s just nuts. I think that the mysticism of muskie is the only reason that they get more attention and more protection. It’s the same reason that trout get more attention than bowfin or gar. Anglers just want that rarer, more ‘challenging’ fish. So many anglers have this ‘it’s just a pike mentality,’ when they catch one that the pike really doesn't get the attention that it deserves and the species doesn't get the favoritism that it should have.”
Blurring the LinesAs previously mentioned, pike and muskie often inhabit the same water and can be caught on the same lures on the same day. This has led to a sort of revelation in many Esox fishing circles in recent years, with open-minded anglers going out to hunt both species at the same time.
“Chasing pike and muskie in the same water is a hell of a good time,” Wil Neururer told MeatEater. “In late July to August, muskie and pike will both be fairly shallow and during that first cold front of August, they’ll overlap a lot. It’s a pretty fantastic way to fish when you go after both species. The muskies will make you want to run your head into the wall trying to catch them, while the pike are trusty rusty, old reliable, and catching a bunch of them is a great way to get your anger out after getting your ass handed to you by the muskie.”
While pike and muskie have different feeding habits, there are a lot of great techniques that appeal to both their natures. Muskie are legendarily picky and prefer larger lures and flies, but pike are water wolves that will smash and kill nearly anything you can drag in front of them with no qualms about hitting larger lures. As such, fishing with large swim baits like the Realimage, spinner baits like the Musky Killer, and suspending jerkbaits like the Husky Jerk will appeal to both their natures. However, it’s still important to remember the differences between the two fish and to fish the lures accordingly when pursuing them.
“Presentation makes a big difference when trying to catch both pike and muskie in the same water,” Neururer said. “Both fish tend to follow lures to the boat, but with a hesitant pike, you can stop that bait and let it sink to the bottom, and eventually it will bite, but you’d be a fool to do that with a muskie. If you stop the bait on a muskie follow and don’t figure-8 or find a way to keep that lure moving, that fish is gone. So, it’s important to understand all the little nuances before trying to double down on pike and muskie, but it can and should be done. They’re both such awesome fish, you’re missing out on a lot if you only concentrate on one of them.”
To Catch a PredatorAs much as we enjoy going fishing for peaceful pleasure, sometimes you just need a bit of tension. To see a big pike or muskie following your bait back to the boat like an intelligent torpedo fills you with anticipation and a little bit of fear. It’s like watching an ax-wielding psychopath stoically walk after a sprinting teenager in a horror movie. You don’t know exactly what’s about to happen, but you’re pretty sure it’s going to be violent.
Pike and muskie fishing appeal to that small part of our brains that remembers what it is like to be hunted. Whether you’re having them chase your lures to the boat, waiting for them to devour soaking dead-baits on the bottom, or watching them explode on topwater, both pike and muskie add a bit of extra excitement to fishing that can’t be found anywhere else. No matter how different the two species are, the appeal of catching both pike and muskie is one in the same…to bring the thrill of battle into fishing.
Feature image via Drew Price.
Tyler and K.C. meet up with their good friend and fellow Texan, Jesse Griffiths, to chase Rio Grande turkeys in the Texas Hill Country. The landscape is striking, the bluebonnets are in bloom, and the long beards are in full strut. Jesse has a special recipe he wants to share with us, so the goal is to get a bird down ASAP so we can share a special meal with a TexMex flair. However, finding turkeys and getting one in the bag are two very different things. Presented by @onXHunt
Live from the Moody Center in Austin, Texas, Dan and Reid host former country singer, now minister Granger Smith out in God's Country. This episode was taped backstage at the 2024 iHeart Country Festival, where the guys talked with Granger about topics ranging from his Yee Yee brand, to ministry, to writing his new children's book, Up Toward The Light. Granger goes in depth on what it was like taking his son on his first dove hunt and daughter on her first mission trip. He shares his godly wisdom with the guys and explains that while his exit from music wasn't an easy one, he now has "Peace Like a River" over his transition into ministry full time.
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For this week's interview, Cal and Jordan Sillars sit down with Tyler Winter of Native Fish for Tomorrow to learn why we should protect all native fish species and how to be an effective advocate in the conservation space.
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Spring is over and it's time to start getting ready for fall, if you haven't already started! Dirk and Jason go over their exciting hunting plans for 2024 and answer more listener elk hunting questions.
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This week on the show Mark and Tony walk through the deer hunting gear they'll be using in 2024 and breakdown exactly why they chose each item.
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Cooking turkey breast slices on the grill can be a tricky approach, as they’ll easily overcook. Using a technique from The Turkey Book (page 100), Tyler and K.C. from The Element and I made great use of a very large jake’s breast for a quick and appropriate end to a phenomenal Hill Country turkey hunt. I like to cook the breast only on one side until almost cooked through, then quickly finishing the second side ensures two things: the breast won’t be dry, and there will be ample and delicious char on one side. Mesquite is the preferred wood or charcoal for grilling this preparation.
“Shepherd’s Style” or al Pastor, is traditionally applied to pork (it works exceptionally well with feral hog, especially the shoulder, or coppa cut from a fattier hog) but works well with turkey breast, too. The marinade is standard: dried chiles, cumin, some oil, and vinegar to add some tartness. Achiote paste, a fragrant and slightly bitter combination of orange, bright red annatto, spices, and orange juice, adds distinct color and flavor. Find achiote at quality grocery stores or Mexican and Central American markets.
Al Pastor is commonly served with pineapple–roasted or grilled–and here I’m throwing in the leftover cores into the marinade to further tenderize the turkey. Pineapple contains protease, an enzyme that goes to work quickly and effectively on meat, breaking the muscle fibers down and yielding a softer, more tender cut. Serve this on quality corn tortillas with finely chopped raw onion, fresh cilantro, and a salsa of your choosing.
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Janis Putelis, Randall Williams, Chester Floyd, Maggie Smith, Cory Calkins, Max Barta, and Reva Hansen.
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On this episode Tyler Jones, K.C. Smith hop on the phone with Jared Scheffler from Whitetail Adrenaline and talk about deer hunting and tactics they like to use. Jared talks about doing deer drives and how hard hunting can be in Wisconsin. They talk "buck bedding" and what mature bucks like to do during the hunting season. Thanks for listening everyone and be sure to check out "Whitetail Adrenaline" and check out some of the links below for more deer hunting videos!
Check out The Element Youtube Channel and go watch these other great hunting and Fishing Videos!
Florida Keys Fishing
Unreal SoDak Deer Hunting 2023
Second Chance Buck on Texas Public Land
Huge 8 Point Buck from a Hay Bale Blind
Luke McFadden is a 27-year-old, first-generation waterman on the Chesapeake Bay. In this episode of the Bear Grease Podcast, Clay Newcomb invites Luke to tell his story of how determination combined with a love for the outdoors, fishing, and the water, propelled him down a one-way path to becoming a crabber. His experience shows how he embraced challenges, and with thinking outside the box, created a whole new way to engage with customers and create a social media empire.
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This week out in God's Country Dan and Reid host former Florida Georgia Line member Brian Kelley to discuss the "Tennessee Truth" behind his new album. The guys gush over the best spots to fish in 30A, the famous Buc-ee's Brisket sandwich, and bass fishing. BK dives in on his debut "Tennessee Truth" album, sharing the inspiration behind this solo project, what it's been like pursuing his career solo after ten years with FGL, and what he hopes fans take away from this project. He sings one of the best renditions of "That Ain't My Truck" we've ever heard and has the ultimate plot-twist when he shares his "The One That Got Away" on this week's episode!
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On this week's episode, Tony talks about mineral licks, supplemental feeding, and food plots. He discusses the pros and cons of each, and explains why we generally don't need to provide extra food and minerals for the herd.
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Steven Rinella speaks with Brad Leone, Ryan Callaghan, Spencer Neuharth, Randall Williams, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics discussed: Boiling muskrats; recalling our episode on GMOs; Steve’s beaver blanket; Brad’s shows on YouTube; super salad; the cheek sleeve; a bag of dogs; when Brad and Cal cooked up trapping bait; Brad’s YouTube shows; the gluteal crease; when kids get chased off from fishing HOA ponds with guns and knives; jorts; the launch of our MeatEater Kids Podcast; you’re only a resident of one state; why you need to weigh fish on dry land; “Commercial Carl”; what killed the goose?; out of the roost; diving in the shallow for tautogs; the Vinasphere; air pockets in bread; aging fish; and more.
Outro music "MeatEater" by Brad Pike.
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This week Cal talks about lethal goose removal in New Jersey, regulation changes, legislation, and going the distance.
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It's time to eat and there's "masked bandit" on the menu. Brent's gonna tell you how to cook one like they do down in Gillett, Arkansas, home of the world-famous Gillett Coon Supper. He's also sharing a listener-submitted story that anyone can enjoy. It's time to get supper ready on MeatEater's This Country Life podcast.
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On this episode Tyler Jones takes a look at questions submitted by our fans about deer hunting. Tyler gives his thoughts and opinions on how you can make your fall season a successful one. From what gear you need, to where is the best place to ambush a whitetail Buck. Tyler gives you tips on how you can make it possible. We look forward to our next Q and A podcast, be on the look out on our social pages to be apart of the next one! Thanks to everyone who submitted their questions and thanks for listening!
Check out The Element Youtube Channel and go watch these other great hunting and Fishing Videos!
Florida Keys Fishing
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This week on the show Mark's running solo for a special listener Q&A session covering everything from specific hunting tactics to the possible downsides of hunting media, whitetail book recommendations, and more.
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With turkey season in the tail lights, Jason and Dirk answer listener elk hunting questions. They dive deep into scouting, bow and arrow setups, and shot placement.
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Coming to you LIVE from Austin, Texas, Dan and Reid take on the iHeart Country Festival. This special episode includes exclusive "The One That Got Away" stories with Jelly Roll, Riley Green, Walker Hayes, Chase Matthews, Chris Lane, and Kelsey Hart. The guys also play an awesome mashup with Ashley Cooke that's guaranteed to have you dancing along as you listen!
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This week, Cal and Jordan Sillars talk with Trout Unlimited about public lands and national monuments.
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On this Bear Grease Render, Clay Newcomb is joined by Kolby Morehead, of Bear Hunting Magazine, along with Misty Newcomb and Josh “Landbridge” Spielmaker. Clay brings the heat playing his original song “Ballad of Backwoodsman.” The group discusses long-range shooting and bear hunting. Dr. Misty Newcomb takes a deep dive into her field of expertise, "social capital," as they review the Coon Supper podcast.
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Doug Duren, Karl Malcolm, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Chester Floyd, Garrett Long, and Tressa Croaker.
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On this week's episode, Tony breaks down how to not only evaluate whether you're using the right tools for scouting and hunting, but also to figure out ways to use them more effectively.
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In this exclusive interview, Steven Rinella talks with otter mauling victims, Jennifer Royce, Stephanie Johnson, and Leila Pavolich. Janis Putelis and Spencer Neuharth join.
Topics discussed: FTO and missing half your ear; the frequency of otter attacks over time; donate to the Bob Patten Endowment for the Kent State University Experimental Archaeology Laboratory so you can see more bison butchery experiments with Clovis points; the bison skull with a bullet hole at the MeatEater flagship store in Bozeman, MT; Jani’s "Unga Bunga Test"; our interview with the American hunters facing potential prison time in Turks and Caicos; different views on Governor tags; finding a husband for Stephanie; floating on inner tubes down the Jefferson River; when otters were your favorite animal; doing a body roll; the importance of dry bags; just how thankful you are when SOS works on your phone; the landowner and the trooper to the rescue; hundreds of stitches; lingering emotional trauma; having a sense of humor about it as a way to help heal; strapping on the dive knife for next time; and more.
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This week, Cal talks about the death of a bear, a man, and a Honda Civic. He also covers calling in mountain lions while turkey hunting, state and federal legislation, poachers and so much more.
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It won't be long before family vacations and interactions with nature increase. Schools are out for most, but for some the real education in the outdoor classroom begins. The temptation of getting that perfect profile picture with a seemingly docile bison can turn a vacation into tragedy. It can happen quicker than you can say, "Where'd Frank go, and why is that buffalo standing by his shoes?" It's "Messing With Critters" this week on MeatEater's This Country Life podcast.
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An unnamed South Dakota man has been fined more than $30,000 for poaching at least 12 whitetail deer and illegally possessing 55 deadheads. The investigation revealed that on at least one occasion, he roped two live whitetail bucks and tied them to the hitch of his truck.
Officials say the investigation was possible thanks in part to residents reporting suspicious activity.
“South Dakota Game, Fish, and Parks is committed to preserving our wildlife and ensuring that laws are upheld to protect our natural resources,” the agency said in a press release. “We appreciate the community's support in reporting violations and assisting in wildlife conservation efforts.”
The investigation began all the way back in 2020 when Wildlife Conservation Officers received several reports of dead deer in Potter County in the central portion of the state. These reports were especially suspicious because the deer were found in late summer, long before the legal hunting season was set to begin.
A subsequent three-year investigation revealed that the poacher, who was not named in the press release, had been hunting and capturing deer throughout the year.
“Over the course of the investigation, it was found that at least 12 deer were killed throughout all times of year, without proper licensing and no regard to laws in Potter County,” the agency said.
Searches of the poacher’s phone, as well as interviews with other suspects in the case, uncovered videos and pictures depicting the poacher posing with a “trophy whitetail buck” at night and out of season.
This fella was also doing more than hunting, apparently. One of the other suspects showed investigators a video of the poacher roping two live whitetail bucks, tying them to the hitch on his truck, and attempting to fit them with ear tags.
It is unclear why he was trying to capture live deer. It is illegal to trap deer in South Dakota (as it is in all other states), but landowners can operate captive deer facilities with a permit from the South Dakota Animal Industry Board.
MeatEater requested comment from South Dakota Game, Fish, and Parks (GFP) but did not receive a response by publication time.
Wildlife Conservation Officers also found 55 deadheads in various states of decomposition when they searched the poacher’s home. Deadheads are illegal to possess for any reason unless authorized by GFP officials.
The three-year investigation and prosecution concluded in December of last year. The poacher accepted a plea agreement in which he pleaded guilty to 12 Class 1 misdemeanors for hunting or taking big game during nighttime, closed season, or without license. All Class 1 misdemeanors carry a maximum penalty of one year in jail and a $2,000 fine.
He caught the maximum fine for each count for a total of $24,000 in civil fines. He will also have to pay $6,000 in criminal fines along with $1,158 in court costs.
He was sentenced to four years in jail, though all but 30 days of that sentence were suspended. The conditions of that suspended sentence are unclear, but if he meets them, he will only spend a month behind bars.
In addition, his hunting privileges were revoked for eight years, and he had to forfeit all firearms involved in the crimes.
There is often disagreement about the appropriate punishment for wildlife crimes. While legal hunters are often dismayed at the leniency granted by judges, there are a variety of reasons a poacher might receive harsher or lighter sentences. For more on this topic, check out this article, “Why Don’t Poachers Ever Get What They Deserve?”
Images via South Dakota Turn in Poachers (TIPs) Facebook Page.
Have any hot news tips? We’d love to hear them. Shoot us an email at meateater@themeateater.com with the subject line “Hot Tip” followed by a brief description of the story.
Most interactions between wildlife and humans don’t end well. A Tourist in Yellowstone walks too close to a buffalo and is gored. Some uneducated person wants to feed a mangy-looking dog that’s actually a coyote and gets bit. Someone stumbles upon a well-hidden fawn and gets roundhoused by a reasonably protective momma deer. The list goes on.
This video shows the rare side of human-wildlife interactions where things don’t go poorly. These kids in Evergreen, Colorado, were playing some backyard ball and decided to include a local elk in on their game.
Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW) spokesperson told 9 News, “It appears the kids were staying a safe distance from the elk and that they were not harassing the animal since they didn't throw the ball directly at it.”
Now, this elk is no Pelé, but it does seem to be kicking the ball back and waiting for the next pass. Meanwhile, its companions feeding in the trees remain rather uninterested and unbothered by the situation.
You might be wondering why this elk decided to engage in the game. The CPW spokesperson suggested that the elk was treating the ball like a predator by headbutting and stomping at it. So, this may have been a defensive act. But the elk also looks young, probably a yearling, so it might have just been curious and feeling playful with a bellyful of fresh spring greens.
To be very clear: we don't want to encourage anyone to include elk in their next pickup soccer game. They’ll always hoof the ball out of play, and because they have one eye on either side of their head, they’re likely to be caught sleeping even when you pass right at them. All jokes aside, this incident turned out all right, but you might get a different reaction if you decide to seek out an elk herd and shoot a screamer in their direction.
Feature image and video via 9 News.
Read enough gun reviews and you’re sure to see a rifle design described as “thoughtful.” The term is probably overused, but I think it fits Sig Sauer’s new rifle: the CROSS Magnum.
Sig’s engineers designed the CROSS Magnum with an actual human hunter in mind. The rifle is chock full of small features that make it easier to shoot, more convenient to use, and more deadly in the field. That’s usually what writers of my ilk mean when they say a rifle design is “thoughtful,” and I can’t think of a better descriptor of Sig’s new offering.
Specs and Features* Caliber: .300 Win Mag * Barrel Length (in): 24 * Magazine: (1) 6rd Steel Mag * Mag Type: AICS * Action: Bolt * Stock: SIG Precision Stock * Barrel Material: Stainless Steel * Trigger Type: 2-Stage Match (Adjustable) * Barrel Twist: 1:9 * Receiver Finish: Anodized * Overall Length: 45.2 in * Folded Length: 36 in * Muzzle Thread Pitch: 5/8 in - 24 * Accessory Rail: M-LOK * Overall Weight: 8.9 lb W/MAGAZINE * MSRP: $2,500
Why a Magnum?The knock on Sig’s first iteration of the CROSS rifle was that the 16- and 18-inch barrels don’t squeeze enough velocity out of the .308 Win., 6.5 Creedmoor, and 277 Fury cartridges. Cutting the barrel length trimmed weight and made the rifle more portable with a suppressor, but it also reduced the maximum range of these cartridges (especially the 6.5 Creedmoor). That’s fine for most common hunting distances, but if you wanted a CROSS that could really reach out there, you were forced to swap in an aftermarket barrel.
The CROSS Magnum has no such limitations: the 24-inch barrel produces exactly the velocities you expect from a .300 Win. Mag. As you can see from the chart below, 180-grain bullets averaged a hair above 3,000 feet-per-second (fps) while 190-grain pills flew about 2,800 fps at the muzzle.
The rifle’s 24-inch barrel maximizes the .300 Win. Mag.’s performance, but it doesn’t increase the overall weight of the rifle beyond what’s reasonable for a hunting rig. At 8.9 pounds with an empty magazine, it isn’t what I’d call lightweight, but adding a hunting scope and bipod puts the completed setup in the 11-pound range. That’s doable for most hunts, and even a backcountry trip would be manageable with a good rifle sling.
The 24-inch barrel takes full advantage of the .300 Win. Mag.'s power.
The rifle’s nine-pound frame also offers an advantage. Namely, recoil mitigation. I’m not shy about admitting that I don’t love bringing a big magnum rifle to the range, especially for the amount of shooting required to do accuracy testing. A day spent shooting a big bore rifle can leave you with a sore shoulder and an aching head, but lots of practice is the only way to get competent with your setup.
I had to double up on ear protection shooting the Sig CROSS, but I was pleasantly surprised by the amount of felt recoil. The muzzle brake helps considerably, and the gun’s weight does a nice job absorbing those Win. Mag. loads. It’s still tough to see your hits, but I went home without the usual complaints.
This is one of the things I like about the new CROSS. It strikes a nice balance between the “lightweight mountain rifle” model and the too-heavy-for-the-field benchrest rifle. Lighter-recoiling rifles can get away with being lighter overall, but for magnum rifles I think it’s good to have a bit more heft.
Flexible DesignThe rifle’s reasonable weight is due in part to the CROSS Magnum’s one-piece aluminum receiver. The CROSS takes its cues from AR-platform rifles, but it combines the AR-15’s upper and lower receivers into a single receiver. This shaves off a few ounces and makes the rifle sleeker and more compact.
The one-piece receiver provides strength looks great.
The receiver also allows for quick barrel swaps. If you ever decide that a different barrel would better suit your needs, it’s easy to remove the barrel nut and swap barrels, much like you would with an AR-15. Several companies offer aftermarket barrels for the original short-action CROSS, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see the same for the Magnum in short order.
You can change calibers with a barrel swap, but you’re limited to cartridges whose case uses the same bolt face as the .300 Win. Mag. Fortunately, the CROSS Magnum bolt body can be disassembled without tools, which makes it easy to swap bolt faces and accommodate a wider range of cartridges. I haven’t seen any other companies offer CROSS bolt head assemblies (yet), but Sig already sells the standalone part. Given the company’s larger focus on modularity, I can see them offering bolt heads for other cartridges at some point down the line.
The AR-style barrel nut can be removed to swap barrels.
Thoughtful FeaturesThat modularity doesn’t stop with the rifle’s action. The rifle also features a fully adjustable buttstock system that can tune comb height and length of pull. In addition, taking its cues from competition rifle setups, the height of the buttpad can be adjusted to accommodate virtually any awkward shooting position in the field. All of these adjustments can be made by hand without tools: comb height is adjusted with a lever and spring system; the LOP can be changed using a knob; and the buttpad moves along a picatinny-style rail and is fixed with a simple button.
The stock is fully adjustable for comb height, length of pull, and buttpad height.
Of course, the most obvious feature of the stock is its ability to fold along the side of the rifle. I’ve used quite a few folding stocks, and this is one of my favorites. It captures the bolt handle and reduces the overall length of the rifle to a mere 36 inches. But it’s also remarkably simple. Rather than require multiple buttons to be pushed or the hinge to be lifted and pulled, this system features a single release button. When it needs to be unfolded, users simply pull it back out and it snaps in place. Easy.
The stock can also be folded, which cuts the overall length by about 9 inches.
Moving towards the muzzle end of the rifle, the controls and pistol grip are both modeled after the AR-15. This makes operating intuitive for anyone familiar with the AR platform, but it also allows you to swap your favorite AR grip for the one that comes with the CROSS (though I doubt you’ll want to).
What’s more, competitive shooters will notice that the safety selector doubles as a thumb rest. Running a thumb along the side of the rifle (as opposed to wrapping it around the grip) helps avoid torquing the gun and increases practical accuracy. Sig engineers understood this and integrated a thumb rest into the design without having to add another piece of metal to the receiver.
The safety selector doubles as a thumb rest.
Finally, the handguard is worth a mention. It’s free-floated and runs about two-thirds of the way down the barrel. A picatinny rail runs all the way along the top, and M-Lok slots cover every other side. The bottom also features a full-length ARCA rail. Photographers have used ARCA systems for a long time, but lately they’ve been adopted by rifle shooters due to their stability and ease of use.
You’ll most often see ARCA attachments on bipods and tripods. This allows any piece of gear–binos, spotting scopes, or rifles–to be attached to the stabilizer with just a few turns of a knob. Most handguards use M-Lok slots, picatinny rails, or just a sling stud, which requires the user to purchase a separate ARCA rail to take advantage of this system. But the CROSS Magnum’s integrated ARCA rail makes it easy to mount the rifle to a tripod, bipod, or any other stabilizer fitted with an ARCA attachment.
The integrated ARCA rail allows the rifle to be easily mounted to tripods and bipods.
At the RangeNow for the fun part. As I mentioned above, shooting the CROSS Magnum is actually a pleasant experience, which I can’t say about all magnum rifles. Part of that is due to how well the rifle absorbs recoil, but the trigger helps a lot, too.
Range days are the best days.
In a word, the two-stage trigger is excellent. On the rifle I received, the first stage clocks in at 1.5 pounds while the second takes up another pound, for a total of 2.5 pounds. The break is crisp and clean with zero creep or mushiness.
I’ve seen some complain that this trigger is too light for a hunting rifle, and I see where those folks are coming from. But having two stages mitigates some of that risk since the first stage is a clear signal that the second is about to break. Also, the trigger is adjustable. If 2.5 pounds is too light, you can increase that to four pounds using a T15 bit and the external set screw.
The trigger is excellent.
The action is smooth, and the 60-degree throw facilitates quick followup shots. I did have some trouble when the bolt failed to pick up the next cartridge and load it into the chamber. I thought at first I was short-stroking the action–not pulling the bolt far enough back to clear the rear of the next cartridge. That may have been the case once or twice, but I also noticed that sometimes the next round was canted back in the magazine, out of reach of the bolt face.
This may have been due to a faulty magazine or faulty loading on my part–but it happened enough times to warrant a mention, if for no other reason than to warn would-be users to load their magazines carefully.
I broke in the barrel with a few rounds of shooting and cleaning, then started accuracy testing. I started by shooting a five-shot, cold-bore group. This is to test how the rifle shoots if the bore is left to cool completely between each shot. I think this is an important test because it replicates an actual hunting scenario. When you’re out in the field, you won’t be able to warm up the barrel to its sweet spot. The rifle has to make a single shot (hopefully it’s just one shot) on a totally cold bore.
Unlike other rifles I’ve tested, I saw zero difference between the cold bore group and the other groups. None were small enough to blow your socks off, but that’s the kind of consistency I like to see in a hunting rifle.
I also saw very little difference between how the rifle shoots match-grade and hunting ammo. The match ammo posted a slightly smaller average, but the soft-point hunting ammo performed nearly as well. Again: two thumbs up for consistency.
Accuracy testing was conducted from 100 yards.
| Ammo | 180-grain Venari Soft Point | 190-grain OTM Match | | --- | --- | --- | | Average Group (in) | 1.55 | 1.43 | | Small Group (in) | 1.4 | 1.2 | | Average Velocity (fps) | 3069 | 2894 |
All groups shot from 100 yards using an MDT CKYE-POD bipod and rear bag.A fairly typical group.
For those used to seeing half-inch groups in forums and gun magazines, these results look underwhelming. And I admit, my socks are still on my feet, especially considering this rifle’s MSRP.
Still, there are a few things worth mentioning. First, it’s not uncommon for a factory rifle to be picky about ammo. My experience with accuracy testing has taught me that the same rifle might shoot terrible groups with one bullet and shoot the lights out with another.
Second, and I think this is my one big complaint about the CROSS Magnum, the .300 Win. Mag. isn’t what I would have chosen for dead-nuts accuracy. The old magnum can be accurate, there's no doubt about that. But for a factory rifle shooting factory ammo, this is about what I'd expect. I don’t know why Sig went with the .300 Win. Mag. when there are more modern, accurate high-powered cartridges to choose from. I suppose the market for the .300 Win. Mag. is larger, as the comment section below is about to prove. But I hope Sig expands their lineup of long-action offerings to include a few of those more accurate options on this platform.
Last ShotThe good news is that the CROSS platform is customizable, at home and out-of-the-box. Aftermarket barrels can solve most accuracy issues and allow users to swap calibers, and those options will only increase as more hunters switch to these and other chassis-style platforms. That’s why I think this rifle is thoughtfully designed–it offers a host of useful features now while maintaining the flexibility to grow and change into the future. If you’re looking for a big boy rifle for your next elk, moose, or bison hunt, the new CROSS Magnum is worth a look.
This week on the show, we're joined by Jake Hofer of The Land Podcast to discuss everything you need to know to buy a great deer hunting property.
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Some of the best hunters are those you've never heard of. Brock Shelton doesn't have social media, and nobody aside from his close friends has ever seen a deer that he has killed, but his wall is testament to how effective he is in the whitetail stand. Jason and Brock discuss the whitetail deer hunter's calendar and how successful deer hunters are working year round. We talk about setting stands, weather fronts, hunting different periods of the rut, and a bunch of other things.
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For this week's special drop, we dig into BLM rule changes, conservation leases, Ambler Road, the National Petroleum Reserve and what all these rule changes mean for hunters.
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A week ago, a buddy of mine sent me a picture of twin fawns lying on the forest floor. While scouring the woods for morels, he stumbled onto the pair. They couldn’t have been more than a few days old.
These encounters are happening all over the whitetail’s range right now. If you’re lucky enough to walk up on a newborn, it might seem like it would be impossible for enough of them to survive the first few weeks of their lives to the point where we have viable populations to hunt.
Many do survive, however, and the first advantage they have is one of numbers.
Predator SwampingIf you were to take a walk in my backyard right now, you’d notice a hell of a lot of baby frogs on the edge of our pond. Once the tadpoles lose their tails and crawl from the water, there is a window where the amphibian numbers are amazing. This is no accident.
It’s an evolutionary trait that developed to swamp predator numbers. The more prey that saturates the landscape at one time, the less likely any one individual is to get munched on. Regionally, whitetails rely on the same method. This is why an uninterrupted rut will occur in a fast and furious manner, where most of the does will be bred within a short window of time.
The more fawns born in the same couple of weeks, the less likely it is that a disproportionate amount will end up in the gullets of predators. This is also why a trickle rut is bad for deer numbers. The longer it’s drawn out, the less saturation occurs in the spring.
Fawns don’t rely solely on strength in numbers to survive to their first birthday. They also inherently understand the benefits of laying low.
Good Hiding Spots One of the most predator-dense areas I hunt is northern Wisconsin. We have the big four—wolves, coyotes, bears, and bobcats. We also see older does, year after year, raising fawns near cabins and roads. The best fawning grounds over there seem to be the areas closest to human activity, which might simply be due to predators’ reluctance to get too close to man.
There’s an advantage there, but a bigger cross-species advantage is the gene-deep bend toward laying low. Contrary to popular belief, fawns aren’t scent-free. They are just small and unwilling (and unable) to move a whole lot. The more they hide in the tall grass, the less scent they leave around. Black bears are pretty good at finding them anyway, but generally, this strategy allows them to grow into their legs and other survival traits before they start to trail mom around through the woods and fields.
Their custom paint job aids in the hiding process as well. The stippled coats of fawns work amazingly well at blending into the forest floor, especially a forest floor that is dappled in sunlight (which you often see in the late spring and early summer).
Three Weeks To Freedom If you were to start watching a rerun of Friends the moment a fawn hit the ground, that little deer would be able to stand up on wobbly legs about the time the credits rolled. A couple hours later, that same fawn can walk around some. Less than a month after that, it can run fast enough in short bursts to leave most predators behind.
This ability to run and cover ground coincides with a change in their diets. At first, their sole source of nutrition is their mother’s milk. This stage lasts a few weeks before they start adding in natural foliage. They will still nurse for quite a few more weeks, but they don’t count on just mom for their daily calories.
By the time they can really run, they are far less likely to end up clenched between the jaws of something big and toothy. In fact, at this point in many regions, the biggest threats they face are all human-related. Hunters are a big one, naturally, but so are vehicles.
It’s not an easy go for young deer, or any deer in most places, but the threat of being helpless and unable to escape predation is mostly concentrated in a small amount of time right after they’re born.
They learn the ways of the woods early and excel at surviving almost out of the gate. That might not even seem possible if you stumble across a fawn curled up in the CRP while you’re out hanging trail cameras, but it’s true.
And honestly, it’s pretty incredible.
For more information on deer hunting, check out these articles: What Whitetails Can Teach You About Hunting Ethics, Why the Ghost of Predators Past Make the Modern Whitetail So Difficult to Hunt, and What Deadheads Teach Whitetail Hunters About Buck Behavior.
I love mushroom-filled ravioli, so I thought to add a few covetous morel mushrooms into ravioli this spring. With the addition of ground venison, you’ll get a meaty, satisfying meal.
I use one of my favorite cooking shortcuts here: Instead of making homemade pasta, which is time-consuming and labor-intensive, I use gyoza/pot sticker wrappers. My favorite brand is Dynasty, which seems to hold up well in the process. Of course, if you’d rather make your own homemade pasta, more power to you.
I enjoy a simple sauce of brown butter and sage, but you can use whatever sauce you like. A cream-based sauce would taste amazing, while a red sauce might overwhelm the flavor of the morels. Note that these makeshift ravioli are delicate—not the kind you can toss around in a sauce. So, make the sauce for drizzling, not tossing.
In this episode, Danielle demonstrates how to make truly exceptional fajitas. As most deer flank and skirt steaks are relatively small, she shows us how to "fake a flank" with wild game and achieve the texture a good fajita deserves. So grab a tenderizing mallet, your favorite deer meat, and a few cups of oil as Danielle walks us through the perfect recipe for the season! Presented by Smithey.
In this episode, Danielle demonstrates how to make truly exceptional fajitas. As most deer flank and skirt steaks are relatively small, she shows us how to "fake a flank" with wild game and achieve the texture a good fajita deserves. So grab a tenderizing mallet, your favorite deer meat, and a few cups of oil as Danielle walks us through the perfect recipe for the season! Presented by Smithey.
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On this episode Tyler Jones, K.C. Smith take a look at questions submitted by our fans about deer hunting. We give our thoughts and opinions on how you can make your fall season a successful one. From managing your time and balancing it with family to hunting on a low budget. We give you tips on how you can make it possible. We look forward to our next Q and A podcast, be on the look out on our social pages to be apart of the next one! Thanks to everyone who submitted their questions and thanks for listening!
Check out The Element Youtube Channel and go watch these other great turkey hunts!!
Michael's Iowa Public Land Bird
yler's Rio Grande Turkey | Point Blank!
Bow Hunting Mountain Merriams
Greg's Opening Day Turkey
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Brad Leone, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Corinne Schneider, Collin Fopma, and Mackenzie Elmquist.
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Once a year in the small farming town of Gillett, Arkansas, people from the local and surrounding communities gather in the gymnasium of the de-commission high school for a fundraiser to provide scholarships for the towns high school seniors. Throughout the decades, this event has also become an epicenter for state and regional politicians to gladhand with the constituents. In this Bear Grease episode, Clay Newcomb discusses the link between the Gillett Coon Supper and the value of social capital and civic engagement with author, Timothy P. Carney. Additional interviews with local resident Scott Place and a special appearance by former President of the United States, Bill Clinton.
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It wasn’t until I had both jakes pieced out and in the cooler that I realized I hadn’t taken a picture of my daughters and I with their birds. In the excitement of a double during a beautiful spring morning in Minnesota, I’d neglected to get the image that might mean the most to me in the future.
That’s pretty stupid, especially for someone who carries thousands of dollars worth of camera gear on every hunt. Not to mention that, by trade, that same person is a photographer who should know better. I’ve never batted .1000 in life, and I’m probably not going to start now.
I did take solace in the fact that I had plenty of images of the girls with their birds. I also had two different video angles of those jakes cautiously walking in and not walking out. I filmed both with trail cameras, which have become almost as important to me on my spring turkey hunts as my calls or camo.
Filming a turkey hunt with a trail camera is an easy way to get some extra memories out of the hunt. It’s cheap (if you already own a camera) and easy to do. There are a few considerations to make when you’re setting up, which will ensure a cool clip of that strutter before you jelly his head.
Camera Choice And SettingsI’ve filmed turkey hunts with traditional cameras and cell cameras. A lot of people don’t know this, but you can set up most cell cameras to function just like a traditional camera, so there’s often no need to fire up your data plan to do this if you only have cell cameras. A bigger concern than what camera you use, is what settings you choose.
First off, select the longest video clip your camera offers. That might be between a minute and five, but whatever it is, choose the longest duration. This means that even if the hen that your longbeard is following makes it into your spread a minute before him, you’ll still capture the kill. It’s also a good idea to set up the recovery time as short as possible. This might be one second or five, but you want that camera ready to take a new clip as soon as possible.
Choose the highest resolution for the video quality you can, too. There’s no reason not to, honestly (unless you’re using a small-capacity SD card). The settings mentioned so far are universal for me. I do, however, switch the trigger sensitivity depending on my setup.
If I have my decoys out in an alfalfa field and the wind is blowing 30mph, I know that my cameras are going to pick up that movement. I don’t want 100 clips of clover blowing in the wind. This situation necessitates the lowest sensitivity setting. If I’m on a logging road on a calm morning, I’ll go the other direction to ensure that the camera fires up the moment a bird walks in range.
Think Through The Look One of the mistakes I made when I stared to mess around with filming turkey hunts on trail cameras is that I often put the cameras too close to my decoys. You know that the birds are likely to focus on your jake decoy, so that should be the starting point.
Since I mostly just set my cameras up on the ground as opposed to a tree, it’s hard to capture a three-foot-tall bird if it’s too close to the decoys. I’ve started to place them between 10 to 20 feet away, depending on the setting, so that I can capture the whole bird as it comes in and not just get a video of turkey feet walking past the camera.
It’s also a good idea to try to anticipate where birds will approach from and aim your camera in that direction. This produces a better overall shot, but you do have to be mindful of the sun. While I don’t do much to hide my cameras on the ground, I do pile up some debris around them to make them blend in a little. The turkeys don’t seem to care, but you also don’t want them to catch the sun flaring off the lens if you can avoid it.
While this is one more thing to think about on a turkey hunt, it can be a cool way to capture some hi-res video of your kill without having to invest in camera gear or think about filming in a meaningful way. I do this on pretty much every hunt now, even when I’m running and gunning, and might set up in multiple spots in a single morning. It’s usually no more effort than pulling the camera from my pack and setting it up, which takes seconds. That’s a little bit of a pain, but when it works out and a strutter attacks your decoys while the cameras rolling, it’s always worth it.
For more turkey hunting information, check out these articles: Avoid These Mistakes to Kill Your First Turkey, 3 Setup Mistakes Most Turkey Hunters Make, and Three Ways You Can Help with Wild Turkey Conservation.
Whether you call them slabs, specks, calico, or sac-a-lait, there is no doubt that crappie are the most pursued and popular panfish in North America. With a range that extends from Southern Canada all the way to the Texas Panhandle, crappie are found in almost every state in the US. Though not quite as popular as bass or trout, crappie are a niche fish that have climbed their way to the top of the panfish hierarchy by being one of the best-tasting fish in freshwater.
Both serious crappie anglers and dedicated fish eaters are always looking to fill their freezers with crappie fillets, inspiring an almost fanatical dedication among anglers that can border on obsession. Crappie fishermen set tip-ups and jig all winter and hunt suspended fish with electronics from boats throughout the summer and fall. Yet, there’s no doubt that the absolute best time to fill a stringer with some fat papermouths is during the spring.
Finding Spring CrappieSpring is the season when crappies move from their deep wintering holes in large schools to gather in the shallows for the spawn. It’s a time of fantastic fishing when, so long as you’re in the right spot, you can catch a limit of crappie in only a few minutes. However, spring crappie fishing still has its challenges, principally finding where to start fishing.
“It can definitely be a feast or famine type of situation,” said Minnesota fishing guide Wil Neururer. “With all the crappie in the water gathered in one place, not fishing in the exact right spot means you’re going to come up empty. But it also means that when you find the fish, you’re going to catch a hell of a lot of them.”
With the fish moving en masse from deeper to shallower water, Neururer and many other crappie anglers can find and stay on top of migrating springtime crappie schools by following the water temperature.
“Water temperature is vital to catching spring crappie,” Neururer said. “In the early part of the season, when the water is in the 40s, the fish will push into the shallowest and warmest water possible. I concentrate on shallow, northern bays in lakes and ponds with dark bottoms that will lose ice quickly and absorb and hold a lot of heat. You’ll find crappie in less than six inches of water in spots like that. Then once the water starts tickling the 50-degree mark, they’ll start moving into slightly deeper water in those same bays, and all you have to do is follow them out.”
Once the water temperatures rise into the mid-50s and 60s, crappie will begin to gather and spawn in one to six feet of water, concentrating in areas with lots of weed beds, brush piles, and other cover. Once water temps reach the mid-60s, the fish will move into deeper water between eight to 15 feet immediately adjacent to their spawning areas to feed. The easiest way to pinpoint these roaming crappie schools is by using electronics and marking the fish as they migrate. However, if you don’t have a boat equipped with sonar or are fishing from shore, you can still find crappie by casting and fishing from shallower to deeper water until you find the fish.
“It usually doesn’t take long for crappie to bite,” Neururer told MeatEater. “Patience is not the key in this sort of fishing. Spring crappies are hungry and aggressive, so if you don’t get a bite in a spot in 10 minutes or so, try moving the boat or casting 10 or 15 feet incrementally further out until you get a strike. Once you get on top of the fish, you’re definitely going to know it.”
Spring Crappie EquipmentCrappie are a small fish, even the largest specimens rarely growing larger than a few pounds. In addition, spring crappie can be sluggish, and their strikes can be incredibly subtle. Consequently, you’re going to want to target them with the lightest equipment possible.
Crappie rods should be light or even ultra-light action and between five and eight feet long. These rods are ideal for detecting gentle strikes and feeling for structure along the bottom while still giving you enough leverage to keep the struggling fish under control. Pair your rod with light 2- to 6-pound test monofilament or fluorocarbon line, and you’ll have the perfect set-up for catching crappie no matter what fishing method you’re using.
Best Techniques for Spring CrappieThere are a lot of different techniques for spring crappie that vary in effectiveness depending on when and where you’re fishing. In the early part of the season, you’ll want to use stationary methods that easily allow sluggish crappie to find and eat your bait without having to chase it down. For this kind of fishing, nothing works better than a slip-bobber rig.
“Slip-bobber rigs are a tried-and-true crappie killer,” Neururer said. “You can set two or three of them out at a time (where legal) and cover a variety of different depths all at once. It’s a great way for kids to get into fishing because they’re easy to set up and it doesn’t take a lot of waiting around to get a crappie to strike. When you fish slip bobbers in the right place, you can have almost constant action.”
To set up a slip-bobber rig, attach a bobber stop to your line about 3 to 6 inches shorter than the depth of the water you’re fishing. Slide a 1- to 3½-inch slip bobber to your line below the bobber stop and then tie on a size 10 to 6 bait hook. Clip a BB-size split shot to your line about 2 to 3 inches above your hook, then add your bait, and you’ll be ready to go.
As far as baits for crappie go, you have several options, including worms, hellgrammites, or leeches. However, unlike other panfish like bluegill, which eat a lot of insect nymphs and larvae, crappie are baitfish hunting predators, making small minnows your best bet for success. Hook minnows to your line by pushing the hook through the bait’s mouth and out through its nostril so it can swim freely and struggle—impossible for a hungry crappie to resist.
Later in the spring when the water gets warmer and crappie begin to move into deeper water and become more aggressive, you can have great luck using lures and baits with a little more action. Small 1/16-ounce jigs tipped with minnows or worms or even soft-plastics like the Squirmin Grub or a Paddletail are fantastic for fishing in warmer and deeper water. You can cast these lures quite a distance and jig them back along the bottom or drop them vertically from a boat and jig them in the middle of a crappie school you’ve located on your sonar.
If you’re searching for a spring crappie school by trying to cover water, casting and retrieving small jerkbaits and crankbaits like a Scatter Rap Countdown or an Ultra Light can be incredibly effective. If you’re trying to prob a greater variety of depths while still covering water, you can also use small inline trout spinners like the Panther Martin and the Roostertail. These lures can be fished just beneath the surface on a fast retrieval or sunk and fished near the bottom when retrieved slowly. Both techniques work well for finding spring crappie moving between deeper and shallower water.
Rolling the DiceFishing is always a gamble. You can go out for hours and even days at a time and come up completely empty. But when it comes to the game of spring crappie fishing, you can win big. With the fish stacked up all together and actively feeding, the action can be fast and furious and make any time spent looking for the fish entirely worth it.
Crappie are widespread and very easy to catch. This means that no matter where you live, spring crappie are probably close by and waiting to provide some of the best days on the water you’ll ever have, so it’s best to go all in every time you’re on the water because eventually, it’s going to pay off.
On this week's show, Tony discusses the importance of good hunting buddies, and how their value extends far beyond just being another person to do deer chores with or bounce ideas off of.
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This week Dan and Reid Isbell host music row legend Luke Laird out in God’s Country. Luke shares an epic story of driving to write with Eric Church and having to stop on the way to buy a new truck so he’d make it to the write. Luckily for him, the song they wrote on that trip ended up being a Grammy-nominated track. The guys discuss where Luke’s love for hunting with a recurve bow comes from and how another music row legend, Rhett Atkins, is his go-to for helping him track deer. Luke has over 20 No. 1 songs and is definitely the man behind several songs you know and love.
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You knew it was coming. After two consecutive weeks of bagging turkeys like he's picking peas, the mighty hunter has stumbled. That he encountered turbulence might be a more fitting description. Brent's tales of woe aren't confined to turkey hunting either, but you probably knew that already. It's time for some humble pie on this week's episode of MeatEater's "This Country Life" podcast.
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Christopher “CJ” Alexander, whose name graced headlines in December after photos of him posing with an 18-point buck he harvested drew skepticism, has officially been indicted on 23 total charges, the Ohio Attorney General’s Office, on behalf of the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, announced today.
Three others, including Alexander’s sister Kristina M. Alexander, and brothers Corey P. Haunert and Zachary R. Haunert, also face charges.
The indictment, returned this afternoon by a Clinton County grand jury, accuses Alexander, 28, of Wilmington, of unlawfully harvesting the deer on Nov. 9, 2023. He claimed that the animal had been on property owned by his sister. When he harvested the deer he presented written permission from his sister to hunt on her land to a wildlife officer. However, an investigation by authorities from Ohio DNR’s Division of Wildlife, turned up evidence that indicated otherwise.
“Blinded by greed, the defendants set their sights on fame and fortune while disregarding basic hunting regulations,” Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost said. “Instead of the cover of Field & Stream, their notoriety will be a booking photo.”
Warranted searches of cellphone data indicated that Alexander had illegally hunted the trophy buck, which some reports rank as the third largest typical whitetail ever killed in North America, on private property about 10 miles from where he claimed to have killed it. Additionally, Alexander is accused of lying about the date when the deer was killed and falsifying the written permission from his sister after the fact.
The attorney’s report alleges that the whitetail was staged at the property of Alexander’s sister with the help of the Haunert brothers to conceal the poaching.
According to Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost, Corey Haunert aided Alexander in poaching deer on multiple occasions, providing the crossbow used to hunt and assisting in deer retrieval and staging with Zachary Haunert.
Alexander is also accused of deceptively profiting from the poaching by selling deer antlers and receiving payments totaling $20,000 from an antler collector, a hunting magazine, and a company that sells deer products.
“This once-in-a-lifetime deer embodies the great natural resources Ohio has to offer,” Yost added. “It is shameful that this deer ended up in an evidence room rather than adorning an ethical hunter’s wall as a prized trophy.”
Alexander faces five counts each of illegally hunting deer without written permission and taking possession of a deer in violation of a division rule, three counts of theft by deception, two counts each of hunting without a license, hunting deer without a valid deer permit, and tampering with evidence, and one count each of jacklighting, theft, falsification, and sale of wildlife parts.
Corey Haunert, 29, faces eight charges, including four counts of aiding a wildlife offender, two counts of hunting without written permission, one count each of tampering with evidence, and falsification.
Zachary Haunert, 31, faces two misdemeanor counts of aiding a wildlife offender. Kristina Alexander, 37, faces one count of falsification and one count of aiding a wildlife offender.
Feature image via The Sportsmen Party Facebook Page.
Camels are perhaps the most unexpected of inhabits of Australia’s modern deserts. On a continent otherwise dominated by marsupials, reptiles, and cattle stations the size of small countries, these giant nomads seem both alien yet perfectly adapted to the vast desert scrubland they now call home. Their presence isn’t without controversy, but a growing group of outdoorsmen are pursuing these animals in their new habitat and reaping the rewards of their delectable meat.
Camels? In Australia?As strange as that might sound, camels have a long history on the continent, dating back to when the first Europeans reached the shores of Australia in the early 17th century. Australia is not only a vast continent, approximately 11 times the size of Texas, but its interior is also incredibly dry. So dry, in fact, that horses and mules were poorly equipped to carry settlers and their gear into this new country, and most would die after a few days in the extreme heat. So, to get around this obstacle, settlers had to employ the only domestic livestock capable of traversing the deserts. Dromedary camels.
The first camels were imported from the Canary Islands in 1840 and were used for decades to allow explorers and station owners to access huge areas of land across the desert. But, as motor vehicles became more popular in the early 20th century, traveling by camel became obsolete, and many were turned loose by their previous owners. The herds that now roam Australia are descendants of those liberated animals. And unlike their native range, there were very few predators (apart from the odd dingo pack) and, initially, very little human disturbance. Joined by other feral escapees such as brumby horses, feral donkeys, and feral “scrub bulls,” these camels now number between three hundred thousand to one million individuals, roaming across many of the large cattle stations in the area.
Impacts of a Long-Legged InvaderThe introduction of such a huge population of herbivores doesn’t come without consequences, both economic and environmental. Not only do they compete with native grazers such as red kangaroos, but they also compete for water with wildlife, livestock, and the communities in these remote regions. In many areas, camels will simply push over cattle fences to access water ponds, draining much of it dry and then moving on to another area to raid. Their nomadic nature can create a number of problems that are hard to avoid without resorting to some form of culling.
In rural South Australia, local governments have begun to do just that. In 2020, some 5,000 of these animals were gunned down by government-contracted helicopter cullers, largely backed by the many cattle graziers in the region, who disdain the damage that camels were causing to their fences and water sources. And because of how incredibly remote the area is, most of these animals were left to rot. Despite culls like this, populations of camels continue to grow, leading some locals to see them in a different light. Instead of all-out eradication, utilization has been seen as another option.
Utilizing a ResourceOver the last 50 years, as camels have become increasingly abundant across Australia’s deserts, the local hunting population has started to see this animal as more than a pest and instead a valuable quarry. Their incredible eyesight and nomadic nature make for a challenging quarry, often requiring the hunter to travel huge distances each day to locate individuals on the landscape, on properties up to seven times the size of the King Ranch in Texas. Once located, taking one with a rifle is reasonably simple at a range of 100 to 200 meters, given there is a bit of cover around, but getting within bow range is much more of a challenge.
And once harvested, their meat is delectable. A local hunter in South Australia, Joshua Haines, describes the meat as: “A combination between the wagyu beef and the finest quality venison.”
The reason behind this comes down to the camel’s biology. Despite the myth, the iconic hump of a camel isn’t filled with water but instead filled with fat. Camels can quickly covert grass and browse into fat during times of plenty and then have reserved energy stores to tap into during drier months.
Because of this, the backstraps of a camel are not only surrounded by a lump of pearly white fat weighing over 80 pounds but also have considerable marbling. Not only is the meat delicious, but each camel can produce over 400 pounds of meat, more than what you’d get off the largest bull elk. The meat is so fatty that even when making sausages, you don’t need to add fat, and for that huge mass of hump fat, it can be rendered down into “camel grease” that can be used similarly to bear or pork fat.
Growing Camel MarketsAnd it isn’t just hunters that have started to recognise this value, but also the station owners themselves. Instead of culling camels, some landowners are mustering them with helicopters and shipping them back to the Middle East, where the market for camel meat is very strong.
In many instances, using camels as the main grazer on the landscape instead of cattle can actually be beneficial, as they consume less food and water than cows, they’re largely disease resistant, and their soft footpads greatly minimize erosion. Though there are still many obstacles preventing sustainable use, such as a lack of infrastructure in the remote outback, it’s becoming an increasingly attractive prospect for many landowners as a way to profit off this widespread species.
As often is the case with introduced species, their presence is highly divisive. On one hand, their environmental and economic impacts are incredibly significant, but at the same time, their impacts on the local communities as a food and recreation source are impossible to ignore. Finding a balance between these two through sustainable harvest is likely the best way forward, both for the camels and the people living alongside them.
Long before the first rays from the October sunrise slanted their way through the forest, I knew there were turkeys roosted all around me. That was exciting, because in addition to a couple of deer tags, I had a fall turkey license in my wallet.
It wasn’t too deep into legal shooting light before I realized I had a problem. With a whole flock roosted in the surrounding trees, getting away with any type of movement was going to be tricky.
As soon as the first couple of birds pitched down, I got ready to draw. Through a chorus of clucks and kee kees, I managed to pick out a hen and shoot right over her back. Another followed her down the trail, and I whiffed again. The third time I shot, I’m not even sure I had my eyes open. I was in full panic mode, with a heavy case of turkey fever.
With two arrows left in my quiver, I watched the flock feed away and almost immediately noticed a deer heading my way. When the little button buck got to 17 yards, I shot him square in the guts. He ended up hopping a few steps and bedding down. With my last arrow, I hit him too far back again. He took off, and I climbed down to go meet up with my dad.
It was a classic emotional roller coaster. I’d shot horribly, but I knew that I was about to tag my second deer. What I didn’t know was that when we walked up on him, he’d still be alive. It was the first time I had to cut a deer’s throat, and it made that long-lost teenage version of myself want to do better.
Let The Bad Feelings Speak That debacle of a morning happened a couple of decades ago, but I remember it well. It was the first step on a long journey to try to be as good of a shot as I can be. As you probably well know, it’s an admirable goal. It’s also a quest that never really ends.
Hitting and losing a deer sucks, a lot. But we are generally sheltered from the suffering that the experience causes. We see it from our perspective, which is the hope of taking a shot, followed by the crushing reality that another one has slipped through our fingers. It’s a different experience when you find one still alive.
Unless you’re a Patrick Bateman-level psycho, that should leave a mark. No one wants to walk up on a struggling deer to finish it off, but it happens. When it does, it’s probably not going to make you feel great about yourself. The bad feelings plead an interesting case, and you should listen. It’s a good reminder to take the shooting and shot selection parts of what we do very seriously.
There Are No Gray Areas, PersonallyThe question of ethics comes up all of the time. It’s the old, what do you do when no one is watching, quandary. The thing is, we know what makes us feel good about ourselves, just as we know what makes us feel shitty.
Take an encounter a buddy of mine had on a hunt several years ago in South Dakota. I was tagged out and scouting while he went in to hang a stand on a walk-in ranch. We had dealt with nonstop rain for the whole trip, and it was forecasted to get worse.
This meant that legal shooting hours extended deep into the twilight. It also meant that blood trailing would be extra challenging due to the impending storms.
As the light faded, a pair of young bucks posed up for him. He shot, and although he didn’t do anything legally wrong, ethically, it wasn’t much of a gray area. And he knew it.
We never found that deer, although I’m certain it died. I’m also certain that that was the last time my buddy would push it in a low-light situation while sitting in the drizzling rain. On paper, that sounds like a no-brainer situation, but it’s not so simple.
When you factor in having a few days out-of-state, the cost of the license, and the trip overall, it’s easier to understand taking a shot when you know you probably shouldn’t. If you haven’t done that yet, keep hunting. You’ll get there.
What these poor decisions do for us is set our moral hunting compass. While ethics is an entire category rooted in gray areas, personally, it doesn’t have to be. You know what decisions make you feel like you did the right thing.
Choices, Choices, Choices You don’t have to make a bad shot on a buck or take a greedy shot in terrible conditions to mold your ethics in the right direction. As hunters, we should always examine our choices. Some hunters would use every legal technological advantage they could get their hands on, while experiencing zero qualms.
Others just might not feel right about embracing using a crossbow that is rifle-accurate at 100 yards, or a camera that sends instant images to their phone, or waiting over a pile of corn for a hungry buck. Many of the legal methods of hunting, and much of the legal equipment, might cross a certain line.
In this realm, sometimes you just know that certain things aren’t for you. With others, you might have to try them out to know for sure. Either way, what happens during your hunts and how you feel about them, informs your future self. Listen to what that person says because he’s leading you along a better path as a hunter.
For more deer hunting info, check out these articles: How to Identify the Core Areas of Mature Bucks, What Deadheads Teach Whitetail Hunters About Buck Behavior, and Hunting One Target Buck Can Ruin Your Whole Whitetail Season.
This episode Dirk and Jason play listener questions from the call-in number. Questions about hunting a full moon, hunting elk that move from public to private land, hunting elk in the jungles of North Idaho, and several more. If you have a question that you would like answered on the air, call in and leave a message. Please note, your question can't be longer than 3 minutes or it will get cut off.
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This week on the show, I'm joined by Weston Paul of MTN Tough. We're discussing the many ways that a running habit can make you a better hunter, and best practices for ramping up your training on trails, with races, and other next level approaches to becoming more physically and mentally tough.
To use the 30 Day Free Trial to MTNTOUGH use promo code: WIRED or visit this redemption link: http://lab.mtntough.com/checkout/subscribe/purchase?code=wired&plan=monthly
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For this week's special drop, we dig into an Oklahoma bill (HB 3462) that aims to release pen-raised deer into the wild. Joining us is Kip Adams, the Chief Conservation Officer for the National Deer Association. We'll get into CWD testing, what "CWD resistance" actually means, and if this extremely controversial theory could work.
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On this special episode Tyler Jones, K.C. Smith sit down with Michael Stoll and Eric Gentry and talk about recent turkey hunting adventures. We get into hunting camo patterns and our early days of watching hunting content on the outdoor channel. We talk tactics, calling and what we noticed hunting Eastern's in Missouri. Michael breaks down the success he had with Nick and we discuss the different sounds of turkey in the woods. Thanks for listening and be on the lookout for a Q and A podcast soon!
Check out The Element Youtube Channel and go watch these other great turkey hunts!!
Michael's Iowa Public Land Bird
yler's Rio Grande Turkey | Point Blank!
Bow Hunting Mountain Merriams
Greg's Opening Day Turkey
Fresh back from the MeatEater Live Tour, Clay Newcomb is joined by the Render Crew and Anthony Ballard, Bear Program Leader for the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks. He discusses the history, research, current status and developments of the black bear population in the state of Mississippi. Bear Newcomb talks about his new Mountain Feist puppy, Osage. Misty Newcomb shares about her new website, thenewcombfarm.com. Josh "Landbridge" Spielmaker and his wife, Kristie Spielmaker, tell about their experience attending the MeatEater Live Tour in Anaheim, California.
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Ryan Callaghan, Clay Newcomb, Randall Williams, Chilly, Marco Gill, and Ryan Thompson.
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In Wisconsin, a citizens’ resolution to ban LiveScope, 360-degree imaging, and similar electronics is garnering support. The resolution appeared in Wisconsin DNR’s annual spring hearing and public input questionnaire in April, asking, “Would you support banning the use of live scopes, and similar 360-degree imaging electronics in all Wisconsin waters?” Of the respondents, 6,786 said “yes,” and 6,290 said “no.” The ban won support in 36 counties, was opposed in 35, and tied in one. It appears likely that the initiative will advance to another hearing in spring of next year.
But will it actually result in a written policy change? MeatEater contributor Pat Durkin doesn’t think so. “My prediction is that this technology won’t be banned here,” he said. “That 52-48 margin and 50-50 county split tells the story. In fish and game politics, the tie goes to the status quo. If it can somehow be shown that all this technology is harming fisheries, we’ll likely adjust the bag limits accordingly. Folks seem far more willing to reduce the bag than they used to be.”
The resolution, as originally submitted, makes a large assumption that live-time imaging is negatively impacting the state’s fisheries. The proposal claims that “the advancements in fishing electronics” are “having an adverse effect on the state’s fish populations” but does not offer any evidence for this statement. There’s no doubt that electronics and advancements in fish-finder technology have resulted in more effective anglers, but whether they’ve impacted fisheries at a population-level is anything but certain.
But even if Wisconsin doesn’t move forward with a LiveScope Ban, the deeper question remains: just because we have something available at our fingertips, does that mean we should use it?
In 2018, MeatEater interviewed conservation pioneer Jim Posewitz for BHA (shortly before the stalwart’s death), posing the question, “How do you approach the concept of fair chase in the face of new technology?” Posewitz responded, “Fair chase depends on developing a personal association with the game you are pursuing. The more you appreciate the animals, the less likely you will engage in something that’s unfair.”
From an ethical perspective, Posewitz’s response is bang-on. It’s up to the individual to decide what to use or how to behave while afield. For one angler, that might mean only fly-fishing with dry flies; another angler might see no problem trolling cranks with sonar pinging in every direction. In the same vein, just because a daily bag limit exists doesn’t mean one has to max it out. In fact, if everyone hit their daily bag limits, there likely wouldn’t be a whole lot of fish left in the most heavily fished rivers or game in the most heavily hunted national forests.
LiveScope isn’t the only technology sportsmen are wrestling with. Nevada, Arizona, and Utah all have restrictions on the use of game cameras for hunting. Arizona’s restrictions are the most extreme, prohibiting all trail cameras for “taking or locating or aiding in the take of wildlife.” Utah took a slightly less restrictive approach but still bans all trail cameras on public land from July 31 to December 31.
Mark Kenyon weighed in on game cameras in a 2019 article. “For me, the fair chase question becomes most glaring when it comes to how real-time information from wireless cameras is used and the disproportionate advantage it gives hunters over game animals,” he wrote. “If a photo or video is sent and acted upon immediately, leading a hunter to know exactly where an animal is at a given moment, I sense that a line has been crossed. What chance does an animal have if its exact location is digitally transmitted and tracked? What skill does it require from a hunter other than checking a mobile app and shooting straight? This is where I’ve chosen to drag my stick through the sand.”
Similar to Posewitz’s approach, Kenyon notes that trail cam use is a gray area with room for personal ethics to guide one’s actions. But as broader guidelines, wildlife agencies already enact caliber restrictions, limits on bow draw weights, and restrictions on the number of rods an angler can have in the water—among countless other things. Is restricting fishing sonar too far? Or is it on par with similar fair-chase restrictions? If Wisconsin DNR’s survey is any indication, it’s a split ticket.
“We’ll keep arguing, of course, just like we do about recurves and compounds, but I’d be shocked if a ban goes any further than the shouting,” Durkin said.
Whatever happens in Wisconsin, the question offers a good reminder to think about what we’re doing while on the water or in the woods. Are we fishing for the enjoyment of it or to rake in fish for a tournament prize? Do we respect our quarry? Regulating fish-finder technology might be personal lines in the sand for now, but it could take on more concrete limits in coming years if wildlife agencies begin to weigh in—as the DNR could do in Wisconsin soon.
Opening day of turkey season has its perks. A new season will make you forget about the previous year’s mistakes or misses, and it’s hard to beat that first spring morning after you’ve been cooped up all winter. Morale, energy, and expectations sit at an all-time high, with a season full of promise straight ahead. Killing a turkey on opening day might be your most exciting hunt, but killing a turkey during the last days of the season will be your most rewarding.
Despite what the outdated hunting forums or comment sections say, birds still gobble well into (and even after) the season. They might not be as eager as they were opening week, but there’s plenty of good turkey hunting to be had during those last few days of the season. Whether you’ve yet to fill a tag or you’re in a multiple-bird state, here are a few tips on how to kill late-season gobblers.
Less CallingWhile this tip applies to turkey hunting across the board, it really pays off if you hunt pressured turkeys, especially in the late season. It’s tempting to think that the next call will be the one he gobbles at, but that’s rarely the case. If you’re hunting public ground or other hammered areas, put your call away and scout for turkey sign. Just because the birds aren’t talking doesn’t mean they aren’t around. Fresh tracks, scat, and scratching will help you find birds faster than cranking down on the yelps.
If you come across an area littered with scratching, post up and keep the calling to a minimum. When I find areas like this and the birds are quiet, I try to impose a no-yelp ban on myself. I’ll scratch in the leaves, cluck, or purr, and then wait. It’s tough, and I’m not always that strict with it. However, I’ve had multiple encounters where I called lightly and a curious hen brought a gobbler in or multiple gobblers came in silent. And, yes, the occasional fired-up tom will stroll in too.
More CallingI promise, I’m not sending mixed signals. Nor am I an advocate for overcalling. Successful turkey hunting has more to do with interpreting an individual bird than it does being a champion caller, though that certainly doesn’t hurt. While it’s generally a good idea to call less, some longbeards seem like they fire up the more you call to them. After all, sometimes punching a tag comes down to not just finding a bird but finding the right bird.
I’ve had gobblers, especially in the late season, that gobbled all the way into my setup, like they couldn’t get there fast enough. Those hunts aren’t frequent, but they are awesome. I don’t have the research to back this up, but I have to imagine it has something to do with hens going to nest, a reestablishing of the pecking order, or a combination of things.
Recently, I killed a turkey that wanted to play the game exactly the way a turkey hunter dreams. He gobbled at yelps, cutts, clucks, purrs, and scratching in the leaves. I got to watch him strut and gobble his head off around a field. Only, every time I’d go quiet, he’d turn the other way, quit strutting, and start to leave.
When he’d start to walk off, I’d turn my head the opposite way and yelp. Just like that, he’d blow up, turn colors, and start strutting toward me again. I’d go quiet, and we’d repeat the process. Finally, I decided to keep calling, even though it felt wrong, and everything inside me told me to shut up. I’m glad I didn’t. He put on a show, gobbled his tiny brain out, and strutted all the way to 35 yards where I shot him. While this goes against turkey hunting 101, there are always exceptions to the rule.
Cover GroundThis should go without saying, but in the latter part of the season, most of the killable turkeys are in someone’s freezer. There are still plenty of turkeys out there; they just might not be in obvious places (like in earshot of the road). If you’re not hearing any gobbles, it’s probably time to trade out your heavy rubber boots for some hikers.
One of the best ways to do this is to pick a large parcel of public ground and work your way through it, calling sparingly and listening for walking or scratching in the leaves. If you come across a place with fresh turkey sign, park it for a while. It’s probably a good place to kill a tom at midday.
Hit the Unconventional SpotsCovering ground doesn’t just mean racking up the miles. Sometimes, you’re better off working through unconventional spots that don’t scream “turkey woods.” Everyone wants to kill a longbeard in old-growth forests or wide-open river bottoms, myself included. But you have to go where the turkeys are, not where you want them to be.
A few years ago, I killed a longbeard that was roosted in a stubby pine stand that had yaupon thickets interspersed throughout it. You wouldn’t have pegged that spot on a map. He wouldn’t leave that stretch of woods, and I had to crawl my way in there before getting a shot.
Just Keep HuntingHonestly, there’s no real secret to killing late-season turkeys. It might not be the gobble fest of opening day, but it’s still better than the off-season. While these tactics can help, the majority of your success depends on your patience and persistence.
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve punched a tag on mornings when I wanted to hit snooze. If you can wait out the crowds, you can wait out the season for sneaky good hunting. After all, patient hunters kill more turkeys.
Feature image via Justin Michau.
On today's episode, Tony discusses how people are generally stressed out and anxious these days, and how it has been clinically proven that time in the outdoors is almost like medicine when it comes to our pursuit of happiness.
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This week Dan and Reid Isbell host Drew Holcomb out in God’s Country to discuss duck hunting, navigating fatherhood as a touring artist, and how his grandfather used his surgeon skills as the family taxidermist. Drew shares how his song “Family” has connected him with television analyst Ernie Johnson and how Shaq gave his son, Huck, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. The guys discuss how grandpas are the G.O.A.T. and Drew's gravorite Garth Brooks tune.
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Steven Rinella talks with Clay Newcomb, Spencer Neuharth, Austin Chelaborad, Phil Taylor.
Topics discussed: What side of the bed do you sleep on?; wonderstone; the erogeny of mountains; how Clay wants a timber rattlesnake; getting bit by cobras and recalling the Schmidt Pain Index; how to correctly pronounce “Roosevelt” and other corrections; a lot of musky talk; Johnny Cash and a pile of pole beans; Cam Hanes’ hog hunt video and Clay Matthews’ duck hunt videos are live; remember to reserve your hunting or fishing trip with MeatEater Experiences; AZ votes to eliminate Governor’s tags; the power of raffles; how Phil woke up at 5:30am to go to Disney Land during a half day break on the MeatEater Live Tour; how you feel hunting out of a state vehicle; how you’re only a resident of one state; and more.
Outro song: "Reel 'Em In" by Garrett Holbrook
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Turkey-hunting shotguns are in a class of their own. Shorter barrels, fancy camo patterns, pistol grips, and custom chokes separate gobbler getters from traditional shotguns you might find in your grandpa’s closet. Red dots belong to this group of turkey-specific accessories, too. While some folks still prefer a bead, red dots are becoming the norm in the turkey woods. After all, if you’re spending over $10 per shell on the hottest TSS loads, you want every shot to count.
I used to possess a bit of skepticism around red dots. I assumed they were overkill or for hunters who wanted to take pokes beyond standard shooting distances. I was wrong. I’ve been hunting with red dots for several years now. Over the years, I’ve missed several turkeys with a traditional bead, but I’ve yet to miss a turkey with a red dot (though I’m sure I just sealed my fate).
Unless I decide to take my grandfather’s Model 12 out of the gun safe, I’ll be hunting with a red dot. Even if you don’t plan on shooting turkeys beyond the 40-yard range, you should still consider running a red dot on your shotgun, especially if you’ve found yourself on a missing streak. While red dots won’t help your turkey calling, they can make you a more efficient shooter. If you’re on the fence, here are three reasons to drop a red dot on your turkey rig.
Easier Target AcquisitionRunning a traditional bead is simple, but simple doesn’t always mean easier. You don’t have to worry about battery life, bumping your sight off, or clouded glass with trusty iron sights, but there are some disadvantages to not using an optic. For starters, a traditional bead only allows you to see what’s above it. This becomes problematic when you’re shooting at longer distances, and your bead appears to cover an entire turkey. A red dot or reflex sight allows you to see the whole target and aim for a more accurate point of impact, which is critical when you’re dealing with such a small kill zone.
Red dots also make target acquisition easier. There’s no mistaking the red (or green) dot in your sight’s housing, which makes it easy to track a turkey’s head as it bobs through the timber. And, if you happen to have a gobbler charge in right off the roost, your red dot will provide plenty of brightness in those early hours.
Point of Impact Doesn’t ChangeIn a perfect world, all shotguns would have a point of impact closely aligned with the placement of the front sight (i.e., the center of your pattern would land exactly where you place your bead). Unfortunately, this isn’t always the case.
With enough practice and familiarity, you can know where to aim your shotgun if its point of impact doesn’t occur dead center. You might remember this when you’re patterning your turkey loads, but an accelerated heartbeat and screaming longbeard might make you forget.
With a red dot, it doesn’t matter where your shotgun’s point of impact lands. You simply sight in your optic so that the center of your pattern aligns with the dot. Once set, it’s as simple as point-and-shoot.
Because most red dots come parallax-free, you don’t have to worry about the dot being off target even if you don’t get all the way down on the gun. Wherever the dot lands, your pattern will go. This isn’t the case with a traditional bead. If you pop your head up just before you shoot, there’s a good chance you’ll miss a turkey high. With a red dot, as long as the sight remains on target, you’re good.
Maximize Your Turkey LoadA red dot, with the right choke and ammo combo, can allow you to put more pellets on paper at further distances for the simple fact that you can see your target better. It’s kind of a no-brainer. Much like investing in one of the best hunting scopes, mounting a red dot on your turkey gun will give you more mileage out of your choke tube and load.
However, I’m not advocating that a red dot and TSS loads will automatically extend your effective range to 60+ yards. While possible with the right choke and ammo, that range requires practice and confidence. But it can give you a surer point of aim for your current effect range, so there’s no doubt when it’s time to pull the trigger.
On the other hand, a red dot can help you avoid those dreaded close-range misses, too. You’ve probably done this or know someone who’s missed a turkey within layup range. Because turkey loads maintain a tighter flight pattern at close distances than others, it’s possible to miss a turkey within 20 yards, even if you’re just slightly off.
For instance, your pattern at 20 yards might be the size of a softball. The chance of missing also increases if your shotgun’s POI isn’t dead center either. While even the best red dots for hunting won’t eliminate flinches, they can mitigate both of these issues by giving you a more precise point of aim.
Last ShotMore technology in the woods doesn’t always equate to better hunting. Most of the time I’d argue just the opposite. Red dots are an exception. Even though they look like they belong in Starship Troopers more than they do turkey woods, red dots provide a tremendous upside for hunters.
Hunters tend to view deer as we think of them now, which is understandable. It’s also a mostly distilled and distorted look at the most popular game animal. We can’t really help it since we live about 75 years, and have a hard time comprehending time scales much longer than that.
We aren’t comfortable with big numbers, and our brains aren’t great at understanding them. The distances between objects in the universe don’t make sense to us. We speak of light years as we would earth-based distances, but a single light year is six trillion miles. We talk of the dinosaurs with passing interest but can scarcely fathom giant reptiles ruling the earth 100 million years ago.
When it comes to deer, we generally don’t even acknowledge their origin story. This is something I dug pretty deep into while researching a book several years ago. It’s a good reminder that if you want to be a better hunter, you should try to understand where deer came from.
The Reigning ChampInformation about any event that happened deep into the past will be explained through a wide range of dates because it’s hard to pinpoint specifics. Whitetails, or the precursors to our modern whitetails, hit the scene a long time ago. Fossils, some of which were found in Florida, tell a story of somewhere between two and five million years ago when the first chapter of the whitetail’s book was written.
Think about that for a second. Imagine the predators that deer had to deal with over the course of millions of years. We think of deer as adaptable because they can live in cities or in the mountains. They thrive in extremely cold climates as easily as equatorial regions where cacti dominate. All of this is evidence of a truly adaptable critter, but it doesn’t factor in the list of predators they’ve gone up against over the years.
The hot topic in this category today is the gray wolf. A formidable predator, no doubt. Not that you could survey them, but I bet modern deer would choose packs of wolves over some of the toothy critters their ancestors had to avoid.
Giant bear and lion species, for example. Members from each could easily dwarf the largest specimens found today throughout the world. North America had its own version of the cheetah as well, a cat that also shaped the evolutionary history of the pronghorn. Deer dodged saber-toothed tigers and jaguars, as well.
Perhaps this feels like I’m selectively showcasing the survival narrative of my favorite game animal, but the truth is there were a hell of a lot of herbivores through the years that went up against these apex predators. A few still exist, but most of them are lost to the history of Earth. Predators don’t deserve all of the credit for wiping out various species of herbivores because they often had help from a changing climate and natural disasters.
The big and toothy precursors to today’s predator certainly didn’t go lightly on the whitetail, however, and yet we still have them to hunt. This can’t be said about many of the animals that were on the menu next to the whitetail, and that says something that modern hunters should listen to.
Why We Love Dumb DeerWhen we discuss difficult-to-hunt deer, we tend to focus on how much pressure they receive. I do this a lot because I’ve spent tons of time on public land and enough time on highly managed private ground to know the difference. But it’s not so simple.
Epigenetics, the study of heritable traits that occur without a change to DNA sequence, can alter the course of a species' existence and influence evolution. Those heritable traits, like looking up in the trees for danger after 30 or 40 generations of deer that have dealt with death from above, make it more difficult to be a treestand hunter.
We attribute that type of characteristic to smart deer. The ones that don’t look up, well, they are dumb. Just like the deer that are babysat on a privately managed property until they are deemed old enough to shoot, don’t exactly scream high IQ.
These are easy-to-understand examples, but what about the deer bloodlines where avoiding the American Lion was the difference between life and death? We can scarcely fathom how that threat would carve a new pathway through the species’ DNA. We might never know, but that doesn’t mean that echoes of those past predators don’t still shape the behavior of the deer we hunt today.
How They Understand UsWe all know that the deer pattern us, but do we really? If we acknowledge that but walk the same paths to the same stands over and over, we aren’t giving the whitetail its due. This is true of all deer but becomes something else with older bucks (and does).
Whitetails have an understanding of where we enter the woods, where we are most likely to sit in ambush, and where we are most likely to sneak around when we are trying to find them. They learn this by seeing us, hearing us, and most importantly, smelling us.
They know when we are most likely to be in the woods with them and the seasonal timing and weather conditions that are most likely to keep us away. They seem to learn, as well, the difference between a harmless hiker and a hunter.
This is why successful hunters tend to follow one of two paths. The first is the land manager path, where creating dumber deer is the goal. If you can nullify the survival instincts built through millennia of avoiding predators, you win. The second is the mobile hunter path, where a combination of obsessive scouting and surprise sits often produces much better than average results.
If you can’t do the former, you might want to consider the latter. This might be the only way to consistently beat pressured whitetails at their own game. After all, you are competing against not only your neighbor’s hunting party but also packs of dire wolves that lived 100,000 years ago.
To best just such a prey animal, it’s a good idea to acknowledge how well they’ve done thus far against some pretty stiff competition. Competition that didn’t need to follow game laws, could see as well at night as in the day, and that possessed olfactory senses on par with their prey. Compared to them, we are terrible at this stuff, and it often shows in our successes—and our failures.
For more information on whitetail hunting, check out these articles: Hunting One Target Buck Can Ruin Your Whole Season, The Whitetail Misses That Sting The Most, and How To Identify The Core Areas Of Mature Bucks.
This week, Cal talks about South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem's decision to kill a bird dog, a live tour update, and cicada pee and the Law of Urination.
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It's been a turkey season of firsts and Brent's still reeling from an incredible opener in Missouri. He's got two great hunts on tap for you, a movie review, and is sharing a listener-submitted tale that pairs well with this episode. Sit back and relax, it's time for MeatEater's "This Country Life" podcast.
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I hate talking about the first time I experimented with a tree saddle. It reminds me that I'm not exactly young anymore.
The first time I dove into the world of saddle hunting was when reading John Eberhart's book Bowhunting Pressured Whitetails. The classic was the first mention of a hunting saddle I'd seen, and the book was released in 2003. For those who didn't major in math, that's more than two decades ago.
At the time, saddle options were limited, and there weren’t brands dedicated to producing saddle-hunting accessories. Still, it was fun to experiment, and I could see where a saddle would offer some advantages. Ultimately, I decided the saddle game wasn't worth the sore hips and weird shooting angles.
Fast-forward twenty-plus years, and today, we're in the midst of a certified saddle-hunting explosion that has all the cool kids and influencers unable to utter a sentence without first asking, “Do you even saddle, bruh?”
I own a few saddles and will spend a fair amount of time hunting from them this fall. That said, they are a tool and, in my opinion, one that's inferior to a lock-on stand in many (if not most) situations. I realize there are plenty who will disagree, and that's fine. But I'm pretty set on the statement. A tree saddle, while useful, can never fully replace a lock-on stand setup. Here's why.
ComfortYes, I have heard the claims and seen the YouTube testimonials. And the fact is, a tree saddle is super comfortable. And then gravity takes over. No matter how great your saddle fits or how many gallons of pre-workout you pound before blowing up at the local gym, you can not defy the effects of gravity. Hanging from a saddle will take its toll on your body. I feel it in my hips, my back, and my legs. To combat this, I spend more time standing on my platform to relieve the fatigue and pressure.
None of this happens when using a solid, moderately sized lock-on stand. Yes, when spending multiple hours in one of the uber-light (and uber-tiny) stands, I'll get a sore butt, an aching back and a touch of claustrophobia. But when using a stand with a larger platform, it's much easier for me to stay on the stand most of the day.
The bottom line is that a lock-on stand provides comfort for a longer period of time.
VersatilityOne of the primary selling points of a saddle is its ability to be used in a variety of trees. I won't deny this versatility. You can deploy a saddle in a wide array of trees, including those that lean heavily.
But here’s the thing: While you can technically utilize a saddle in those trees, actually hunting or shooting from can be big-time problematic. Again, gravity comes into play. When using a saddle in a tree with a heavy lean, I’ve found it exceptionally hard to set up in a way that doesn't have me face-planting into the trunk of the tree any time I try to maneuver, or swing around the opposite side of the tree because of the pull of gravity.
While lock-on stands are limited to trees with moderate leans or less, stands with adjustable bases will work well in all but the heaviest-leaning trees.
Saddles can also be tough to use in trees with multiple limbs as the tethers and ropes tend to be hampered by those limbs. Again, multi-limbed trees aren’t much of a problem for a lock-on stand.
To be fair, there are certain trees on which a saddle can be used that would give a lock-on stand trouble, and trees with smaller-than-ideal trunks are one such instance. But overall, I’ve had fewer issues selecting a suitable tree when using a lock-on stand than when using a saddle.
Shot OptionsAnother primary talking point of a saddle is the ability to shoot at virtually any angle from the tree. This is, technically, true. In reality, some shots are pretty darned tough to pull off. In fact, shots on your offhand side are tricky, requiring you to spin around on a tiny platform and use your tether to lock yourself against the tree trunk. That shot option would be stupidly easy to pull off from a lock-on stand.
I'm not saying shooting from a saddle is always difficult. It isn’t. Strong-side shots are a breeze, and shooting behind the tree is far easier than doing so on a saddle or a lock-on stand in most instances.
But I will say this: I have missed out on close-range shot opportunities from a saddle simply because I couldn’t get my body positioned in a manner that would allow me to draw my bow. That has never happened in a lock-on stand.
SimplicityThis point (like this entire piece) is a point of personal preference formed from experience.
To me, deploying a lock-on stand is just easier than dealing with a saddle. I'm not saying there's a huge difference between the two, and I will be honest and admit that if I were to spend more time using a saddle, the familiarity factor would be reduced. But I can get a set of climbing sticks in place, a lock-on stand secured to the tree, and ready to hunt in a hurry.
My saddle setups don't take much more time, but there is almost always a bit more of a fiddle factor in getting things set just right, which I don't encounter when using a lock-on stand.
Overall, my preference is to grab a solid set of climbing sticks and a lock-on stand. I'll certainly keep the saddle in my arsenal. It's a handy tool that I wouldn't want to go without, but, for this bowhunter, a saddle simply isn't a complete replacement for a lock-on stand, and likely never will be.
Nothing beats tagging a longbeard right after fly down. You’re back at camp before breakfast, and you look like a turkey guru to your hunting buddies. It’s how most turkey hunters envision a plan unfolding the night before. Unfortunately, it’s not usually the case.
I can count on both hands how many times I’ve had a turkey hunt play out this way. Most of my successful hunts occurred late morning or middle of the day after multiple setups, periods of silence, and pity parties. The latter time frame happens to be one of my favorites to hunt turkeys.
Sure, roosting a bird and killing him right off the limb has its perks, but there’s something more exciting and rewarding about striking a lonely gobbler when you least expect it. At this point in the day, most hunters have called it quits, hens have gone to nest, and those mythical gobblers become more susceptible to seductive hen sounds. So, just in case you don’t bag your bird around sunrise, here are a few tips on how to kill a midday gobbler.
AmbushWhether you’re hunting private or pressured public ground, you’re bound to encounter a tom that goes silent. However, if you know where the turkeys want to be, you can fill your tag without ever making a call.
To do that, you’ll need to find fresh turkey sign or glass them up in open country. This applies to stubborn or “call-shy” gobblers too. If you find tons of turkey scratching and droppings in the timber, you can feel confident that turkeys will probably show up there eventually, so it’s worth a sit.
Look For Strut ZonesThe same applies to strut zones, which are exactly what they sound like—zones or areas where turkeys like to strut. These areas typically provide gobblers with some type of visual advantage (think ridge tops, open pastures, or creek bottoms).
Whether you glass up a couple longbeards parading around a pasture or find drag marks on a dirt road, you’ll want to spend time in these places. It’s not as thrilling as calling them in, but if you’re bent on punching your tag and want to forego that whole dance, set up in that spot before they get there. You’ll need to know how to scout for turkeys, and this might take a few observational sits. While it’s not a guarantee, turkeys can be predictable.
My late grandfather killed his best turkey after cutting fresh tracks and drag marks. One afternoon while riding the roads of his hunting camp, he spotted the fresh sign on a dirt road overlooking a clearcut. The next morning, he went in before daylight and never heard a turkey gobble but felt confident in the spot. He returned around noon, set up within gun range of the drag marks, and never called. A few hours later, he heard drumming and watched as a tank of a longbeard strutted into the road one last time. The turkey never gobbled.
Run-and-GunThis term gets thrown around a lot, and there’s a right and wrong way to go about it. Most hunters interpret run-and-gun as driving to as many spots as possible while you hop out, owl hoot a few times or even yelp, and then move on after a few seconds of silence. You might get lucky and strike a bird this way, but those odds are slim. Despite the name, run-and-gun requires a bit more patience, and turkey hunting favors the patient.
Instead of bouncing from spot to spot, pick a parcel of public ground and make your way through it, calling periodically and listening. The key is to listen more than you call. Sometimes, you’ll get a response. But most times, longbeards will come in silent.
Whenever I’m working my way through a place, I’ll start with a few clucks and yelps. If nothing immediately responds, I’ll up the volume and run another sequence of yelps, adding a few more than the previous time. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had a gobbler respond after the second try.
If nothing responds after the second sequence, I’ll give a spot fifteen minutes before moving on. During those fifteen minutes it’s important to listen for drumming, scratching, or walking. Most sad turkey hunting stories involve a silent tom and an impatient hunter. My early turkey hunting days were full of such blunders. A little listening might be the difference in a punched tag and a spooked turkey if you know how to set up for turkeys in the woods.
If I’m run-and-gunning and come across a spot with fresh scratching, droppings, or other sign, I’ll give that spot a little more time. In this case, I’ll do some light clucking, purring, or other contentment calls and keep it to a minimum. Just last week, I went to a spot where I knew turkeys like to frequent in the afternoon. I hooted and didn’t get a response. Instead of calling, I decided to give it half an hour and listen. Before that half-hour ended, a bird gobbled on his own. I yelped back to him, he cut me off, and I went silent. Not twenty minutes later, he strutted into a dirt nap.
Just be PatientIt’s true, gobblers aren’t as vocal later in the day as they are on the limb, but don’t let that fool you into thinking they aren’t killable. Just because they’re not gobbling their heads off doesn’t mean they’re not willing.
It can be easy to get sloppy with your calling and walking if you’re not hearing any birds during the middle of the day. However, if you stay patient and hunt like there’s a gobbler behind every tree, you won’t be caught off guard when one finally does respond.
Takedown rifles are seriously underrated. A small, versatile rifle on hand at all times, whether you’re in the backcountry or scouting from your truck, is perfect for an opportunistic hunt on a rabbit, grouse, or squirrel. But picking the perfect rifle out of all the options can be overwhelming. This article breaks down the best rimfire takedowns available, and the situations they’re best suited to.
Jump to: Our Recommended Takedown Rifles
Why Purchase a Takedown Rifle?Takedown rifles allow the user to detach the barrel from the stock for transport and then reattach it when it needs to be used, usually without having to use any tools. At their best, takedown rimfire rifles have all the aspects of their larger counterparts, just in a smaller, more portable package.
Whether you’re hunting in the backcountry, floating down the river in a boat, or getting flown into the wilderness for weeks at a time, it’s the gun you can depend on to put food on the table while larger game eludes you. They’re equally at home slipped away under the seat of your truck, and they’re also perfect for the owner who doesn’t have a lot of space at home and wants to store their rifle safely away from children or guests.
What We Look for in a Takedown RifleA takedown rifle should be a gun for every person and every situation. It should be a joy to use, and ideally just as effective as its larger counterpart, within reason. Hence, when picking your perfect takedown rimfire rifle, consider the following:
- Size & Weight
- Cost
- Versatility
- Accuracy & Range
We’re looking for a rifle that’s relatively inexpensive, easy to use, and can be deployed with limited skill and time. The last thing you want is to be fumbling around, putting your gun together while the target hops away. Once assembled, it should be reliable enough to hit the target. It can be a difficult balance to strike, but here are our best picks.
Jump to: What Makes a Good Takedown Rifle
Takedown Rifles We Recommend
| Ruger 10/22 Takedown .22 LR | Chiappa Little Badger .22 LR | Henry US Survival AR-7 | Savage 42 Takedown .22 WMR/.410 | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Highlight | Best Value & Accuracy | Cheapest & Lightest | Most Compact | Most Versatile | | Action | Semi-Auto | Break Action | Semi-Auto | Break Action | | Capacity | 10 rounds | 1 round (2 magazines) | 8 rounds | 2 rounds (1 shot rimfire, 1 shot .410) | | Length | 35 in | 31 in | 35 in | 35.75 in | | Weight | 4.2 lb | 3.6 lb (with scope) | 3.5 lb | 6.1 lb | | Price | $499 USD | $189.99 USD | $300 USD | $520 USD | | Shop Now | Shop Now | Shop Now | Shop Now | | Field Notes | Field Notes | Field Notes | Field Notes |
*Estimated Price on 05/01/24What Makes a Good Takedown Rifle?1. Size & Weight If you’re going to spend the money on a takedown rifle, you might as well go for the smallest, most compact one out there. Ideally, aim for a rifle that is a pound or two lighter than a regular rimfire with a total length of less than 40 inches. Anything beyond that compromises its utility. Modified stocks can also help achieve this.
For instance, take the Magpul X-22 Backpacker designed for the 10/22 takedown. I’ve used this stock for years, and it significantly reduces the size of the folded rifle without compromising functionality. Additionally, it has space for an additional 10-round magazine, meaning that there isn’t often the need to carry heaps of extra ammo in your pack, which saves weight and space.
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Cost Takedown rifles do not need to be expensive. Personally, I wouldn’t spend more than $600 for a brand-new model and significantly less for second-hand. Second-hand takedowns tend to be highly reliable, especially if they only have iron sights, so a bit of bargain hunting can really pay off. I’d recommend using sites such as GunBroker and Drury’s Guns for used rifles but do be aware of scams. For more details on purchasing a used firearm, click here.
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Versatility Ideally, you want a gun that can take any small game animal out there, from small gophers and squirrels to bigger jackrabbits, pheasants, and possibly even raccoons or beavers. For the most part, a .22 LR can do the job, but something bigger can really help.
If you’re in an area where larger targets are abundant, opting for a takedown chambered in .17 HMR or .22 WMR can be helpful. Even more versatile are the combination rifles, often with a rimfire cartridge in one barrel and a .410 shotgun on the bottom. This gives the hunter the option to pursue both flushed game and stationary animals at close range.
- Accuracy & Range Takedown rifles aren’t going to be winning any awards for accuracy and range, but they don’t need to. As per their intended use, the longest range that you’re going to shoot at is around 50 yards, with most shots between 20 and 35 yards. Being able to shoot a one-inch group at this distance is imperative, with anything more accurate just a bonus. Playing around with different ammo and investing in a small red-dot sight can significantly improve accuracy with minimal impact on size and weight.
Our Recommendations Best Value and Accuracy Ruger 10/22 Takedown Price: $499 USD
Buy on scheels.com The Ruger 10/22 is perhaps the most popular small game rifle of modern times, and the takedown model captures almost all of this utility. It’s relatively cheap, reliable, quick to assemble, and just incredibly fun to play around with.
Plus, for a takedown rifle, it maintains accuracy at a reasonable range, making it perfect for all sorts of small game. I’ve killed uncountable numbers of rabbits, hares and possums with this rifle, and even taken on the odd turkey and wallaby with it as well. For me, it’s the best all-round option out there, especially if you’re already familiar with the 10/22.
Specifications * Action: Semi-Auto * Capacity: 10 rounds * Length: 35 in * Weight: 4.2 lb * Price: $499 USD
Cheapest & Lightest Chiappa Little Badger .22 LR Price: $189.99 USD
Buy on sportsmans.com The Little Badger is the embodiment of minimalism in a rifle. It’s ridiculously light, cheap, and easy to use, but comes with limitations. Its single-shot design can be a pain if you miss your first shot, and its small size does sacrifice some of its accuracy and range.
The sheer novelty of its structure makes for a bit of fun when shooting, but it’s probably a gun reserved for the most die-hard backcountry adventurers or those with minimal budgets. If you desire a harder-hitting rifle, there are .17 HMR and .22 WMR models as well.
Specifications * Action: Break Action * Capacity: 1 round (2 magazines) * Length: 31 in * Weight: 3.6 lb (with scope) * Price: $189.99 USD
Most Compact Henry US Survival AR-7 Price: $300 USD
Buy on sportsmans.com This rifle has almost legendary status as the survival weapon of choice for US Air Force pilots in the mid-20th century. It’s a small and versatile firearm that can be used on most small game, and if you have to, survive a dangerous situation.
In many ways, it combines many features of both the 10/22 and the Little Badger. It’s incredibly light and the most compact of all our options but has the added advantage of being semi-auto. Its unique ability to fit the barrel, action, and magazine into the stock makes it the most compactable of all the rifles on this list, though it is still heavier than the Chiappa, and it falls behind the Ruger 10/22 in accuracy.
Specifications * Action: Semi-Auto * Capacity: 8 rounds * Length: 35 in * Weight: 3.5 lb * Price: $300 USD
Most Versatile Savage 42 Takedown .22 WMR/.410 Price: $520 USD
Buy on sportsmans.com The Savage 42 is unique because it’s really two guns in one. The double-barrel system allows the hunter to fire rimfire cartridges from the top barrel and .410 shot shells from the bottom barrel. The two rounds can be fired in quick succession, perfect for pretty much every small game animal under the sun.
I’ve used this gun on a couple of occasions, targeting California quail and chukar in the Central Otago of New Zealand, where rabbits are incredibly common, and it worked like a charm in both scenarios. It is the heaviest, least compact, and most expensive of all our recommendations, but the versatility of having both a rifle and shotgun cartridge is hard to beat, earning its place on our list. Plus, when chambered in .22 WMR, it’s a heavier hitter than all the other options and gives hunters some extra range.
Specifications * Action: Break Action * Capacity: 2 rounds (1 shot rimfire, 1 shot 410.) * Length: 35.75 in * Weight: 6.1 lb * Price: $520 USD
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On this special episode K.C. Smith is on a hunt with Michael Stoll, Eric Gentry and our brand new intern, Nick Gonzales. We sit down and introduce Nick and talk a little bit about the Packers vs. Cowboys over the years. Michael gives his thoughts on why the Eastern is the best subspecies. We get into what has happened over the last few weeks in the turkey woods as well. If you haven't already, go watch Michaels public land turkey hunt in Iowa our on YouTube now! Thanks for listening.
Check out The Element Youtube Channel and go watch these other great turkey hunts!!
Michael's Iowa Public Land Bird
yler's Rio Grande Turkey | Point Blank!
Bow Hunting Mountain Merriams
Greg's Opening Day Turkey
Steven Rinella talks with the two American hunters, Ryan Watson and Bryan Hagerich, currently detained on the Caribbean island nation of the Turks and Caicos. They face potential 12-year prison sentences for having accidentally left hunting ammunition rounds in the tourist luggage they brought with them on vacation to the island.
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This week, Cal gets to know Steve's roll on the TRCP board: how do boards function, why TRCP, and should you consider a volunteer board position?
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Spot and stalk bear hunting can be tough, but also rewarding. Dirk and Josh Boyd share a conversation about spring bear hunting in the backcountry.
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On this week's show, Tony and I break down our top 12 book recommendations for hunters and anglers.
Books Mentioned:
Trout Bum by John Gierach
At the Grave of the Unknown Fisherman by John Gierach
True North by Jim Harrison
A Hunter's Heart collected by David Petersen
The Gentle Giant of Time by Gene Hill
Whitetail Access by Chris Eberhart
The Old Man and the Boy by Robert Roark
Death in the Long Grass by Peter Hathaway Capstick
Should the Tent Be Burning Like That? by Bill Heavey
Mercy on Beeson's Partridge by Sydney Lea
Meat Eater by Steven Rinella
American Buffalo by Steven Rinella
Man-Eating Leopard of Rudrapravang by Jim Corbett
No Beast So Fierce by Dane HuckelbridgeThe Tiger by John Vaillant
A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold
Get the Wired to Hunt hat before it's gone!
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Brody Henderson, Seth Morris, Randall Williams, Chester Floyd, Taylin Tomlinson, Cory Calkins, Keith Anspach, and Logan Dove.
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Join Clay and the crew for a behind-the-scenes view into the MeatEater Live Tour. Steve Rinella, Janis Putelis, and Spencer Neuharth are hitting ten cities across the western United States telling stories, playing music, and even playing games.
Get your tickets for the remaining tour dates in Spokane, WA, Portland, OR, and Tacoma, WA here.
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On today's show, Tony explains how hunters should try to understand why thinking only like a predator, and not a prey animal, can really hold you back in the whitetail woods.
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This week Dan and Reid host Drake White for the most inspiring episode of God’s Country yet. Drake talks about his 14-year journey in a ten-year town and how he’s kept a positive attitude amidst his traumatic brain injury. The guys learned that Drake’s first show was at his hometown beauty pageant and that, during his Nashville tenure, he took three months to move across the world. Everyone agreed “Lord I Hope This Day Is Good” is the perfect song to listen to on your way to the stand and laughed over the instructions given to them over the years on how to find said stand.
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Steven Rinella talks with Peter Stark, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics discussed: Being an adventurer and then an adventure historian; Peter's many books; the beaver in the tile work of Astor Place; how young Washington was a screw up; how exasperated Steve gets listening to Attenborough, God bless him; dinosaurs in the snow; land back scenarios; mapping out old water ways; checking out narwhals with Inuit hunters; how far north can you go?; different ways to die; box jellies and black mambas; the lost Pacific Empire of Astor and Jefferson; young Washington; Tecumseh; and more.
Outro song by Jacob Perleoni
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This week Cal talks about BLM Rules, Colorado anti-hunters' embrace of big cat lovers and so much more.
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Brent's opening week of Missouri's 2024 turkey season went better than he'd hoped. Along with that, a lot of you found the picture of Tim and him on Google Maps that he challenged you to find. The opportunity for Brent to read a listener-submitted "My TCL Story" received a lot of attention, and he's got one for us today. Turkeys, pocket knives, one of your stories, and a little political intrigue are all here in this week's episode of MeatEater's This Country Life podcast.
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Within the next couple months bucks will start growing their new antlers. By mid-summer, social media feeds will fill up with trail camera images of velvet-antlered hitlisters. Quite a few of these deer will be given names if they don’t have one already.
This will happen with hunters ranging from celebrity power couples to random dudes scattered across the country who spend their whole season on grandma’s 40 acres. The one-buck hunt is all the rage right now, which is great for some people.
The challenge of letting one go for a few years before targeting him is something that a lot of whitetail junkies love. It’s also a hunting style that presents a nearly impossible task for others. If you’re interested in hunting this way, figuring out how well it’ll work in your world is important.
Just as important as figuring out whether you actually care to hunt this way at all.
A Lot Of DisappointmentEight years ago, a buddy and I glassed up an extremely tall 10-pointer as it munched away in a summertime beanfield. After hanging some cameras in the area, I started to realize the buck was spending a lot of time on a farm I had permission to hunt. I got obsessed.
The buck was all of 160 inches and framed up like a mule deer. He was also really good at not walking past me in daylight. I hunted him as meticulously as I could and never laid eyes on him, even though my cameras showed that he was hanging out right under my nose.
It got to the point where every deer I saw coming down the trail was a disappointment, and I didn’t like it. As the Minnesota gun season loomed closer, I started to back off of that deer to just hunt, and ended up on another part of the farm one late October morning.
Not long into the sit, a doe trotted by. I then heard a buck roar twice, which had never happened before, nor has it happened since. The deer, a main-frame eight with split brows, charged past my stand and made the mistake of stopping when I mrrped him. It was one of the coolest hunts I’ve ever had, but also tainted by a little disappointment. The buck I shot was a good one, no doubt. But he wasn’t the one I had been thinking about all summer and fall.
Not For EveryoneIt’s hard for people who have a decent spot to hunt to realize sometimes how good they really have it. In so many places, passing up a buck in hopes that he’ll make it another season or three is a lost cause. Hunting pressure, predation, nasty winters, EHD, and a host of other factors can conspire to keep deer from getting old on private land. On public land, it’s often worse.
You might want to find a target buck, babysit him for a few years, and then set your sights on him when he’s mature. You might also never, ever get a chance to do that. In that case, the best you can do is try to find the biggest buck in the neighborhood on any given season, and focus on him. Or, you can forget about one-buck hunts and embrace the mystery.
Something Antlered This Way ComesI’m old enough to remember hunting in the pre-trail-camera days. There were plenty of question marks in the pursuit back then, and it’s something that I love about hunting. In fact, it’s one of the main reasons I like to travel to random states to hunt public land.
Having no history with a spot and no trail camera images to persuade me to hunt one way or another is freeing. It’s fun not to know who is going to come down the trail and to decide, in the moment, whether a deer is worthy of my tag or not.
This might be how you are wired, too. A great way to find out is to dive deep into the one-buck-hunt world. I did, and more than just with that big Minnesota 10-pointer. I found out that my spots aren’t great for it, and that I don’t really like that style. Your mileage might vary, of course.
That’s the great thing about this stuff, and it’s something to consider in the off-season as you’re planning on getting a few cameras out or maybe thinking about taking an over-the-road trip this fall. Should you find a target buck and laser in on him, or play it fast and loose and let the deer gods decide your fate?
Try both, figure it out. Then, lean into whatever works for you so you can get the most out of your season.
For more deer hunting information, check out these articles: Who Really Hunts The Hardest To Kill Whitetails?, The Whitetail Misses That Sting The Most, and Lost Your Hunting Access? No Need To Panic.
Ryan Watson and Bryan Hagerich didn’t know each other before they got arrested and jailed in Turks and Caicos earlier this year, but now they’re making plans to go elk hunting together as soon as they return to the United States.
Unfortunately, that first step–returning to the U.S.–feels like a bigger challenge than bagging the biggest bull in the mountains.
“Even to this day, I think I’m going to wake up from this and it’s going to be over,” Hagerich told MeatEater. “But it’s your new reality, and I don’t know if it will ever sink in.”
Watson and his wife, Valerie, gained international attention earlier this week when NBC Boston published a story on their predicament. Customs officials at an airport on the Caribbean Island found four rifle cartridges in their luggage, and police arrested the couple on charges under a law that bars the possession of guns and ammo in the British Overseas Territory. The law comes with a minimum sentence of 12 years in prison.
After posting bail and spending about a week on the island, Valerie was allowed to go home to be with their 7- and 9-year-old children. Ryan also posted bail, but his charges remained and he was forced to stay and await trial.
Ryan soon discovered that he wasn’t alone. The Watson’s story brought to light other Americans who since August of 2023 have been stranded on the island for similar offenses. Hagerich was one of them, and he’s been on the island for the past eight weeks with a 12-year prison sentence hanging over his head.
Arrested at the AirportBoth Hagerich and Watson had come to Turks and Caicos for vacation. Watson lives in Oklahoma, and he was with his wife and some friends celebrating their 40th birthdays. Hagerich, a Pennsylvania native, was with his wife, Ashley, and their two kids (three and five years old at the time), and they had visited the island on three previous occasions.
“It’s a place that we love. Lots of memories here. It was a special place for us leading up to all of this,” Hagerich told MeatEater.
Those memories were tainted eight weeks ago when Hagerich and his family tried to fly from Providenciales International Airport to Pittsburg. Hagerich heard his name over the intercom, and he went over to the ticket counter. Airport employees told him one of his bags had been selected for a “random search,” and he consented.
Officials found a full box of factory-loaded 6.5 PRC rifle ammunition in his checked bag, and he realized it was the same ammunition he had used during whitetail season last year. He told MeatEater he used that bag weekly during the season, traveling back and forth to his family’s hunting property.
“From there, chaos broke loose. All these people rushed in, and it sounded like they wanted to take me directly to jail,” Hagerich recalls. “I said I had a wife and two kids who are about to board a plane, and they need to be aware of what’s going on. After some pleading on my part, they got my wife and kids.”
Bryan Hagerich with his kids and a whitetail buck.
Officials allowed Hagerich a few minutes alone with his wife, but they wouldn’t let the kids join them. Hagerich gave her the car keys and told her he’d see her tomorrow.
Hagerich’s family was allowed to board a plane and leave, but for him it was “straight to the jail.”
“My wife was completely clueless. She had no idea where I was, no clue what was going on. No one reached out to her to explain anything,” Hagerich says.
Watson’s experience was similar. He and his wife were trying to fly home on April 12 when one of Watson’s carry-on duffle bags got flagged by security. After searching it for several minutes, the customs agent found four 6.5 Creedmoor cartridges. They were all in a small bag, and Watson says he had purchased the hand-loads from a shop in Oklahoma.
“I recognized the packaging and I was like, oh crap,” he said. “I told them I don’t need them, you can throw them away, I’m so sorry about this.”
The Watsons didn’t realize the seriousness of their situation until a plain-clothed police officer put them in a car and brought them to a police station. Watson asked what the fine would be, which is when the officer told them the offense came with a 12-year prison sentence.
Watson and his wife were both arrested because officials said they weren’t sure who the bag belonged to (Valerie had a number of her own items in the bag).
“Reason seemed to have gone out the window at that point,” Watson said. “I had no idea [the cartridges] were in the bag and no idea when they got in the bag.”
The law on Turks and Caicos requires a local resident to put up collateral for bail. Fortunately, the pair only spent about three days in jail before the driver from their vacation offered to put up the title of his car to get them out. Valerie had to stay on the island until April 23, when officials dropped the charges and she was allowed to fly home.
Hagerich wasn’t quite so fortunate. He spent eight days in jail in February before he made bail, and he told MeatEater it was nothing like he ever expected.
He was placed in a “pitch black” cell with, at one point, six other people, some of whom had been arrested for murder. They were given blankets (“if we were lucky”), and an exercise mat to sleep and sit on.
“The first night was the absolute worst. Countless people coming in and out. I didn’t sleep, but I was also fearful about who the next person was to come in,” he said. “It was quite terrifying to say the least.”
Fortunately, neither Hagerich or Watson report being injured or mistreated while in police custody.
Neither man had ever been in trouble with the law on U.S. soil, let alone foreign turf. “It was strange to be called ‘prisoner,’ strange to be in shackles. It was so foreign to me. None of this seems real, to be honest to you,” Watson said.
Ryan Watson with a whitetail buck.
The Firearms OrdinanceBoth men are being represented by a lawyer named Oliver Smith, who has also represented the other Americans who have been arrested under the Firearms Ordinance.
Turks and Caicos passed an amendment to the Ordinance back in 2022, ostensibly as a way to combat gun-related violence on the island. The statute prescribes a mandatory minimum custodial sentence of 12 years in prison for anyone traveling with a firearm, ammunition, or other weapon.
The U.S. Embassy in the Bahamas had previously released a travel advisory warning Americans not to travel to Turks and Caicos with firearms or ammunition, and they recently updated that warning to be even more explicit.
Watson and Hagerich say they were not aware of the law and had not seen the advisory.
They aren’t the only ones. The Turks and Caicos Attorney General published a press release earlier this week stating that five other individuals had been prosecuted under the ordinance but given reduced sentences due to “exceptional circumstances.”
Four of those individuals were hit with fines and allowed to return home. Watson and Hagerich say one was even allowed to leave the airport that same day. The other, an American named Micahel Grimm, was arrested in August of 2023 and given an eight-month prison sentence for bringing ammunition in his luggage.
“We’ve been told that a lot of these decisions were made to thwart the gun violence they were experiencing on the island, but I can’t make sense of it, and I don’t think we’ve been able to have a conversation with anyone who can,” Watson said. “There is not a gun within 1,000 miles that can fire that cartridge. At best, you could throw it at somebody. This is not what’s causing gun violence on this island.”
Watson has been in touch with U.S. Senator Markwayne Mullin (OK-R) and Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt, both of whom have been working behind the scenes to get the charges dropped. So far, the U.S. Embassy hasn’t been able to help because, according to Watson, they don’t want to get involved in the Turks and Caicos’ legal system.
“There’s got to be a way to come up with a logical solution to this,” Hagerich said. “This law wasn’t created with tourists in mind. It was created to address the smuggling of firearms and ammunition from other countries, which I understand and respect. But to lump everything into a one-size-fits-all approach doesn’t make logical sense.”
The director of public prosecutions said in a statement that, in total, eight firearms and ammunition prosecutions have been conducted involving tourists from the United States, three of which are currently before the court: Watson, Hagerich, and another more recent case. All three are out on bail.
Hope for the HuntIf there’s one silver lining here, it’s that Watson and Hagerich have become good friends through their shared ordeal. They’re staying at the same Airbnb while they await their trials, and they share a love for the outdoors.
Hagerich (who showed up to our Zoom interview in a Sitka shirt but we won’t hold that against him) grew up hunting, but didn’t make it a lifestyle until he got a little older.
“You’re in nature, God’s greatest creation. It was a time to relax, reflect, share camaraderie with friends and family. It quickly became a huge aspect of my life,” he said. “It’s grown into more than a weekend hobby.”
Bryan Hagerich with an antelope.
Watson grew up hunting whitetail, upland birds, and turkeys in Oklahoma. Watson says he also has a huge passion for chasing elk but terrible luck doing it.
“My wife tells me that if I go on another elk trip and come home empty-handed that she’s going to leave me for a real elk hunter,” Watson said, laughing.
Hagerich drew a Montana archery elk tag last year and had a great hunt. Watson, meanwhile, just got an email from the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish saying he hadn’t drawn the elk tags he’d put in for.
“[Hagerich] has been rubbing this in my face since we’ve gotten to know each other,” Watson joked. “More salt in this wound right now. Didn't draw again!”
Watson may be an unlucky elk hunter, but his son had a great turkey season. Watson proudly showed a photograph of his son with two jake turkeys on the ground, which he bagged on the same day this year.
“Talk about a proud dad. It was the hunt of a lifetime,” he said. “I just can’t imagine not having any more mornings like that.”
Watson with his son and a whitetail buck.
If You Want to HelpHagerich’s trial is set to begin on May 4th.
“It’s both of our trials. I’m going to be sitting right there with him,” Watson said. “We’re still prayerful there’s an outside chance we get resolution before that, but we’re preparing ourselves. We’ve decided we’re in this together. We have the same goal in mind of getting back to our kids.”
Watson’s sister set up a GoFundMe to help pay for legal bills and living expenses as the family loses income from Watson’s absence. Watson also encouraged concerned Americans to get in touch with their elected officials and ask them to use their influence to get them home.
Once they get home, they’re already planning a hunt together.
“I need some of his luck in the elk woods,” Watson said, glancing at Hagerich. “I can’t wait. I’m strong in my faith and I remain prayerful that God has a plan for us in all of this, not only to get back to our families but to help anybody else who’s in this situation.”
Get to know your conservation groups with Hunter Van Donsel, Montana/Wyoming Regional director for Pheasants Forever. On this episode, you'll learn about pheasants, why habitat matters, and what this conservation organization can do for you.
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On this week's show, we discuss how to make a living in a conservation related field, as well as advice for becoming a more effective volunteer conservationist and advocate, with Chris Borgatti of Backcountry Hunters & Anglers and Matt Ross of the National Deer Association.
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Turkey season is here! The birds are gobbling, so we wanted to touch on turkey tactics one last time. Jason and Dirk discuss everything that they carry in their vest, their approach on different subspecies, how to call to birds in when henned up, and much more. Jason then throws some real-life hunting scenarios at Dirk that steers the conversations to what their next move will be.
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I’m all too familiar with frustrating trail camera experiences. Ending up with poor-quality images or no pictures at all feels like a waste of time. If you're new to using trail cameras, you can avoid this mistake and learn from my experience.
You could be happy just to know there are deer in the area. Or you may be frustrated with camera performance and want to learn more about capturing usable trail cam pictures. However, a blurry image of a deer will not help narrow your efforts of getting a whitetail inside bow range.
Running cameras teaches a few lessons. Most importantly, it teaches you to recognize that trail cameras aren't a replacement for poor scouting. They are a tool. When used correctly, they can enhance your scouting and make you more successful.
Hung too HighA high camera hang is a popular tactic for setting trail cams on public land. It avoids detection by deer and discourages theft. But, if you plan to hang your camera too high, you might as well leave it in your backpack. Camera sensors miss much of what happens below them with a steep angle, which means there will be fewer pictures than there would be with a lower camera placement.
If you insist on hanging your camera high, hang it downhill from the targeted zone. This way, the camera will maintain a better window to capture movement. Deer will be unable to detect the camera, thieves will still have to climb to steal it, and the images on the card will be what you're hoping for.
I prefer a height of around six feet. You may lose a few cameras to scumbags that have nothing better to do, but you will avoid detection by deer. Side note: if a thief is determined to steal a camera, they will steal it, regardless of whether it's ten feet up in a tree or not.
Over ExposureOverexposure kills great photos. Maybe you pointed a camera east, straight down a tractor lane or powerline cut. A big-bodied deer walked in front of your camera right after the sun rose, but when you pulled the camera, all you could see were deer legs and a glare. Annoying, right?
Field edges and "wildlife openings" can be great setups for trail cam photos. A barrier to sunlight or pointing the camera away from the rising or setting sun is a better way to correct exposure. An example of a barrier would be to point a camera across the corner of a field at the adjacent woodline. A backdrop like that will help clear up your images.
Incorrect BackgroundNight photos come out best with a good background. This helps the trail cam flash to better illuminate the foreground and capture more defined images. It also offers more clarity when trying to identify deer activity. This way, you can easily spot new bucks that appear during the rut without struggling to figure out what you're looking at.
In the past, I believed that taking photos at night held little value, but they can actually be useful in forming a successful hunting strategy. Think about a buck that is mainly nocturnal during early fall. As time passes, his activity shifts towards daylight. If you follow the trend and are one step ahead, it could be what you need to put a buck in your shooting lane.
Bad BatteriesThere's a little Pennsylvania Dutch running in my blood. I don't like to admit it, but sometimes I can be cheap. The cheapness doesn't compare to the rest of my family, but biting the bullet for good batteries is tough to swallow in today's economy.
Lithium batteries are downright expensive. On average, it costs about $27 to buy batteries for a single camera. If you're wondering if lithium batteries are necessary, they are not. However, lithium batteries have benefits. Their output exceeds alkaline batteries, resulting in crisper images. They also have a much longer battery life. One set of lithium batteries could last an entire year, depending on your camera settings (less in video mode).
Alkaline batteries are fine, but you should know a few things before using them in your cameras. They may only last three or four months. If it gets cold enough, freezing can occur and cause the batteries to burst. If batteries are leaking and causing corrosion, you must clean your camera. And if you’re running a high-burst count or in video mode, expect a short battery life.
Unmatched SettingsFly fishermen know how to "match the hatch" better than any other outdoorsmen. Likewise, trail cam users must learn to match their settings to the sign or surroundings. Running photo mode on a scrape with a short delay (ten to fifteen seconds) will fill an SD card quickly. In that case, shooting a ten-second video to capture the action or increase the delay would be better.
Settings are all experimental. As a rule of thumb, lengthen delays for features where a deer will spend more time on, and shorten them for features in areas where deer are moving through.
Not Enough AngleWe discussed hanging height earlier, and I mentioned that six feet is a good height. Even at six feet, you might need to use a shim behind the camera for the optimal angle. Failing to shim the camera will result in pictures showing only the back, ears, and racks. You'll still have some intel but won't have ideal photos.
You can fix this by using a laser pointer or placing your phone over the lens in selfie mode. Be careful with the selfie mode trick because a camera's layout may differ from your phone's. You could also walk in front of the camera and check the photo, which can be cumbersome. For the best and easiest result, use a camera with an onboard screen to direct the aim.
Follow-up FailureFollow-up failure can happen from either direction. Checking cameras too often increases pressure and causes deer to change their behavior. On the other hand, not checking them at all could waste all your efforts.
A camera hung in early summer might have new vegetation blocking the view. It's a real downer to check a camera after a year to find a frame full of tall grass or a downed tree limb. One check could have saved your fall photos.
Other things, like rodents or bears moving your camera, a spider web on the lens, or ants in the camera housing, will ruin your photos. One pre-fall check and a single check during the season are all that's needed. Save in-season checks for when you pass a camera on a hunt.
Steven Rinella and Cameron Hanes archery hunt for wild hogs in Texas. It's mid winter and before they sit down to record episode #522 of the MeatEater Podcast, Steve and Cameron take advantage of the excessive wild pig population on a south Texas ranch.
The most recent meeting of the Washington State Fish and Wildlife Commission descended into open infighting last week as five of the nine commissioners voted to begin a process that could restrict cougar hunting in the state.
The commission was considering a petition submitted last year by the Humane Society, the Center for Biological Diversity, the Mountain Lion Foundation, and Washington Wildlife First. The petitioners claim the current rules governing cougar hunting are based on “politics, not science,” and that hunters are killing cougars beyond what the population can sustain.
In response, the commission voted 5-4 to submit a proposal to the Fish and Wildlife Department that could significantly reduce cougar hunting opportunities in the state.
But the decision wasn’t without opposition, and not just from Washington State hunters. Kelly Susewind, the Director of the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, accused the commission of blatantly ignoring the opinions of state biologists.
“I’m just trying to get my head around this whole thing. I’m in a bit of disbelief, frankly,” he told the commission. “You’re trying to go your direction despite where the agency wants to go, and if we don’t say what you want to hear, you don’t want to hear from us. I just want to make it clear that that’s completely counter to what we’ve done in the past. Anybody who thinks this is a good process has a much different mindset than I do.”
Commissioner Jim Anderson put forward a motion to hold off on making new cougar hunting rules until a more thorough process could unfold. But the majority of the commission rejected that motion, opting instead to begin a rulemaking process that runs counter to what state biologists recommend.
“I can’t say how much I think that’s a backward approach. We’re directing without a fundamental knowledge, we’re directing based on biases,” Anderson said. “And that’s why my motion was to take the time, engage the staff… I think it’s a big mistake to go down this path.”
Perhaps the most pointed criticism came from Commissioner Molly Linville, who represents eastern Washington.
“I would implore us to ask ourselves, ‘Is this going to build trust with the public or this going to cause a firestorm we are about to step into?' ” She asked her fellow commissioners. “I believe this is going to cause a firestorm. For the first time, I’m going to really understand why the public doesn’t trust us. I just got completely disregarded when I shared that there are four of us who aren’t comfortable, and you just want to steamroll us, and you aren’t going to like the reaction from the public. I guarantee it. This is not good governance.”
Despite these concerns, Commissioners Melanie Rowland, Woody Meyers, Lorna Smith, Barbara Baker, and Tim Reagan voted for a proposal that would do the following:
- Count all independent-aged cougars (18+ months old) towards the total cougar mortality cap.
- Establish that the cougar hunting season begins September 1 and ends March 31.
- Determine the cap based on the best available estimates of cougar density and growth rate (currently, those parameters are estimated at 2.3 cougars per 100 square kilometers and 1.13 intrinsic growth).
- Count all human-related cougar mortality towards the total cougar mortality cap–including harvested cougars and cougars killed to resolve conflicts.
- Managers may close hunting in any population management unit (PMU) prior to the cap being reached upon consideration of factors such as disease, suspected additional mortality, or any other issue affecting cougar populations.
- In PMUs where combined cougar mortality meets or exceeds 20% of the population prior to September 1st, the season shall remain closed. Additionally, if opened, the season shall close automatically within 72 hours of that number being reached. (This provision will sunset at the end of the 2024 season.)
This proposal doesn’t finalize these provisions, but it does direct the Department of Fish and Wildlife to develop rules based on these directions. The commission will still have to vote on whatever rules the department puts forward, but if they adhere to these provisions, there’s no reason to believe these same five commissioners won’t vote for them again.
Washington state hunters are concerned about these proposed changes because they could significantly reduce their opportunities. Current regulations only count cougars over 24 months, but lowering that bar to 18 months means the quota will be reached more quickly (and thus close the unit to hunting). Counting conflict removals towards that quota will speed up that process even further.
“Nearly every commissioner recognized that it was conflict removal that caused more deaths (and concern) than hunting, but they instead chose to not address actions to reduce conflict kills,” Mandy Carlstrom told MeatEater. Carlstrom serves as communications lead for the Washington State chapter of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers. “Instead, once conflict is done killing cougars, whatever is left in the quota capacity is all hunters will be able to pursue.”
“Of course, conflict removal will continue happening after the quota closes for hunters when necessary. Which means they just reduced opportunity without ever reducing lethal take overall—it could actually increase,” she continued.
Commissioner Rowland, one of the commissioners who voted in favor of these changes, acknowledged that conflict removal is what’s driving “too many cougars being killed,” but still supported limiting hunting opportunities “because we can.”
“If we have too many cougars being killed and we see that conflict removals are where it’s increasing. I’m not blaming the hunters for too many cougars being killed but that’s the only thing we can really address for now. I think we do need to address the hunting removals because we can,” she said.
It’s unclear the extent to which hunters mitigate conflicts with cougars, but Bart George, a mountain lion researcher and the wildlife program manager for Kalispel Tribe Natural Resources Department in Washington State, told MeatEater that conflicts can be reduced with hounds.
“General hunting doesn’t do that much to reduce cougar conflicts,” he said. “But hunting with hounds and pursuing them likely has a bigger impact. If you look at western states that have active, hound hunting communities and pursuit seasons, they tend to have far fewer public safety issues and livestock and pet depredations.”
Washington State does have a mountain lion hunting season, unlike nearby California, but hunters are not permitted to use hounds.
Most human-lion conflicts involve pets, livestock, and property, but the big cats do sometimes attack people. Just this spring, a group of cyclists were attacked by a mountain lion in Washington State while two brothers were attacked and one killed by a mountain lion in California.
The Commission hopes to finalize these new rules before next year’s cougar hunting season, but there’s still time to weigh in. Concerned hunters can contact members of the Fish and Wildlife Commission here and submit public comments at an upcoming meeting.
Steven Rinella and Cameron Hanes archery hunt for wild hogs in Texas. It's mid winter and, before recording episode #522 of the MeatEater Podcast, Steve and Cameron take advantage of the excessive wild pig population on a south Texas ranch.
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On this special episode Tyler Jones, K.C. Smith are in Arkansas hunting Eastern Turkey with pastor Scott Harness. For those that remember our "Arkansas Buck Truck" episode over on the MeatEater Youtube channel, you will remember Scott who graciously hosted us while we Deer Hunted with Clay Newcomb. We tell stories from that trip and last year's hunt with Scott. We laugh about the fun times we have had together but more importantly we discuss why it's so important to start reading the word God has left for us. We discuss Scripture and how it relates to hunting and everyday life. If you would like to find out more or just talk to someone please reach out to us or Scott on social media. This was one of our favorite podcast we've ever recorded, thanks for listening!
Check out The Element Youtube Channel and go watch these other great turkey hunts!!
Tyler's Rio Grande Turkey | Point Blank!
Bow Hunting Mountain Merriams
Greg's Opening Day Turkey
Unbelievable Turkey Hunt In Missouri
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Brody Henderson, Seth Morris, Randall Williams, Chester Floyd, Chilly, Alyssa Smith, Roman Schnobrich, and Keith Anspach.
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On this episode of the Bear Grease Render, Clay Newcomb and the Render Crew are joined by “herpaculturalist” and snake ambassador Brad Birchfield as he shows up on the scene with some jaw-dropping stories and bundle of snakes from his personal collection. Bear Newcomb tells the tale of his turkey hunting exploits. Also joining are Misty Newcomb and Josh “Landbridge” Spielmaker as we discuss the Cobra Scare Podcast.
Come see Clay and the rest of the MeatEater crew on the MeatEater Live Tour starting April 23rd. See www.themeateater.com/events for cities, dates, and tickets. Join in on the Owl Hoot Contest for your chance to win a genuine Coon Skin Hat.
See the video of Carl Barnett’s confession: https://youtu.be/1dv9IZCSW44?feature=shared
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At a meeting on April 9th, the Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries Commission voted to adopt a black bear hunting season in the state—the first since the Louisiana black bear was listed under the Endangered Species Act in 1992.
The Commission approved a 16-day season, set to run December 7 to 22 this year. Only ten tags will be administered this year through the state’s lottery system, and hunting will be limited to a single unit in the northeast corner of the state. Additionally, hunting over bait will be permitted.
The decision comes on the heels of an uptick in complaints about the burgeoning bear population in the state. “It’s beginning to be a pain in the behind to try and deer hunt, and we’re paying to deer hunt, we’re not paying to raise bears, we’re paying to deer hunt,” one disgruntled resident told a local news channel, WAFB9, last November.
“Every time we go to the woods and the neighboring properties whenever they go to the woods, you’ll see three, four, or five sometimes,” he continued. “It’s just getting way out of hand.”
But it hasn’t always been that way. Lousiana bears were nearly hunted to extinction in the 1800s and 1900s. Among those who cashed in on the action: Teddy Roosevelt. He ventured to the state in 1902 and 1907 to hunt black bears. Both trips are steeped in folklore.
As legend has it, on the first excursion, Holt Collier—a former slave and hound tender, single-handedly captured and tied a live bear to a tree that Roosevelt refused to shoot. The second hunt lasted thirteen days, but he got redemption. Roosevelt recounted in a letter: “At last today I killed my big she bear—202 lbs. It was my thirteenth day; now everything is pure pleasure… I shot her through the lungs at first shot, and then broke her back between the shoulders lest she should injure the leading dog. The hunt was great fun.” (You can read this article for a full, historical account of the hunts.)
Along with hunting pressure, habitat loss was the final blow to the bears. Their preferred habitat of hardwood river bottoms full of cypress, ash, and oak was torn to pieces by logging and farming activities. Together, overhunting and habitat loss prompted an ESA listing in 1992, with an overall population of less than 400 bears at the time. A subsequent recovery plan in 1995 called for restoring and protecting bear habitat and the establishment of at least two viable subpopulations in the state: one in both the Tensas and Atchafalaya river basins.
The conservation efforts proved wildly successful on all fronts. Thanks to voluntary and incentive-based restoration projects on private land, the state not only stopped deforestation in critical areas on the Mississippi River Delta but actually created a net gain in habitat. Additionally, recovery efforts helped the state permanently protect an additional 37,000 acres of public land.
The bears were removed from the ESA in 2016, and population estimates today are between 1,200 and 1,500 animals—enough to prompt a hunting season. While tags will be extremely limited this season, numbers could increase in subsequent years so long as recovery and population goals are still being met. Overall, it’s a success story for the species, and hunters are poised to reap the benefits of it in Louisiana this winter.
The Working for Wildlife Tour is back for 2024, and we want you to join us!
If you’re not familiar with the Tour, here’s the deal. The Working for Wildlife Tour launched in 2023 as an opportunity to shine a spotlight on the many volunteer events put on across the country by conservation organizations, bringing hunters and anglers together to volunteer their time to improve wildlife habitat, restore ecosystems, and clean up public lands and waters. Unfortunately, many of these events slip under the radar without the attention or participation they deserve. We wanted to help change that and our solution was to get involved ourselves and invite you to join along.
In collaboration with Backcountry Hunters & Anglers, the National Deer Association, and Michigan United Conservation Club, we hosted events last year in Massachusetts, Michigan, Idaho, Missouri, Mississippi, and Kentucky—involving more than 500 volunteers and resulting in more than 2,000 pounds of trash collected off public lands, 18 acres of early successional habitat improved, 80 small game brush piles created, more than a dozen acres of aspen forest restored, 35 acres of wildlife food plots planted, 200 crabapple trees planted, 800 pounds of white oak acorns collected for reforestation efforts, and much more. Now we’re ready to run it back in 2024, and you’re invited to join me.
If I learned anything in 2023, it’s that these events are a damned good time and make a real impact. I can’t wait to meet a bunch of you, answer your questions, hear your stories, and get our hands dirty together doing good work for wildlife. We'll also be giving away "I Work for Wildlife" t-shirts to the first 25 volunteers at each event.
For more details about the three events scheduled so far for this year’s tour and how you can sign up to participate, see the tour schedule and registration links below.
2024 Working for Wildlife Tour EventsDate: May 18, 2024Location: Daniel Boone National Forest (Kentucky)Activity: White oak release, hunter access improvements, boundary workPartner Conservation Organization: National Deer AssociationRegistration Link: Click here
Date: June 1, 2024Location: Allegheny National Forest (Pennsylvania)Activity: Rehabilitating existing wildlife openings, removing and restoring crib-fencing around wildlife plantings and removing and hanging bird nesting and bat boxes, and tree and shrub plantingPartner Conservation Organization: National Deer AssociationRegistration Link: Click here
Date: August 24, 2024Location: Pine Island Wildlife Management Area (Minnesota)Activity: Creating boat access, clearing/improving hunter walking trails, planting trees for white-tailed deer wintering habitat, repairing derelict signage, installing invasive species kioskPartner Conservation Organization: Sportsmen for the Boundary WatersRegistration Link: Click here
On this week's show, Tony talks about hunting regrets big and small, and how can analyze our decisions to make better choices going forward.
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This week Dan and Reid host multi-platinum and award-winning artist, Anne Wilson. Anne shares her love for the Kentucky farm her family owns, her cowboy boot collection, and what it was like growing up surrounded by a family who loves the outdoors. The guys show their age when Anne admits she's never seen Space Jam, and names Anne as another "GCP Artist to Watch in 2024!" Anne ends the episode with her rendition of her gravorite song, "Sand in My Boots" and telling the guys about her Jesus.
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There’s nothing anglers look forward to more than spring. After being locked in the cold, dark cage of winter for months, being out on the open water and casting a line in the sun almost feels like a personal revival. Rods in hand, we head out to our favorite waters to chase everything from trout and panfish, to pickerel and catfish. Still, the fish that most of us fantasized about catching while hibernating on the couch during our wintertime hiatus was undoubtedly the bass.
A mascot for the American fishing experience, bass are the most popular fish in freshwater, and catching the first spring bass serves as a symbolic kickoff for the fishing season. However, spring bass are a much different animal from their topwater-slamming, spinnerbait-crushing, slobber-knocker-summertime counterparts.
Spring bass are finicky and elusive and can be difficult for early-season anglers to really get a handle on. Yet, when you’re using the right techniques, spring bass fishing can be as good or better than summer fishing and even offer you the chance at the bass of a lifetime.
Finding Spring BassBoth largemouth and smallmouth bass are warmwater species whose normally aggressive behavior is dulled by the cold waters of winter. When the waters finally begin to warm in spring, bass almost become like bears emerging from hibernation—lethargic and slow but extremely hungry. Additionally, bass are also spring spawners, further muddling their normally predictable actions as they are now doubly driven by the need to feed and breed.
Most spring bass will slowly begin to migrate from the deep waters where they spent the winter to the shallow flats where they plan to lay their eggs, feeding heavily along the way. Schooling together, the fish will move along underwater channels and work their way up drop-offs and along deep edges in 15 to 25 feet of water near the shallow gravel bars that will become their spawning grounds. Throughout the day, the fish will move up and down the water column, pushing into shallower water as water temperatures increase during the afternoon and then back into deeper water as they drop in the evening.
You can easily intercept these bass schools by using electronics or bathymetric maps to locate likely spots at the proper depth. Concentrate your efforts around rocky areas, emerging vegetation, and other cover that will hold pre-spawn bass, as well as the baitfish and panfish they’ll be feeding on. Bass emerging from their inactive winter season and preparing for the spawn will be absolutely ferocious. As long as you’re using the right fishing methods, you stand a good chance of having continuous bass-fishing action from dawn to dusk.
Equipment for Spring Bass FishingSpring bass fishing requires a lot of finesse techniques, so you’re going to be better off fishing with lighter gear. Instead of using that heavy-action casting rod that you use to rip around buzz baits and yank big largemouth out of weed beds during the summer, try using a softer, medium- to light-action spinning rod rigged with 8- to 10-pound test line. Using these lighter rods will allow you to easily slow down your presentations, help you detect structure along the bottom, and feel what can sometimes be some surprisingly subtle strikes.
Dropping In Soft PlasticsWhile there are a few different fishing techniques that will absolutely slay spring bass, drop-shotting or bottom bouncing with soft plastics is almost always going to be your best producer. Both methods allow you to slowly work baits in deeper water where they can trigger strikes from even the most finicky bucketmouths. However, there are certain times of day and certain areas when both techniques will work especially well.
Bottom-bouncing a soft plastic tube bait, crawfish, worm, or creature bait on a jighead hook or shaky head hook is great for drawing in more aggressive bass in the late afternoon or for when you have to cover water to find fish. Using a heavier ¼-ounce jighead or shakey head hook that will get to the bottom quickly, cast your soft plastics into deeper water with a lot of rocky bottoms and let them sink to the bottom. Once you feel your soft plastic hit the rocks, begin to jig-retrieve it back to the boat with a lot of slow, bouncing lifts of your rod. This will cause the bait to rise and fall in the water column and to clack against rocks and stir up the bottom while it does, calling in and hopefully triggering aggressive strikes from hungry bass coming over to investigate the disturbance.
On colder days when bass are sluggish or when you find a school of them locked up in deep water, a soft plastic rigged on a drop-shot rig is the way to go. Set up your drop-shot by first tying a size 2 to size 1/0 drop-shot hook or octopus hook to your line, leaving a long 18 to 20-inch tag end of line off the knot. Tie a small ⅛- to ¼-ounce casting sinker or drop sinker to the tag end and then add your bait. You want the presentation to appear natural, so rig the soft-plastic baits by hooking them once through the heads or tails, leaving at least two-thirds of the bait to dangle and flutter in the water.
Fish a drop shot rig by either casting it and working it slowly back towards you or by dropping it vertically in the water directly on top of the fish. Let the weight sink down to the bottom, then begin to gently jig it so you’re barely lifting the weight, concentrating your efforts on just trying to move the soft plastic. This creates a very natural-looking presentation of a baitfish or crayfish in distress and is just the thing to tempt a big spring bass into moving in and inhaling it.
Suspending JerkbaitsFishing with suspended jerkbaits like the Staredown and the Husky Jerk is another fantastic method for spring bass fishing. They are especially effective when fishing on colder days or in colder water when bass are less apt to chase down a fast-moving lure. These jerkbaits can also be held in the strike zone for long periods of time, making them perfect for targeting suspending bass holding above the bottom in deeper water.
Unlike classic jerkbaits, suspending jerkbaits don’t rise back to the surface once they stop moving, allowing you to fish them incredibly slowly with a lot of fast jerks and long pauses. They work extremely well in deeper water with a lot of deepwater humps, rock piles, and ridges along their path or when fishing along the slope of a drop-off adjacent to the bass’s shallow-water spawning grounds.
Fish jerkbaits by casting them across the top of underwater structures and reeling them down to depth. Then begin to add a lot of jerks and slashes to your presentation with a lot of long two- to five-second pauses mixed in, varying the cadence with every cast until you find a rhythm that the bass seem to like.
Ideally, the sudden frantic movements will attract a bass’s attention by imitating a wounded or dying baitfish and cause them to approach expecting an easy meal. Be sure to reel in your extra slack during the pauses in your retrieval because, most of the time, interested bass will absolutely smash the bait once it stops moving, and you’ll need to set the hook quickly.
A Spring FlingSpringtime bass fishing is almost like reuniting with an old flame. You haven’t seen them in a while, and you don’t exactly know how they’re going to react. Yet once you reunite, all the magic you had in the past can be instantly reignited.
Spring bass are fat and happy. In their pre-spawn, or even spawning mode, they’ll all be gathered in one place, meaning you can be quickly plunged right back into all the hard-fighting, lip-ripping joy you remember from the summer. So, if you’re one of the anglers who dreamed all winter of getting back out on the water and catching their first big bass, there’s no time to waste—they’re out there waiting for you.
We are pleased to announce that The MeatEater Outdoor Cookbook: Wild Game Recipes for the Grill, Smoker, Campstove, and Campfire is now available! Check out an excerpt from the introduction below.
“One summer, when I was nine or ten, my dad put me to work with a hammer and chisel removing the old mortar from a pickup-truckload of red bricks that he’d salvaged from a demolished building. I was then tasked with stirring batches of fresh mortar with a garden hoe while my dad and a friend named Eugene built a gigantic fire ring in our backyard down by the lake. For the next decade or so, that fire ring served as a sort of laboratory for adolescent experiments in outdoor cooking.
Through an endless litany of burns and scalds on our hands, my neighborhood buddies and I fine-tuned the making of sassafras tea (add lots of sugar), botched multiple attempts at roasting whole chipmunks, incinerated dozens of foil-wrapped potatoes that were buried beneath the coals for too long, fried countless bluegill caught from the lake, and made so many “hobo pies” (nowadays, these are more politely referred to as iron pies) that we’d frequently drain a tub of margarine in a single cooking session and then melt the polypropylene container over the heat of the fire because we liked the crazy zipping sound that the material made when it dripped into the flames.
All of it tasted amazing! Even the burned and desiccated potatoes were a treat once you became accustomed to the grittiness of wood ash. But the actual flavors and textures of the meals had little to do with how much I loved them. Instead, I was drawn to the labor, ingenuity, and ever-so-slight danger involved with outdoor cooking. And I was inspired by the environment. While cooking outside, the walls and ceiling of a conventional indoor kitchen were replaced by the open sky and the lake. A humming exhaust fan and the background noise of TV became wind through the trees and birdsong. While cooking in that environment, I couldn’t help but feel connected to something deep and eternal about my own human experience.” —Steven Rinella
A bit about the book: Featuring 100+ recipes for cooking outside, it’s a follow-up to our 2018 bestseller, The MeatEater Fish & Game Cookbook. There’s something here for everyone who loves the outdoors, from backyard grill masters to backcountry big game hunters. Each chapter covers a different outdoor cooking method—grilling, smoking, cooking over coals. Throughout, recipes are tagged for backyard cooking, car camping, or backpacking.
Along with recipes, Steve explains essential outdoor cooking techniques like how to build the perfect outdoor kitchen for any scenario and what it takes to maintain a fire. With preparations ranging from simple backcountry chow to guest-worthy showstoppers, The MeatEater Outdoor Cookbook is the essential companion for anyone who wants to eat well in the wild.
Click here to order your copy now!
Too hungry to wait for your book to arrive? Get cooking right now with this Ancho Cola Jerky recipe from the book. And stay tuned for more recipe drops in the weeks to come.
Join Steve as he smokes a wild hog to celebrate the release of the MeatEater Outdoor Cookbook. A few extra tasty sides make this an unforgettable dish to make sure your wild pig doesn't go unnoticed. The MeatEater Outdoor Cookbook has something for everyone who loves the outdoors, from backyard grill masters to backcountry big game hunters. It's the essential companion for anyone who wants to eat well in the wild. Get your copy of the new cookbook today.
On this week’s episode of the Bear Grease Render your host, Clay Newcomb, is joined by Kristy & Josh “Landbridge” Spielmaker, Dr. Misty Newcomb, Gary “Believer” Newcomb, and Kolby Morehead, owner of Bear Hunting Magazine. The crew discusses the moon and its supposed power over human and animal behavior. Clay highlights the whitetail-focused First Lite's Specter Camo & how it’s benefiting conservation, the new Akern Grunt-n-Bleat from...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Collin Fopma, Max Barta, Tressa Croaker, Roman Schnobrich, and Chester Floyd. Connect with MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Trivia Merch
Welcome to the SECOND episode of Rut Fresh Radio for the 2023 Season! In each episode, K.C. and Tyler interview deer hunters from across the country in search of the freshest, most current information on Whitetail Buck movement and hear stories of hunting success. This week we get to hear from hunters in Delaware, North Dakota, Georgia, and Nebraska. Optimism is high, with a good weather forecast for the next week. However, the how and when of...
On this week's show, Tony explains that most hunters are far too conservative in their approach, which means they often don't scout or hunt the best areas. He argues that playing it safe has its place in the woods, but it shouldn't be the default strategy for most of us. Connect with Tony Peterson and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Steven Rinella talks with Son Tao, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, Chester Floyd, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics discussed: The "master" label; when you're a Master Sergeant in the U.S. Military; fish names abbreviated down to initials; guide flies; tying flies that actually catch fish; fleeing Vietnam in a banana boat; Steve's friend's mobile bar; announcing the launch of MeatEater Season 12; get our Dirty Dozen 2024 calendar; Phelp's mind-bending and devastating Unleashed V2 bugle tube; sifting through what's actually a population-level effect; the Weird Al of fishing; getting started on the fishing rod your neighbor couldn't sell at his garage sale; no wasting food at the dinner table; crispy skin; if you're not a doctor or lawyer, you're not my kid; how we withdrew from Afghanistan; when your fish on a fly rod is a trophy-sized bonefish; Healing Waters - Fly Fishing; God talking to you through your car radio; arts & crafts; tying to perfection; commercial ties from overseas sweat shops; the bonds you form when you endure together; CALL 9-8-8 now if you need to talk to someone; find a hobby you love; and more.
Your life is important. Please reach out to someone. There are resources to support you, whether you're an at-risk veteran, a friend or family member, and really, just anyone who is suffering. Remember, you matter and you are not alone.
Call or text 9-8-8 24/7
9-8-8 Lifeline
Stop Soldier Suicide
Military One Source
Overwatch+Project
America’s Warrior Partnership
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Warriors In Quiet Waters
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This week Cal talks about technology and hunting, snorts progress on a hot hunt, misappropriation of license dollars, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
This week Brent's jumping in with both feet talking about his journey as a coon hunter. His family's legacy with the sport goes back to the childhood of his father and continues today. There are some pretty good tales in this one, and Brent promises, they're all true. Connect with Brent and MeatEater MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Bear Grease Merch https://gootf.com/
This week on the show we chat with Todd Graf of Bowhunting.com about the habits, personality traits, and behaviors of the biggest, oldest bucks he's ever hunted.
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September is here! Jason sits down with Cory Calkins to talk about what they've seen so far this September. They then dive into Cory's guiding backstory and they talk about the differences in elk in wilderness areas versus private ranches as well as what is required to be successful in both locations. They also touch on the moon phase and the weather changes and how they think it affects how the elk will respond.
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This is the FIRST episode of Rut Fresh Radio of the 2023 Season! In each episode, K.C. and Tyler interview deer hunters from across the country in search of the freshest, most current information on Whitetail Buck movement and hear stories of hunting success. This week we get to hear from hunters in South Carolina, Tennessee, North Dakota, and Kentucky. It’s the early SZN, which means the rare chance at a velvet buck! However, hunters this week talk about the impact of a heat wave on deer movement. We get the details about overcoming the elements and getting in range of a nice whitetail deer.
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Logan Dove, Chester Floyd, Christine Sawicki, Hilary Byrne, and Ben Long.
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In this episode, Tyler Jones and K.C. Smith delve into the world of early season deer hunting, providing valuable tips and insights for both novice and experienced hunters. Join us as we discuss the intricacies of whitetail deer bow hunting on public land, uncovering strategies that will greatly enhance your chances of a successful hunt. Additionally, we address common questions and concerns that hunters may have during this time of the year, ensuring that you are well-prepared and informed.
One of the key factors in a successful hunt is scouting the property beforehand. We explore the importance of scouting in detail, outlining the methods and techniques that will enable you to effectively map out the deer's behavior and patterns. From identifying prime locations for tree stands to understanding the significance of food sources and bedding areas, our expert guests share their invaluable knowledge, empowering you to make informed decisions and optimize your hunting experience.
Whether you are relatively new to deer hunting or a seasoned veteran, this episode offers a wealth of useful information that will undoubtedly enhance your early season hunting endeavors. Tune in and discover the secrets to a fruitful deer hunting experience on public land, as we equip you with the tools and insights necessary to maximize your chances of success.
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Videos discussed in this episode!
Kansas 2018
-NM 2019
-Kansas 2019
-SD 2020
-TX 2022
Iowa 2019
Iowa 2019
Iowa 2019
South Dakota 2022
On this week's episode of Bear Grease, Clay Newcomb has curated a selection of stories about close calls and near death in Alaska. We've got five stories of raging rivers, charging grizzlies, boat wrecks, and nights on the mountain sleeping under a goat hide. You'll hear from hunting guide Billy Molls, Chad Ferguson, Carrie Kegler, and Meateater's own Randall Williams. We really doubt you're gonna want to miss this one.
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On this week's show, Tony talks about an ever-present and often misunderstood element of every hunt - wind. He breaks down not only how playing the wind is important, but how much it influences the movements, and decisions, of the game that we hunt.
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Steven Rinella talks with Krysten Schuler, a wildlife disease ecologist at Cornell University’s Wildlife Health Lab.
Topics discussed: Watch our behind-the-scenes footage from Cornell’s necropsy lab; the fungus that affects salamanders; deer ticks carrying blood that contains prions; why things die; mange; brain worm; the infection cycle of when worm larvae in deer poop is eaten by a snail, which then gets eaten by a moose; insect contamination on raw produce; liver flukes, or parasites that look like the sidecar of a liver; "found dead"; winter tick; lead in birds and incinerating fisher liver to test lead levels; making CWD smash burgers for your friends who say they don’t care about CWD; hemorrhagic diseases and floating in ponds; the time when Steve defended his family from a “rabid” squirrel; the rabid beaver that bit five people; nasal bots; and more.
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This week Cal laments the season ahead, CWD Texas style, and what to pay attention to in upcoming legislation.
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Brents got stories about kids scattered all over the woods coon hunting without lights, and another one about taking his son to the doctor caused by a wasp sting that would make a grown man cry. There’s lots of good stuff in this one including a school program that kids of every grade can take advantage of and Brent will tell you what it is and how to get it. It’s Part 2 of “Kids and Outdoors” on Meateater’s This Country Life podcast. Connect...
We’ve often said there are more ways than one to skin a cat when talking about archery elk hunting strategies. This week Dirk Durham sat down with “Alone” Season 8 TV Series winner and long-time traditional bowhunter, Clay Hays, to compare and contrast elk hunting tactics. Being that he is a traditional archer, and Dirk shoots a compound, their approach to bowhunting elk isn't always that different. We cover from pre-rut archery to post-rut traditional flintlock muzzleloader tactics and have a lot of great nuggets to take away to the field this fall.
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This week on the show, the script is flipped and I am being run through our “What Would You Do?” gauntlet, hopefully giving insight into exactly how I’d handle some of the most challenging deer hunting scenarios our guest hosts Dan and Tony can throw at me.
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On this week’s episode of the Bear Grease Render, your host, Clay Newcomb, is joined by Joe Wilson, Founder of the World Championship Squirrel Cookoff, Ben Lagrone of Balanced Families, and Jonathan Webster. The crew starts off talking about learning to be a good father and about the new Phelps Game Calls, the Akern Grunter. They then turn their attention to the World Champion Squirrel Cookoff before talking about the last Bear Grease episode...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Alyssa Smith, Tressa Croaker, Cory Calkins, Collin Fopma, Chester Floyd, and Seth Morris. Connect with MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Trivia Merch
On today's episode, Tony explains how valuable doe sightings can be to most whitetail hunters throughout the season, and during pre-season scouting missions. He also discusses how we don't give pressured, mature does enough credit for helping us become better hunters. Connect with Tony Peterson and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Steven Rinella talks with Ken Burns and Dayton Duncan. Topics discussed: When you’ve made more than three dozen renowned documentaries; Ken Burns’ college film ending with the pan across a painting; how The Civil War film consumed Americans; The Tenth Inning; Lewis & Clark, Jazz, Muhammad Ali and so many more; what do you want on your cheeseburger?; questioning the superiority of a species; The American Buffalo film, featuring Steve and...
This week Cal talks about Nazi raccoons, Southern Wolves, and Public lands. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
It’s all about kids and getting them out of the house this week. In Part 1 of “Kids and Outdoors”, Brent shares some simple recipes for what he calls, “Getting the youngins off the couch and out of the house”. It’s easy to do and fun for everyone. He’s also going to tell you a story about his son’s first deer from 20 years ago that defies any explanation. You’ll want to be sure and listen to the end where he quotes his 11-year-old daughter...
On this week's episode, Jason takes on a bunch of listener questions on elk hunting. He answers questions on what to do when elk shut down, how to determine what your next move should be, and how to deal with the excitement of a big bull getting within bow range amongst others. He then changes the discussion to other ways to hunt elk aside from calling and what the pros and cons of these options are. He discusses sitting wallows, ambushing...
This week on the show I’m running Tyler Jones and KC Smith of The Element through our "What Would You Do?" gauntlet, giving us insight into exactly how they’d handle some of the most challenging deer hunting scenarios I could throw at them. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEater Mark Kenyon on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
The Element Podcast powered by FIRST LITE On this episode, Tyler Jones, K.C. Smith discuss their recent archery hunt for pronghorn (also called antelope) in New Mexico. They talk about the challenges of hunting these fast-moving animals on foot. Both hunters had different arrow setups - Tyler had a faster bow shooting heavier arrows while K.C. had a lighter arrow setup. On the hunt, they struggled to get accurate ranges to the antelope due to...
On this episode of Bear Grease, Clay Newcomb will explore life in the Mississippi Delta as well as the health of the ecosystem. We’ll hear from commercial fisherman Bill Lancaster, Dr. Jack Killgore of the United States Army Corps of Engineers, and author Hank Burdine. You’ll learn about commercial fishing on the Mississippi River - the equipment they use and the species they target. You’ll also learn about the health of not only the fishery but...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Seth Morris, Chester Floyd, Maggie Smith, Cory Calkins, Logan Dove, and Collin Fopma. Connect with MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Trivia Merch
On this week's show, Tony breaks down something that a lot of hunters never think about - what deer really do in any given 24-hour cycle. He explains that hunters often fill in the blanks when it comes to deer activity and that this is a mistake when you could try to learn more about what whitetails actually do with themselves throughout the day. Connect with Tony Peterson and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram and Facebook MeatEater on...
Topics discussed: Trying to beat the Merlin app with human bird calls; how it’s all in the “hwaaah”; the earliest recordings of bird sounds; a collection of extinct bird specimens; mapping the tapestry and complexity of bird population declines; when you’ve kept a bird watching list since you were 9-years-old; Cornell’s Lab of Ornithology’s competitive birding team; permits for sampling; the birds that have done well because of humans; Steve’s...
This week Cal talks about cocaine fishing, the Maui fire, and whether we should ban inner tubes on rivers for public safety. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Have a seat, slip off or untie those boots, and back out of those Crocs and flip-flops. We’re talking about manly footwear this week and which ones make the cut. Can leather boots be the only proper adornment for your feet or have others slipped into and out of the closet? Hear what Brent thinks and decide for yourself on today's episode of This Country Life. Connect with Brent and MeatEater MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube...
The Element Podcast powered by FIRST LITE On this episode, Tyler Jones, K.C. Smith, Eric Gentry and the team are out in New Mexico chasing the wild speed goat, Pronghorn Antelope. They discuss their first time hunting these animals and what they are noticing and learning chasing one of the fastest animals in the world. Eric talks about the new Sony G-series lens we got and what his point of view has been like watching us hunt antelope. We talk...
This week on the show, I’m running Steve Sherk through our “What Would You Do?” gauntlet, giving us insight into exactly how he’d handle some of the most challenging deer hunting scenarios I could throw at him. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEater Mark Kenyon on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
On this week's episode, host Dirk Durham talks about pre-season preparation with the host of the podcast "The Western Huntsman", Jim Huntsman. They discuss everything from making sure your bow and arrows are correct for elk hunting, to not letting the idea that you have to be an elite athlete to enjoy chasing bugles in the elk woods, be a barrier. Connect with Dirk and Phelps Game Calls Phelps on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube Shop Phelps Merch
On this episode of the Bear Grease Render, Clay Newcomb is joined by his wife Misty, Josh “Landbridge” Spielmaker, Gary “Believer” Newcomb, Brent Reaves, and for the first time, Brent's wife, Alexis. The crew discusses Josh’s recent adventures in trapping coons, the newest episode of This Country Life, and Misty’s disdain for cats. Afterward, they begin dissecting the most recent Bear Grease episode that centered around the three men who helped...
Janis Putelis hosts MeatEater Trivia with Spencer Neuharth, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Tressa Croaker, Rick Hutton, Hanzi Deschermeier, and Max Barta. Connect with MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Trivia Merch
In this week's episode, Tony takes a deep dive into an aspect of scouting and hunting that affects us all - bugs. He shares personal experiences from his own misadventures with stinging and biting insects, along with some tips on how to avoid them. Connect with Tony Peterson and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Steve Rinella talks with Dave Smith, Jason Phelps, Janis Putelis, Seth Morris, Chester Floyd, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics discussed: Pleasing poses; our punt gun resurfaces and how Steve almost lost his eyes; the MeatEater Auction House of Oddities is back; an owl pellet containing a banded bird leg bone; the GoFundMe for a NV state bear biologist who's been slapped with $150,000 in damages; Jason Phelps advises on three things to...
This week Cal talks about his new shotgun, gets into new legislation and the SHARKED Act with Virginia Rep. Wittman, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
We’re beating the heat this week so bring your cutoffs! It’s time to hit the water in Brent’s version of Country-Pool-Palooza. Brent says swimming holes are where you find them and if you look hard enough you’ll find them just about anywhere. Stand by for turtles, cows, and swinging vines in this week’s episode of This Country Life. Connect with Brent and MeatEater MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Bear Grease Merch
This week on the show, I’m running Jared Mills through our “What Would You Do?” gauntlet, giving us insight into exactly how he’d handle some of the most challenging deer hunting scenarios I could throw at him. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEater Mark Kenyon on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
In this episode, Jason sits down with Jeff Roberts of PNWILD to go over everything fall bear. The bulk of the conversation hinges around the food sources that the bears will be on, but they also dive into e-scouting, watching the receding snow lines, feet on the ground, and even using hiking websites to determine where you should be focusing your time in the fall when trying to turn up bears. Other topics discussed are hot weather field care, how...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Angela Perri, Brent Reaves, Ronny Boehme, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Corinne Schneider, and Phil Taylor. Connect with MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Trivia Merch
On this episode of Bear Grease, Clay Newcomb and John Barry, author of Rising Tide discuss two Civil War veterans who pioneered the doctrine of controlling this great river, Charles Ellett and Andrew Humphries. They’ll show us how their obsession and rivalry shaped the way we manage the river and how that led to one of the most costly natural disasters in American history. We learn about Mark Twain, America's most celebrated writer, who was...
On this week's show, Tony discusses the psychological phenomenon known as hindsight bias and how it relates to hunting. Through multiple examples, he explores how we come to have regrets in the outdoors, and how we can best mitigate them for our future selves. Connect with Tony Peterson and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
The Element Podcast powered by FIRST LITE On this episode, Tyler Jones, and K.C. Smith discuss their biggest mistakes while filming hunts. From 350 inch bugling bulls, big Iowa whitetails, and South Dakota bucks to camera equipment malfunctioning there is certainly a couple lessons to take out of this one. For the best gear made with the serious hunter in mind, get you some First Lite Gear. Go subscribe to The Element YouTube Channel! Watch...
Steven Rinella talks to Angela Perri, Brent Reaves, Ronny Boehme, Janis Putelis, Spencer Neuharth, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics include: Brass knuckle daggers and TSA confiscating stuff; who had the very first pet dog?; how Steve thinks The North Wall in “Games of Thrones” is in Alaska; a very special bobcat burial; Steve’s 12 signs of astrology; hunting the wooly rhino; when wolves turn into dogs; from hunting to scavenging in a...
This week Cal talks about legislation, exposure, lead, leases, eagles, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Steve Rinella talks with Clay Newcomb, Dirk Durham, Jason Phelps, KC Smith, Tyler Jones, Chester Floyd, and Phil Taylor. Topics include: Clay’s appetizer; sleeping in a convenience store parking lot; seeing the buck from the truck; when trucks and boats going aerodynamic; Chester’s Grandpa Czekalski; the blurred line between tighty whities and skin; bear scratches down your brand new truck; the universal animal stop call; getting the chance to...
It’s Part 2 of “Minding Your Manners”. Brent’s talking about specific instances when having manners and not having them can impact you and those around you. Lots of goodies including wearing a hat inside, shaking hands, running the gauntlet for the last biscuit in the bowl, and more! Join Brent as he tells you how the cow ate the cabbage in this final installment of his first two-part episode. Connect with Brent and MeatEater MeatEater on...
This week on the show I’m running Bobby Kendall, of The Whitetail Group, through our “What Would You Do?” gauntlet, as I present Bobby a series of specific challenging deer hunting scenarios to see how he would handle them and the thought process behind his decisions. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEater Mark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Ever wondered what it's like to archery elk hunt in New Mexico? Jason introduces new co-host Dirk "The Bugler" Durham on this week's show and the guys talk at length about how quirky the elk rut can really be, even in the famed state of New Mexico. Be sure to follow up and get your eyes on Dirk's "New Mexico Bulls" film, which he discusses in this episode. It's out on the Phelps Game Calls channel of The MeatEater network now. Connect with Dirk...
On this episode, Tyler Jones, K.C. Smith, Greg Latham, and Eric Gentry talk about their summer vacations and outdoor activities in lead up to this season! From fishing on the gulf coast to catching halibut up in Alaska! The Element Crew have been busy this summer!
On this episode of the Bear Grease, Clay and Misty Newcomb host a couples edition of the Render featuring Josh “Landbridge” and Kristy Spielmaker, as well as Terrell “Thalweg” Spencer and his wife, former Rice Queen of Cross County Arkansas, Carla Spencer. The crew talks about Tim the Squirrel Dog’s recent and uncharacteristic exploration of the trash and is then joined by Bear Newcomb, who tells of the time he used a fly rod to catch a gar, or...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Hilary Byrne, Alyssa Smith, Collin Fopma, and Phil Taylor. Connect with MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Trivia Merch
On this week's show, Tony explains how beneficial it is to us as humans, and hunters, to stay curious and always willing to learn something new. This mindset works for whitetails and western game, and is the secret to success for many of the most accomplished hunters. Connect with Tony Peterson and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Steve Rinella talks with Katie Finch and their son, “Jimbabwe,” Andy “Pooter” Radziallowski, Kelsey Morris, and Seth Morris. Topics include: Tickles, touches, and takes; the owners of the rotten A-frame; Kelsey’s Studio Gallery in Three Folks, MT; the Leviathan and different interpretations; Act 54 passed in Maui, allowing nonprofits to donate wild game meat to “under-resourced” communities; full freegan vegans; all the people getting bitten by...
This week Cal talks about Ohio, M-44s, the felixer, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
What could a teacher, a trip to the principal’s office, a promise to an 11-year-old girl, the classic children’s book, “Where the Red Fern Grows,” and a hair salon all have in common? It’s a story that took Brent 46 years to live and about 15 minutes to tell. Come along with him this week as he navigates through that tale and others on how being respectful can be an investment, and a saving grace. It’s Part 1 of “Minding Your Manners." Connect...
Jason sits down with Bill Vanderheyden from Iron Will Outfitters to talk about the sharp end of the stick. They dive into arrows, efficiency, and ethics, discussing single bevel vs. double bevel, the optimum amount of offset and helical, as well as Bill's work on arrow flight with the University of Colorado. Connect with Jason Phelps Phelps on Instagram, Facebook, and Youtube Shop Phelps Merch
This week on the show, Tony and I are sharing our own strategies for scouting whitetails as we wrap up our month-long scouting series leading into the upcoming deer season. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEater Mark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Janis Putelis, Sam James, Cory Calkins, Austin “Chilly” Chleborad, Randall Williams, Maddy Lehman, Mackenzie Elmquist, and Phil Taylor. Connect with MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Trivia Merch
On this episode of Bear Grease, the second in a series on the Mississippi River, host Clay Newcomb guides you through the story about the settlement of the Mississippi Delta, the people of the area, and the challenges that shaped their identity. We’ll be veering out of the river into its floodplain because, as William Faulkner said, “To understand the world you must first understand a place like Mississippi.” Once again we’ll be leaning on author...
On this week's show, Tony breaks down not only why natural ground blinds are such a good ambush option for a variety of critters, but also how to make sure you use this strategy correctly no matter where you hunt. Connect with Tony Peterson and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Steve Rinella talks with Brody Henderson, Spencer Neuharth, Chester Floyd, Max Barta, Austin “Chilly” Chleborad, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics include: Why we need a crafty mirror expert; how Chester budgets for jigging wraps in the family expenses; wielding the priest, aka Brody’s little beating stick; rearing Atlantic Salmon in little fish raceways; a hot tip on fulfilling your college credits; when Steve got a bad grade in...
This week Cal talks about what exactly people mean by hunting approval, Labour Party rallies behind duck hunting, and a Canadian moose ride-along. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
What do hay hauling, Sunday clothes, and bobwhite quail all have in common? You might not believe it if anyone else told you, but you can believe it when Brent does. It’s summertime in Arkansas and if those cows are gonna eat when it’s cold, someone’s got to be sweating when it’s hot. Well, at least they used too. Join Brent as he navigates hauling hay, the calamity of cooling off before the job is done, and his experiences with how the whole...
Iowa resident, Ted Zangerle, has been an integral part of The Hunting Public for years. He has racked up tons of scouting and hunting experience from time spent in multiple states, and he brings a unique perspective to the table when it comes to figuring out where deer should be at any given moment throughout the hunting season. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEater Mark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram...
On this episode of the Bear Grease Render, Clay Newcomb is joined by the usual suspects, Brent Reaves, Misty Newcomb, and Josh “Landbridge” Spielmaker, as well as by veteran Terrell “Thalweg” Spencer and Clay’s longtime friend Ryan “Flintface” Greb. The crew talks about Jeremiah Johnson, the finer points of watermelons, a seemingly indestructible bear, and some catfish noodling. Clay also quizzes the crew on their retention of information gleaned...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Tony Peterson, Mark Kenyon, Ryan Callaghan, Ford Van Fossan, Logan Williamson, Seth Morris, Chester Floyd, and Cory Calkins. Connect with MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Trivia Merch
On this week's episode, Tony breaks down the various lines of thought behind setting hunting standards, and how to decide if a certain caliber of animal is right for your specific situation. Connect with Tony Peterson and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Steve Rinella talks with Zeb Hogan, Tommy Eidson aka The Blue Collar Scholar, Keith Anspatch, and Dom Cooper. Topics include: What you'll see when you walk into the First Lite store in Hailey, ID; an insane mullet; TKTKTKTKTKKT TKTKTKKTKTKTKT and more. Connect with Steve and MeatEater Steve on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
This week, Cal talks about how being special can be the worst, black bears, public meetings, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Steve Rinella talks with Clay Newcomb, Dirk Durham, Jason Phelps, KC Smith, Tyler Jones, Chester Floyd, and Phil Taylor. Topics include: Clay’s appetizer; sleeping in a convenience store parking lot; seeing the buck from the truck; when trucks and boats going aerodynamic; Chester’s Grandpa Czekalski; the blurred line between tighty whities and skin; bear scratches down your brand new truck; the universal animal stop call; getting the chance to...
This week on the show, Brent's drawing on his history in the big woods of Arkansas to make the case that everyone -- from foresters, firewood cutters, hunters, and anyone in between -- ought to know their trees. Join him as he walks you through using tree identification skills to make the most out of his hunts, avoid extra labor in his firewood collecting, and shut up the high school loudmouth. Connect with Brent and MeatEater MeatEater on...
Today on the show, Jason is joined by his buddy Brock for part two of their elk biology conversation. This time, they get deep into every elk hunter's favorite topic -- the rut. They talk on everything from elk estrus cycles to the reasons some elk are call shy and others aren't. Connect with Jason and Phelps Phelps on Instagram, Facebook, and Youtube Shop Phelps Merch
Clint Campbell not only hosts the Truth From The Stand Podcast, but he's also an obsessive public land whitetail hunter. He targets mountain bucks in his home state of Pennsylvania, and travels every year to middle America to get his deer fix. Campbell's scouting strategies vary by location, but his overarching goal is to set himself up for success on pressured deer no matter where they live. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEater Mark Kenyon on...
On this episode, Clay Newcomb is taking us to what some Native Americans call the river beyond any age and others call the Father of Waters. He’s talking about the Mississippi river. To understand the river and its impact on America takes a diverse cast of storytellers. New York Times best selling author John M. Barry will be our guest, along with author Hank Burdine and a fellow by the name of Will Primos. We'll also be joined by two Army Corps...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steve Rinella, Derek Wolfe, Bill Vanderheyden, Randall Williams, Brody Henderson, Ryan Callaghan, and Hayden Sammak.
On this week's show, Tony discusses how challenging hunting really is. He also breaks down how to approach life with an attitude toward setting goals, so that when it comes to the work part of hunting, you'll be better prepared to succeed. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEater Mark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Steve Rinella talks with Derek Wolfe, Bill Vanderheyden, Randall Williams, Spencer Neuharth, Chester Floyd, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics include: Elon vs. Zuckerberg; sacking Tom Brady; a fine for farting; putting an arrow into the monster cat; Derek's sports show The Drive, The Wolfe Untamed Podcast, and his new hunting show; the Phil Cam; Iron Will broadheads in the MeatEater store; Bill's tank of a black bear; the smell of the...
This week, Cal talks about picking up litter, PETA feet and onions, Trail Cams in Kansas, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Watermelons? Yep, watermelons. Today on the show, Brent pontificates on the finer points of summer's favorite fruit. Where do they come from? How the heck can you have a seedless watermelon? How do you pick the very best of the bunch? Stick around and Brent is gonna spell it out for you. In the words of self-described watermelon aficionado Clay Newcomb (not a joke), you're not gonna want to miss this one. Connect with Brent and MeatEater...
On This episode, Tyler & K.C. Talk about fly fishing and why it is such a great activity to enjoy during the hot summer months. From how they got started, to tactics & Strategy. Tyler and K.C. discuss everything fly fishing.
Outdoor Writer and Mississippi resident, Adam Moore, details his strategy for figuring out big woods, southern whitetails. Moore focuses his efforts on identifying soft and hard mast, as well as browse-laden edges so that he can key in on current deer movement whether he's bowhunting early, or rifle hunting throughout the rut. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEater Mark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram...
On this episode of the Bear Grease Render, Clay Newcomb is joined by the usual suspects - Brent Reaves, Misty Newcomb, as well as Kristy and Josh “Landbridge” Spielmaker. The crew starts off talking about a catastrophic energy that Misty suffered after thinking about sneezing, or maybe long days of quilting, Brent's affinity for Bream, as well as an update on Banjo and whether or not he’ll be up for sale. Afterwards the crew dives into Crockett’s...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Tressa Croaker, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Logan Dove, Randall Williams, Chester Floyd, Seth Morris, and Christine Sawicki.
On this week's show, Tony explains how we are all hypocrites to some extent when it comes to our hunting beliefs and styles. He encourages all of us to recognize this trait in ourselves, and to just try to be a little better about it. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEater Mark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Steve Rinella talks with David Grann, Janis Putelis, and Corinne Schneider. Topics include: All of David Grann's best selling books; when your books get turned into films; the nautical terms we use in daily life; how history shapes us but we're oblivious about it; infighting at the Audubon society over a name change; a great idea for a new book; the last stitch; the prize of all the oceans; building a ship out of 4,000 oak trees; inspecting...
This week Cal talks about getting the lead out, BLM, and Conservation easements with special guests Tracy Stone Manning and Jordan Sillars. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
On this week's episode of THE This Country Life podcast, our buddy Brent talks us through one of his absolute favorite things -- bream fishing. He covers everything from catching the little buggers to what may be his real favorite part of the process (that would be eating them). So listen up and get the crickets ready, you're not going to want to miss any of this! Connect with Brent and MeatEater MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and...
Steve Rinella talks with Ashley Bleau, Bailey Gore, and Captain Greg McCoy. Topics include: The biggest, coolest fish; when the rod changes hands; the East Coast’s biggest tournament; The Sensation; hooking your first blue marlin; the final hour of the final day; keep cranking!; David vs. Goliath; diving deep down; when you catch a 619-pound blue marlin; tournament rules; a shark bite; defining “landed” and “mutilation”; losing out on $3....
This week Clay Croft joins Jordan and Janis once again. This time to discuss car camping! They discuss everything from sleeping on the ground to sleeping on top of your vehicle, the most badass kitchen setups, how to keep cool or warm and how to stay organized. Connect with Janis, Jordan, and MeatEater MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Known as one of the best whitetail hunters in the country, Michigander Andy May, lays out his strategy for obsessively scouting multiple properties in the off-season so that he always feels like he has something to work with during every day of the bow season. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEater Mark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
This week on the show, Jason comes to you from the field with biologist Paul Wik to talk elk mortality and recruitment. They discuss the effects of predation and environmental factors in relation to elk recruitment, and what that means for hunting opportunity. Connect with Jason and Phelps Phelps on Instagram, Facebook, and Youtube Shop Phelps Merch
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Brody Henderson, Janis Putelis, Randall Williams, Seth Morris, Max Barta, Sam Bates, Mackenzie Elmquist, and Corinne Schneider.
On this week’s episode of Bear Grease, the final episode in our series on David Crockett, Clay Newcomb takes us on a deep dive into Davy’s death at the Alamo. He’ll look not just at the pop culture versions from John Wayne and Walt Disney, but also history’s best understanding of what really transpired. We’ll learn that it was far more important in US history than you might think. Clay talks with Wade Dillon, James Crisp, and of course, New York...
Up until my latest dog, I have always taken water introduction for granted. Since I’m a retriever guy, I’ve always had dogs that took to water with ease. I assumed that would be the case two years ago when I picked up a little black Lab we named Sadie, but she had other plans. While I assumed steadiness and recall would prove to be the toughest challenges with my fresh recruit, it quickly became clear that she was not going into the water. No...
Out in the frost-bitten fjords that span Iceland’s northern shore, snow-capped cliffs rise high above an Arctic tundra, where gentle waves lap upon a rocky shoreline and sea-run brown trout swim upstream through glacial meltwater. The fjords let in the sea and bring in life. All around, a ubiquitous green moss carpets volcanic rock, like a verdant sponge broken only by the ivory white pelts of arctic foxes and secluded wooden shacks. The shacks...
On today's show, Tony explains his love for antelope and antelope hunting. While pronghorns just don't get the love of elk and mule deer, they do offer a unique hunting experience whether you want to head west with archery tackle or a flat-shooting rifle. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
We're so thrilled to announce that Steven Rinella's first book for children, Catch a Crayfish, Count the Stars, has hit the New York Times bestseller list in the coveted #1 spot. We'd like to extend a hearty thanks to all of our fans for making this moment possible. Crayfish has only been out in the world for two weeks, but in that time we've been bowled over by your response. It's incredibly moving to hear that your kids are poring over its...
There’s nothing better than the wisdom of older anglers. With their years of experience etched in the lines of their faces, a well-aged angler can teach you more about the fishing game than an entire library of books, podcasts, and YouTube videos. Some teach by taking you out on the water, chuckling gently as they help you bait your hook or they do it by slapping you on the side of the head and yelling “Not that way dummy!” However, the most...
Steve Rinella talks to Scott Carney, Brody Henderson, and Corinne Schneider. Topics include: On the road for the Catch a Crayfish, Count the Stars live tour; watch “The Rise and Fall of the Wim Hof Empire” and read the print story now; ambulance chaser lawyer billboards; how touching a bison calf doesn't lead to rejection from its mother; a correction on freeze drying; harvesting organs; meditating a whole lot; being cast from the womb; Steve...
Poachers, smugglers, and other fish and game felons steal our shared natural resources, and “Cal’s Poaching Desk” is here with all the sordid details. For more stories of wildlife wrongdoing, be sure to tune in to “Cal’s Week in Review.” New episodes drop every Sunday. Duck Hunt Degenerate A South Carolina man used a toy pistol from the Nintendo “Duck Hunt” video game to rob a business, according to the York County Sheriff's Office. Twenty-five...
Trail cameras have replaced the traditional summer scouting method of sitting behind a spotting scope for as many nights as possible. Some whitetail hunters do still glass food sources to dial in bachelor group patterns, but most deer hunters are keeping tabs via 24/7 digital scouters. This seems like a win. Trail cameras are mostly passive intel gatherers. Once you put them out, they work while you play. The value is obvious but often doesn’t...
This week, Cal talks about where the IFGA gets it wrong, Florida's CWD problem and what you can do, a rabid Alaska moose, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Welcome back to This Country Life. This week on the show, our buddy Brent is gonna tell you all about frog gigging, one of his favorite summertime activities. He's gonna cover everything from the end of your spear to the end of your fork. Brent's also gonna touch on regulations, and just what becomes of the folks who throw the regs to the wayside. If you've got a body of water with some bullfrogs near you (and you probably do), you're not going...
This week on the show I’m answering your questions about everything from the key traits that the most successful deer hunters share, to my take on the top 3 days to be in the whitetail woods, and more. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEater Mark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
The question on gun blogs and internet forums is usually posed like this: “The world is ending and you only have enough room for one gun in your bug-out bag. Which would you select?” The MeatEater edition of this question is a little different: “If hunters (for some godforsaken reason) were limited to a single firearm, which one would you pick?” In my humble and correct opinion, there is only one good answer to this question. But before we get to...
The straw that broke the camel’s back for me was a video from the Archery Trade Association show this past winter announcing a new livestream-enabled cell camera. The excited brand representative laid out a scenario in which a hunter gets a text message on their phone with a photo of a big buck stepping in front of their camera. From here, he exclaimed, the hunter could pull up the camera app and hit the “Live” button. Now this hunter could watch...
What makes a “California burger” Californian? Thanks to refrigeration and shipping, fresh produce is accessible 365 days a year, but this wasn’t always the case. The original California burger, invented in the early 1900s, included lettuce, tomato, and onion—a nod to the Golden State’s abundance of sunshine, mild weather, and year-round production of fresh vegetables. Today, lettuce, tomato, and onion are the standard garnish for most burgers, so...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Seth Morris, Rick Hutton, Maggie Smith, Randall Williams, and Hayden Sammak.
On today's show, Tony kicks off a new direction for the Foundation's podcast. He breaks down the value of learning to spot and stalk when you're primarily an ambush hunter, and explains why learning to quickly make decisions in the field will help you no matter what game you're after.
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Steve Rinella talks with Roger Hurt, Morgan Potter, Ryan Callaghan, Randall Williams, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics include: The guy who's had a hunting license for over 60 years; recalling the Roosevelt Safari; when you guide Roosevelt and then Hemmingway in Africa; convalescing after a run-in with a cape buffalo; cut-up elk sheds strewn across the land; when the Edmund Fitzgerald photobombs your dad's picture; running into a mob of 500 kangaroos; defining a “concession” in Tanzania; how a great tracker is both born and made; different kinds of poachers; homemade muzzleloaders for which AA batteries serve as slugs; the government official attached to every hunt party; how the Cecile the Lion debacle undermined hunting across Africa; a delicate balance of lion coalitions; the 22-month gestation period for a female elephant; discussing the play-to-play model; defining "safari" as a journey; the double men; what being a true professional hunter entails; pith helmets; and more.
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This week, Cal talks about how the crime desk and corner crossing do not go in the same category and how sweet that is, and so much more.
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A man only gets so many dogs in his life, and picking the right ones is important. Whatever breed of squirrel-treeing, tail-wagging outdoor accomplice you've got your eye on, Brent's gonna tell you the tricks he uses to find the very best pups. On the fence about getting a squirrel dog of your own? Brent's got a couple stories up that might just sway you.
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Once you have found a spot to hunt, what is next? In this episode Jason covers the technical how to of: breaking down an area quickly to determine if elk are present, how to go about locating them, how to move in, what you should be looking for as you setup, and then how to go about calling.
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This week I'm joined by long-time co-host Dan Johnson to reflect on the past 10 seasons of the Wired to Hunt podcast and the deer hunting lessons we've learned along the way.
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Interested in traveling to hunt? This podcast covers it all from packing your gear into duffels, checking your rifle with airlines, what to carry in your carryon, all the way to logistics of getting your meat home.
If you have a question you want to submit to Gear Talk for discussion, email geartalk@themeateater.com. Want to comment on this episode? Visit https://www.themeateater.com/listen/gear-talk and join the conversation.
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Ryan Callaghan, Christine Sawicki, Chester Floyd, Hilary Byrne, and Randall Williams.
On the last episode, we learned that David Crockett was America's first celebrity and that his identity was founded on being a bear hunter. We learned that there were four Crocketts that America knew: the bear hunter, the soldier, the politician and the martyr at the Alamo. Today, Clay Newcomb will dive into what he believes was the most important part of his life, his childhood in early life. They didn't put this part of his story on television and make cartoons of it to put on lunch boxes, but this period led him to be a soldier, which we're gonna talk about. We'll hear again from Cornell Professor, Robert Morgan and meet the man who's had one of Crockett's first guns, Betsy, in his family since 1803. We might even hear from the “greatest of all time” Michael Jordan. The way forward is complex. The truth is narrow and elusive, but Crockett's influence on American culture is foundational to learning why we are the way we are. We really doubt you’re gonna want to miss this one…
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On this episode Tyler and K.C. Reminice on their 2022 trip to Oklahoma! They talk about past struggles with land owner harassment, trouble with weather along with the struggles of hunting land with few trees. They follow up their past struggles with the story of Tyler and K.C.'s incredible hunts from this year which is live NOW on the MeatEater Youtube page!
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On today's episode, Tony talks about the various whitetail trends that have come and gone. He also makes the case that if you want consistent success in the deer woods, you should be more of a contrarian than a follower when it comes to the latest fads.
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Steve Rinella talks with Kimi Werner, Cameron Kirkconnell, Errol “T” Thurston, Dirt Myth, and Justin Turkowski.
Topics include: Debating what makes a good freeze dried meal; T's fear of snakes; pre-order our latest book, "Catch a Crayfish, Count the Stars"; a scientific paper on the high rate of flit knapping injuries; how Florida may Constitutionalize the right to hunt and fish; how soap can make humans more attractive to mosquitos; how burning coals inside an old, dry coconut is the best skeeter repellent; when Kimi rejected a job offer to be a mermaid; a Moulin Rouge outfit in Paris and claiming that snakes can't swim, when they can; corrections on the fastest wind speeds; ciguatera, the toxin found in large reef fish that makes you sick; when Kimi called Seth a liar; country fried turtle steak; is conch harvesting unsustainable in the Bahamas?; mushy meat; bonefish being too much work; flashlights in the hole; the elusive cubera; and more.
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This week, Cal talks about killer pygmy hippos, firearms stuff in California, a limited draw for hunting coyotes with dogs, why it's risky for a bear to become a barfly, and so much more.
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This week, Brent gives you the low down on how to field judge a restaurant in parts unknown. He also shares a couple stories about when you ought to just buy the whole role of bologna at the deli counter, why you should be suspicious of even your favorite foods on the menu, and how a young man's bad decisions on a night out don't begin and end with what he chooses to quench his thirst.
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Imagine a world in which your favorite hunting spot is sold off and covered with condominiums. I mean it. Close your eyes for a moment and imagine this scenario. See your place, hear it, smell it. Now imagine a condo over there and there and there. How does that make you feel?
Then, picture your favorite stretch of river or local lake choked out by a toxic algal bloom or slick with oil. Envision a future hike with your son or daughter and say to them, “Back when I was your age there used to be deer and grouse here. I wish you could have seen it.”
How do we ensure that some version of this imagined reality never comes to be? How do we fight back when the next batch of bad news inevitably knocks on the front door?
Quality habitat, open spaces, public access, well-managed wildlife populations, the right to hunt and fish, clean air and water—all of these are all critical to the outdoor way of life that we cherish. They’re also perpetually at risk. “Those crucial ingredients of any good day afield do not exist by accident,” Ben Long writes in his book “Hunter and Angler: Field Guide to Raisin’ Hell.” “They depend on conservation. And conservation depends on politics.”
Let’s face it, people of our kind tend to run away from politics. But, as I discussed recently with Ben on a Wired to Hunt podcast, this is a mistake. “If we want fish and wildlife to remain both abundant and available, we need to flex the political muscles granted in the U.S. Constitution,” he told me.
But how do we actually do that and do it well? That’s the question I recently posed to Ben and two other conservation professionals who have made it their life’s work to effectively use the political process to ensure a better future for hunting, angling, wildlife, and wild places. Their advice is a playbook for how we as individuals (or as collectives) can successfully raise hell for hunting and fishing and a how-to guide for ensuring we never have to tell our children that we wished they could have seen it “back then.”
Fine-Tune Your Voice “The single most powerful tool that someone has in conservation is their voice,” says Lukas Leaf, executive director of Sportsmen for the Boundary Waters. Speaking up, speaking out, and making your position known are critical to any successful conservation campaign. But it’s also easier said than done. “Conservation advocacy is unique in that it is critical that you cater your approach to the specific issue you are working on and the audience you’re speaking to,” he said.
When advocating for your issue to a decision maker—be it a senator or a fish-and-game commission—through a phone call, in-person testimony, or in a letter, Leaf recommends leading with a personal connection to the issue at hand. “Always express why something is important to you. The personal angle goes a long way. Tell the legislator why you’re calling and why you personally support or are against what you’re calling about,” he said. I’ve been told by multiple professionals in this space that one personal email or phone call is worth ten templated letters or pre-scripted calls.
It’s also important to frame your request to a decision-maker in a way that speaks to their own values or interests. If you can find common ground or a connection between your issue and their stated positions, you’ll have a better chance of them considering your suggestions.
Finally, avoid the temptation to get angry or overly emotional. This will simply lead to your audience tuning you out. “There’s no reason to beat down a legislator when you make a call, sit in on a meeting, or sign an online action. That only creates more division on the issue,” Leaf said. “It’s all about finding common ground that both parties can relate to and then just having a civil conversation.”
By rallying the sporting community to use their voices in this way and by showcasing how real people value a pristine and protected Boundary Waters Wilderness, Sportsmen for the Boundary Waters and its partners were able to defeat the threat of a copper-nickel mine on the border of the BWCA when a twenty-year moratorium on mining adjacent to the BWCA was announced. This news was proof that our voices, when used effectively, can still make a difference.
Be Laser-FocusedWhether as an individual or as part of a conservation organization, it can be tempting to take on every new issue or threat that appears on the horizon. And there is certainly no shortage of those. But as the old saying goes, if you try to be everything to everyone, you’ll end up being nothing to anyone.
The more effective approach, Captains for Clean Water Co-Founder Chris Wittman says, is to “remain laser-focused on an objective or a limited amount of objectives that are going to provide the greatest benefit to whatever your issue or cause is. You can hypothetically chime in on hundreds of things but the impact of that, as an organization, is that it dilutes your resources, it dilutes your messaging, it dilutes the understanding from your audience of what you do or what’s important.”
Something similar could be said for an individual, too. Doing a little bit for a dozen different conservation issues or organizations might end up being less effective than picking the two or three causes you’re most passionate about and doubling down on those with a larger investment of your time, energy, and resources.
This focus on doubling down on an issue and committing to a comprehensive understanding is what separates the best individual advocates from the average, says Wittman. “The people who are most effective at getting involved and bringing more people in through a grassroots network are those who have invested time to have a better understanding of the problems and the solutions, so they can speak from an educated point of view to others,” he says. This is simply not possible unless you prioritize your time and focus your efforts in those few places that matter most to you.
This hyper-focus on a core issue, in this case educating and activating the public around Everglades restoration, has led to Captains for Clean Water having an outsized influence on water quality issues across Florida. Their success, in collaboration with their partners, has led to historic momentum for Everglades restoration, securing hundreds of millions of dollars in state and federal funding for CERP projects, and the defeat of the bad-for-water SB 2508. If you want to have meaningful influence as an advocate, consider a focused approach to how you use your voice, develop your expertise, and exert your social capital.
Build Coalitions“There are roughly 50 million people who hunt and fish in the U.S. But there are 330 million people in the U.S.,” Ben Long writes in his aforementioned book. “It’s pretty simple math. In a democracy, hunters and anglers don’t have the numbers to win alone. We have to work with others, we have to build alliances.”
In other words, if you want to win a political fight in defense of hunting or fishing or wildlife or public lands—yes, of course, rally your fellow hunters and anglers—but also consider building a bigger team. Fortunately, there is no shortage of potential teammates if you’re willing to look outside of our immediate communities and extend an invitation to others with shared interests—hikers, bikers, boaters, bird watchers, small businesses in tourist communities, the list could go on and on. We might not agree on everything, but if we can look past our differences and focus on our shared cause, we can achieve more.
This philosophy of coalition building is as important at the organizational level as it is at the personal. If you’re involved with a conservation organization, you’ll harness exponentially more power by partnering with other groups. And as an individual, if there’s a cause you care about, the quickest way to get an official or decision-maker to listen is to come to the table with diverse parties sharing the same concerns. A state representative will be far more likely to take note of a request if it’s echoed by a hunter, a small business person, and a mountain biker together rather than in isolation.
A perfect example of this was the years-long push to ensure the future of the Land and Water Conservation Fund(LWCF), a program that funnels a portion of royalties from offshore oil and gas development to pay for public land acquisitions in the form of parks, access sites, wildlife habitat, and more. It’s a program that benefits everyone from urban families to hunters and anglers.
Through his work at Resource Media as a journalist and with Backcountry Hunters and Anglers, Ben Long successfully helped educate and rally a wide coalition in support of the LWCF. “When you cut away the ideological rhetoric, LWCF provides very real benefits for everyone, from city parks to multiple-use, public land purchases,” Long said. “So it generated such broad-scale support that elected officials raced to get to the front of the parade.” The end result was the reauthorization of the Land and Water Conservation Fund in 2019 and the securing of full funding, in perpetuity, as of 2020.
For more actionable advice for becoming a more effective conservation advocate, tune in to Wired to Hunt Podcast Ep. 651: How to Raise Hell for Hunting, Fishing, Wildlife, and Wild Places with Ben Long
Announcing Catch a Crayfish, Count the Stars—Steven Rinella’s newest book. It’s his first book for kids, and to kick off publication he’s taking the show on the road. So get your tickets now to meet Steve in person and get your copy signed!
Catch a Crayfish, Count the Stars is an adventure-filled guide to the outdoors for kids ages 8 and up. Filled to the brim with activities designed to get the kids outside, it’s the perfect gift for the budding young naturalist in your life. Kids will learn how to identify constellations, navigate through the woods, gig for bullfrogs, build a bug hotel, follow a game trail, and much more.
The DetailsThe Steven Rinella x SCHEELS Book Tour takes place from June 16th-25th at a participating SCHEELS store near you. Please note this is a ticketed event. The price of the ticket gets you a first-edition copy of the new book and your family access to the signing and photo line. There will be a limited quantity of tickets available at the event, but pre-purchasing tickets is highly encouraged to ensure that books don’t sell out.
Check out the tour stops below to see if Steve will be in your area, and purchase tickets at the links below or see our events page for more details.
Friday, June 16 — Billings, MTMonday, June 19 – Minneapolis, MNTues 6/20 – Omaha, NEWed 6/21 – Kansas City, MOThurs 6/22 – Dallas, TXFri 6/23 – Colorado Springs, COSat 6/24 – Johnstown, COSun 6/25 – Sandy, UT
Fair warning to parents—kids who read this book will come home with dirty hands and muddy boots, a few scraped knees and knuckles, and maybe even a wild critter or two. And we wouldn’t have it any other way.
If there were a way to measure each nation’s tolerance for bold flavors that were not made bold by salt or sugar, I’d bet The United States would have the lowest tolerance of all, and I feel like this is something we really should work on. We’re a melting pot of so many cultures with so many beautiful foods—you’d think that the pot would be brimming with flavor.
This is a disservice to us all—culinarily, nutritionally, and ecologically. This land mass offers us hundreds of edible plants, both native and introduced, that each have their own unique flavors, functions and ecological and nutritional niches, that, when amassed inside our great melting pot, taste vividly of North America.
As of late, though, we seem to favor the sweet, large, starchy, lumpen, and mild, while casting off anything too unapologetic or nuanced. Many of us reach a certain age and think that we just like what we like and we’re stuck with our food preferences like our shoe size, but this isn’t true. The pallet is adaptable at any age, and you really can train yourself to not only tolerate new flavors but love and crave them. (I can personally vouch for this after putting myself through a rigorous hot sauce regimen and increasing my heat tolerance tenfold, thus opening the door to whole new regions of fiery cuisines that I’d previously tucked tail to, that now bring me immense burning pleasure.)
This is all a rather transparent campaign to try to get you, through a little loving shame, to try one of my favorite vegetables—wintercress (a.k.a. yellow rocket, creasy greens, or bittercress) because, yes, it is bitter. I’m not telling you that it’s bitter as a warning, I’m telling you it’s bitter as a welcome, so that you’ll seek it, trusting that it’s something you didn’t even know you were missing and can easily learn to love. Plus, you are what you eat, right? Don’t eat baby food—eat boldly—eat bittercress.
How to Forage for WintercressWintercress (Barbarea vulgaris) is a member of the mustard family and is present in all but a handful of U.S. states. It’s so abundant that it’s been labeled a noxious weed in many states, so it should be easy for most people to find. I was initially told it’s an invasive plant, but Sam Thayer’s new Field Guide to Edible Wild Plants of Eastern & Central North America labels it as a native plant.
“Like beer, wintercress has a strong flavor and is an acquired taste. People who have long eaten it, crave it. Many botanists separate the native North American populations into a separate species, B. orthoceras, but nobody seems able to explain clear or consistent differences between them,” he writes. “I think the distinction lies somewhere between insignificant and bogus.” Thayer does acknowledge a close relative, Barbarea verna, as a separate species commonly known as southern wintercress, which has a spicier flavor but can be used largely in the same ways.
I find wintercress predominantly in and around the edges of farm fields, gardens, parks, vacant lots, and wet meadows. Recent disturbance, moist soil, and full sun seem to be the trifecta of conditions that wintercress prefers. In early spring, when everything is still brown, if you drive by a farm field and see gleaming mounds of emerald green leaves, there’s a good chance it’s wintercress whose basal rosettes bulk up long before most other greens are even beginning to emerge.
At this stage, you can identify it by its vibrant green, semi-gloss, deeply lobed leaves arranged in a basal rosette. The leaves somewhat resemble arugula but are more succulent with larger, rounder lobes, especially the terminal lobe at the tip of the leaf.
It’s important to note that at this stage wintercress has one toxic lookalike to be aware of called butterweed (Packera glabella), which has similarly lobed leaves. It can be distinguished by an increased number of lobes per leaf as well as teeth on the lobe margins, a silvery sheen on the upper surface of the leaves, and hollow stems with purple ridges.
As the season progresses, wintercress will send up fat, green, hairless flower stems with angled edges that branch toward the top of the stem. The stems have small, sparse leaves with large, blunt teeth that clasp the stem. The unopened flower buds look like tiny florets of broccoli but are lighter green in color and expand and bloom into loose clusters of bright yellow flowers with four petals arranged in a cross.
How to Prepare and Eat WintercressThe leaves, unopened flower buds with stalks, and the open flowers of wintercress are all uniquely edible and versatile. The leaves are best in late fall or early spring before flowering when they are most tender and least bitter. I like to cut the newer leaves from the middle half of the rosette and leave the outer ring. I toss these leaves in with other mixed greens for stir-frying, braising, sauteing, or adding into soups, beans, creamy pasta sauces, and egg dishes. They’re also a great addition to ferments like krauts and kimchis or green “sauces” like early spring pesto, salsa verde, chermoula, or zhoug.
Next comes the stalks and flower buds which are my favorite as a standalone vegetable. I treat these exactly like broccoli raab and either stir-fry or quickly saute in fat with a splash of cider vinegar or lemon juice to enjoy as a side. You can also quickly blanch them in salted water, lightly coat in oil and toss on the grill, or snap the top florets off and top creamy pasta or cheesy pizza. It’s a short season for the unopened flower stalks, and I relish it as one does asparagus or ramps.
Lastly, come the bright yellow flowers, which I pinch off at the stem as big clusters and add to the stir-fry pan at the end of cooking. I also add to charcuterie and cheese boards, pile onto sandwiches instead of sprouts or microgreens, or toss a few onto soup, poultry, or fish as a spicy, bright yellow garnish.
This week on the show I’m joined by Steve Rinella to discuss how he’s used hunting and fishing as a classroom for teaching his children about life, his latest outdoor kid focused book, and a whole lot more.
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Part of what draws us to fishing is the idea that each time we feel a tug, we never know if the fish of a lifetime might be on the other end of our line. This past Monday, May 22, full-time Muskogee fireman and fishing guide Ryan Davison landed what may just be his fish of a lifetime.
Davison runs Oklahoma Paddlefish Guide Service with his business partner and fellow firefighter Cameron Foster. After a long day of guiding, he went out looking for a fish of his own. The area in which their guide service operates is known for world record paddlefish (one of the bodies of water they guide on has produced several world records), and that’s exactly what Davison was after.
After catching and releasing a 100-pound paddlefish earlier in the evening, Davison saw another good fish on his Livescope and snagged it with a specialized, barbless hook that paddlefish anglers in the region are required to use. Paddlefish are filter feeders, and snagging is the only way they can be targeted by recreational anglers.
“They all fight good, but right away I knew it wasn’t a giant,” Davison told MeatEater.
He fought the fish for several minutes before finally getting a good look at it, and that’s when he knew he had something unexpected and truly special.
“I pulled it up to the side of the boat thinking I was just gonna shake it off, and that’s when I saw it was solid black,” Davison said. “The whole thing from nose to tail was just jet, jet black.”
The fish has a form of melanism, an excess of melanin resulting in a far darker than normal, even black, appearance. This genetic mutation, although extremely rare in paddlefish, occurs throughout the animal kingdom, including deer, big cats, and wild turkeys.
Once Davison realized he was dealing with the fish of a lifetime, he set up his phone to record the moment. But that moment didn’t go quite the way Davison anticipated.
“So I go to the back of the boat. Normally I have someone else in the boat with me, but I’m trying to land this fish by myself. I have 100-pound braid in my one hand and this fish in the other, and I thought I could just lift it over the stern when all the sudden it starts thrashing and breaks my grip,” Davison said.
As the fish ran back for the depths, Davison could feel the braid starting to slice into his hand, forcing him to let it go.
“The next thing I know, the rod is skipping across the stern and into the water,” Davison said. “At that point I just grab for it, knowing full well that I’m going in.”
And go in he did. Davison slid over the stern but emerged a few seconds later, rod in hand, and climbed back on board via a swim ladder. Amazingly, he not only caught the rod but managed to continue the fight, swim back to the boat, and land the fish. And lucky for us, he did it all on camera.
“The second time I tried to land it, I thought I’d better just do it the right way and use the tail rope,” Davison said.
While only weighing an estimated 60 or 70 pounds (relatively small by Davison’s standards), the paddlefish was undoubtedly one of a kind. In all his years paddlefishing, Davison says he’s never seen nor heard of another one like it.
“I’ve been fishing for these things since I was fifteen. We catch hundreds every season. Sometimes you see a darker one, sometimes you see some really white ones, but never have I seen anything like this. Its eyes, inside its mouth—everything was jet black,” he said. “It looked like freakin’ Batman.”
Davison showed the fish off to the camera, took in the special moment, and then simply let the fish go. When asked if he was tempted at all to keep the fish, Davison said he never even considered it.
“No, it never really crossed my mind. I was just happy to have that interaction and get my hands on it. That was good enough for me.”
Images and video via Ryan Davison.
The California state legislature is considering a bill that would make the Golden State the first in the nation to impose an excise tax on firearms and ammunition.
Assembly Bill 28 calls for an 11% excise tax on all “firearms, firearm precursor parts, and ammunition” sold in the state. That money would be deposited in a newly christened Gun Violence Prevention, Healing, and Recovery Act to fund various efforts related to violence intervention, school mental health, gun confiscation, and firearms education, among other programs.
Proponents of the bill argue that since firearms are used to kill and injure thousands of Californians every year, gun owners should foot the bill to support those victims. They point to the existing Pittman-Robertson excise tax on outdoor equipment to demonstrate the reasonableness of this new tax.
“The tax specified in this act is a modest and reasonable tax on a profitable industry whose lawful and legitimate business activity imposes substantial harmful externalities on California’s families, communities, and taxpayers,” the bill’s authors write. “The modest tax proposed in this measure mirrors the Pittman-Robertson federal excise tax on firearm and ammunition industry participants, is similarly dedicated to funding programs to remediate the harmful externalities of firearm industry commerce, and is similarly unlikely to discourage lawful sales and commerce in firearms or ammunition.”
AB 28 has passed three legislative committees by comfortable margins and is now before the California General Assembly. There is no word yet on when the full Assembly will consider this bill, but it can be brought out and voted upon at any time.
“The possibility of this bill’s passage is very real to the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), which is why we continue to fight against this legislation that would only burden law-abiding gun owners since the costs of additional excise taxes will be passed along to the buyers,” NSSF spokesman Mark Oliva told MeatEater. The NSSF is the firearms industry trade association, and the group has testified and submitted a letter to the Assembly opposing the bill
“This excise tax looks only to punish those who lawfully exercise their Second Amendment rights while doing nothing to address public safety or hold criminals accountable,” Oliva said.
Just Like Pittman-Robertson?The federal government already imposes an 11% tax on long guns and ammunition and a 10% tax on handguns. These taxes have been in place since 1919 and are paid by gun and ammo makers and passed on to the consumer. In 1937, the Pittman-Robertson Act directed these funds to pay for conservation and wildlife management based on the assumption that gun owners are more likely to hunt and fish. The “user pays, public benefits” structure of the North American conservation model calls upon those who use natural resources–in this case, gun owners–to foot the bill for wildlife conservation.
The authors of AB 28 characterize the bill’s excise tax as analogous to Pittman-Robertson. They see gun owners and the gun industry as responsible for the criminal use of firearms, and so gun owners should pay to cover the costs of those damages.
“This act will similarly place a reasonable surtax on firearm and ammunition industry members profiting from the sale of firearms and ammunition in order to generate sustained revenue for programs that are designed to remediate the devastating effects these products cause families and communities across this state,” the authors write.
MeatEater’s Ryan Callaghan points out that a closer analogy would have those who commit crimes with firearms pay the excise tax–not those who use their firearms for lawful purposes.
“If California legislators actually wanted to model this bill after Pittman-Robertson, they’d go after the ‘users’ of gun crime, i.e., criminals who kill and wound people with guns,” he said. “Instead, the bill assumes that law-abiding gun owners are somehow implicated in the crimes of others.”
Callaghan also worries the legislation will have a deleterious effect on conservation funding.
“I wouldn't want to see this tax pass in California because of how valuable Pittman-Robertson funds are,” he explained. “If the 11% tax increases prices to a point where we see diminished return on Pittman-Robertson dollars, we are going to decrease funding for habitat and access to the outdoors–something we know promotes good mental health.”
A Track Record of Success?California would be the first state in the nation to pass a broad tax on all guns and ammunition, but other municipalities have already tried the experiment. The city of Seattle imposed a firearms and ammunition tax in 2016 of $25 per firearm, $0.02 per round of ammunition .22-caliber or less, and $0.05 per round for all other ammunition. The city of Tacoma passed virtually the same tax in 2019.
In Seattle, shootings and shots fired dipped from 135 incidents in 2017 to 85 in 2018 but then rose steadily to 237 in 2022. Similarly, in 2022, Tacoma hit its highest number of homicides ever recorded in the city. Rising homicide rates have plagued virtually every major American city since 2020 whether firearms excise taxes are on the books or not.
Little empirical data exists on the efficacy of using gun taxes to reduce gun-related crime, according to a review of the literature published by the Rand Corporation. While this review notes that moderate tax increases on guns and ammunition are unlikely to disrupt hunting and recreational gun use, it also notes that a uniformly applied tax would “tend to overtax lower-risk purchasers and under-tax higher-risk purchasers.”
“If those who use firearms for nonviolent or legal, protective purposes are more responsive to changes in price than are those whose use engenders harm to themselves or others, this would mitigate the effectiveness of the tax as a means for gun violence prevention,” the study says.
Because AB 28 imposes a new tax on California residents, it requires a two-thirds majority vote in the legislature. While this is a higher bar than most legislation, the NSSF’s Mark Oliva believes it’s possible.
“There is a possibility that anti-gun politicians in California could succeed in garnering the two-thirds majority required to pass this burdensome tax on the firearm and ammunition industry,” he told MeatEater. “This bill has failed in previous sessions, but Democrats have a supermajority in California and can steamroll through legislation at will with little interference.”
On this week’s episode of the Bear Grease Render, Clay Newcomb is joined by a veteran cast of characters: Brent Reaves, of This Country Life fame, Michael Rosmond of Sunspot Lights, Ben Lagrone, and Jonathan Webster. The crew dives right in to talking about America’s First Celebrity, David Crockett, dissecting the impact of Disney’s Crockett revival of the 50’s and its lasting effect on the childhood memories and adult identities of (not just) American men, before backing up to cover topic like good hunting dogs and how you’re closer to death than you realize; how to catch a live coon by the tail and what ever happened to Hoot. Clay then steers the conversation back to the Highlights of the previous Crockett podcast as well as what’s to come in the next episodes of this series on one of America’s favorite bear hunters, politicians, and folk heroes. And we bet you’ll wanna stick around to hear Brent and Clay pontificate on the fashion, comfort and practicality of the Bib Overall. I really doubt you’re gonna wanna miss this one…
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Corinne Schneider, Ryan Callaghan, Seth Morris, and Dan Ahdoot.
Unless you harvest it yourself, crab meat is a pricey delicacy. With a single king crab leg fetching nearly $80 and limbs of other crustacean species not far behind, they’ve always been a treat few can afford. But recently, prices have hiked up another notch due to concurrent population crashes of multiple species in the Bering Sea. The collapses have left entire crab-fishing fleets moored to shore and processors scrambling to find new seafood sources.
One collapse is the widely-reported disappearance of 11 billion snow crabs in the Bering Sea in 2021. At the time, the crash was initially thought to be due to overfishing. New research, however, reveals that scientists may have misinterpreted the initial data. To understand why, it’s necessary to look back at the years leading up to the crash.
Based on annual surveys conducted by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which manages crab harvest in conjunction with the state of Alaska, total snow crab abundance was at an all-time high in 2018. Then, in 2019, the overall population decreased by 60%. The total number of males (the primary target of the fishery) actually increased, however, leading to a harvest quota increase in 2020.
NOAA didn’t conduct a survey that year due to COVID, but when they resumed in 2021, they found a near-total population collapse–almost 11 billion crabs shy of 2018 numbers. Naturally, overfishing was the primary suspect. But now, after several years without a population rebound, researchers are pointing fingers at another culprit: warming oceans.
The Bering Sea experienced thermal heatwaves in 2016, 2018, and 2019, similar to the “Blob” in the Gulf of Alaska, but a little further north. Marine heatwaves are caused by a combination of unusually warm weather patterns in conjunction with water currents and wind. Their dynamics are similar to atmospheric heatwaves (a week of 100-degree weather in Colorado, for example), with one key difference: water holds heat much longer than air, meaning once the hot weather dissipates, the water stays warm for weeks or months afterward.
It often takes several years to see population and ecosystem shifts after significant environmental events, and in the Bering Sea, we are just now seeing the compounding effects of the heatwaves. Those shifts start with a change in phytoplankton production (small, photosynthetic organisms on the bottom of the food chain), then trickle up to crustaceans, fish, and larger fauna like whales and seabirds. Warmer water also increases the metabolic demands (hunger) of organisms, meaning more competition for a limited amount of food.
In addition to the impacts of warm water on the food chain, it also has a physically detrimental effect on juvenile crab development. In the Bering Sea, immature snow crabs concentrate in colder, shallow waters, and research suggests that 2°C is the critical water-temperature threshold for the development of immature snow crabs. Warmer conditions between 2017 and 2020 kept temperatures hovering around that threshold, leading to low juvenile snow crab survival. In conjunction with heavy fishing pressure in 2020, it was a perfect storm for a population collapse.
In terms of the bigger picture, it’s possible that snow crabs may never reach their former abundance in the Bering Sea. “As you warm Arctic ecosystems, those systems become prone to a state change, where Arctic taxa such as snow crab become replaced by subarctic taxa that are better able to tolerate ice-free and warm conditions,” Mike Litzow, director of the NOAA Fisheries Kodiak Laboratory told the Alaska Beacon. It’s a phenomenon known as “borealization,” which describes the northern creep of boreal, or subarctic, ecosystems–both aquatic and terrestrial.
What we’re seeing in crab populations is just a microcosm of a much larger shift in ecosystems at northern latitudes. And while the impact to most people is limited to higher prices at the grocery store, it’s important to look at the issue holistically. Being connected to your food and where it comes from means learning about the biology of whatever it is you’re eating and being inquisitive when things go awry. Follow food chains back to their bases, and the paths lead to a bigger-picture understanding of what’s happening. In this case, deep on the ocean floor in the North Pacific.
What if I told you that out there in the world exists a bird that is so low to the ground that it often goes under the radar of the vast majority of homesteaders? It’s the same bird that allows folks in both rural and urban settings to explore several aspects of self-sufficiency while still often abiding local by-laws, all the while capable of laying an egg a day and using only a fraction of the room and energy that chickens require. Not to mention, they also provide delicious and easy-to-prepare meat.
Sounds too good to be true, right? I thought the exact same thing until a friend of mine showed me his covey of Coturnix quail, which led me to invest in thirty birds the next spring. What surprised me the most was how ridiculously easy it is to keep quail and even make a few dollars in the process.
Start off StrongAs with anything, having a solid understanding of quail is important. The vast majority of quail in domestic captivity are called Coturnix quail, sometimes called Japanese quail. They’re a drab-looking bird that comes in various plumages and can sustain brief stints of airtime, but they really shine when it comes to putting on weight and laying eggs. Also, they don’t need much space, which makes them a favorite for urban homesteaders.
When you’re looking to invest in a covey, it’s important to know how you want to start. Are you looking to invest in chicks to raise or are you hoping to get adult birds that are already laying eggs? The answer will dictate how you go about getting your setup ready for when your birds arrive.
If you’re going down the chick road, a good brooder setup is important because that’s where the chicks will spend the first three to four weeks of their lives. If you’re feeling a bit on the impatient side and want to skip to adult quail, then you’re going to want to construct a proper enclosure. Adult quail need roughly 0.6 square feet of space to live comfortably, so it’s just a matter of deciding how much space you have for the birds you need.
Quail CondosThere are plenty of ways to house your quail. Most folks usually go for a hutch-type pen that sits off the ground with a floor on a slight angle so that when the birds lay their eggs (usually mid to late afternoon), the eggs roll out of the pen and into a catchment area. The floor of the pen generally consists of hardware cloth, so their waste goes through the holes of the hardware cloth and into a tray underneath for convenient cleanup.
Keeping your quail on the ground is another great choice if you can guarantee predators won’t be able to claw, chew, or dig their way into the pen. I dug a deep trench around my quail pens, filled it with chicken wire, and put hefty stones on top to prevent predators from getting in.
A word of caution—while we often think about hawks or foxes, rats are my biggest predator concern. Last year, two rats killed eighteen quail overnight after tunneling more than seven feet into the pen. Don’t underestimate this sly adversary. But a bonus is that if you decide to keep your quail on the ground, they sometimes go broody and will try to hatch eggs, which is a lot of fun to watch.
One final reminder: these birds are nomadic in the wild and will camp out just about anywhere, so free-ranging is not an option. They’ll free range right into the next county, never to be seen again.
Live Fast, Die HardCoturnix Quail have an average lifespan of roughly two years. Similar to turkey poults, it seems like they’re always finding new ways to end their lives prematurely. In addition to quail, I’ve raised ducklings and chicks, and it’s always the quail who seem to take it upon themselves to thin their numbers out on their own. In other words, they like to die.
The good news is that they don’t need to live for long. At just eight weeks old, they’re fully grown and ready to be butchered. By 10 weeks old, the hens will begin to lay eggs and lots of them. But due to their short lifespan, their egg production slows down more quickly compared to ducks or chickens.
A little bit of common sense goes a long way when raising these birds. For example, if you have newly hatched quail chicks, putting a few stones in the reservoir of a waterer will prevent a lot of chicks from drowning themselves. My adult birds use a drip system made from an old five-gallon bucket and, one night a few years back, I forgot to put the lid on the pale. The next morning I pulled seven dead quail that had flown into the bucket and promptly drowned. The takeaway here is that if there’s a way to die, these birds will find it. So take measures to nip whatever that might be in the bud ahead of time and save yourself (and your quail) the grief.
Quail BasicsQuail chicks need a higher source of protein than chickens or ducks, so start with a good source of game bird feed that comes in crumbles instead of pellets. The reason for this is that when Coturnix quail hatch, they’re smaller than a golf ball and simply can't fit pellets in their beaks. Baby quail need a food source with roughly 25% protein in it. Unfortunately, most feed mills don’t keep a ready supply of game bird feed on hand, which can make things difficult. A great alternative is turkey starter, which offers 23% to 28% protein, and is perfect for your quail chicks (and easier on your wallet).
I start giving my chicks bits of greenery around three weeks old because my quail live on the ground once they’re fully feathered—usually around four to five weeks old. Plants like dandelion leaves and bits of grass will give them an added source of nutrition, and by three weeks old, they’re unbelievably efficient foragers.
Though they’re awkward and bulky, Coturnix quail can fly and do so quite well. No matter how you decide to house your birds, it can be next to impossible to get them back if they take off. Make certain there’s only one way in and out and that they can’t get through it. I once left the door to my pen open for about three seconds, all the time my birds needed to make their daring escape. One flew into the woods and was never seen again, while the other made a short flight onto the roof of our house.
You’ll quickly discover that by six weeks of age, your roosters are beginning to get teenage urges. They’ll begin to crow, too, but not like your typical barnyard rooster. Males make a sound that I can only describe as the call of a redwing black blackbird that’s had too much to drink. One male to every six females is a good ratio to start with, and you can cull the rest of the males at eight weeks old for the freezer.
On this weeks episode, Tyler Jones and K.C. Smith recap the 4th episode of the "Buck Truck" series on MeatEater. Kansas is a special place to us, a lot of good things have come from it. It hasn't been easy though we've dealt with many trials and we discuss that in this podcast. Some of our best memories comes from these tough times and battling through them has made for some special moments. Watch our 2022 Kansas memories over on the MeatEater YouTube channel TODAY!
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On this week's episode, Tony breaks down the importance of putting out trail cameras now, so that you have enough time to truly figure out the daily patterns of the bucks you'll be targeting in September and October.
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By now the benefits of incorporating native plants in your landscaping and vegetable garden are very well documented. Native plants require fewer inputs and less upkeep because they’re adapted to your local environment, they provide habitat for native insects and birds, and in some cases, they are a refuge for plants that are threatened or endangered in the wild. I can already hear you saying, “Yea, that all sounds great, but I’m trying to use my garden to feed my family,” well native plants can do that too!
Over the years, we’ve replaced nearly every non-native plant in our yard with native fruits, edible herbs, and even wild mushrooms. Below are a few of our favorite native plants and fungi that we have incorporated into our garden.
Saskatoons (Serviceberries)Saskatoons, also called Serviceberries or Juneberries, are native to nearly all of North America. Their delicious fruits taste like a cross between a blueberry and an apple, and their showy spring flowers give them ornamental value. Depending on the species, saskatoons can grow as either a bush or a medium-sized tree. Native birds and chipmunks love their fruits, but they usually leave enough for us to harvest as well.
RampsRamps are delicious oniony-garlicky spring ephemerals that are typically only available to foragers who venture out into the spring woods to collect them. But if you have some relatively moist soil, you can grow your very own patch at home! We transplanted a few ramps into the less sunny parts of our garden a few years ago, and they spread and expand their patch every year. We also collect seeds from them which we scatter around our yard and the woods near our neighborhood.
To learn more about harvesting ramps, click here.
PawpawsPawpaws are sometimes described as being the northernmost tropical fruit because of their similarities to bananas and mangoes. Before the industrialization of our food system, they were commonly eaten in Eastern North America, but because they don’t ship well, they fell out of fashion.
You likely won’t find them in a grocery store anytime soon, but if you grow some in your backyard, you can pick them at peak ripeness and enjoy their tropical flavor. Pawpaws need to cross-pollinate in order to produce fruit, so you’ll need to plant at least two. Pawpaws are understory trees, so we grow them under a mulberry tree in the shadiest part of our yard where sun-loving plants would struggle.
Wild StrawberriesThe ancestors of cultivated strawberries are native to the Americas, but wild strawberries (which are sometimes called Alpine Strawberries) are more similar to the original fruits. They are much smaller than the cultivated strawberries you might find in the grocery store, but their flavor is unmatched. We plant wild strawberries on the sunny hillsides in our yard that aren’t ideal for vegetable garden beds.
For a helpful video with more information on cultivating strawberries, click here.
Lion’s Mane MushroomsLion’s Mane Mushrooms are exploding in popularity due to their potential use as a treatment for degenerative brain diseases like dementia and Alzheimer’s. These mushrooms are native to North America and can be found growing on hardwood logs in many of our deciduous forests.
You can also buy spawn online and inoculate logs in your backyard to grow your very own native mushrooms. We grow them on oak and beech logs that the arborists around our city cut near the powerlines.
Click here for more information on growing lion’s mane mushrooms.
Wine Cap MushroomsWine cap mushrooms are native fungi that work for our garden on three levels: soil-building, water retention, and food production. The mycelium of wine cap mushrooms breaks down wood chips and mulch and quickly turns them into rich mushroom compost. It also ties the mulch into big mats, which are excellent at holding moisture in the soil.
In the spring and fall, it produces bounties of delicious mushrooms that resemble the cultivated button mushrooms found in the grocery store. We spread wood chip mulch under all of our fruit trees and inoculate it with wine cap mushrooms. As the wood chips break down into compost, they feed the trees, and the mushrooms feed us.
Want to learn more about eating what’s already growing in your backyard? Check out these articles as well: 3 Wild Salad Greens You Can Find in Your Backyard, How to Forage for Dandelion Crowns, and How to Forage for Wild Cherries.
It took me nearly four full seasons of bowhunting to kill my first deer. That clueless button buck, a gift of a deer in late December in Minnesota, changed the arc of my hunting career. He represented a lot of things to me, but most importantly, he showed me that it could be done. Until I walked up to him lying in the snow, I didn’t fully believe it.
You might not either if you’re struggling to get your first deer with a bow. It’s not easy, even though there are plenty of folks who make it seem like it is. It’s not. And there’s no shame in struggling. There’s also no shame in calibrating your standards to increase your odds of filling a tag, literally any tag.
Low-Bar HuntingOther people’s standards need not apply when you’re trying to arrow your first deer. While it’s a personal journey and up to you to set your standards, I’d argue that you should set the bar so low a turtle can clear it. If any deer—fawn, doe, or buck—is fair game, then your chances of success are as high as they can be.
If you don’t want to shoot a fawn, doe, or young buck, that’s up to you. But know that when you set those high standards, your chances of success go way down. Your learning curve ramps way up, as well. This is because you’ll get fewer chances to try to draw and shoot, so you’ll have fewer chances to get better when it counts the most.
Focus On The Food & WaterThere are a lot of strategies for hunting deer that range from sitting destination food sources, to hunting specific buck beds, to camping out on a promising terrain trap for days on end. The newbie looking to bloody his or her knife for the first time would be well served to keep things simple.
Focus on deer food and water sources. This goes for private land hunters, as well as public land hunters. There are constants in a deer’s world, and they revolve around avoiding predation at all costs but also getting enough calories and water to survive.
While this can be considered dumbed-down deer hunting, it also works. Deer eat soybeans, and if you just want to kill a deer with your bow, sitting on the edge of a beanfield is a pretty good idea. Deer also need to drink every day. Setting up a stand or a blind on a pond in the woods or at the top of a wooded draw is another no-brainer. You might not encounter Booner bucks with any level of frequency on these spots, especially if you’re hunting where there’s plenty of pressure, but you should encounter deer, which is the goal.
Forget The Gimmicks It can be frustrating to struggle to kill your first deer. This leads us to impulse purchases of decoys, scents, calls, and anything that promises success. Forget all of these things and instead focus on setting up downwind of places deer like to walk. Let them come to you, don’t force the issue.
This is the foundation of good hunters everywhere, and it’s a skill that will help you throughout an entire lifetime of whitetail hunting. The get-rich-quick stuff can come later, but for now, consider it your job to scout enough to understand where deer are likely to walk. Then pay attention to your setups and how the deer react to them.
If you constantly get busted, ask yourself why. Is your stand too low, or maybe you’re silhouetted in such a way the deer easily see you moving? Is the wind swirling more than you think, or maybe you’re hunting your setups when the wind is wrong? If you identify where deer like to go, like those food and water sources I mentioned earlier, the next step is to figure out how to hunt them correctly on those spots.
This is an art, but the good news is that if you have lower standards, you can make mistakes and still earn shots. A forky might let you draw on him without bolting, unlike a mature doe or buck. A year-and-a-half-old doe might see you in a natural ground blind and approach for a closer look, which might give you a shot. An older deer probably won’t.
So drop those standards, hunt the easy spots, and forget about the get-rich-quick products. Learn to hunt deer, all deer, first. If you do, a whitetail is bound to pose up at 20 yards for you, and just maybe, everything will go your way.
Then you’ll go from a deer hunter to a deer killer, just like that.
For more deer hunting info, check out these articles: Why I Love To Shoot Young Bucks, To Kill A Doe, and Where To Shoot A Deer.
Steve Rinella talks with Dan Ahdoot, Janis Putelis, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics include: Get your wild cow milking "Gnome on the Range" shirt; well wishes for Dan's broken ankle; we know Mo; why Dan's first appearance on The MeatEater Podcast led to his hilarious and heartfelt first book, "Undercooked"; freewriting; when fly fishing guides lie; the Arkansas episode of "Buck Truck" from The Element as being the best reason for why hunting whitetail might just be better; more pet deer stories; a mutually concussed man and grouse; an update on direwolves from The OG of Archaeology; the best and worst arguments for reintroduction; letting nature do its thing; Dan's Food Network show, "Raid the Fridge," and his podcast, "Green Eggs and Dan"; when you're coastal-elite-adjacent-comedian-hunter-foodie; how hunters are the real foodies; a shit tent, a cigar, and a mini forest fire; getting out of speeding tickets because you're the Cobra Kai guy; and more.
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Three men belonging to an Idaho family suspected of poaching for many years have been convicted of multiple felonies and misdemeanors after they were caught shooting elk from a moving pickup truck.
Donald E. Curtiss, 74, his son Travis Eugene, 47, and Travis’s son, Eben Eugene, 22, were convicted of a total of 10 felonies and eight misdemeanors, including unlawful killing, possessing, or wasting wildlife and hunting game animals from a motorized vehicle. They will each pay $7,300 in fines and restitution, have their hunting and trapping licenses suspended for 10 years, and serve 100 hours of community service.
The Idaho Fish and Game Department (IDFG) believes the Curtiss family has been poaching for “multiple decades.” They were able to make these convictions thanks to the quick action of several witnesses and the unique kind of bullet the men used during the incident.
“We wouldn’t have made the convictions at all without the witnesses calling right away and getting as fresh information as we could,” lead IDFG investigator Joe Heald told MeatEater. “All the witnesses were willing to provide written statements about what they had seen and then testify in court. Without that, it would have been a really tough case.”
On November 2, 2021, the Curtiss group located a large herd of elk on a piece of Bureau of Land Management land near Arco, Idaho. They chased the herd in the truck for “a considerable distance,” with Travis behind the wheel, Donald shooting from the passenger window, and Eben shooting from the bed of the truck. They used a two-track road to drive into the herd, splitting it in two, and then went off-road to chase the group that contained the largest six-point bull.
The men killed a rag horn bull, a cow, a spike, a calf, and two mature bulls. They drove past the first four elk to the mature bulls, whose head, quarters, and backstraps they harvested. They left the other elk to waste. They illegally killed six elk in total, and IDFG officers also found evidence of a seventh elk that was mortally wounded but escaped.
Unfortunately for the Curtiss’s, two other hunters had also been hunting the same elk herd and witnessed the trio intercept and fire at the large group of animals as they tried to make their way from a field into the mountains. One of those hunters immediately called IDFG’s poaching hotline to report the incident, and officers executed a search warrant on the Curtiss home shortly after they returned home.
The family initially agreed to speak to the officers, but it didn’t take long for them to clam up and invoke their Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination.
Even though the officers found meat from the two poached bulls in the Curtiss home, they weren’t sure the charges would stick. “At this point the case may have gone unsolved, needing to be proven based solely on the evidence at the scene and witness observations and cooperation. Witnesses to the rescue,” the IDFG said in its press release.
The two hunters observed the incident, gave detailed statements, and followed up those statements with testimony in court. Later, a third witness helped officers in identifying the suspects by recording the license plate number of a truck that matched the description of the Curtiss vehicle the officers were looking for.
At the trial, a fourth expert firearms witness confirmed that the poachers used unusual types of all-copper 7mm and .270-caliber bullets known as Barnes XLC. These bullets were only produced between 2001 and 2006, and they feature a unique blue coating.
Heald told MeatEater that these bullets were found in the four elk that were left to waste, and investigators later found one of them in the meat from one of the bull elk the Curtiss’s carried home. This crucial piece of physical evidence confirmed witness accounts of the incident.
“It seems like almost every year, I get a call about an elk that’s been shot and left to waste,” Heald said. “Most of the time I do a necropsy on the elk and pull out a bullet, but it’s two days old. I don’t have any suspects. I don’t have anything to go on. In this case, without the witnesses calling right away, that’s what it would have been.”
Most spring panfish anglers are “Andy Griffith” types who whistle a merry tune as they stroll down to the water with their rods over their shoulders, not necessarily concerned with catching fish. They have a bit of an “aww shucks” attitude towards fishing, blaming any lack of action on cold water and the fish not being hungry. After fishing for a few hours, these anglers will head home empty-handed but content in knowing that the fishing will get better when summer arrives.
While there’s nothing wrong with this nonchalant manner, anglers who casually fish or even skip over spring fishing can be missing out on some huge opportunities. As soon as the ice melts, fat crappie, bluegill, and other panfish begin pushing into shallow water in preparation for the spawn, offering some of the best fishing of the entire year. Whether you live in the north where the fish have only begun to move from their winter haunts, or in the south where panfish are already on or are just moving off their spawning beds, spring can be a time of plenty for panfish anglers who fish in the right spots and use the right equipment and fishing methods.
Fish With Light TackleLight tackle is essential for spring panfish success. Not only does it make the smaller fish more fun to catch, but it also helps anglers with certain finesse fishing techniques. Anglers should use light-action rods strung with lighter 2- to 6-pound fluorocarbon or monofilament lines. These setups are ideal for fishing in cold water when you need to detect subtle strikes. Additionally, they’re perfect for smoothly and accurately casting lightweight lures and bait rigs long distances when searching for spread-out panfish.
Look For Warm WaterAs water warms throughout the spring, panfish become more active and will begin to seek out areas with the ideal depth, terrain, and water temperatures (between 55 and 67 degrees) for the spawn. These spots are generally in sheltered coves with firm bottoms that have a lot of access to cover. While there can be a lot of places that fit this description, there are certain areas to concentrate your efforts.
“During the early part of the season, I look for south-facing bays that get a lot of sun and have mid- to upper-40-degree water temperatures,” Minnesota fishing guide Wil Neururer told MeatEater.
“Once the water starts to heat up later in the spring, to the more 50- and 60-degree water temperatures, I’ll start hunting for those classic, shallow back bays because those are the first spots that those fish are going to go into,” Neururer said. “They’ll use little deep spots in those bays during cold fronts, and they’ll move out into the shallows and structure when it’s sunny. I also like to look in channels between bays or even between different lakes because both crappie and bluegill will stack up in those spots.”
Use Live Bait During Early SpringWhile there are a myriad of different panfish lures during the early spring when the fish are sluggish and spooky, it’s hard to go wrong with live bait. Whether you’re targeting suspended crappie in deep holes or sunfish warming up on shallow flats, fishing slow with baits like minnows, worms, crickets, or leeches will draw a lot more strikes than lures.
The best way to rig these baits is with a spring bobber rig. These bobbers are narrower than traditional round bobbers and create less water resistance, which allows you to better detect subtle strikes and ensure that the fish will hang on to the bait long enough so that your hooksets will hit the mark.
To set it up, pull the spring back to expose the notch on the end of the bobber and then hook a small loop of line into the notch. Release the spring so that the line is locked into the bobber. Tie a small size 12 to 8 bait hook to the line and then add the bait. You can adjust this rig to suit a variety of depths, setting it up so that your bait always hangs just above the bottom, where panfish are suspended. Once you’re dialed in on the depth, add a small split shot to the line about a foot above the bait and you’ll be ready to go.
Fish Small then BigIn the early spring when the water is cold, panfish will be less apt to take on larger meals. However, as the water gets warmer throughout the season, you’ll start having more luck on larger baits, so being aware of the water temperature is crucial.
“The cooler the water, the more micro I will go,” Neururer said. “I’ll even fish with just a plain hook and a sinker that’s more finesse and will cause less disturbance. However, when the water is in the 60s I’ll start using bigger baits. Fish like crappies aren’t afraid to choke. I’ve even had times when I’m fishing for walleyes with a four- or five-inch shiner and start hooking into crappie, so you won’t be going wrong with using something bigger during those warm water conditions. It’s a lot of fun when you start getting into panfish on that kind of stuff.”
Fish Deep to Shallow When Fishing from ShoreAs panfish move into their spawning areas, they will stack up and feed in a variety of different depths. They’ll hold near deep water structures, over underwater springs, around weed beds, and off the shallow edges of their spawning areas. Exactly where they’re holding will depend on the body of water in question and what stage of the spawn the fish are currently in.
While electronics can help to key in on the fish, if you’re not precisely sure where panfish are feeding, your best bet is to start with the deeper areas of the water first and then systematically work into shallow water. Start fishing in 8 to 10 feet of water or as far out from shore as you can cast. If you don’t have any luck within a few minutes, reel your line in a few feet. Keep repeating this process of fishing in different depths and working your baits into shallower water until you strike paydirt and start having consistent strikes.
Start Fishing with Lures in Late SpringIn late spring when panfish are spawning or transitioning into the post-spawn, they’ll become extremely aggressive. While these fish will still strike live baits, it can be more fun and even more productive to use lures. Casting and retrieving small spinners, spoons, and even tiny crankbaits like the Creme and the Bitsy Minnow can catch you a lot of fish, especially when panfish are feeding in open water. However, if you really want to stack up some true slabs in the cooler, you can’t go wrong with soft plastics.
“Small paddle tails on light jigs are great for both bluegill and crappie in late spring,” Neururer said. “But I’ll even boost up to a big three- or four-inch paddle tail or even a Berkley Gulp Minnow, which is when it gets really fun because that’s when you get into the big ones. A four-inch paddle tail that’s really moving and causing commotion will usually be smashed by the biggest fish in the school.”
Try Sight FishingWhen fishing for spring panfish in clear water, you can have a lot of luck sight fishing. You can do this by both looking for the fish’s nests which appear as small, bright patches of sand along the bottom or by spotting the fish themselves. This is especially effective on bright and sunny days that occur directly after a cold front when the fish are in search of shallow, warm water.
Search shallow areas immediately adjacent to structures like weed beds, woodpiles, and boat docks that offer fish in easy places to hide. You have to be stealthy in these situations as the fish can be extremely spooky, so using a trolling motor or slowly stalking along the bank into casting range is vital for success. Once you spot a fish, try to cast past them with a small jig, crankbait, or even a bait rig, and then try to work the bait or lure back towards them until they spot it. This can make for some fun fishing as the panfish will often rocket in and aggressively smash the bait.
Look for PredatorsIf you’re not seeing or catching any panfish in a fishing spot, it’s often a good idea to start looking for predators. Fish like bass, pickerel, and pike frequent the same areas as panfish during the spring and often depend upon the smaller fish as a food source. Aerial predators like ospreys, herons, and gulls can also be a sign that there are panfish in a certain area.
When you’re not having a lot of luck, finding these predators can tell you a lot about where panfish may be hiding. Spotting birds hovering around or frequenting an area often means you should head in that direction. Likewise, if you’re seeing or hooking into a lot of larger predators like bass, it means you’re in the ballpark of where the panfish are feeding, and it will only take a small adjustment of fishing in deeper or shallower water to start catching the fish you’re after.
“Largemouth are a really good indicator of panfish presence,” Neururer said. “They’ll even show up to areas first to both spawn and feed, so don’t get annoyed if you end up hooking into four or five bass because it means that there are panfish around and you’re going to get into them if you just keep trying.”
Jig Around CoverNo matter the time of year, targeting panfish around heavy cover is always a good idea. During both the pre and post-spawn, large bluegills will push themselves into stands of reeds or cattails or will hide beneath algae mats, lily pads, and docks as a way of protecting themselves against predators. Crappies will do the same thing, but they will also spawn in areas of deep cover around the root systems of trees, under overhanging banks, or within submerged vegetation.
Finding these points of cover is vital to spring-fishing success, and anglers looking to catch a mess of panfish often have to get their baits and lures right into the thick of it. This can be done with several different methods, but it usually works best by jigging.
Using a small 1/32- to 1/16-ounce marabou jig or plain jig head baited with a worm or minnow, you can drop your bait right into the center of thick patches of cover and trigger panfish into striking by making small pulsing jigs with your rod tip. Though this is most effective when done from a boat, shore anglers can also have a lot of luck by jigging off of the end of docks and along the edges of undercut banks. Panfish will dash out quickly from these spots to strike jigs before dashing back into cover again.
Have Fun and Keep it SimpleThere’s a casual joy in targeting panfish. It’s one of those simple pleasures in life where high populations of voracious fish will happily gulp down almost any bait or lure you put in the water. While these tips are helpful, spring panfish fishing is not supposed to be a complicated or challenging angling style that requires a ton of specialized equipment and know-how. Rather, with the fish moving into shallow water and willing to strike, spring panfishing is just an easy way to have some fun on the water after a long winter. So once you’re on top of the fish, it's best to try and channel your own inner Andy Griffith and just sit back, take it easy, and enjoy it while it lasts.
Feature image via Tosh Brown.
This week, Cal talks about legislation, regulation wins and failures, as well as overdrawn tags.
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This week, Brent gives you the low down on setting trotlines for catfish. As traditional as it is effective, trotline fishing has been around forever because it works! Setting one up is something you can do yourself, and Brent's here to walk you through it. He'll also share a cautionary tale about packing for an expedition, and a sad solution to forgotten taters. As Clay Newcomb might say, you ain't gonna wanna miss this one!
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Steve Rinella talks with Craig Harper, Jason Phelps, and Seth Morris.
Topics include: Tree stand accidents; season delays; the special little tree cuts and our Line One turkey call; managing habitat for hunting; the launch of The Element's "Buck Truck" series; MeatEater and Jani's new gear giveaway; Chat GPT's anti-hunting bias; the various turkey slams; tasing turkeys; when your uncle claims your deer as his own; adaptive resource management; long spurs and selectivity; when the the objective is the quality of the herd; the debate over early vs. later season; initiating the nest and when multiple hens lay in the same spot; being on the curve and turkey reintroduction; historic highs; the need to define "wildlife" and managing with specificity; the edge and the interior; being where they wanna go; and more.
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This week, Cal talks about Camp Greyling, bills that threaten LWCF, Polish pheasants, and so much more.
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This week on This Country Life, Brent introduces you to a few of his turkey hunting mentors, and tells stories of chasing wily gobblers everywhere from river bottoms to ridge tops. Looking to find a mentor of your own? Brent's gonna tell you how you might.
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This week Tony and I kick off a multi-week series exploring the equally fantastic and fraught journey of attempting to raise a future hunting/angling/outdoors kid, and in this episode we share the lessons we've learned up to this point in our own parenting journeys and the questions and concerns we still have for the years to come.
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This week on the show, Jason is joined in the field by guest John Weik as they discuss their recent turkey hunt. They discuss separating themselves from other hunters in the area, both in terms of distance and strategy.
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Jordan and Janis discuss a young woman’s 32-day turkey Grand Slam, their personal backcountry stove systems, how Janis protects his kids’ ears, inserts for hunting boots, Nemo’s Roamer car-camping pad, and handling leather boots in wet conditions.
If you have a question you want to submit to Gear Talk for discussion, email geartalk@themeateater.com. Want to comment on this episode? Visit https://www.themeateater.com/listen/gear-talk and join the conversation.
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Brody Henderson, Hayden Sammak, Seth Morris, Chester Floyd, Randall Williams, Tressa Croaker and Morgan Jacobsen
n this episode of Bear Grease, part two of our Conman series on the double life of Asa Forrest Carter, Clay Newcomb dives into the gritty details of the violence, hate, and conspiracy philosophies of the first 45 years of his life and how, in the last decade of his life, he transformed into an unrecognizable, “Cherokee Indian” author who wanted to be America’s next Hemmingway – and almost did it. Once again, author of Unmasking the Klansman, Dr. Dan T Carter and Steve Rinella of MeatEater lead the way as his guests. Brace yourself because this winding trail will be treacherous as they talk about the beating of jazz singer Nat King Cole, read from the Unabomber’s Manifesto, and begin to understand how Asa Carter did what he did. We’re going neck deep into the mind of a Conman. We really doubt you’re gonna wanna miss this one…
Audio excerpts courtesy of “The Reconstruction of Asa Carter”
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On this weeks episode, Tyler Jones and K.C. Smith recap the first episode of their Meateater series "Buck Truck." The guys talk everything about deer hunting in Nebraska. From past years hunts and tactics, to the events that unfolded on the first episode of "Buck Truck." You won't want to miss this!
On this episode, which happens to be the 100th Foundation's show, Tony discusses how when hunting opportunities go away, they don't come back. He also explores his vision for the future of hunting, and how we have an obligation to leave something positive in our wake for the next generation of whitetail hunters.
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Topics include: Opinions on eavesdropping; when you're a New York Times Selling Best Author every time; go get "Only the Dead," Jack Carr's latest novel; novelizations and when a prequel sequel of a movie is a book; show business lessons; when 18,000 dairy cows die in an explosion at a Texas dairy farm; wolverine sightings in Oregon for the first time in three decades; K-leather; conservation surveys; when a flunking soap opera actor narrates your book and you have to wait ten years to re-record it yourself; going into the cave; when you legitimately consider yourself an author; waning accountability; history of war lessons; the Taliban as a guest of Afghanistan; Hemmingway's typewriter; heavy with acronyms; Chapter 10 of “MeatEater” narrated by Steve; and more.
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This week Cal talks about the Palmetto Florida Muscovy Massacre, legislation, and prairie chickens.
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This week on This Country Life, Brent Reaves shares the stuff in his pockets -- what some of you might call his "every day carry." From a 10 year old buckeye to a gold dollar coin, Brent walks you through each item you can expect him to have on his person, why he carries it, and why he thinks you should, too. So come on in and find out what makes Brent's EDC short list -- after this, you might just add a few items to yours!
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This week on the show I’m joined by conservationist and author Ben Long to discuss the tools, skills, and knowledge necessary to raise hell for hunting, fishing, wildlife, and wild places.
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On this episode of the Bear Grease Render, the crew convenes in Missouri for some spring turkey hunting. Clay Newcomb is joined by veteran Meateater videographers Loren Moulton and Dave Gardner as well as Brent Reaves, who you can now hear every Friday on this same feed on his new podcast This Country Life. The crew recaps the triumphs and pitfalls of chasing those wisened longbeards in the spring woods before turning their attention to Forest, or should we say Asa, Carter’s “The Education of Little Tree.” The crew discusses how remarkable it is that Asa Carter was able to pull off this deception, whether or not this was an arc of repentance and redemption or if it was just a con, and the decision to give this to their kids to read or not. I really doubt you’re gonna wanna miss this one…
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Janis Putelis Clay Newcomb, Danielle Prewett, Jordan Budd, Tyler Jones, Mark Kenyon, Tony Peterson and Phil Taylor.
On this weeks episode, Tyler Jones and K.C. Smith take questions from our recent Instagram stories. We take the time and answer all of your questions from best pizza to deer and hog hunting tips. We will do more of these in the future so keep an eye out on Instagram for some more Q & A's. Thanks for listening!
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Hunting Apparel: First Lite Hunting
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Greg's Texas Public Land Turkey
Missouri Turkey Hunt | Huge Rainbow Trout!!
3....2....1...SHOOT! Texas Hog Hunting
On this week's show, Tony discusses how to decide if a kill plot is right for your situation, and then how to make one actually happen. He explains the process of testing soil, picking seed varieties, and setting realistic expectations around establishing a little whitetail buffet in the woods.
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Steven Rinella talks with Janis Putelis, Clay Newcomb, Brent Reaves, Tony Peterson, Jason Phelps, Jordan Budd, and Phil Taylor.
Topics include: Phil's haircut; when the time comes for butt probes; trail cam bans and folks caught peeing; the new podcast on our network, “This Country Life with Brent Reaves"; bear meat vending machines in Japan; akern shortages; the story behind Steve's sighting of the hairy belly fanny pack; the punishment for mistaking a husky pup for a wolf; the time when Clay raised deer; the fish doorbell; beating the system; arguing over hunting mule deer vs. whitetail; dumpin' carrots as habitat improvement; Jani and Jordan’s "Gear Talk" podcast; raffle and sweepstakes law; Legoland; and more.
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This week, Cal talks about rolling the dice on fish fillets, legislation that effects you, and so much more.
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Welcome to episode one of This Country Life! Today, we meet your host Brent Reaves: a family man and life long outdoorsman whose familial roots in rural Arkansas can be traced back over 150 years. As a way of introduction, Brent shares two of his favorite stories, taking us from schoolyard hi-jinx to riding out a lightning storm in a washed-out muskrat burrow. You're not gonna want to miss this addition to the Bear Grease lineup.
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This week, I'm joined by MeatEater's own Tony Peterson to talk turkey. On this episode, we answer a couple listener questions, talk pressured birds, and dive into turkey calling strategy. Tony is a certified turkey killer, and if you're a turkey hunter, you're not going to want to miss this.
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This week on the show we’re joined by Whit Fosburgh and Aaron Field, from the TRCP, to discuss the biggest conservation bill of the year and how WE can help get it passed.
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Jordan and Janis answer listener submitted questions. But first, an organizational gear hack Jordan stumbled upon while in the city and Janis’ continued lion hunting fails. They give their take on the best gun if you can only have one; clothing options for hike-and-sit whitetail hunting versus slow tracking-style whitetail hunting, which also translates to mountain hunting; rangefinding binoculars vs binos and a rangefinder; white gas vs canister stoves; the weight of their hunting packs; and what gear to buy that will actually save weight in your pack.
If you have a question you want to submit to Gear Talk for discussion, email geartalk@themeateater.com. Want to comment on this episode? Visit https://www.themeateater.com/listen/gear-talk and join the conversation.
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On this weeks episode, Tyler Jones and K.C. Smith sit down with one of their cameramen Greg Latham and discuss his recent turkey hunt. We talk about the success he had and how it all went down! Thanks for listening
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Greg's Texas Public Land Turkey
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Brody Henderson, Rick Hutton, Ryan Callaghan, Cory Calkins, Corinne Schneider, Paul Lewis, Ian Fraizer, and Phil Taylor.
On this episode of Bear Grease Clay Newcomb talks with New York Times best selling author Steve Rinella and Dr. Dan T. Carter, professor emeritus at the University of South Carolina about black-listed book “The Education of Little Tree.” The book, an alleged semi-autobiographical story about a Cherokee boy growing up in southern Appalachia, was written by Forest Carter, which was the false identity of famed white supremicist, Ku Klux Klan chapter founder and speech writer for Governor George Wallace, Dan Carter. In part 1, Clay reflects on the honest, insightful, and empathetic context of the book and explores the nuance and dissonance of what to do with with art in light of an artist’s beliefs. I really doubt you’re gonna to wanna miss this one…
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On a late September day in Montana, a group of my colleagues and I here at MeatEater collaborated with a team of archeologists to butcher a bison using an Ice Age tool kit made of stone. The goal was to create a collection of tools and bones that might help unravel the mystery of how our fellow hunters survived thousands of years ago.
Researchers are still analyzing the data collected during this experiment, but we will follow up with the results as soon as the study is published.
Steve Rinella talks with Ian Frazier, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Steve Rinella talks with Ian Frazier, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics include: Frazier's bajillion books and articles in The New Yorker; the Lakota word, ichipasisi; Steve's piece about fishing in the turbine, which led to his big break; the "weights in fish" guys plead guilty; a correction on a correction about Dale Hollow Lake; rewards for turning in bands and the million dollar phesant; a note to the hater; how many pythons are really out there; circumpolar distribution; globigerina ooze; Steelhead Joe; the Chukchi hunters; seal liver with angel hair pasta; not wanting to live near other writers; hog distribution maps overlaid with voting maps; the Bronx; the in between-ness of a place; steamboat explosions; and more.
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This week, Cal talks about peacocks, bear meat, winter kill, and so much more.
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Steven Rinella and Luke Combs bring you a special episode of “Chetiquette” with Chester Floyd and the rest of the MeatEater crew.
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This week on the show I’m joined by Kip Adams, Chief Conservation Officer for the National Deer Association, to discuss the current state of whitetails across the country and the opportunities we have to create a better future for deer and deer hunting.
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On this weeks episode, Tyler Jones and K.C. Smith talk with their crew about their recent turkey hunts. First up, Greg Latham and Michael Stoll tell us how they killed a bird on public land in Texas. Later Brian Bostic and Eric Gentry tell us how they doubled up on some birds as well! Check out some of our latest turkey action over on our YouTube channel! Thanks for listening.
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Hunting Apparel: First Lite Hunting
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Greg's Texas Public Land Turkey
Missouri Turkey Hunt | Huge Rainbow Trout!!
3....2....1...SHOOT! Texas Hog Hunting
On this episode of the Bear Grease Render, Clay Newcomb travels down south to chase a Mississippi long beard. Joined by Lake Pickle, Jordan Blissett, and assistant to the regional producer, Isaac Neale, the crew talk about their favorite memories from their time at Primos, recount the morning’s hunt, describe the ubiquitous and iconic historic property from which they recorded es, and an unscheduled call in from the one and only Will Primos. You’re not gonna wanna miss this one…
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Brody Henderson, Clay Newcomb, Danielle Prewett, KC Smith, Mark Kenyon, Brent Reaves, Jason Phelps, Tony Peterson and Phil Taylor.
On this week's show, Tony talks about how there are no bad encounters with deer while you're turkey hunting. The sightings, and even the deer you spook while chasing longbeards, all provide valuable intel for you fall hunts if you're willing to pay attention.
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Steve Rinella talks with Chris Murray, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics include: Mark Kenyon's Working for Wildlife tour; pre-order Catch a Crayfish, Count the Stars; the 62-pound beaver with a mushroomed .22 in the back of the head; an update from Home Range's Trap-a-Cat project; the first captured, collared, released wolverine in Utah; the final word on refried beans; Kansas' ban on trail cams; when you steal a gator egg, hatch it, and then raise that gator for 20 years; the definition of estivate; inspired by Steve Irwin; stinky gator stomachs; smelling underwater; temperature-based sex selection; how gators are good moms; the nest chirping noise; conservation and egg return; long life spans; how to properly capture a gator; the robust innate immune system; sensitivity to ecotoxins; gator blood; holding breath under water for seven hours; and more.
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This week Cal talks about Recovering America's Wildlife Act, antelope accidents, urban wildlife, and so much more.
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Kneeling on hard water and drilling through inches of ice in arctic-like conditions—ice fishing is just plain cold.
Don’t dress right, and it can be miserable. But a quality pair of ice fishing bibs can keep you on the ice longer, up your odds, and even help save your life.
Jump to: The Ice Fishing Bibs We Use
What We Look for in Good Fishing BibsIn our collective decades on ice in the harshest of winters, we’ve put plenty of pairs to the test. Some kept us warm, dry, and focused on the mission, while others ruined otherwise awesome days of fishing with leaks, tears, and chills. But the bibs we always go back to have a few things in common.
- Warmth
- Waterproofness
- Comfort
- Durable Functionality
We’re looking for a warm, weatherproof pair that provides long-lasting performance without sacrificing a comfortable fit.
Jump to: What Makes a Good Ice Fishing Bib
The Ice Fishing Bibs We UseThe MeatEater crew has donned these bibs on the ice—and water—and they’ve outperformed all the others.
| Eskimo Superior Barrier Bibs Jay & Chester's Pick | First LiteRefuge Bib Cal's Pick | Simms Challenger Insulated Fishing Bib Seth's Pick | | --- | --- | --- | | Highlight | Best Overall | Most Versatile | Most Durable | | Insulation | N/A | Body-mapped 37.5Synthetic Gen III Insulation | Body-mapped Primaloft | | Shell | DuraDry polyester | 4.5L waterproof polyester | 100% Nylontwo-layer Toray | | Waterproof | Yes | Yes | Yes | | Flotation | Yes | No | No | | Price | $320 * | $500 * | $300 * | | Shop Now | Shop Now | Shop Now | | Field Notes | Field Notes | Field Notes |
*Estimated Price on 03/31/23What Makes a Good Ice Fishing BibIce fishing demands a unique combination of protection and performance in top-tier gear. These are the key qualities we look for in a pair of ice fishing bibs.
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WarmthSitting on ice in sub-freezing weather for hours on end calls for clothing that can seal in heat and keep your core temperature from dropping. Great ice fishing bibs will offer sufficient insulation or act as a barrier over insulation pieces as part of an overall kit that allows for shedding and adding layers as conditions change. They should also be windproof to block blustery gusts. Lined hand warmer pockets or built-in muffs are great features to look for, too.
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WaterproofnessCold water splashing up, ice melting beneath your body heat—your ice fishing getup needs to completely shield you from moisture, not just resist it. So a 100% waterproof bib is non-negotiable. Additional features such as fully taped seams and waterproof zipper technology can also help prevent leaks in vulnerable spots.
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ComfortWhile a pair of bibs that protects you from the elements is important, you still need to be able to move around comfortably when ice fishing. A great bib will offer room for layering without being too bulky, adjustability to achieve a tailored fit, a design built for mobility, and overall comfort.
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Durable FunctionalityLike our other outdoor gear, ice fishing bibs are bound to take some abuse through years of hard use. We need a pair that can stand up to the rigors of hard water while offering the functionality needed to make them a utilitarian part of our ice fishing toolkit. Reinforced fabric in high-wear areas, removable knee pads, side zips, and smart storage pockets can take ice fishing bibs from good to great.
Flotation Assistance No matter the safety precautions you take, some level of risk is always involved when walking on hard water. Trap door ice, thin ice, and ice that’s continually disturbed by icebreaker ships can easily give way and leave ice anglers fighting for their lives.
Most people who don’t survive a breakthrough die from drowning, not hypothermia. So ensuring you can stay at the surface rather than sink into frigid water and get trapped underneath the ice is critical.
That’s why many ice fishing bibs—and jackets—are outfitted with flotation aids that add buoyancy in case of such an emergency, such as the Uplyft Breathable Flotation assistance in Eskimo’s Superior Barrier Bibs.
If you’re ice fishing early in the season, treading onto questionable ice, or just want the added peace of mind, look for a pair of bibs with some type of flotation assistance. But keep in mind even the best flotation assistance is engineered to increase your odds in a worst-case scenario and not intended for testing the limits.
Field notes from the MeatEater Crew Jay & Chester's PickBest Overall Eskimo Superior Barrier Bibs Price: $320 "It's an ice angler’s dream." Chester Floyd Buy on geteskimo.com Buy on amazon.com Part of Eskimo’s modular Superior System, these bibs are designed to provide a durable, weatherproof barrier over optional mid-layers for added insulation in temps down to -49 degrees.
"With the customizable system, I'm never too warm when trekking across the ice in the Insulator puffy pants. And when I get to my fishing spot, I can slip into my Barrier Bib shell for maximum warmth and comfort," Chester said.
Built-in adjustability in the shoulder straps, waist, and fold-up hem, as well as a gusseted crotch provide a tailored fit and optimal mobility.
"These are form-fitting and not as bulky or heavy as some other systems I've used in the past—still allowing me to beat my friends as we run to the tip-ups," Jay said.
Fully taped seams, reinforced wear points, and a DuraDry exterior guarantee long-lasting performance in the fiercest conditions.
"As a run-and-gun ice fisherman, I often don't take the time to set up a seat on the ice. I'm kneeling, and the heavy-duty knee pads definitely make a huge difference at the end of the day," Jay said. "Aside from lots of storage on these bibs, I really like the waterproofing, as we always get splashed by the water off the auger when cutting holes."
With a full feature set—including Uplyft Breathable Flotation assistance—and plenty of versatility, Eskimo Superior Barrier Bibs check all the boxes for a solid ice fishing setup.
"Removable knee pads, wicked-smart floatation assistance, and most importantly, their waterproof membrane—it's an ice angler's dream," Chester said.
Specifications * Insulation: N/A * Shell: DuraDry polyester * Waterproof: Yes * Flotation: Yes * Price: $320
Cal's PickMost Versatile First Lite Refuge Bib Price: $500 "Stretch your budget, not your closet." Ryan Callaghan Buy on firstlite.com First Lite's Refuge Bib was built with waterfowlers in mind, but it's just as functional in an ice shanty as a duck blind.
"The First Lite Refuge Bib has been my go-to for ice fishing," Cal said. "I have a couple of other options, but I prefer a bib that will keep me warm, is water-resistant, has easy access to inside layers, and will pull double duty."
Featuring 300g 37.5 Synthetic Gen III Insulation in the seat, 200g in the legs, 160g in the back and body, and 60g in the hand warmer muff, the waterproof Refuge Bib layers well over the rest of your kit for customized warmth and sports full-length size sips for easy on and off. Shield foam in the seat and knees adds a layer of cushion and insulation on cold, icy surfaces.
"From mud-covered waterfowl field hunts to wind-blown, hard-water perch missions, the Refuge Bib makes a ton of sense," Cal said. "Stretch your budget, not your closet."
Specifications * Insulation: Body-mapped 37.5 Synthetic Gen III Insulation * Shell: 4.5L waterproof polyester * Waterproof: Yes * Flotation: No * Price: $500
Seth's PickMost Durable Simms Challenger Insulated Fishing Bib Price: $300 "I've been running them all season and absolutely love the abrasion panels on areas that get the most wear." Seth Morris Buy on simmsfishing.com Reinforced with high abrasion-resistant oxford nylon in the seat, knees, and cuffs, the Simms Challenger Insulated Fishing Bib is engineered to take a beating on the ice.
"I've been running them all season and absolutely love the abrasion panels on areas that get the most wear," Seth said.
The legs are backed by 100g PrimaLoft, while the upper body features 80g insulation. A waterproof storm flap over the front zipper locks out moisture, and the high-back design with adjustable suspenders allows for a comfortable, tailored fit.
With a lightweight construction that doesn’t limit mobility, the Simms Challenger Insulated Fishing Bib isn’t limited to just ice fishing.
"They're also great for open-water fishing out of a boat in colder weather conditions," Seth said.
Specifications * Insulation: Body-mapped PrimaLoft * Shell: 100% nylon two-layer Toray * Waterproof: Yes * Flotation: No * Price: $300
Ask ten different hunters how often they clean their guns, and you’re liable to get ten different answers–and start a fight while you’re at it. For such a mundane task, scraping the fouling from a gun’s barrel and action can stir up some serious emotion.
Asking the Internet doesn’t help much, either. This Quora thread on the topic features yelly, ALL CAPS responses, book-length answers, and odd references to genitalia. One respondent maintains that gun owners “fetishize” gun cleaning, while another describes the task as a “Zen experience.”
It’s impossible to say precisely how often you should clean your guns, but let’s try to cut through some of this fouling and get to the shiny truth of the matter. This advice focuses primarily on long guns but many of these principles can be applied to other types of firearms as well.
Accuracy Is EverythingI surveyed the MeatEater crew and reached out to some of the country’s largest gun manufacturers, and as expected, the advice I received landed all over the map. MeatEater’s Director of Hunt and Fish and a competitive shooter, Garrett Long, told me it’s usually a “long time” between cleanings.
“If you talk to Precision Rifle Series competitors, nearly all of them will tell you to clean it after about 1,000 rounds,” he said.
On the other end of the spectrum, Weatherby recommends cleaning your rifle after every single trip to the range or the field. They say that since a rifle can show signs of decreased accuracy after as few as 30 rounds, a gun should be cleaned around that point.
Despite these widely divergent recommendations, everyone I spoke with agreed that accuracy should be a key indicator of when it’s time to break out the CLP.
“Once you start seeing your accuracy open up, if I’m using the same or similar ammo, I always clean out my bore,” Rich Spalla told me. Spalla is the product manager for Sig Sauer’s CROSS bolt action rifle and an instructor at the Sig Sauer Academy.
When he brings a new rifle to the range for the first time, he begins by following the manufacturer’s break-in instructions, which often include cleaning at various intervals. After that, a barrel’s accuracy will likely improve with a small amount of fouling but then slowly degrade as the fouling builds up along the lands and grooves.
How much accuracy degrades depends on your specific gun and how you use it. If you’re a competitive shooter tracking minute changes in group sizes, you might clean it more often than a weekend warrior plinking at the range.
MeatEater’s Janis Putelis uses accuracy as a guide and finds that he doesn’t need to clean his rifles as often as he used to.
“I used to clean my guns a lot. Every 20 rounds,” he said. “But I soon realized that I wasn't gaining anything. My accuracy wouldn't improve with a clean gun and I wasn't hurting the gun by leaving the barrel dirty.”
Now, Putelis says he cleans his rifle’s barrels every 200 or 300 rounds. Spalla agreed that 200 to 250 rounds is a good rule of thumb.
There is one big caveat, Spalla said. It may take several years for some hunters to shoot through 300 rounds or for their rifle’s accuracy to begin to degrade. If that’s the case, he recommends cleaning the barrel at least once a year to avoid carbon corrosion.
“Having your barrel slightly coated with carbon isn’t always a bad thing, but if you left it in there for a year it could start chewing away at your gun,” he said.
Bottom line? Clean your rifle’s barrel when group sizes expand, or at least once a year.
Can Frequent Cleaning Damage a Barrel?Some gun owners worry that cleaning a rifle too frequently will damage a bore faster than shooting it dirty. They claim that the harsh cleaning agents and copper wire brushes will wear down the lands and grooves and permanently damage accuracy.
I asked Spalla about this, and he said that frequent cleaning won’t damage most barrels as long as the user follows the instructions that come with the bore solvent. The most important thing is to remember to never leave a solvent inside a barrel longer than recommended.
“Solvent can definitely get into your bore if you let it sit in there,” he said. “It could cause corrosion and pitting. These chemicals are pretty harsh and could break down the composition of certain materials in a barrel.”
The Weatherby Service Team agreed. I posed this question to a representative of the company’s team of gunsmiths and technicians, and he said that most standard cleaning solutions should pose no issue if they are thoroughly removed with a few waves of clean patches at the end of the cleaning process.
As for the brush, most Weatherby gunsmiths prefer a nylon brush, but that’s only because copper brushes will degrade when using a copper remover. Copper brushes, they said, shouldn’t harm a barrel as long as the user follows the recommended procedure.
Don’t Forget about MoistureSo far, I’ve focused exclusively on barrel cleaning. But there are many other parts of a gun that need TLC. Even if you wait 500 rounds to clean a barrel, you should still make sure that rust isn’t eating away at other components.
“Rust prevention is my primary concern. Do whatever it takes to mitigate moisture accumulation,” said MeatEater’s Ryan Callaghan.
Callaghan told me that he “de-gunks” his gun’s bolt by hosing it down with Break Free CLP. He lets it dry, applies a small amount of oil or dry lube, and works that into action.
Long recommended cleaning non-barrel components frequently, and Putelis’s regular cleaning routine is focused “more on the outside of the gun than the inside of the barrel.”
“Most of my gun care happens after the gun has experienced heavy moisture. At the minimum, the gun will be wiped down and oiled, but preferably I'd take apart the action and make sure all moisture is wiped away. I'll also run a bore snake down the barrel to remove any moisture,” he said.
This is especially important for hunters, but anyone who takes a firearm outside should do a once-over before returning the safe queen to her throne. Moisture can accumulate even when it isn’t raining, so it’s always a good idea to field strip your rifle, wipe it down with Break Free or a similar product, and apply a light layer of oil.
If you’re running a semi-automatic rifle, it’s even more important to make sure the non-barrel components are clean and properly oiled. A gunky bolt-action rifle can still be cycled with a little elbow grease, but a dirty autoloader will go down for the count. Even though constant cleaning may not be strictly necessary, it’s crucial that these types of actions aren’t allowed to get too dirty.
Barrels can also suffer from moisture accumulation. Even if you don’t do a thorough bore cleaning, Spalla recommended running an oiled patch through the barrel after hunting or shooting.
“You spend a lot of money on a gun, and the most important part of that gun is your rifle barrel,” he said. “If I’m going to store it for any period of time, I slap an oily patch down it.”
Last ShotCleaning your guns not only keeps them in good condition. It can also make you a more proficient shooter and hunter.
“When you’re cleaning a firearm, you’re looking for anything that could be wrong, and you’re understanding better how it works. What it looks like when it’s clean or dirty or pitted. Those are good things to learn and understand,” Spalla pointed out. “You become a better shooter and a better hunter when you handle your equipment, which will help you yield the best results.”
Clean your barrel when accuracy starts to degrade or once a year, and clean the other components after every trip to the range. Above all else, make sure you wipe away moisture from both outside and inside the gun. If you stick to those three rules of thumb, your gun will stay accurate and functioning as long as you own it.
For a breakdown of some of our favorite cleaning products, check out this article.
Ryan Lampers has spring bear dialed!!! Year after year he finds success in multiple states and these aren’t just run of the mill bears, Ryan targets mature boars. In this episode Jason wanted to dig into all of Ryan’s spot and stalk bear hunting experience in hopes you can find something that may help you spring bear hunting this year. They discuss finding bears, how the weather will affect them, time of day to find them and how long to hang out in an area before moving on, amongst a bunch of other topics.
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This week we have Taylor Chamberlin on the podcast to discuss broadheads. We also discuss shot placement and why Taylor can’t have a deer running 100 yards after the shot. Taylor dives into mechanicals versus fixed blades and breaks down what he’s used and how they performed.
If you have a question you want to submit to Gear Talk for discussion, email geartalk@themeateater.com. Want to comment on this episode? Visit https://www.themeateater.com/listen/gear-talk and join the conversation.
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This week on Bear Grease, Clay Newcomb hosts another all-star cast of sure 'nuff dyed in the wool, turkey hunting storytellers. Gobbling turkeys create a rare intoxication for man. It’s exhilarating to call, get a response, and watch a long beard work into shotgun range. Each spring, the turkey hunter has the opportunity to step into a world he does not fully understand and participate in it for short windows of time… it’s a rare experience. On this episode we’ve got eight storytellers that'll help you get a glimpse of that rare experience. We have North Carolina novelist David Joy, Jimbo Ronquest tells a story of a Missouri turkey hunt with his father, and a couple great Mississippi stories from Billy Johnson and David Hitt Neill. We also have some old favorites: Gary “Believer” Newcomb, Brent Reaves and Andy Brown.…I really doubt you’re going to want to miss this one…
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Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Randall Williams, Brody Henderson, Hayden Sammak, Mike Kunz, and Phil Taylor
On this weeks episode, Tyler Jones and K.C. Smith sits down with their good buddy Brian Bostic and they discuss what YOU should be doing each month to meet your fall whitetail goals. They go around the room and give ideas of what you could be doing during the month of April and all of the others months as well! Don't forget to check out the YouTube channel and some of the most recent videos. Thanks for listening
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Hunting Apparel: First Lite Hunting
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I love tabbouleh salad. It’s bright, fresh, and somehow still satisfyingly filling. Bulgur wheat is the main ingredient in tabbouleh. It's basically cracked whole-grain wheat berries, and offers a hearty, slightly nutty, and chewy texture that is a great alternative to brown rice, quinoa, or couscous. Served the Middle Eastern way, bulgar wheat is fantastic in tabbouleh salad, a delicious side dish known for its heavy doses of freshly chopped herbs and vegetables. Sometimes, I’ll make a giant bowl and eat from it for several days. Tabbouleh keeps well refrigerated and is meant to be enjoyed cold.
Tabbouleh also tastes amazing paired with meats, especially these meatballs, which I made to resemble the flavor of kofta. If the weather is nice, take your cooking outside: Form the ground meat mixture around skewers and cook them on the grill instead of making meatballs.
During my formative years of turkey hunting, it was common advice to yelp softly three times and then shut the hell up. I don’t know why this was the standard, but it was. It clearly didn’t originate from hunters who spent lots of time in close proximity to wild hens.
The ladies are vocal, but they need to be relatively close for you to hear much of their chatter because when they are content, they often use their library voices. Having spent a stupid amount of time bowhunting turkeys from blinds, I feel like I’ve heard it all. I also feel like the hunter who hasn’t is missing out on making some calls that can really seal the deal on the whole thing.
Clucks & PurrsIf you use quality decoys and set up on a good food source, it’s only a matter of time before live hens will mix it up with your fakes. When they do, as long as they are relaxed, you’ll hear them purr and cluck.
These two calls are the equivalent of a doe out in the field who keeps her head in the beans and her tail waving back and forth. It’s an all-clear call, and it’s amazing for selling the ruse that your fakes, or your fakes and some real ladies, are just content to be there. I like to use a slate call, or a mouth call, to produce both.
To purr with a pot call, you just have to lightly drag the striker across the surface. With a mouth call, it’s a quiet rolling “R” sound, like if you were trying to whisper in Creole. If you really want to sound like a happy hen, punctuate your purrs with a soft cluck. Real turkeys make this sound a lot, and often if you have a tom that is locked up out of range, this can convince him it’s worth coming closer.
It’s also worth noting that a little scratching in the leaf litter can add a lot of realism to any setup. This is often considered a fall tactic, but it’s just as effective in the spring. Just pay attention to the one, one-two cadence of a real bird, and copy that while you’re calling.
CuttsNot all outside-the-box turkey calling involves staying quiet. Excited cutting mixed with equally excited yelping can be a great strategy. This is usually not something you hear a hen do when she’s alone—or thinks she’s alone. I don’t know if it’s a dominance thing or what, but if you learn to sharply cutt, and can excitedly yelp during the sequence, you can turn downtime into an adrenaline dump real fast.
I prefer a slate call for aggressive cutting, where you almost pop the striker on the surface. This is easy enough to lead to yelping if you have the skills. A better move is to use a mouth call and a slate call to cutt simultaneously, and then work into some back-and-forth yelping.
It’s also worth noting that if you do call a hen in and she either yelps or cutts at you, you should give her an aggressive cutting sequence back. The loud, staccato-like cutts do something to toms that are in earshot, and in my experience. This almost always gets nearby birds fired up enough to either come in or gobble their heads off.
Cutting also sounds like a call you don’t want to hear, which is a putt. This alarm call is the bane of many turkey hunters’ existence, but there is a way to shut it down. When a hen sees or hears something she doesn’t like, and starts putting, cutt at her—hard. Every time she putts, drown it out with your own cutting. For some reason, this often seems to diffuse the situation and can work to settle the nearby birds down. It’s also worth it if for no other reason than if you don’t, she’s going to leave and let everyone know she’s unhappy.
If you can’t get the right cutting sound with your slate or mouth calls, pick up a box call. This is a great option for loud, crisp, rapid-fire cutting.
Most hunters are aware of cutts, clucks, and purrs, but it’s how they put them to use that matters. Some situations call for a soft, subtle approach, while others require a louder-than-most sequence. Either way, learning how to use the turkey’s language to a higher level will help you call in more longbeards, and is almost a necessity if you hunt pressured birds.
If you want more turkey calling advice, check out these articles: 3 Calling Mistakes Every Turkey Hunter Makes, 3 Turkey Calls Every Hunter Should Own, and How To Call Pressured Turkeys.
On today's show, Tony discusses how easy it is to lose focus not only when we are actually hunting, but also scouting. He explains some ways to stay focused on the mission, which is something most deer hunters probably need to work on.
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Steven Rinella talks with Mike Kunz, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics include: When we called Mike Kunz the "Forest Gump of Archaeology"; the emperor of the north and the king of the west; dustpans of mosquitos; foxes running out of a gray whale carcass; the Alaska pipeline project; igneous intrusions; when you find Paleoindian projectile points in Alaska; the poor odds that you were the first person to find a thing that someone else dropped; how the Mesa site was discovered; the property of conchoidal fracture; direct tattoo evidence and direwolves; how everyone knew how to make projectile points; polar bears and climate change; the arctic small tool tradition; two iron pendants, two copper rings, and three blue glass beads; Occam's razor; going with the evidence you have; The Mesa Site: Paleoindians above the Arctic Circle; and more.
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When I turned 11, I didn’t realize I was in for the longest year of my life. The wait until 12, which was the legal hunting age in my home state of Minnesota back then, was torture. I wanted to hunt in the worst way, but it wasn’t like my dad was going to take me to a state with a younger minimum age requirement.
This was pretty standard for a long time in the deer world. Now, there are quite a few states with no minimum age, which leaves it up to the parents to decide. I’m all for that and took full advantage of it when Wisconsin did away with its youth restrictions.
My twin daughters started deer hunting a full three years before I did, and while it has been a fun ride, it has also been a real learning experience for all involved. The lessons are many, but three stick out to me as the most poignant.
It’s Their Hunt, Not YoursI’ve taken a lot of people hunting for the first time, and it has gone a variety of ways. I wanted them all to have success, but not in the same way I wanted my daughters to succeed when they started deer hunting.
It became a mission of mine to put any legal deer within 20 yards of them. What I didn’t realize in that single-minded pursuit was that they didn’t care nearly as much as I did. I wanted it so badly for them that I overlooked the fact that the whole experience was new to them, and not just a mission to kill as quickly as possible.
This meant a lot of things. For starters, it meant working around their schedule, their tolerance for boredom, and their willingness to handle the weather. In other words, even if there was a cold front in late October, it didn’t mean anything if they had school, or simply didn’t want to sit for four hours in sub-freezing temps.
We catered our sits to warmer, more pleasant weather during whatever weekends we had free. While my girls are pretty patient with hunting, they are still young. All-day sits weren’t going to happen, and I needed to think in terms of three or four-hour time frames at most. In so many ways, it became clear that when it was time for them to hunt, it was time for me to simply guide them. Once I did, it became a hell of a lot of fun.
Don’t Add To The PressureI’ve personally bow-killed probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 125ish big game animals. Even with a resume like that, I screw up all of the time. I still get buck fever, I still miss, and I still get busted.
I needed to remind myself of that, often, when I started hunting with my daughters. As bad as I wanted them to succeed, mistakes were inevitable. Some they made, some I made, but they happened on every hunt.
Some cost us deer, some didn’t. But they happened, and they’ll keep happening. It sucks in the moment, but the truth is, the best hunters aren’t made from easy success. They are made from failure. There might be nothing more valuable in creating a lifelong hunter than several years of mostly screwing up, punctuated by a few sweet moments of success.
Acknowledging that is a great step toward not putting more pressure on kids to succeed. It’s hard not to step in and do everything possible for them, but it’s worth it to give them a safe amount of autonomy in their close encounters with deer. And if they screw up, let it go.
Everything Is A LessonI started scouting with, and taking my daughters on my deer hunts, long before they actually hunted. I wanted them to learn about the process of being a hunter. Every blind we set up, camera we hung, or bit of sign we found, was a lesson in and of itself.
When we hunt together, the lessons come in many forms. How and when to move, what certain sounds mean in the woods, and what to do when a shot isn’t perfect. The list is endless, and it’s an amazing thing to be a part of, especially if you’re at the stage of your hunting career when so many aspects of a hunt are almost second nature.
This extends far beyond some of the obvious aspects of deer hunting, too. For example, if you put some level of your trophy standards on a young hunter, the potential for a bad hunt rises. Let them decide for themselves, before the hunt, but also when a deer walks in. My daughters talk a big game about deer, but when any legal deer is in front of them, they go from selective to bloodthirsty. There’s a lesson there, and it’s a good one for all of us to experience.
While I’ve learned these things from my twin girls, I’ve also learned something else about deer hunting with them—I enjoy it more when they hunt than when I do. I know that probably sounds crazy to some, but it’s true.
It’s also true that hunting with them has reminded me of, and taught me, so many important lessons.
If you want to read more about hunting deer, give these articles a look: How I Made Deer Hunting Fun Again, Why I Love To Shoot Young Bucks, and Where To Shoot A Deer.
Most stroganoff recipes will direct you to sear slices from a tender cut of meat like a ribeye. But I grew up eating a low and slow-cooked version using a roast such as a chuck or round. Using the braising liquid as the base of the sauce creates a phenomenal extra layer of deep flavor. Plus, I'd much rather save the nice cuts for another use.
This stroganoff may be more time-consuming, but the extra effort is well worth the wait. Fire up the crock pot or braise the meat in the oven a day ahead by following the steps below. The sauce will come together quickly after taking the time to pre-cook the meat.
This week Cal talks about rat lung worm via the slowest delivery method (snail), legislation, corrections, dock light fishing, and so much more.
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For a large portion of the 20th century, the .357 Magnum and the .44 Remington Magnum were the undisputed heavyweight champions of the handgun cartridge world. The .357 held that title for an impressive 20 years between 1935 and 1955, while the .44 Rem. Mag. was the king from its release in 1955 until the .454 Casull hit the market (as a wildcat in 1959 and as a standardized SAAMI cartridge in 1998, but who’s counting?).
These two legendary cartridges aren’t just for target shooting and Dirty Harry movies, either. They’ve taken everything from whitetail deer to grizzly bears through the bores of both large-frame revolvers and lever action rifles.
Either would make an excellent choice for handgun hunting, but which would win in a modern-day heavyweight bout? Read on to find out.
BallisticsI won’t belabor this point–the .44 Mag. is more powerful than the .357 Mag. It fires heavier, wider bullets the same speed as its smaller predecessor, which produces far more energy at the muzzle and terminal damage downrange.
These 158-grain Federal Fusion .357 Mag. loads, for example, exit a four-inch barrel at 1,240 feet-per-second (fps) and produce 539 foot-pounds (ft.-lbs.) of energy. These Federal Fusion .44 Mag. loads travel about the same speed (1,290 fps), but they use 240-grain bullets to do it. The heavier pills produce a whopping 887 ft.-lbs. of energy from that pistol-length barrel.
Trajectories at 100 yards are similar using those Federal Fusion bullets: the .357 drops 7.1 inches while the .44 Mag. drops 6.7 inches.
The .44 Mag. is more powerful in all handguns, but some might assume that a longer barrel changes this dynamic. Both cartridges are widely chambered in lever-action rifles, and it’s reasonable to wonder whether those extra inches make a difference.
In a word, not really. A 240-grain Federal Hydra-Shok .44 Mag. leaves an 18-inch barrel at 1,643 fps, according to Ballistics by the Inch. A 158-grain Federal Hydra-Shok .357 Mag. leaves the same barrel at 1,721 fps, but that slight velocity increase isn’t enough to close the energy gap.
Federal’s own data backs this up. In their HammerDown series, which is designed for lever guns, the .44 Mag. beats the .357 in velocity, energy, and trajectory.
Winner: .44 Remington Magnum
ShootabilityA cartridge’s recoil energy is highly dependent on a firearm’s weight, and that’s doubly true when it comes to handguns. Most people experience initial discomfort shooting a .44 Rem. Mag. through a revolver, but Chuck Hawks reports that the same cartridge is eminently manageable in a 7.5-pound rifle. In this scenario, a 240-grain projectile traveling 1,760 fps only produces about 11 ft.-lbs. of recoil energy. For comparison, a .308 Win. usually produces about 18 ft.-lbs.
But while a .44 Rem. Mag. is pleasant to fire from a rifle, the .357 Mag. still has it beat. It’s a delight to shoot with a heavy revolver, and in a lever-action rifle it only kicks with four to five foot-pounds of recoil energy. That’s just a little more recoil than a .223 Rem.
The .357 is easier to shoot than the .44 Rem. Mag., and it’s also easier on your wallet. The .357 is less expensive both in the hunting and plinking categories. You’ll pay about $0.70 per round for the cheapest .357, but you aren’t escaping with a box of .44 Rem. Mag. for less than a dollar per round. When it comes to quality hunting ammo, the .357 is usually 10-20% less expensive.
Winner: .357 Magnum
VersatilityIn his classic handbook, “Cartridges of the World,” Frank C. Barnes describes how most people articulate the versatility gap between the .357 and the .44 Rem. Mag. He says that while the .357 is “the best all-around handgun hunting cartridge for small and medium game,” it is “not fully adequate” for large game like elk and bear “unless used by an excellent marksman.”
The .44 Rem. Mag., on the other hand, “is one of the few commercial handgun cartridges that can be considered fully adequate for big game hunting.” He christens the “big .44” as capable of bringing down deer, black bear, elk, moose, and even big Alaskan brown bears.
These distinctions are fair, but Barnes is considering both cartridges as exclusively handgun rounds. Shot from a lever action rifle and when using modern hunting bullets, the .357 deserves a little more credit as a deer slayer.
That being said, it’s impossible to argue that the .357 is more versatile than the .44. Neither is considered an ideal varmint round, but the .44 can punch higher than the .357 to more easily take very large game like moose and brown bear.
Winner: .44 Remington Magnum
And the Winner Is…As the winner of two out of three categories, the .44 Rem. Mag. deserves the nod in this Caliber Battle. But your personal decision depends on whether the .44 Mag.’s added recoil is worth its versatility advantage. This is especially true if you plan to hunt with a handgun. Can you shoot the .44 accurately, and do you care about going after large game? If the answer to both questions is “Yes,” the .44 is the way to go. If the answer to either question is “No,” the .357 Mag. deserves a look. It’s a great short-range deer cartridge, especially in a rifle, and it’s cheaper and easier to shoot.
Overall Winner: .44 Remington Magnum
Poachers, smugglers, and other fish and game felons steal our shared natural resources, and “Cal’s Poaching Desk” is here with all the sordid details. For more stories of wildlife wrongdoing, be sure to tune in to “Cal’s Week in Review.” New episodes drop every Sunday.
Moose Paddle MurderA Minnesota man is being charged with second-degree murder after he killed another man with a moose paddle.
Twenty-seven-year-old Levi Axtell told authorities that he suspected 77-year-old Lawrence Scully of stalking his toddler-age daughter. Scully was convicted of molesting a six-year-old girl all the way back in 1979, but police haven’t said whether there was any truth to Axtell’s claims.
Whatever the case may be, Axtell decided to take matters into his own hands, according to CBS Minnesota. He crashed his car into a vehicle on Scully’s driveway, entered his home, and reportedly struck the older man 15 to 20 times with a shovel. Apparently, the shovel wasn’t quite doing the job because Axtell later told authorities that he grabbed a moose paddle and used it to “finish him off.”
Axtell turned himself in to the police immediately after the incident.
“Elk Fever”Another man turned himself in to authorities after a far-less-serious-but-still-grisly crime. The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife reported that a man blamed “elk fever” for his decision to shoot from a road into a herd of elk.
Officials have not identified the man, but the 66-year-old allegedly killed one elk and wounded at least three others with a rifle chambered in .308 Winchester. There were about 30 animals in the herd, and while he did possess a late-season cow elk tag, he ended up hitting at least two other cows and one bull.
Game wardens put down one of the cows and the bull, and the other cow swam into the Nehalem River, where officials believe she drowned.
The man harvested one of the cows and turned himself in after the landowner encouraged him to do so. He has been cited with one count of using a prohibited hunting method and two counts of unlawful take of an elk.
I’m not a doctor, but if this man is suffering from elk fever, I think there’s only one real solution.
Drugs Are So Bad, GuysUp in Michigan, game wardens arrested and charged two men with illegally possessing firearms and drugs after they initially pulled them over for suspected hunting violations.
The two men were driving around a remote area of the Pigeon River Country State Forest. When game wardens stopped their vehicle, they noticed that the passenger had a .308 rifle leaning against his right leg with a round balanced on the door handle, and the driver had a loaded .22-caliber rifle behind his seat.
When questioned, they said they were “out looking to hunt stuff.” That may have been true, but game violations turned out to be the least of their concerns. A search of the rental car turned up two additional firearms, alcohol, several containers of crystal meth, marijuana, and evidence of drug use.
Salmon SnaggersStaying in Michigan, six Colorado men have been fined a combined $6,600 after they were caught using an illegal fishing method to snag salmon from the Manistee River. Game wardens seized over 460 pounds of fish, which were donated to local charities.
We covered this incident back in Episode 183, but the DNR just reported that the men have each been fined $1,100. I’ll let the good people of the Mitten State decide whether that penalty was too harsh, not harsh enough, or juuust right.
A Bad Day for BretIn another case where poaching violations led to more serious crimes, a Minnesota man was hit with firearm and drug charges after being investigated for illegal bear guiding.
Fifty-five-year-old Bret Glatzmaier was already on probation for felony livestock rustling when officers conducted a search of his home in Becker County. As you can imagine, one thing kind of led to another, and ol’ Bret had himself a pretty bad day.
Officers noticed a corn feeder and pumpkins in his yard, and while baiting doesn’t appear to be illegal in Becker County, Glatzmaier admitted to shooting a deer out of season from his window. Officers also found eight rifles and two shotguns in his home, which are illegal for him to possess, given his pending livestock rustling felony. Agents added another felony after they found a gram of meth in his bedroom.
All of those crimes are on top of a misdemeanor violation after investigators discovered that Glatzmaier had charged a woman $600 for a guided black bear hunt back in September.
$10,000 Per DeerAn Illinois man will pay over $20,000 after DNR investigators accused him of illegally harvesting an eight-point and 12-point whitetail deer. As is common in these cases, his true crimes were actually much more extensive.
Fifty-eight-year-old Jerry Stafford runs a high-fence hunting operation called Samson's Whitetail Mountain. Stafford found himself under investigation after he began advertising “low-fence” hunts in conjunction with the Illinois whitetail hunting season. Stafford and his unpermitted guides were apparently willing to do almost anything to get their client’s a deer. They were documented hunting with the aid of a motor vehicle and the use of lights, hunting before legal shooting hours, hunting without permission, and violating tagging requirements.
In exchange for pleading guilty to two whitetail buck violations and a misdemeanor for improperly disposing of an animal, he received 24 months of court supervision along with the $20,000 fine.
Note: The feature image is not the actual murder weapon.
For more poaching and conservation news, along with dope animal facts, check out “Cal’s Week in Review.” New episodes drop every Sunday.
Tennessee Outdoor Writer and podcast host, Brodie Swisher, is a turkey hunting machine. On today’s episode, he chats with guest host, Tony Peterson, about his strategies for hunting pressured longbeards from his southern haunts all the way up to the northern fringe of wild turkey habitat.
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On this episode of the Bear Grease Render, Clay Newcomb gathers special crew of turkey chasers and storytellers. Clay is joined by Gary “Believer” Newcomb, veteran Bear Greaser Andy Brown, Cauy House and his grandfather from his turkey story, Steve Phillips, as well as retired United States Forest Service agent and former Arkansas Game and Fish agent Joe Liles. Tune in for stories of first hunts, any swarms, and chasing poachers. Stay tuned for Gary describing his custom modified turkey gun. We really doubt you’re gonna wanna miss this one…
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Brody Henderson, Janis Putelis, Hayden Sammak, Dan Chumbler, Tressa Croaker, Carl Young, and Phil Taylor.
On this weeks episode, Tyler Jones and K.C. Smith break down Michael's turkey hunting trip in Florida. They discuss what made things difficult and how he tried to gain access to places. They discuss the wildlife in the swamps and what "hit" Michael in his boots! We have a few turkey hunts coming up so don't forget to subscribe to us on YouTube and thanks for listening.
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Missouri Turkey Hunt | Huge Rainbow Trout!!
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Eric's First Buck Ever
On this week's episode, Tony breaks down some of the universal truths about buck travel, and dives into the specifics of figuring out deer movement on individual properties.
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Steve Rinella talks with Trae Crowder, Janis Putelis, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Topics include: Chattanooga Charlie on "Veronica Mars"; wearing a MAGA hat so that no one talks to you; a conservative barista; pre-order Catch a Crayfish, Count the Stars today; having a rude awakening to the fact that boneless wings aren't wings; South Carolina's coyote harvest incentive program; let's raise some money to Save Teddy's Church in D.C.; in defense of golf courses; cleaning MOOP at Burning Man; growing up in OshKosh B'gosh; the southern accent; the world record smallmouth bass; when your dad owns a video store; starting on the redneck comedy schtick; where fancy people and trashy people intersect; The Liberal Redneck's commentary; how right wingers need to figure out how to do funny comedy; Trae's new comedy special on Amazon; why Southerners are just born good story tellers; the longest goodbyes; and more.
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This week Cal talks about the Willow Project, legislation, pythons, and why you need a 45 foot yacht, not a 44 foot yacht.
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Cooking with animal fat seems to be all the rage right now, which is funny because humans have been using animal fats for far longer than they’ve been using vegetable oils. Up until relatively recently in human history, a lot of dishes would have been made using fat rendered from animals.
The rise of the various vegetable oils coincided with many other advances in food technology like the widespread availability of processed flour, sugar, and dairy. Modern foods spurred by that technological revolution largely abandoned inefficient and expensive animal fats as an ingredient in favor of convenient, cheap vegetable oils.
By now, most of us have figured out that you can sauté some greens in duck fat, but learning how to bake with animal fat is a whole new skill set, especially because many baked goods recipes were never developed with animal fats in mind.
TerminologyFirst, to clarify: the words tallow, lard, and grease are all used to describe rendered fats. And like most culinary terms, they don’t have hard-line definitions, just common uses. These terms can be used somewhat interchangeably, but are generally used to refer to specific types of fat.
Tallow usually refers to rendered beef fat and sometimes deer fat. The commonality between the two is that the fat, when rendered, remains solid at room temperature and can have a chalkier, waxier texture. This is due to tallow having a higher saturated fat content, with deer tallow being higher in saturated fat than beef tallow.
Lard is almost always pork fat, usually rendered leaf fat (organ fat). But, it is sometimes used to describe bear fat as well. Lard seems to be used to describe a rendered fat that becomes soft, but not liquid, at room temperature.
Duck fat is usually called just that, duck fat. And bear fat is commonly referred to as bear grease, bear oil, or bear lard. Which term is used seems to vary from region to region, but “grease” seems to be an up-and-coming term, and is the only one with its own hat that I know of.
All the fats mentioned above will not be as neutral tasting as vegetable oils. More like butter, they'll have their own flavor. However, if properly rendered and stored, it should actually be milder in flavor than most butter.
The flavor can vary and is influenced by many factors—the time of year, the health of the animal, and its diet. This variation is less pronounced with herbivorous animals. Beef and deer tallow is pretty consistent. Fat from omnivores exhibits a much wider range of flavor profiles. Waterfowl fat can range from snowy white and clean to a reddish “fishy” color. Bear and hog fat will vary just as much. There is going to be a difference between a corn-fed animal and one that has been scavenging dead salmon.
As a general guideline, the whiter the fat, the more neutral it will taste. But the best way to determine how it will taste is to render it and smell it. Any off flavors will be easy to smell as the fat oxidizes. Properly rendered fats from “clean animals” should not taste “rancid,” “bitter,” or “gamey.”
Characteristics and UsesLet's start with butter, which is the most common baking fat. Most modern recipes that call for the use of fat use butter. This is for many reasons—availability, price, and, most importantly, taste. Nothing tastes quite like butter, but all the animal fats in this article can be used as a direct substitute for butter, though there will be slight differences in taste and texture.
The big thing to keep in mind when you’re substituting animal fat for butter or cooking oil in a recipe is the texture. If you have a recipe that calls for cooking oil, you will need to first melt down your deer tallow into a liquid. If you’re making biscuits and the recipe calls for frozen butter, you need to make sure your pork lard is frozen solid before working with it, and so forth. Because animal fats behave a little differently than butter at different temperatures, it is important that you take the time to understand the consistency that your fat will be at various temperatures before using it in a recipe.
Tallow From either beef or deer, tallow is higher in saturated fats than the other fats mentioned in this article. This gives it a more solid texture and a higher melting point. Tallow will usually have a richer mouthfeel, sort of like how dark chocolate has a more lingering, mouth-coating taste than milk chocolate.
Because of the higher melting point, tallow works well in flakey baked goods, recipes that call for cutting in cold butter, or laminating dough. Biscuits, pie crusts, and croissants are all winners. Tallow also works well in savory baked goods. I use deer tallow in dark chocolate chip cookies, where the extra saturated fat from the deer fat adds depth to the cookie, and there is no unpleasant “waxiness.”
Tallow is firmer than butter at room temp, which is great when you need to fold in cold pieces into a dough. I like to keep sticks of tallow in the freezer and use a cheese grater to get irregular flakes of cold tallow into a dough. If creaming the tallow with sugar, like with most cookie recipes, you need to get the tallow to room temp or just above it.
Tallow will taste richer than butter and have slightly more savoriness to it. If you want to have the richness of tallow and the traditional flavor of butter, use a 50:50 ratio of butter and tallow in your recipe.
LardPork lard is similar to vegetable shortening. It's soft at room temperature, fairly neutral, and can be used as a direct substitute for butter. Lard works in any pastry, from sweet to savory, the texture makes it easy to work with, and it is the most commonly used animal fat in baking. Pork lard is available at most grocery stores and many online retailers.
Lard is commonly used with masa to make tortillas and tamales, and it works well in any recipe where butter or shortening is used. I have used it to make everything from shortbreads to pretzels. It’s a solid, all-purpose fat that is easy to work with. I use it in recipes that call for softened or melted butter.
In baked goods, you can use it as a butter substitute at a 1:1 ratio, or fold in a little butter if you want to retain some of the butter flavor in the final product.
Duck FatOne of the most prized animal fats, duck fat is usually associated with savory applications. Like pork lard, it's a great all-purpose fat. You can use it in any cooking method, from frying to braising, and it is great in baked goods as well.
As mentioned earlier, waterfowl fat can vary in taste quite a bit—species, food source, and the individual bird itself will be factored in how it tastes. I have found that late-season birds feeding on fields have the cleanest, most neutral taste. Birds that have been eating aquatic animals, or skinny early-season birds tend to be “fishier” or grassy. Of course, you can also buy rendered duck fat at the store, which comes from domestic, grain-fed birds. This fat is very neutral and easy to work with.
Duck fat has a similar texture to shortening, though slightly softer. It works great in recipes that call for creaming, laminating, or melting the fat. If you’re creaming it, you’ll want it a little colder than room temperature. Use as a 1:1 substitute for butter, or a 50:50 ratio with butter to add a hint of savoriness and retain the buttery taste.
Bear GreaseBear grease is incredible stuff. There is a long history of using bear fat for cooking. One of the reasons for this is that compared to most wild game, bears have a lot of fat, especially in the fall when they are preparing for hibernation.
Because bears are omnivores, their fat can vary in taste, just like their diet. Similar to ducks and geese, bears feasting on corn, berries, or mast will have a clean, neutral taste with a slight hint of sweetness. Bruins getting fat on garbage or dead fish will taste like garbage or dead fish.
Bear grease is semi-liquid to liquid at room temperature, and its consistency is closer to olive oil than butter. Because of this, it’s a shoo-in for any recipe that calls for using oil or melted butter. Black bear brownies have a nice ring to them, and they are delicious. Use bear fat as a 1:1 substitute for any recipe that calls for vegetable oil or melted butter.
If this all sounds a little intimidating, don’t worry. If you can dial in the right texture when you’re baking with animal fats, the rest of it comes fairly easily. Knowing and understanding how fat behaves at different temperatures is key to getting a good result—the rest is easy. I like to start my experiments with a 50/50 mix of animal fat and whatever fat is being called for in the recipe, and then work my way up to a full 1:1 ratio as I see what tweaks need to be made.
If you’re serious about becoming a better bowhunter, winter is a great time to hone your archery skills. To become a better archer, contrary to flashy social media trends, you don’t need to test out your bottom pin and send arrows into the next county. The fact is, you can become a better archer right from the comfort of your basement. All you need is your top pin and a 10-yard range. To become a better archer, rather than blind repetition, you’ll need a plan. Here’s your blueprint for becoming a better archer this off-season.
Learn to Tune Your BowTry as you might, without a well-tuned bow, your archery game will continually suffer. While I’m a big advocate for supporting your local archery shop, it’s far too easy to push off that pro shop tune-up and gain a false sense of confidence that your bow is tuned well enough. To ensure your bow remains in tune and shooting to its best capability, knowing how to tune your bow yourself is a skill set you’ll never regret learning.
While you could write a book on the different methods to tune a compound bow, learning to paper-tune is a good place to start. Start off with setting your arrow rest and nocking point in accordance with the manufacturer’s center shot specs. With a few shots through paper, you might only need to bump your arrow rest a few clicks in either direction to get your arrow flying true. However, sometimes it’s not that easy with all the factors at play. For errant arrow flight, hop online and find a comprehensive guide to paper tuning. Even if you need to invest several hours into your tune, you’ll find new confidence in your bow and ensure good arrow flight when you screw on your broadheads next fall.
Break Down Your FormAn accurate and repeatable archery shot has many components, each requiring attention. A good shot begins with a proper stance that gets your body lined up to the target anatomically. Next, you’ll want to study your grip and find the hand position that’s most repeatable with minimal muscle manipulation and torque. From there, you’ll focus on repeatable anchor points and peep-to-sight housing alignment. Last but not least, you’ll want to learn how to master your release aid to execute a clean release and follow through.
Rather than trying to focus on each of these factors at the same time, it’s easier to focus on each aspect independently. For example, when studying your grip, give your grip 100% of your focus and temporarily turn a blind eye to the rest of your shot execution. After mastering each piece of your form independently, you’ll eventually be able to put all of the pieces together and execute a shot that feels as clean as any shot you’ve ever released before. A great resource for learning more about proper shot execution is John Dudley’s YouTube series that he calls “School of Nock.” If you’re serious about improving your form, Dudley’s course walks you through each aspect of the shot sequence and offers vetted advice on how to better each piece of your archery form.
Blank BaleAfter breaking down your form, piece by piece, blank bale shooting can be a great way to reinforce your newly perfected form. The idea is to feel each shot, focusing only on your form, and eliminating the pressure that aiming at a bullseye introduces to your shot sequence. For anyone going through target panic, blank baling can be your best friend.
For those of you not familiar with blank bale shooting, the concept is simple. It’s called blank bale shooting because you’ll be shooting at a blank target, no five-spot target, and no bullseye. Stand just a few yards from your archery target and draw your bow as you normally would. After settling into your anchor point and roughly centering your pin on the target, close your eyes. By closing your eyes, you turn your focus from centering up your pin on the target to focusing exclusively on your form.
Execute your shot with your eyes closed. If you punched your release, if you torqued your grip, or if your bow arm got the yips, you will feel the results, and it will profoundly stand out. The beauty of blank baling is that you don’t care where your arrow ends up; instead, you’re exclusively focusing on how well your form was executed.
Develop a RoutineLike anything, getting good at something takes repetition, targeted repetition. Even if it’s only a few arrows a day, developing a shooting routine will help rewire your brain and will ensure that your newly improved archery form becomes muscle memory. Muscle memory is your friend when that buck of a lifetime is coming through your shooting lane, and adrenaline causes the wheels to come off the bus.
If confined to your basement throughout the winter, or even out of convenience for the remainder of the year, keep your basement archery range up and running. Consider implementing blank bale practice into your daily shooting routine. Some of the best target shooters in the world begin and end each archery session with a round of blank baling.
To keep things interesting, consider purchasing scaled-down paper targets, whether it be a five-spot NFAA style target, a three-spot Vegas target, or even big game animal targets. These scaled-down targets feature shrunken scoring rings to make a 10-yard shot more difficult and comparable to a standard-sized target at 20 yards. Anything you can do to keep things interesting and stick with your archery routine will make you a better archer in the long run.
Jordan Budd grew up as a ranch kid taking advantage of all the great outdoors had to offer. Now, she has her own guiding service and a podcast you might have heard of -- MeatEater's Gear Talk. Today, we're talking turkeys and Jordan's turkey killing gear picks. We cover everything from ground blinds and comfortable seating options to broadheads and red dots. If you're a turkey hunter, you're not going to want to miss this! Connect with Jason and...
This week Jordan and Janis are joined by Steve Baker of WorkSharp to discuss knife sharpening. They discuss the tools needed, technique used, some problems you can run into and ultimately how to keep your knife sharp in the field. Also discussed this week is Jordan's guiding season, why you shouldn’t be scared to wash your outerwear, and Florida turkey hunting.If you have a question you want to submit to Gear Talk for discussion, email geartalk...
On today’s episode, Tony speaks to podcast host, Dan Johnson, about the future of nonresident opportunities. They also cover the considerations necessary to plan a nonresident whitetail hunt, so that the experience is worth it, and the odds of success are high. Plus, Mark updates us on his new project, the Working For Wildlife Tour. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram...
On this weeks episode, Tyler Jones and K.C. Smith sit down with their cameramen Greg Latham and Eric Gentry to talk Favorites! From big game hunting to the wide world of sports, The Element crew share their preferences and opinions on just about everything. Go subscribe to The Element YouTube Channel!Hunting Apparel: First Lite HuntingGo Checkout these videos:Tyler's Giant Kansas BuckK.C.'s New Mexico Elk HuntGreg's Texas Public Land Buck...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Brody Henderson, Hayden Sammak, Randall Williams, Sam James, Dan Chumbler, Chester Floyd, and Phil Taylor
This week is open mic night at the Bear Grease home fire and Clay Newcomb is givin’ the stage to some of the best turkey hunters he could dig out of the spring woods. You'll hear from Cauy House, authors Robert Hitt Neill, Jr and Hank Burdine, Garvin Gibbons, and Richard Campbell. And Bear Grease veterans Andy Brown, Moe Shepherd, and Hall of Famer Roy Clark. These stories give a glimpse into the joys, tribulations and passions of the American...
This recipe was inspired by a game dinner I attended last fall. The historic Cottonwood Hotel in Omaha put on an impressive seven-course meal of game meat and fish, and my favorite bite of the night was their pumpkin-seed crusted fried sturgeon with juniper aioli, which was cleverly infused with the essence of eastern red cedar. These elements honored the delicate flavor and texture of freshwater fish well.This recipe is my simplified version...
The Humane Society of the United States sent undercover investigators to two coyote calling contests in Nevada earlier this year to secretly record audio and video of the participants.The animal rights organization published their findings in a report designed to gin up support for a bill in the state legislature that would ban so-called “wildlife killing contests.” The report includes images, video, and audio, along with alleged quotes from...
On this week's episode, Tony talks about a few of the things people often overlook when they start to plan an over-the-road hunt. While it might seem too early to focus on trip logistics, Tony argues that this is actually the best time to start laying the foundation for a great hunt. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
I came to the realization in the fall of 2021 that I managed to make deer hunting not fun.“I’d lost sight of what makes hunting fun," I wrote last summer about this epiphany. "I’d gotten too goal-oriented, too strung out, too stressed, too worried about what other people think, and too busy for others. And I hated it…When the season ended, I took stock of what had happened and what I could learn from it, and then dedicated myself to...
The clocks just jumped ahead an hour, and daytime temps are finally above the freezing mark. The days of ice fishing at your favorite lake are dwindling as the ice starts to get thinner and thinner.Plans for spring fishing trips on open water out of my trusty Alumacraft are already bouncing around my head. Fishing out of a boat will be here before we know it, but before that happens, there are some important things to take care of before you're...
Steve Rinella talks with Richard Martinez, Janis Putelis, Seth Morris, Chester Floyd, and Garret Smith. Topics include: The original Live, Laugh, Love sign; Florida's for fighting; three P's and a W; moving some Texas super cougars to Florida; Chester opening for Trampled By Turtles and how you need him to open for you to get a sold out show; deer nuts and a note; spearing in Wisconsin; more human deadheads; the 3,500 year old brown bear; how...
This week Cal talks about Salmon fishing closures, bait ban, banning in North Dakota, wildlife crime, and so much more.Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
At any given time of year, you’re likely to find Hayden Bailey outside, whether he’s catching catfish and snapping turtles, shooting squirrels, deer hunting, or pursuing one of his greatest passions: shed hunting. The Chillicothe, Illinois, resident loves to spend every minute outside, especially with his wife, Abby, and their small children. In fact, Bailey has always been an outdoorsy guy, tagging along with his dad to look for sheds and...
It’s safe to say that hunters are spoiled by bullet selections these days. But the sheer number of options can be overwhelming. What’s the difference between “cup and core” and “soft point?” What does it mean for a bullet to be “bonded,” why do some hunters swear by “partition” bullets, and isn’t “monolithic” the word scientists use to describe Stonehenge?Many hunters avoid these questions by picking the first box of ammo they find in their...
On today’s show, Tony chats with Wisconsin dog trainer and whitetail addict, Josh Miller, about shed hunting. Miller is one of the pioneers of shed-dog training, as well a passionate bowhunter who manages properties for mature bucks. Plus, Mark makes a special announcement: his new project, the Working For Wildlife Tour. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Seth Morris, Chest Floyd, Christine Sawicki, Cory Calkins, Hayden Sammak, and Phil Taylor.
On this episode of the Bear Grease Render, Clay Newcomb is coming at you live for the second time from the Black Bear Bonanza in Northwest Arkansas. This time Clay is joined by render regulars Misty Newcomb, Josh "Landbridge" Spielmaker, and of course Brent Reaves, as well as Arkansas BHA Chapter Chair James Brandenburg and the state of Arkansas's Large Carnivore Biologist, Myron Means. The crew discusses hunting black bears in Arkansas...
On this weeks episode hosts, Tyler Jones and K.C. Smith sit down with their cameramen Michael Stoll and Greg Latham. Four hunters from four different backgrounds of hunting, discuss their takes on some of the hot topics in the hunting world. Broadheads, crossbows, trophy hunting, and more; we give our personal anecdotes about where these and others belong. NEW Bows Setup!Shoot On 3 | Hunting Pigs From The GroundIt just doesn't get any better...
On today's show, Tony breaks down why March is the best month to take a long look at the spots you plan to hang stands and set ground blinds this season, so that you'll have more productive sits come fall. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Steve Rinella talks with Rebecca Watters, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics include: The Oedipus complex; sexy critters; Steve getting serious about climate change because of poison ivy; the special tiki bar in Nashville; the Phelps Harrison Owl Hooter; how claims of private property value diminution are irrelevant when it comes to whether corner crossing is legal or not; a real breakdown of the refried...
This week, Cal talks about a daylight lion hunt, Dream Cities, paying attention to legislation, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Spending time outdoors, whether it’s sitting in a tree stand or working in the garden, is a big source of joy in my life. But what’s less joyful is the impact being outside in all conditions has on my skin, where the rain, wind, and cold often leave my hands chapped and cracking. Making skin salve from deer tallow is a really satisfying and easy annual project, and its impact on my skin is noticeable. Deer tallow salve is protective and luxurious...
Poachers, smugglers, and other fish and game felons steal our shared natural resources, and “Cal’s Poaching Desk” is here with all the sordid details. For more stories of wildlife wrongdoing, be sure to tune in to“Cal’s Week in Review.” New episodes drop every Sunday.Husky Skinner SentencedRemember that woman who accidentally shot and skinned a husky and then bragged on Facebook about killing a “wolf?” There’s been an update in that case.Amber...
We just can’t help ourselves. As hunters, we continually ride waves of trophy obsession, but they always eventually crash. When they do, we usually lean into the experience of the hunt for a few years. But, over time, the swells build, and we find ourselves right back to the antlers-over-everything mindset.The latest example of this cycle occurred within about the last 10 or 12 years. Before that, network outdoor television and print magazines...
New Jersey bowhunter, Greg Litzinger, has made a name for himself over the years by killing good bucks on heavily pressured grown. On this episode Litzinger breaks down his winter scouting strategies and explains why the work he does now always pays off in October. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
This week we dive into what Janis carries while turkey hunting from the mountains of Montana to the swamps of Florida. We also discuss Jordan getting stuck, new products dropped and a couple listener questions. If you have a question you want to submit to Gear Talk for discussion, email geartalk@themeateater.com. Want to comment on this episode? Visit https://www.themeateater.com/listen/gear-talk and join the conversation.Connect with Janis...
Eric Braaten is a great turkey caller, great turkey hunter, and has done a lot for turkeys here in Washington. On today’s episode Jason and Eric take a deep dive into turkey calls. They discuss the materials used and how they affect the tone and pitch of diaphragms, pot calls and box calls. Their discussion then turns to strategy where they talk about hunting small sections of public land, how to utilize private agriculture to your advantage and...
What do you think of when you hear the state, Arkansas? This is Clay Newcomb’s beloved homeland, and on this episode he dives deep into the long-standing national image of Arkansas. It hasn’t always been great. Scholars say it was the most picked on state in America in the 20th century and to this day remains the most “hillbilly” state per the internet. But is that truth, or just the results of branding and strong stereotypes? Clay interviews Dr...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Janis Putelis, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, Carl Young, Tressa Croaker, Rick Hutton, Cory Calkins, Hayden Sammak, and Phil Taylor.
On this weeks episode hosts, Tyler Jones and K.C. Smith sit down with their cameramen Eric Gentry and Michael Stoll and talk about what it takes to plan your hunting trips. We discuss how to plan for it financially, how to plan for a good hunt and issues that you could run into along the way. We talk about our dream hunts and how you can make that possible! Thanks for listening and don't forget to chuck us out on YouTube. NEW Bows Setup!Shoot...
On today's episodes, Tony breaks down why consuming hunting content can be great for entertainment and some education, but how it also represents an edited reality that isn't overly relatable to most hunters. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Steve Rinella talks with Kevin Murphy, Guy Zuck, Seth Morris, and Chester Floyd. Topics include: Hot wings, six ways; unstabilized lard is superior; when you scratch your beard and come up with the answer; what a larder is; Kevin's melted ring bangle jewelry; neanderthal's euro mount collections; the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect; the "weights in fish!" Leatherman; cheating at a walleye tournament and encouraging your son to pass off counterfeit money...
This week, Cal talks Texas aoudad, native vs. non-native, and so much more.Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Lawmakers, agency professionals, along with hunting and fishing manufacturers have crafted countless ways to pay for state and national conservation programs since passing the Pittman-Robertson Act in 1937.But countless others since then have buried legislation, forsaken promises, and withheld funding that could have launched and maintained many long-lost conservation initiatives.Yes, hunters, anglers, and trappers proudly embrace North America...
In the winter, deer require about 1.5 quarts of water per day for every 100 pounds of body weight. During warmer, summer months, their hydration needs double. This is worth knowing, no matter when or where you hunt whitetails.Even in areas where water isn’t in short supply, identifying the most likely spots for a buck to slake his thirst is a solid strategy. Where water is limited, it can be a bigger draw than food, bedding, or any of the other...
The Hunting Public’s, Aaron Warbritton, is one of the best deer hunters in the country. On this episode, he explains why he loves winter scouting so much, and how he decides which types of findings will benefit him most come fall.Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
On this week's episode, Clay Newcomb is all business. After introducing the render crew - Misty Newcomb, Gary Newcomb, Brent Reaves, Josh "Landbridge" Spielmaker, and Ben Lagrone - Clay gives a quick recap on the Bear Grease Hall of Fame, emphasizing its seriousness and immutability, before introducing not one, but two new candidates! Following the vote, the discussion turns to Clay's Magnum Opus, the most recent episode on "the Big Bear of...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steve Rinella, Megan Denean, Janis Putelis, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, Randall Williams, Maggie Hudlow, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
On this weeks episode hosts, Tyler Jones and K.C. Smith talk all about archery. They talk about their bows and what they like to use. They also discuss arrow rest and sights they prefer and why they don't like some. The both of them breakdown their arrow setup and why they choose the arrows they use. Thanks for listening and be sure to check us out on Youtube as well! Shoot On 3 | Hunting Pigs From The GroundAXIS Deer HuntingIt just doesn't...
On today's episode, Tony discusses how shed hunting is more than just an effort to find some bone. It's also a way to train yourself to look for details, and to get really good with your binoculars, both of which will help you when you're actually whitetail hunting. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Steve Rinella talks with Megan Denean, Janis Putelis, Ryan Callaghan, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.Topics include: How you can skip telling the story to all the nurses; representative, representative; a deer struck at 30,000 feet; snarge, the remains of bird on an aircraft; critter strikes in the air and DNA tests; twig eater, he who strips of bark; putting a human skull in a crock pot; cadavers making your mouth water; when old ladies are...
This week, Cal talks about the closely guarded secrets of crested saguaro cacti, permanent easements (and other legislation), invasive snakes, sniffing out CWD hotspots with dogs, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
A new pup is a living, four-legged promise. Tucked deep inside of the adorable awkwardness is a future full of rooster flushes and limits of greenheads. All you have to do to do is train it to listen and understand its role at home and in the field.It’s simple, really, yet so many people get it wrong. Or, they give up before their dog matures into the finished product it should be. These shortfalls often begin with the puppy phase, and just as...
Shawn Luchtel’s shed season looks a little different from the average whitetail hunter’s.The founder of Heartland Bowhunter, who consistently puts mature bucks on the ground, almost exclusively searches for sheds on his private hunting land in Missouri. Generally, Luchtel will wait until March—when just about all bucks have dropped their antlers—to scour the 1,500-2,000 acres he shed hunts.“The majority of March I spend shed hunting, and then...
Today's guest is part human and part owl. James Harrison has been designing and building calls for 14 years and winning calling contests for just as long. His skills don’t end there though, he is as good as they get out in the woods when it comes to killing turkeys. On this episode Jason and James talk about: why you would locate a turkey without turkey calls and which calls to use, what different strategies to use throughout the day and how...
This week Jordan and Janis break down Jordan’s gear list for an upcoming spring black bear hunt. Janis picks apart the list with questions in order to get to the bottom of why Jordan carries what she does. Backpacks, rain gear, tarps, bullets and stoves are all in the discussion along with much more. If you have a question you want to submit to Gear Talk for discussion, email geartalk@themeateater.com. Want to comment on this episode? Visit...
This week on the show I’m joined by Kyle Lybarger of The Native Habitat Project to explore the potential for managing our whitetail properties with a holistic native ecosystem focus and the tools and tactics for doing that. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Hosts, Tyler Jones and K.C. Smith talk about a clip from a recent Joe Rogan podcast that featured Steve Rinella. What is better, Whitetail or Mule Deer? They break down their opinions on the debate and made their case to why Whitetails are better. We love to hunt them all though so send us your thoughts! Thanks for listening. Shoot On 3 | Hunting Pigs From The GroundBass Fishing For Reds Texas CoastIt just doesn't get any better than these two...
On this episode Clay Newcomb is going to take you on a journey to explore an uncanny bear hunting story written in 1841 called “The Big Bear of Arkansas.” Its influence almost single-handedly branded Arkansas as the “Bear State” and paved a path for some of America’s greatest Southern authors. Clay Newcomb and the crew will talk about the remarkable and pretty-durn-new-to-planet-earth power of media to influence our imaginations about people we...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Danielle Prewett, K.C. Smith, Tyler Jones, Jordan Sillars, Hunter Spencer, Randall Williams, and Phil Taylor.
On today's episode, Tony explains how we are often our own worst enemy when it comes to presence in the deer woods. He also argues that the winter-scouting window of time we have right now, is a gift that we can use to help us avoid burning out our spots come fall. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Steve Rinella talks with K.C. Smith, Tyler Jones, Jordan Sillars, Hunter Spencer, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.Topics include: Jordan's caliber battles; the leaked letter asking Biden to ban beaver trapping; milk from heaven vs. cow's milk; kids eating deer and duck turds; the Bozeman Hat Association; leapfrogging tree stands; when your book cover is banned on the internet; the Tofu Crafter; how KC got hung up on an audad's horn; almost...
This week, Cal talks about counterfeiting big bills to supplement your ill-gotten tournament winnings, important legislation, opportunistic mounties, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
It’s no secret that we live in a world of click now and have it on your doorstep tomorrow. While that can be super convenient, it also doesn’t work for everything when it comes to the outdoors. In the same way that a small old-school tackle, fly, or bait shop just always seems to have what you can’t find anywhere else, sometimes anglers have to take things into their own hands. One such item is a minnow cart.I guess the first question is, what...
At the close of every duck season, it doesn’t take long for mallards and other puddle ducks to fill the skies and start landing in front of vacant hunting blinds. Greenheads, pintails, and other waterfowl dabble and preen in waters they would not have prior to the close of the season because hunters would have been there trying to coax them into shooting range. The chatter in taverns across the four flyways and on social media begins. It’s the...
This week on the show I’m joined by Bobby Kendal and Toby Stay, of The Whitetail Group, to discuss their extremely strategic approach to building elite whitetail hunting properties.Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Hosts, Tyler Jones and K.C. Smith take a deep dive into post season scouting. Telling you their tactics for interpreting sign when the season is over and how to tie that to what the deer are doing in season. Bass Fishing For Reds Texas CoastHunting Exotic Axis Deer In TexasIt just doesn't get any better than these two hunts:Tyler's KANSAS Giant 18 pt!K.C.'s Dramatic Biggest BUCK EVER!MAKE SURE YOU ARE SUBSCRIBED to our Youtube Channel...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Carmen Vanbianchi, Chris Carlson, Ken Carlson, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
This week the Bear Grease Render is coming at you from camp in the Arkansas Delta on the Cache Bayou. Your fearless host, Clay Newcomb, is joined by the incomparable Brent Reaves as well as render veteran and owner of Sunspot Outdoors, Michael Rosamond. Cameramen Loren Moulton and Dave Gardner flew in for the render as well and decided to stick around and shoot some Coon and Squirrel Hunting for an upcoming Bear Grease project. As the river level...
On this week's show, Tony discusses how a general understanding of the land, and the habitats available, allow hunters to figure deer out more effectively no matter what specific properties they end up hunting throughout the season. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Steve Rinella talks with Chris Carlson, Ken Carlson, Carmen Vanbianchi, Janis Putelis, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.Topics include: Pre-eminent Youtubers and snowmobiles; how "pre" might be an unnecessary prefix; Operation Big Coon; following lynx tracks; how to donate to Carmen's "Trap a Cat" project; little explosions and collar spacers that release collars; why elm wood is satan wood; all the different grades of veneer; reading the wood...
This week, Cal talks about wet turkey vultures, his opinion on letting tribes hunt Yellowstone National Park, legislation, and so much more.Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Lemon, fresh basil and garlic, olive oil, shoyu, and cracked pepper come together to make a delicious and transformative marinade. In this recipe I use skinned and filleted yellow spot papio, but any fish will do. After a 45-minute marinade, a quick, hot sear on the grill seals in the bright herbaceous and citrusy flavors.
Every trophy-class buck has a story behind it, but one state record is backed by a sordid tale of crime, greed, and celebrity.The Letterman Buck stands atop the record book for typical mule deer bucks for the state of Montana. Killed in 2004, the buck officially scored 207 7/8 inches.If you look at the state record book, there is no hunter name listed with the buck. The head is in public ownership by the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife...
Today on the show I’m joined by Jared Van Hees, host of the Habitat Podcast, to discuss small property land improvements, soil conserving food plot practices, and more of what he's done to enjoy whitetail success on his 15 acre farm. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Samong Yang cut his teeth chasing turkeys in the NE corner of Washington. These high pressured merriams that call the mountains home, provide turkey hunters with all kinds of additional challenges. On this episode Jason and Samong touch on how much to call to pressured birds, what to do when they hang up, whether to use a decoy or not in the open country and what calls do they each carry. Connect with Jason and PhelpsPhelps on Instagram...
Heidi Allen of Nikwax joins Jordan and Janis to discuss the care and maintenance of your outerwear and boots. They discuss what DWR is and how it works, why cleaning your gear is important, how to best clean your garments and why boot conditioners can be harmful if applied too frequently. All of it plus the nitty gritty in this week's episode of Gear Talk!If you have a question you want to submit to Gear Talk for discussion, email geartalk...
In this Episode hosts Tyler Jones And K.C. Smith talk about recent hog hunting adventures. We bring one of our cameramen, Eric Gentry on and discuss how he was catching Reds on the Texas coast last month. We talk about spot and stalk situations and how it can help you be a better hunter. We also play a little game of "would you rather."Hunting Exotic Axis Deer In TexasWade Fishing - Catch, Clean and CookIt just doesn't get any better than...
We’re on the third and final episode in our series on the Shawnee leader, Tecumseh. He’s been called the greatest Native leader in American history, but we’ve found ourselves backed against the bedrock of inevitability. On this side of mortality, all great men and their stories must come to end. On this episode we’ll talk with Peter Cozzens, Robert Morgan, Dave Edmunds and Shawnee Chief Ben Barnes about that fateful day in October 1813, but...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Janis Putelis, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, Hayden Sammak, Chester Floyd, Cory Calkins, Hanzi Deschermeier, and Phil Taylor.
On today's episode, Tony outlines his approach to shed hunting from February to April, and explains why it doesn't really matter if you find any antlers or not - as long as you're getting out there with a plan. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Steve Rinella talks with Jason Bergsman, Matt Cook, Bridget Noonan, Jason Phelps, and Clay Newcomb. Topics include: What chaps Steve's ass; Alaska's traditional use practices; donuts and black bears; purposefully putting an icky slant on things; how you should never fall in love with a ground nesting bird; controlling efficacy; more on turkey season in Michigan; "Texotics" and gynecologist hunters; when a shooting leads first responders to a...
This week Cal talks about crime, public lands, legislation, and conservation easements.Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
One of my favorite things about acquiring my own wild meat is that it comes with an added bonus: fat. Many hunters overlook wild game fat and dismiss it as they would most stuff from the gut pile. Wild game fat has great value, though.Duck fat, for example, is treasured by foodies and some folks pay serious money for dishes that include this ingredient. But the value of wild game fat extends beyond birds, and if you’re lucky enough to acquire a...
A tribal hunter was hit by a stray bullet while cleaning a bison on the northern border of Yellowstone National Park on Jan. 17 during the seasonal regulated hunt. The incident brought renewed attention to a hunt that some consider overcrowded, and it comes as the National Park Service considers updating how it manages bison in the park.Jackson Wak Wak of the Nez Perce Tribe was field-dressing a bison near Beattie Gulch when hit by the bullet...
Separated by only 0.013 inches of bullet diameter, the 6.5 Creedmoor and the .270 Winchester make an obvious Caliber Battle matchup. Both are used widely by hunters from Alaska to Alabama, both throw similarly weighted bullets traveling similar velocities, and both are chambered in a variety of rifles.In fact, when you Google “6.5 Creedmoor vs,” the first auto-fill option is “270.” Hunters are clearly interested in how these two uber-popular...
This week on the show I’m joined by Mark Drury’s farm managers Wade Robinson and Perry Battin to discuss the habitat strategies they employ to create world class wildlife habitat and whitetail hunting opportunities.Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
This week on the Bear Grease Render, a very special crew braves the elements to meet up to talk about the famed orator and Shawnee leader of the pan-indian confederacy, Tecumseh. Misty, Clay and Josh are joined this week by first time guests Jessica Lewellan and Kristie Speilmaker, as well as returning favorite Terrell Spencer. Topics discussed include an AI generated biographic article that struggles with the Newcomb's first names, the APPA...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Dr. Jonathan Reisman, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, Seth Morris, Chest Floyd, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
On this week's show, Tony breaks down why we do what we do, just to try to kill a deer. He explains why it's important to acknowledge the effort necessary to be a successful deer hunter, and offers up a few ways to help everyone embrace the less-enjoyable aspects of pursuing whitetails. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
In this Episode hosts Tyler Jones And K.C. Smith are heading back from an Axis hunt in the hill country of Texas. K.C. is getting over a bug and struggles with coughing but we discuss the history of exotics and talk about high fences in Texas. We talk native vs. non-native and the strategy we used during our Axis Hunt. Thanks for listening! Wade Fishing - Catch, Clean and CookWould You Pass This Buck On Texas Public Land?It just doesn't get...
Steve Rinella talks with Dr. Jonathan Reisman, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, Spencer Neuharth, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics include: Discussing déja poo; the defining of flatus; preserving, rather than killing, bacteria; gathering ginkgo biloba nuts from trees in NYC; eating wild game and keeping kosher; holy blood; meeting your cadaver; how badly Steve wants to go on NPR's "Fresh Air" with Terry Gross; eating everything but...
This week, Cal rounds up state and federal legislative action, the turducken of the weasel family, and bears.Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
If you clicked on this article, you likely didn’t plan on trapping muskrats this season. We’re in the dead of winter, and trapping prep is best done in the summer, or fall at the latest. But maybe you don’t like to ski, hunting seasons are coming to a close, and trapping is still open.Chasing muskrats is a great way to enter the world of trapping furbearers. They are plentiful, not trap-shy, and easy to skin and dry. The traps and fur processing...
In this recipe, freshwater meets saltwater in a prawn-stuffed fish bake. I speared some freshwater prawns in a river to fill up a beautiful ocean-harvested goatfish. Smothered in aioli and crisped up with some panko breadcrumbs, this dish is an ultimate fusion of flavors.
Other than humans, few mammals besides white-tailed deer have the flexibility and fortitude to live wherever they choose.As Rollin H. Baker details in the 1984 book “White-tailed Deer: Ecology and Management,” South America’s whitetails thrive from Peru’s humid, sea-level tropics to just above tree-line at 13,450 feet in northwestern Bolivia. And whitetails in North America vary from herds thriving in cypress swamps across the Deep South to...
In this Episode hosts Tyler Jones And K.C. Smith are answering everybody's submitted questions. Covering a wide array of questions in rapid succession including hunting setups, the guys favorite new way to access public hunting pieces, future series featured on the MeatEater YouTube page and a ton more!Wade Fishing - Catch, Clean and Cook Would You Pass This Buck On Texas Public Land? It just doesn't get any better than these two hunts...
This week on the show we wrap up our Big Buck Breakdown series with the up and down three year story of Ross Hausmann's hunt for an Iowa giant known as Big Potatoes.Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
This week on the show, guest host Dirk Durham chats with champion elk caller Jermaine Hodge about Colorado elk hunting and calling tactics for pressured bulls. They discuss realistic vocalizations, finding a hunting partner, and hunting in and around pressure. Connect with Jason and PhelpsPhelps on Instagram, Facebook, and YoutubeShop Phelps Merch
This week Janis and Jordan tackle some questions sent in from podcast listeners. They discuss headlamp options, tripod and tripod head setups, big game calibers and more! Products discussed:Black Diamond 500-r headlamp - https://www.blackdiamondequipment.com/en_US/product/storm-500-r/Petzl Actik Core headlamp - https://www.petzl.com/US/en/Sport/Headlamps/ACTIK-COREPetzl E-Light backup headlamp - https://www.petzl.com/US/en/Sport/Headlamps...
This is the second episode in our Tecumseh series were we’ll look at his life from 1775 through 1812. Originally, I planned to title this one, “Uncommon Genius” which is what US President William Henry Harrison called the Shawnee. I decided, however, to use a declarative statement made by “the panther crossing the sky” himself. In response to intolerable encroachment, while many of his own tribe were leaving and heading West, Tecumseh said, “we...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Hayden Sammak, Seth Morris, Chest Floyd, Maggie Smith, and Max Barta.
On today's episode, Tony breaks down why it shouldn't really matter too much to us where, or how, other people hunt. He argues we should focus more on working to enjoy our own hunting situations as much as possible. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Steven Rinella talks with Mercer Lawing, Janis Putelis, Seth Morris, and Phil Taylor.Topics include: How Theater Phil brought the roof down; the genetic mutation that creates a cinnamon black bear; how a poop snow cone would actually preserve microbes; the Blue Collar Scholar's poop bucket design; when you make a pair of earrings out of your foot bone spurs; hocking up a nock through your concha; a 33-year-old banded sandhill crane; how bobcat...
This week, Cal talks about the better way to collect DNA, fancy trash pickup, lots of legislation, and so much more.Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
In order to legally travel with waterfowl, you must leave a wing or head intact for identification purposes. Deboning the bird makes for a more compact and convenient carry, and once you place it into a ziptop or vacuum-sealed bag, the duck is easily identifiable and won’t get freezer burnt.
A mother and her one-year-old son were killed Tuesday, Jan. 17, in a rare unprovoked attack in the remote village of Wales, according to Alaska state troopers. Officials identified the victims as 24-year-old Summer Myomick and 1-year-old Clyde Ongtowasruk.The trooper’s report indicated that a polar bear entered the community and chased multiple residents before it fatally attacked an adult female and juvenile male. The pair were walking on the...
For new hunters, buying the right shotgun can be a challenge. There are so many platforms to choose from—gas- and inertia-driven semi-autos, pumps, over/unders, side-by-sides, and single-shots. Then, once you decide on a platform, there are an endless number of models.The reality is, it can take years to find a shotgun that fits your body type and shooting style (unless you have the money to purchase a bespoke shotgun). It’s a lengthy process we...
This week on the show we're continuing our big buck breakdown series and we're chatting with Shawn Luchtel of Heartland Bowhunter about his four experience chasing a giant Missouri whitetail he called Caesar.Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Tyler Jones And K.C. Smith host Chad Rice from CRUZR Saddles to talk decoys and hunting. Also gear talk and saddle setup! Wade Fishing - Catch, Clean and Cook Would You Pass This Buck On Texas Public Land? It just doesn't get any better than these two hunts: Tyler's KANSAS Giant 18 pt!K.C.'s Dramatic Biggest BUCK EVER! Be sure and subscribe on YOUTUBE so you can experience all the action on film! MAKE SURE YOU ARE SUBSCRIBED to our...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Savannah Ashour, Randall Williams, Brody Henderson, Cory Calkins, Hayden Sammak, Seth Morris, Maggie Smith, and Sam James.
On this episode of Bear Grease, most of the regulars, Clay, Misty, Josh, Gary, and Isaac, gather at the Bear Grease Global Headquarters to discuss the great and enigmatic leader of the Pan-Indian Confederacy Movement, Tecumseh. But not before the crew, who is joined by James Brandenburg, Chair of the Arkansas chapter of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers, talk about the upcoming second annual Black Bear Bonanza which will take place March 4th from...
On today's show, Tony explains how some of our deer hunting beliefs that we know are true, actually aren't - and how that can hold us back on our quest to get better at the whitetail game. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Steve Rinella talks with Jesse Griffiths and Corinne Schneider. Topics include: "Almost everything is from around here"; Jesse driving 17 pounds of lemon from South Texas to Dai Due in Austin; burning money; ricks and cords as measurements of wood; when a guy in dreads shows up and wants to show you something in his car; pronouncing coyote; more Chettiquette questions; Steve opposing Michigan's unlimited take of turkeys in the fall; wrongly...
This week Cal talks about naked mole rats, getting the Shafts-bury, and so much more.Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
A 17-year-old girl accomplished a one-in-a-lifetime hunt after successfully bagging a rare all-white antelope in Wyoming on October 27. Tristian Olsen of Forestville, New York, was hunting private land in Johnson County when she spotted the albino antelope juxtaposed against the golden hills of Wyoming in autumn.Accompanied by her father, Gary Olsen, and friend, Ryan Smith, the group traveled to Kaycee, Wyoming, in pursuit of antelope after...
This is venison soup and sandwich combo is an absolute dream on chilly days. To check out my previous video on how to make venison bone broth, click here. And you can find a recipe for a perfectly tender and juicy roast that’s great for a French Dip right here.
Here are three knots that you need to know as an outdoorsman and a quick rundown of how to tie each of them. The bowline makes a solid anchor point, you can then use a trucker’s hitch for cinching down loads tight. The Evenk or Siberian hitch is also a cinching knot and is great to use when hanging bear bags in the high country.
We spent the week Joe Rogan style, hunting Nilgai in the tropics of South Texas. We also chased some whitetails, as well as all the gulf fish species. In this podcast we talk about the tactics of hunting from the ground, our best recipes for wild game and fish, dream hunts, and shot placement on whitetail as well as big game. Greg's BIG Texas Public Land Buck Would You Pass This Buck On Texas Public Land? It just doesn't get any better...
This week on Gear Talk, Jordan and Janis briefly recap their 2022 seasons then dive into their top gear picks for the year. They discuss snowmobiles, side by sides, boots, tripod heads, tents, rain gear and more. If you have a question you want to submit to Gear Talk for discussion, email geartalk@themeateater.com. Want to comment on this episode? Visit https://www.themeateater.com/listen/gear-talk and join the conversation.Connect with Janis...
This week on the show, Jason continues his conversation with Dr. Bronson Strickland as they discuss the ins and outs of hunting big whitetails, no matter where you're getting after them. Connect with Jason and PhelpsPhelps on Instagram, Facebook, and YoutubeShop Phelps Merch
This week on the show, I’m joined by diehard DIY bowhunter Justin Hollandsworth of Whitetail Addictions to break down his four year up and down journey chasing a ghost buck he called Woody.Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
On this episode we’re neck deep in the murky waters of American identity - we’re peering into the life of the Shawnee leader, Tecumseh. I want to understand his social and political context, the foundations of what built him, while trying to understand the extraordinary leadership of the man whose name means “a panther crossing the sky.” He was a hunter, a warrior, and an exceptional orator. He was a revolutionary leader who was a genius. Though...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Brody Henderson, Hayden Sammak, Cory Calkins, Alyssa Smith, Seth Morris, Logan Dove, and Corinne Schneider.
On today's episode, Tony discusses how tough whitetails really are, and how knowing that can shape our decisions as hunters. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Steve Rinella talks with Joe Rogan, Jesse Griffiths, and Corinne Schneider. Topics include: The pink pig; Corinne's first wild hog; rattling in a crazy number of whitetail; how basically no one hunts nilgai with a bow, but Joe; the nilgai bark; a bow hunt fraught with peril; Steve’s take on how flies conceive of time; discussing draw weight and Joe's 90-pound bow; a more athletic giraffe; tracking and gridding; no blood; Joe’s take on how...
This week, Cal talks about the dangers of indoor aquariums, duck diets, legislation, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
We don’t believe in Bigfoot at MeatEater, but we’re damn interested in him. To see if a crew of staunch skeptics could be swayed, we gathered the most respected Bigfoot authorities to answer our most pressing questions. This is part one of our eight-part series, Ask a Squatcher.I don’t believe that the moon affects the whitetail rut—there’s simply too much science that tells us otherwise. But deep down, I’m always excited when the newest “Moon...
This neck roast bbq recipe is a great dish to make with a whole venison neck, or a 4-to-6 pound piece of elk or moose neck. Since the neck is a heavily used muscle it takes a lot of cooking to tenderize the meat. l have great luck using a slow cooker.After 6-8 hours, the meat can be pulled right off the bone. The spine ends up looking as clean as a museum specimen, and the meat is perfect for BBQ sandwiches.
Just as premier wines come from the grapes of stressed vines, cool antlers with great character often come from bucks who suffered broken bones, harsh diseases, or crippling injuries.As Demi Lovato sings, “Nothing is more beautiful than the smile that struggled through tears.” Admirable antler traits are subjective, of course, and vary by admirer. Still, most hunters find charm in the bowls, furrows, sharp angles, palmations, flat edges, and...
This week on the show, to kick off a month of big buck breakdowns, I’m joined by Tyler Utter to dive deep into the 6 year story of a giant Ohio whitetail and the strategies he ultimately used to kill his biggest buck to date. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
On this episode of Bear Grease, Misty, Clay, and Brent are joined by some really special guests. Anne Marie Doramus is not only an AGFC Commissioner, but a life long duck hunter. Austin Booth, a former marine, is also an avid waterfowler and the director of the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission. And Kayle Browning is an sport shooter who has competed at the Olympics and a professional shooting coach. This star studded render crew discusses their...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Seth Morris, Rick Hutton, Cory Calkins, Maggie Smith, Max Barta, and Hanzi Deschermeier.
On this week's episode, Tony discusses how reflecting on this past fall can help you structure the 2023 season in such a way that it should be more fulfilling and enjoyable. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Steven Rinella talks with Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Chester Floyd, Hunter Spencer, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics include: When silk killed the beaver hat; Steve's Hot Tip to parents: watch "Adventure Time" with your kids; should you shoot and tag a wounded animal?; when Steve practiced civil disobedience and picked up roadkill; names for genitalia; wacked, crunched, and aced; does a farm-raised duck count to your limit?; to...
This week, Cal talks about what once was Green-land, a 2 million year old poplar, legislation, and so much more.Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
The .223 Remington was designed for the battle, not the field. Militaries want a cartridge that can inflict enough damage to take an enemy off the table, while remaining light and small enough to pack conveniently.Of course, hunters have adopted a wide array of cartridges originally designed for military use. If the .223 Rem. (or, more accurately, the military’s 5.56 NATO) can take down a combatant, surely it has enough juice to take down a...
Largemouth bass aren’t good to eat. Pale-flesh salmon and trout are inferior. Catfish from muddy waters taste like mud. Bony fish are useless. Just as with terrestrial critters, myths and misconceptions regarding fish flesh abound. Though often outright wrong, sometimes they contain kernels of truth.White king salmon, also known as ivory Chinook, demonstrate the fluctuating cultural beliefs about fish flesh. Unlike most Chinook, with their...
My version of pho is authentic in flavor, but unconventional in method. I use venison shanks for this popular Vietnamese soup. The bones and connective tissue enhance the flavor and body of the broth, then I shred the meat and serve in the soup.A traditional pho begins by creating a fragrant bone broth that will be poured into a bowl of rice noodles with thin slices of raw sirloin. Since there are so few cuts of tender meat on a deer, I...
Introducing Ask the Eagle, where I’ll be answering your questions about everything from hunting to butchering to marriage. This week, an Instagram follower wants to know what rifle caliber I’d recommend to hunt all big game with.Have a question of your own? You can write to me asktheeagle@themeateater.com.
Salt is the only rock that humans regularly consume in its raw form. Despite its ubiquitous use today, salt was once used as currency due to its rarity and difficulty in manufacturing. In fact, the word “salary” comes from the Latin word salarium which was a payment of salt given to Roman soldiers. It wasn’t until the invention of industrial processing techniques in the mid-19th century that salt became a staple of everyday culinary life.Before...
Elk hunters were among the first in line to object to wolf reintroduction in the Lower 48, but a new study suggests that mountain lion hunters may have had even greater cause for concern.“The big take home of this paper is that wolves have the strongest effect on the survival and abundance of mountain lions in the system,” Dr. Mark Elbroch told MeatEater. Elbroch is the lead author of the study and the puma program director for Panthera, a wild...
This week on the show, Jason's joined by Dr. Bronson Strickland to discuss the ins and outs of hunting big whitetails, no matter where you're getting after them. This two part podcast series is tailor made for the whitetail geek. Connect with Jason and PhelpsPhelps on Instagram, Facebook, and YoutubeShop Phelps Merch
This week on the show, I'm joined by K.C. Smith and Tyler Jones of The Element to break down their seven state road trip this hunting season and the lessons they learned chasing whitetails across the country.Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
This week on Gear Talk, Janis and Jordan talk with Kendall Card of Crispi US. They dive into the many components of a boot, how one is built, materials used, waterproofing, longevity and much more. If you have a question you want to submit to Gear Talk for discussion, email geartalk@themeateater.com. Want to comment on this episode? Visit https://www.themeateater.com/listen/gear-talk and join the conversation.Connect with Janis, Jordan, and...
Products go through popularity cycles. In the hunting realm, the best example of something that was hot, then not, and is now hot again, would be the tree saddle. The runner-up might be beefy, sharp-as-a-razor, single- and double-bevel broadheads.Single-bevel heads, with their one angled edge, are designed to produce more rotation. This, provided it’s working in concert with the helical of your fletching (and not against it), should create...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Janis Putelis, Hayden Sammak, Hunter Spencer, Garrett Long, and Randall Williams.
Waterfowlers occupy the ranks of the hardest core, most passionate, and ridiculous partakers of wild meat sources known. And they're great storytellers. This is our Duck Stories episode. We’ve searched the swamps and bayous for the best stories about skies being blacked out by mallard ducks, sunk boats, incredible dog retrieves and even gators. We really doubt -- even if you’re not a duck hunter -- that you’re going to want to miss this one...
Consistent whitetail success and enjoyment hinges on two very different aspects of every hunt.The first involves all of the stuff we can’t control, like weather, the actions of other hunters, and the cosmic, known-only-to-them whims upon which all deer operate. The second is what we can control, which can just as easily tank any random sit. Defaulting to an easy field edge stand when you should be in the timber, ignoring loads of fresh sign in...
On this week's show, Tony discusses the reality of hunting pressure on late-season deer. Throughout, he breaks down how to minimize the pressure you put on the whitetails so that you can have productive sits right up until the closing bell. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Steven Rinella talks with Tony Schaufler, Jamie Schaufler, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.Topics include: Steve's Instagram picture of a shipping container full of antlers; PA antler restrictions; did mountain men bait?; expropriation of land and being a good neighbor; the potential medicinal value of consuming paper thin antler slices; making a living picking antlers; the dog chew market; fake antler...
This week, Cal talks about daunting ducks, showing up for the future of bear hunting in New Jersey, Colorado Wolves that won't eat their veggies, and so much more.Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Pennsylvania's, Beau Martonik, is a podcast host, outdoor writer, and public land hunting expert who spends much of his fall targeting big woods deer on ground that is open to anyone. On this episode Martonik breaks down his strategy for nailing down food sources, and finding current deer movement, on public land as the season winds to a close. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook...
This is the FINAL episode of Rut Fresh Radio of the 2022 Season! In each episode, K.C. and Tyler interview deer hunters from across the country in search of the freshest, most current information on Whitetail Buck movement and hear stories of hunting success. This week we get to hear from hunters in Maryland, Georgia, Mississippi, and West Virginia. Right now you’re either you’re chasing the Southern Rut, or you’re trying to fill a tag in the...
On this episode of Bear Grease, the render crew gathers at Meateater South HQ to discuss a variety of things. Clay and Isaac discuss wild Bear Grease Hat sightings. Josh relates being recognized while fishing…by his voice. Brent talks about coon hunting with Clay’s dog Hoot. While Mist and Gary give their thoughts about on Target 2, Mr. Claude Maxwell. Make sure to catch our special guests bringing the Christmas well wishes. I really doubt you’re...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia and a special holiday round of Family Feud with Steven Rinella, Dan Chumbler, Janis Putelis, Hayden Sammak, Maggie Smith, Hunter Spencer, and Corinne Schneider.
On today's episode, Tony breaks down the realities of late-season hunting, and offers up some insight on how to make the quest for a buzzer beater deer as enjoyable as possible. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Steven Rinella talks with Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Seth Morris, Chester Floyd, Hunter Spencer, Hayden Sammak, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics include: Drinking with your parents when you're underage; which states drink the most?; MeatEater's Fancy Pants Christmas Cocktail, featuring Desert Door sotol; reinterpreting, "Baby It's Cold Outside"; Song and Dance Phil performs "It's The Most Wonderful Time to Kill Deer"; Phil and...
This week, Cal talks about legislation, HPAI, CWD, poaching, and so much more.Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
There’s a common misconception that eating the liver from an animal is, to quote Dick Gregory, like eating the filter out of a car. If the liver is the body’s primary filtration system, it must contain all the toxins it pulls from the blood, right? Not so. All the toxic compounds that the liver removes from the bloodstream are broken down into less-harmful molecules. Those molecules then enter blood or bile. Blood-bound toxins are filtered...
A coon hunter is only as good as his hounds. For more details on how a coon hunt goes down, check out the episode “Hillbilly Heaven” of MeatEater Season 11.
This week on the show, I'm breaking down the three year story of my hunt for Junior and the tactics that helped me kill this 5.5 year old Michigan buck on a small property.Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
This week on Gear Talk, Jordan and Janis are joined by First Lite's Whitetail product manager, Greg Farrell. They take a deep dive into all the features of First Lite's newest whitetail gear. If you're a deer nut, you're not going to want to miss this one. If you have a question you want to submit to Gear Talk for discussion, email geartalk@themeateater.com. Want to comment on this episode? Visit https://www.themeateater.com/listen/gear-talk and...
This week on the show, Jason sits down with whitetail legend Don Higgins, as they discuss the major do's and don'ts for success in the whitetail woods. Connect with Jason and PhelpsPhelps on Instagram, Facebook, and YoutubeShop Phelps Merch
This is the FIFTEENTH episode of Rut Fresh Radio of the 2022 Season! In each episode, K.C. and Tyler interview deer hunters from across the country in search of the freshest, most current information on Whitetail Buck movement and hear stories of hunting success. This week we get to hear from hunters in Alabama, North Dakota, Nebraska, and Iowa. It’s the late SZN for many, but the rut is popping if you’re in the right pockets! Hunters this week...
This week, after getting a surprising email, Clay pulls an audible and hops a flight back to Ohio just to interview one very unique man - a business owner, a family man, and a respected pillar of his community. Without saying too much, what we can tell you is this: loyal listeners will recognize the popular threads of redemption, forgiveness and nuance woven into the tapestry of this story. To say that this episode is a surprise might be an...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Cory Calkins, Hayden Sammak, Seth Morris, Janis Putelis, Garrett Long, Alyssa Smith and Carl Hansen.
On today's episode, Tony explains why it's beneficial for bowhunters to rifle or muzzleloader hunt, and vice versa. This weapon switch-up strategy can help all hunters better understand deer behavior throughout the entire season. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Steven Rinella talks with Buddy Levy, Brody Henderson, and Phil Taylor.Topics discussed: Buddy’s latest, “The Empire of Ice and Stone,”; calling people how they'd like to be called; how an arrow nock exits out of your nostril; capitalizing and "the truth about"; trying to find uncontacted people to hang out with; headlines of blonde eskimos; becoming a Canadian; getting separated big time; the importance of a rounded hull; eating polar bears raw...
This week Cal talks about high rise swine, the law enforcement desk, and so much more.Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Last summer, while running a familiar route near my house I noticed a couple walking a black Lab. They were headed my way, so I crossed the street to run past them. I don’t know what the dog saw or heard that caught its attention, but when that Lab took off the woman holding the leash buckled down for a split second before she caught air.I had never seen someone go full Superman from a dog, but she did. She obviously lost her grip on the leash...
The rut is a marathon for both bucks and hunters. We find ourselves run down, tired, hungry, and thirsty when it's all over. We retreat to our fridges and pantries while the bucks do their best to find a soft spot to lay down with the wind at their back close to food and water.Good bedding and food can come in many forms and locations, but water is often limited and hard to come by when temperatures drop and things start freezing. Honing in on a...
On today's show, guest host Tony Peterson chats with Wired to Hunt contributor, Alex Gyllstrom. Throughout this episode they discuss hot and cold streaks, and how they've both found ways to end a whitetail slump where it felt like they'd never kill another buck. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
This is the FOURTEENTH episode of Rut Fresh Radio of the 2022 Season! In each episode, K.C. and Tyler interview deer hunters from across the country in search of the freshest, most current information on Whitetail Buck movement and hear stories of hunting success. This week we get to hear from hunters in Washington, Oklahoma, Florida, and Pennsylvania. It’s the late SZN for many, but the rut is popping if you’re in the right pockets! Hunters this...
One this episode of the regular crew is joined by Clay's friend Ben Lagrone. They talk about child birth, Clay's new coonskin cap, and the mystery Bengal's fan wearing a Bear Grease hat on national television. Clay goes into detail of the untimely passing of best coonhound, Fern. Which leads Gary "Believer" Newcomb to tell a rogue story of how he rode motorcycles all over Vietnam dressed in disguise and ended up in a motorcycle wreck. The crew...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Seth Morris, Hayden Sammak, Phil Taylor, Cory Calkins, Maggie Hudlow, and Corinne Schneider.
On this week's show, Tony goes deeper into the world of hunting does. He explains why they are a real challenge in so many hunting situations, and why you can't really be a good hunter without understanding how all of the deer behave - not just the bucks. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEaterTony Peterson on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
Steven Rinella talks to Janis Putelis, Garret Long, Cory Calkins, Seth Morris, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.Topics discussed: Phil the Engineer, aka Phil the Song and Dance Man, performs in “A Christmas Carol”; Steve’s lesson the United State’s bifurcated legislature; Sen. Martin Heinrich explains Recovering America’s Wildlife Act (RAWA); the coveted elk buffer zone tag; how it became legal to cross national parks with a firearm...
This week, Cal talks about legislation, battery innovation, regulation and innovation, and so much more.Connect with Cal and MeatEaterCal on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Cal's Week in Review Merch
The mule deer rut might be just about over, but for one unlucky buck in Colorado, the last fight of the season ended with a bit of a surprise. On November 29, a 3x4 buck, presumably having seen its reflection in the ground-level window of a Colorado Springs home, was in for a shock when he charged the glass. Rather than locking antlers with his imaginary opponent, the deer crashed through the window, winding up in a basement office.Colorado...
I grew up near Koreatown in Garden Grove, California, and I can tell you that there was no shortage of good eats. One well-known food is Korean fried chicken. It's known for beyond-this-word crispiness and mouth-watering, spicy, sweet sauces.I’ve eaten my fair share of Korean fried chicken as a high school student hanging out with friends on Friday nights, and now when I’m back in town, my friends and I still get together for a meal in “K-Town...
Often attributed to King Solomon, this famous adage pretty well sums up cartridge development over the last 40 years or so: “What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.”Some modern cartridges have improved upon their predecessors, but hunters and sport shooters are rightly skeptical that The Latest Thing™ always surpasses what came before it.Take the .450 Bushmaster, for example...
This week on the show, Jason Phelps is joined by Alex Yerges of Pacific Calls. They dive deep into duck calls, duck call history, and duck hunting strategies. Big game season is all but over, but there's still plenty of time to get after ducks this season. Join Jason and Alex as they discuss the nuances of hunting and calling waterfowl. Connect with Jason and PhelpsPhelps on Instagram, Facebook, and YoutubeShop Phelps Merch
This week on the show, I'm joined by Brennen Nading and Michael Mancl of The Breaking Point TV to discuss their top tactics for killing late season bucks in real world DIY situations. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEaterMark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and FacebookMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch
This week on Gear Talk, Jordan and Janis are joined by Cam Brensinger of Nemo Equipment. They discuss tent coatings; silicone vs polyurethane; seam sealing; gear quality; where gear is made; treated down insulation; down fill power; synthetic insulation; sleeping bag temperature ratings.If you have a question you want to submit to Gear Talk for discussion, email geartalk@themeateater.com. Want to comment on this episode? Visit https://www...
For most people, the worst month to hunt just might be December.I know I’m supposed to paint a rosy picture of rut-worn bucks sprinting into food sources during cold afternoons, but that’s mostly BS. If you hunt where there’s any real pressure at all, the twelfth month of the year is often an exercise in futility. This is true regardless (and often in spite) of weather conditions.It’s not a lost cause, of course. If we view hunting solely with...
This past summer, I grew purple hull peas using seeds given to me by Misty Newcomb. Similar to black eyed peas, these cowpeas are typically used to make a hearty stew with smoked hocks and collard greens.In the sweltering heat of summer, I decided to marinate the cooked peas in a zesty vinaigrette and turn it into a salad with fresh tomatoes and basil from the garden, and serve it with a crispy pheasant cutlet.
I’ve always felt that I’ve been especially blessed as a deer hunter. Not necessarily because of my success, though I’ve had my moments, but rather because I’ve been able to experience so much of the deer hunting world. I grew up in Vermont, had family property in New York and Indiana, and when I was in my mid-twenties, I moved to Montana to become a guide. I’ve been lucky enough to hunt deer in a variety of different states, utilizing a...
This is the TWELFTH episode of Rut Fresh Radio of the 2022 Season! In each episode, K.C. and Tyler interview deer hunters from across the country in search of the freshest, most current information on Whitetail Buck movement and hear stories of hunting success. This week we get to hear from hunters in MISSISSIPPI, COOLORADO, MINNESOTA, and TEXAS! Surprisingly, hunters remarked at the late rut movement they’ve experienced this SZN. Scrapes seemed...
This is the third and final episode of our Secret Agent Man series with undercover Ohio Wildlife agent RT Stewart. In part one we learned about the big picture mechanics of undercover stings and how RT was a pioneer in the early 1990s for the Ohio Department of Natural Resources. We learned that humans don’t do well with chronic stress and discussed the personal toll placed on undercover agents and their families because of it, On this third...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Chester Floyd, Hayden Sammak, Phil Taylor, Maggie Smith, Cory Calkins, Maggie Hudlow, and Corinne Schneider.
When the Great Ammunition Shortage began in earnest in the latter part of 2020, many hunters discovered with dismay that reloading supplies were also virtually impossible to find. Those who had stocked up on brass, powder, primers, and bullets were in good shape; everyone else was SOL. Now’s the time to start preparing for the next ammo shortage. Reloading is fun, rewarding, and safe, and components are finally back in stock at most sporting...
There’s a scene in just about every murder-mystery show where the detective is locked in his office with pictures, note cards, and maps tacked to a wall with strings connecting one thing to the other. A pattern, a clue, a connection–the investigator is searching for anything that can help him solve the riddle at hand. This is exactly how it feels most days during the whitetail season for a deer hunter as he or she tries to figure out where to...
It seems so simple. Just use treats, praise, or maybe a fun toss of a ball or frisbee, and your dog will show up to work as happy as can be. If that were the case, it would be pretty tough to find a professional dog trainer who owns or advocates for e-collars, choke collars, and other forced-compliance tools. But they are everywhere, and they have their place. Yet, forcing a dog to do something is not the same as figuring out how to positively...
On today's show, Tony lays out a case for why we should give does far more credit than we do. He also explains how the challenge of killing mature does can make you a better buck hunter. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Peanuts were most likely first cultivated in Brazil or Peru, where they have been eaten for at least 3,500 years. Nowadays we think of them as a classic American snack, but their journey here was anything but direct. Spanish explorers introduced peanuts to Europe during the beginning of the Columbian exchange, and through trade with West Africans, peanuts became a major staple there. Some years later when West Africans were abducted and enslaved...
The prospects of finding a mature whitetail buck on public land may seem like a fool’s errand and leave you disheartened. You’ve watched truck after truck leave your local public hunting area, presumably all donning firearms and all filling their tags. Why would you waste your time and sit in a proverbial snowbank, trying to fill your deer tag? The truth is, it can be a very difficult time to find a mature buck and kill him. On the contrary, what...
Steven Rinella talks to Richard Fortunato, Charles Trost II, James Searl, Janis Putelis, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics discussed: Pistol packing bagpipe players; the U.S. Border Patrol's role in public land and critter management; Jani's daughter's incredible turkey gobbling skills; the time when Steve and Jani got pulled over by Border Patrol; wild horses; establishing base truth; darting eyes and deception; templing; HR concerns...
This week, Cal talks about Montana Wolves, Liberated Mink, Missouri Bears, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Our go-to hunting pant for every occasion is on sale for a limited time. Check it out here at our Black Friday Sale along with other great deals.
This week on the show, we're joined by diehard bowhunter, writer, and podcaster Clint Casper to discuss his top tactics for killing late rut and late season whitetails. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEater Mark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday, but not because of the turkey, football, or Black Friday deals (speaking of which, you can get up to 40% off on a ton of MeatEater, First Lite, Phelps, and FHF Gear right now). Thanksgiving kicks ass because it means a long weekend of good deer hunting. I know, the rut is basically over for most of the country, but that doesn’t mean big bucks won’t make mistakes at the end of November. One particular study...
On this episode of Bear Grease, the “OG” render crew reunites to discuss Operation Redbud, which at the time was the largest turkey poaching sting in US history. Clay grills Brent on his experiences as an under cover narcotics agent and whether or not he is presently running a sting operation on Clay. Josh ponders the psychological impacts of long term deep cover operations. Gary discusses his experiences growing up around future President Bill...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater's Trivia tournament with Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Seth Morris, Alyssa Smith, Rick Hutton, Max Barta, and Phil Taylor.
This is the TWELFTH episode of Rut Fresh Radio of the 2022 Season! In each episode, K.C. and Tyler interview deer hunters from across the country in search of the freshest, most current information on Whitetail Buck movement and hear stories of hunting success. This week we get to hear from hunters in ALABAMA, WISCONSIN, PENNSYLVANIA, and TENNESSEE. The country is in turmoil, but not because of Elon or political pundits. It’s full-fledge deer...
On this week's show, Tony breaks down his rut hunt and explains why we should all do a little reflecting on this year's successes and failures, so that we can all have more fun next November. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
When it comes to getting away from hunting pressure during the rut, the key is timing and putting distance between yourself and other hunters. Deer, especially mature bucks, will typically only tolerate a small amount of human intrusion. They are going to find areas where hunters aren't, so that means you need to as well. Stay creative and separate yourself from the masses to get close to a pressured public land buck this fall. Double Down on...
There is always debate over the best sides for Thanksgiving dinner, but there is no doubt that turkey is the centerpiece of the holiday dinner. If you’re planning on serving a wild bird instead of a butterball this year, there are a few things to consider. Whole Bird versus Breaking it Down Nothing is more iconic than a whole roasted turkey on a carving platter. But it’s really not an ideal way to cook a wild turkey, or for that matter, any...
This American-made bino harness is quiet, customizable, and made for quick access. Check out our Black Friday Sale to grab one of our favorite pieces of gear from FHF for 30% off.
Steve Rinella talks with Koe Wetzel, Dre Rocha, John Park, Kylee Archer, Max Barta, Chester Floyd, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics discussed: Steve's face on a box of waterfowl ammo; Koe's advice to Chester: stop playing music; Dre's hoodie and the mystery of Tupac; the MeatEater Trivia t-shirt is finally here!; when your dog eats your rib; second degree baiting and ethics; robo deer; growing up in the chicken capital of the world...
This week, Cal talks about cold hunts, warm fires, NJ bear hunting, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Clay Newcomb breaks down Steve Rinella’s turkey hunting tactics in the Gila Wilderness of New Mexico. To watch the full episode, click here.
The greatest treasure hunt in modern history ended two years ago, but the pursuit isn’t over if you’re willing to pay. Earlier this week, Heritage Auctions announced that 476 items from the famed Forrest Fenn treasure are up for sale. Heritage Auctions acquired the treasure from Tosuro Sagrado Holdings, LLC, who purchased it from the finder, Jack Stuef. We’ve covered Fenn’s treasure extensively at MeatEater. On June 8, 2020, we announced that...
From now until November 28, all logowear is 50% off. Check out the sale here so you can get that special someone the Bear Grease hat they keep talking about.
The whitetail rut consists of does coming into heat and bucks looking to breed them. It’s a simple concept and applies in all areas of the country where whitetails roam. The definition of the rut might be the same, but it varies regionally depending on your location and habitat type. Over the years, I’ve hunted the rut throughout the Appalachian mountains in the big woods, as well as the agricultural settings found in the Midwest and Canada...
Today on the show, I'm joined by master whitetail hunter Chris Parish. Currently, we're sharing a camp in Kansas trying to make the most of November. On this episode, Chris walks me through some of his most important experiences as a whitetail hunter and the strategies he employs to find success time and time again. Connect with Jason and Phelps Phelps on Instagram, Facebook, and Youtube Shop Phelps Merch
This week on the show, I'm joined by Tony Peterson to answer a whole pile of listener questions about hunting the rut, lockdown, late November/post-rut tactics and a whole bunch more. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEater Mark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
This week on Gear Talk, Janis and Jordan cover their September and October hunts, Janis's race and September archery elk hunt, heavy arrows, New First Lite pants, Jordan’s mule deer hunt, and new boots. If you have a question you want to submit to Gear Talk for discussion, email geartalk@themeateater.com. Want to comment on this episode? Visit https://www.themeateater.com/listen/gear-talk and join the conversation. Connect with Janis, Jordan...
On this 2nd episode in our Secret Agent Man series we’re going deep into the trenches of the darkside with undercover Ohio wildlife agent RT Stewart to get the full story on Operation Redbud, which at the time, was the largest turkey poaching sting in US history. RT is going to take us on a tour in the Poach Coach and we'll hear how he videoed over 100 illegal turkey kills in two springs. How would you like to see that on VHS tape? He’ll talk...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Janis Putelis, Chester Floyd, Cory Calkins, Maggie Hudlow, Sam James, Tressa Croaker, Christine Sawicki, Brody Henderson, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
This is the ELEVENTH episode of Rut Fresh Radio of the 2022 Season! In each episode, K.C. and Tyler interview deer hunters from across the country in search of the freshest, most current information on Whitetail Buck movement and hear stories of hunting success. This week we get to hear from hunters in Wyoming, Illinois, Kansas, and Rhode Island. Are we in lockdown? I think we’re in lockdown. Maybe we aren’t in lockdown! It’s a great (and...
The New Jersey Fish and Game Council voted to reopen the state’s bear hunt this December. Following a rampant increase in human-bear conflicts, Governor Phil Murphy announced that he will rescind his 2018 executive order which banned bear hunting on state lands. “I feel awful,” Governor Murphy said in an interview with NJ Advance Media. “But I can’t violate what are obvious facts that are potentially undermining public safety, particularly among...
Steve Rinella uses this do-it-all layering kit for all hunts, from turkey hunting in New Mexico’s Gila Wilderness to chasing ducks in the swamps of Louisiana. This kit is a perfect foundation to build on and have at the ready for all of your outdoor pursuits. Click here to check out our Black Friday Sale and add these items to your own do-it-all kit while they’re discounted up to 30% off!
From hot pursuits of early-season archery elk to snowy squirrel hunts—First Lite Wick base layers will keep you dry and comfortable in whatever weather comes your way. Shop our Black Friday Sale to add some of these indispensable layers to your own kit for 30% off typical retail pricing.
On today's show, Tony breaks down what happens in mid-November as the rut starts to wind down, and the hunting pressure from the archery and firearm crowd causes the deer to seek sanctuaries. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
While filming our second season of One Week in November earlier this month, I faced a dilemma. Where I thought the Wisconsin bucks would be cruising was a dead zone. By November 6th, that much was clear. It was also clear that I needed to take advantage of my last day of hunting, so I went looking. What I eventually found clued me into current buck movement. Even at the point in the season when that movement should have been random—it wasn’t. It...
Mississippi pot roast is one of those recipes that seems too good to be true the first time you make it. Its simple ingredient list, set-it-and-forget-it cooking style, and unique flavor will likely make it an immediate classic in your home. It has a little spice and tang from the pepperoncini, but most folks will find it perfectly palatable. This versatile preparation is great on sandwiches with a slice of melted swiss; served over mashed...
I was lucky enough to catch Mahi Mahi, aka dorado, with Kimi Werner on a recent trip to Hawaii. Mahi Mahi are nicknamed the rabbits of the ocean. They're an extremely fast growing fish and can spawn 2 to 3 times a year, making them a resilient and sustainable species to catch and eat. Their flaky, mild white meat is delicious when simply seared in a cast iron skillet. I like to baste it with a miso compound butter for umami flavor, and finish it...
This holiday season we’re offering some of the deepest deals on some of our favorite gear so you can give your loved ones gifts they’ll actually use—and for an awesome price. From November 15 until November 28, you can save up to 40% across all MeatEater brands. Styles from First Lite’s waterfowl line are on sale for the first time ever. MeatEater logowear will be up to 50% off. Great deals from Phelps Game Calls and FHF Gear are also included in...
Steven Rinella talks with Jason Fischer, Brody Henderson, Chester Floyd, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics discussed: Putting metal balls in fish; how Jason didn't believe Steve was Steve; the crazy audacity; Jason as a Gandhi-like figure; how we've lost 1.3 million acres of sagebrush habitat per year for the past 20 years; Chester's son and Chester's thumb; the Lake Erie fishery; how you get to be a tournament director; walleye...
My first in-person experience with dead deer was when I was a kid and saw a few does hung up on a meat pole with their throats slit. I asked why their throats were cut, and I was told: “to bleed them.” I didn’t start hunting until much later in life, so I just tucked the whole experience away in my memory banks. But recently, I’ve been working in a family-operated meat processing facility. Every animal that comes down the kill chute gets a major...
The rut is the special time of year that whitetail hunters live for. But it's also just that, a time of the year. It doesn’t last long—a month or so is about the best you can hope for. Maximizing your time during that magical period is critical. That said, life has a way of getting in the way, and most of us have to choose our shots. So what’s your shot? Is it morning? Is it evening? Let’s break them down. Benefits of Morning Rut Hunts Personally...
This week, Cal talks about some uplifting and depressing wildlife numbers, quail song counting, legislation, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Every user of outdoor spaces can align against one common enemy: surface shitters. Follow these tips so you don’t find yourself being the scourge of everyone else just trying to have a nice time outside and not step in human feces.
My trail camera strategy during the rut is more inventory-based than trying to time movement with an exact setup location. Leading up to the rut I’ve already scouted heavily (both boots on the ground and studying maps) to identify critical areas where a buck will move or use terrain or cover to find does. Trail cameras can be a great tool, acting as your eyes in numerous areas since you can’t be in more than one place at once. Whether you’re...
This week on the show Mark shares the story of his week hunting the whitetail rut in Nebraska and Ohio, the tactics he used to find success, and the lessons he learned along the way. Connect with Mark Kenyon and MeatEater Mark Kenyon on Instagram , Twitter , and Facebook MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Routeed ducks is a name of a recipe that is hyper-local to the south Lafourche parish in southeastern Louisiana. I grew up 45 minutes north, and I never knew this recipe to be called by this name. The common vernacular in south Louisiana considers this recipe to be a “rice and gravy” recipe. The liquid which the ducks cooks in is meant to be used as a gravy on top of a various array of starches. In Louisiana, rice is king. Typically this dish is...
All-day sits are like catching six-pound smallmouth, or shooting 300-pound black bears. Everyone says they do it, but few rarely do. I’m surrounded by folks who identify as hardcore whitetail hunters, and by most accounts, they are. Yet, most of them don’t pull a single dark-to-dark sit during the rut on any given year. You know what? They still kill bucks. A lot of them kill great bucks. The moral of the story is the least surprising part of...
There’s a difference between book smart and bar smart. You may not be book smart, but this series can make you seem educated and interesting from a barstool. So, belly up, pour yourself a glass of something good, and take notes as we look at America’s most destructive stampede of squirrels this side of Independence Day. When you hear the word “stampede,” what kinds of animals come to mind? Bulls, elephants, Black Friday shoppers, and wildebeests...
On this episode, Clay is down in Oklahoma chasing whitetails in the heat of the rut, but finds some time to sit down with Bryan Jump, Sherry and Alvin Grigg, Dave Gardner, & Brian Ringles. They discuss the most recent episode, "Secret Agent Man," following real life undercover game warden R.T. Stewart. The crew also finds time to discuss people's strong opinions on equine hoof care, the finer points of hog hunting and plott hounds, and why...
This is the TENTH episode of Rut Fresh Radio of the 2022 Season! In each episode, K.C. and Tyler interview deer hunters from across the country in search of the freshest, most current information on Whitetail Buck movement and hear stories of hunting success. This week we get to hear from hunters in Texas, North Dakota, Kentucky, and Iowa. We’re in the thick of it now! It seems this past week you’re either HOT, or you’re not. With looming colder...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Dan Flores, Janis Putelis, Chester Floyd, Seth Morris, Cory Calkins, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
On this week's show, Tony discusses a common rut mistake many hunters make, which is to look for deer concentrations when they might be better off looking for fewer deer in the right spots. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
If you are a hunter who lives by the ethos that you should try a new cut of meat every time you kill a deer, it could be easy to quickly run out of ideas. Ribs, shanks, necks, and brisket are all delicious additions to the typical quarters and backstraps, but at some point, you’ll have to start looking inward for new ideas. Into the guts of the deer, that is. Heart If there is one hunting tradition that spans cultures and generations, it is...
Celery root, or celeriac, is quickly becoming one of my favorite fall and winter vegetables. It has the distinctively savory, aromatic qualities of celery along with delicious nutty notes. Texture-wise, celery root is nothing like the watery, fibrous sticks that you keep convincing yourself to like by drowning them in ranch dressing or copious amounts of peanut butter. Celery root is an entirely different animal. It’s as versatile as a potato...
We look forward to the rut with endless optimism, hoping that this is the year that it brings us the buck of a lifetime. The beauty of the rut is that this kind of luck is never out of the question. Even in the grimmest hunting environments, bucks are chasing does somewhere. However, if this sort of luck never seems to roll your way, here are a few ways to improve your rut strategy. Remain Flexible and Mobile It’s human nature to do things the...
Topics discussed: Jani negging Steve; the giant moose paddle that Steve's gonna make into a chair for his kid; how to get stuff from Alaska to the Lower 48; Dan Flores' brilliant new book, "Wild New World," is available; starting a story 66 million years ago; wiping the slate clean with a big asteroid; striking at a shallow angle; when extinctions stopped for 10,000 years; flightless birds as the first things to go; a haunting chicken memory from...
Selecting the space where you locate your vegetable garden might seem mundane or unimportant, but it’s often the reason why some gardens are successful and others aren’t. Most gardeners understand how their USDA growing zone impacts when they should plant their crops. But even within growing zones, there are pockets of unique conditions that can have a great effect on your garden—these are known as microclimates. As I’ll detail below, your garden...
If I’ve heard it once I’ve heard it a thousand times: “I’m a catch-and-release fisherman because I don’t like the taste of freshwater fish.” Anglers and foodies alike who will happily eat saltwater species like tuna, swordfish, and haddock, always seem to turn their noses up at the idea of eating fish from a lake, river, or pond. I understand that most people buy their fish in plastic-wrapped packages at the grocery store where there aren’t a lot...
Jordan Budd explains her strategy for getting Steve on a big Nebraska buck and some of the challenges they faced along the way. Click here to watch the whole episode now.
This week Cal quickly recaps South Dakota -- a state where all animals want to live -- and does a very special interview with the Director of the BLM Tracy Stone-Manning. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
We’ve all read articles stressing the importance of sitting all day during the rut. For those of you who’ve experienced the phenomenon of a midday buck parade, you’ve likely got the program figured out. For anybody out there who’s spent countless midday hours watching nothing but squirrels, this article is for you. There are two important factors that contribute to a productive all-day rut hunt, selecting a location in which deer are likely to...
Every year big bucks are killed on public land. But just because you scouted early and got your stand set up doesn’t mean you own that area for the fall. Here are a few things to consider when using a deer stand on public land.
Trail cam technology has come a long way since the tripwires of the 80s. While early models could only record a single event per setup, modern cellular cameras can transmit hundreds of images and videos to help hunters take inventory of herds from across the country. Jump to: The Trail Cameras We Use What We Look for in a Good Trail Camera We’ve put dozens of different trail cameras through the paces over the years. Some spat out indiscernible...
The landowner and one of the hunters involved in a viral duck hunting confrontation have been charged with class A and B misdemeanors, according to court documents obtained by MeatEater. Jeffrey Erman, the landowner seen in a recent video berating a group of hunters, has been charged with trading in special influence, disorderly conduct, and interference with the rights of hunters. Dustin Wolf, the hunter who obtained permission to hunt the...
This week on Gear Talk, Janis and Jordan discuss their side by sides; Mark Boardman with Vortex Optics joins the discussion to explain adjusting your binocular diopter correctly; Jordan on pitching and using tarps; Janis and the Kifaru Gnargali backpack. If you have a question you want to submit to Gear Talk for discussion, email geartalk@themeateater.com. Click here to subscribe to Gear Talk on iHeart Radio Click here to subscribe to Gear Talk...
This week on Gear Talk, Janis and Jordan discuss their side by sides; Mark Boardman with Vortex Optics joins the discussion to explain adjusting your binocular diopter correctly; Jordan on pitching and using tarps; Janis and the Kifaru Gnargali backpack. If you have a question you want to submit to Gear Talk for discussion, email geartalk@themeateater.com. Want to comment on this episode? Visit https://www.themeateater.com/listen/gear-talk and...
Every week this fall, I’ll be providing updates on whitetail buck movement for the entire country. These reports are based on intel from whitetailers in each region and my own observations as a traveling deer hunter. For more info like this, subscribe to the Rut Fresh Radio Podcast and Whitetail Weekly Newsletter. Rut Fresh Reports are powered by onX. This is it—the rut is here. If you whitetail hunt in the East, Midwest, or West, these next...
Everybody loves a spring chicken, but at the Newcomb Farm, we start ours in the fall to get more productivity out of our egg-laying chickens using their natural egg-laying patterns. Most chicks won’t start laying eggs until 18 to 20 weeks. That means they are pretty much just farm freeloaders for almost the first half of the year. Most chickens also dramatically decline in production–many to the point of laying almost no eggs–in the winter when...
In the history of MeatEater, only a couple of episodes have never made it from the field to our viewers. In Season 11, the crew tried their darndest to include a hard water fishing episode complete with perch roe doughnuts—but not every take is destined for the big screen. Despite Chester’s best efforts to scout and set up the perfect ice fishing episode at Devils Lake, North Dakota, winter weather had a different agenda.
A Pennsylvania hunter has admitted to shooting and killing another hunter this week after an altercation over a hunting spot. David Heathcote of Emlenton, Pennsylvania, told emergency services that he shot Robert Wingard with his shotgun after Wingard threatened to shoot his dogs and his daughter. Wingard was upset, according to Heathcote, because Heathcote had broken up Wingard’s archery deer hunt by targeting doves with a shotgun in the same...
On this episode of the Bear Grease Podcast, we’re going deep undercover in the rough country of Southeast Ohio to learn about the secret lives of wildlife poachers AND the life of an undercover wildlife agent by the name of RT Stewart. He worked 18 years for the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, and in the 1990s, was one of the lead agents on the largest turkey poaching sting in US history. He’s a decorated law enforcement officer, known for...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steven Rinella, Rick Smith, Garret Smith, Chris Gill, Loren Moulton, Danny Bolton, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Seth Morris, and Phil Taylor.
This is the NINTH episode of Rut Fresh Radio of the 2022 Season! In each episode, K.C. and Tyler interview deer hunters from across the country in search of the freshest, most current information on Whitetail Buck movement and hear stories of hunting success. This week we get to hear from hunters in Arkansas, Michigan, Ohio, and Colorado. Early November is the heat of the rut, however hunters this season are going to encounter super hot...
A good layering system is key to staying out in the whitetail woods long enough to find the big buck of your dreams. Hours of glassing require warmth, but when hoofing it to that vantage point, you better be able to shed a layer or two. This complete system will have you ready for any situation throughout the season. Check out Episode 2 of MeatEater Season 11 to watch Steve, Clay, and I hunt Nebraska whitetails, live on the MeatEater website now!
The danger with rut hunting advice is that it’s often diluted, over-simplified garbage. Well, maybe not garbage, but much of the how-to content built around killing a buck during the rut assumes an awful lot about the audience and the conditions that aren’t always true. For example, the weather plays a huge role in rut-hunt planning. Pressure from your fellow deer junkies does, too. Then there is the great intangible of just what the actual deer...
The danger with rut hunting advice is that it’s often diluted, over-simplified garbage. Well, maybe not garbage, but much of the how-to content built around killing a buck during the rut assumes an awful lot about the audience and the conditions that aren’t always true. For example, the weather plays a huge role in rut-hunt planning. Pressure from your fellow deer junkies does, too. Then there is the great intangible of just what the actual deer...
A good layering system is key to staying out in the whitetail woods long enough to find the big buck of your dreams. Hours of glassing require warmth, but when hoofing it to that vantage point, you better be able to shed a layer or two. This complete system will have you ready for any situation throughout the season. Check out Episode 2 of MeatEater Season 11 to watch Steve, Clay, and I hunt Nebraska whitetails, live on the MeatEater website now!
On today's show, Tony discusses a problem that plagues a lot of whitetail hunters, which is that they want a hunt to happen a certain way, in a specific spot. This tends to influence their hunting decisions in a negative way. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
There’s something so satisfying about coming home with a bucket full of panfish. Whether you’re catching bluegill, crappie, or any of the other myriad of sunfish species, having a pile of delectable panfish fillets is on par with having finished processing a deer, spatchcocking a duck, or finding the perfect movie to go with your takeout. When it’s all laid out in front of you, for a moment you feel rich. It’s the reason that these relatively...
Calling a whitetail into shooting range is simply one of the coolest things you can do as a hunter. Not to mention, it’s awfully effective. But (and when it comes to good things there’s always a but), if you use your calls at the wrong times or in the wrong ways they can do more harm than good. Here is a simple breakdown of how to call to bucks the right way, at the right times, during each different phase of the whitetail season. Early Season...
I’ve been corrected a number of times for using the term “rockfish” to describe striped sea bass. I will also make note that none of these people were from the Chesapeake Bay area. Here, striped sea bass are called rockfish, namely for their tendency to congregate on rocky structures. Regardless of what you call them, they are one of the most important game fish in America, and through their tumultuous recent history, they’ve become a symbol of...
There’s something so satisfying about coming home with a bucket full of panfish. Whether you’re catching bluegill, crappie, or any of the other myriad of sunfish species, having a pile of delectable panfish fillets is on par with having finished processing a deer, spatchcocking a duck, or finding the perfect movie to go with your takeout. When it’s all laid out in front of you, for a moment you feel rich. It’s the reason that these relatively...
I’ve been corrected a number of times for using the term “rockfish” to describe striped sea bass. I will also make note that none of these people were from the Chesapeake Bay area. Here, striped sea bass are called rockfish, namely for their tendency to congregate on rocky structures. Regardless of what you call them, they are one of the most important game fish in America, and through their tumultuous recent history, they’ve become a symbol of...
Calling a whitetail into shooting range is simply one of the coolest things you can do as a hunter. Not to mention, it’s awfully effective. But (and when it comes to good things there’s always a but), if you use your calls at the wrong times or in the wrong ways they can do more harm than good. Here is a simple breakdown of how to call to bucks the right way, at the right times, during each different phase of the whitetail season. Early Season...
Steven Rinella talks with Rick Smith, Garret Smith, Chris Gill, Loren Moulton, Danny Bolton, Janis Putelis, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics discussed: MeatEater's Season 11, Episode 1 with Evan Hafer of BRCC is live on themeateater.com; how Chris Gill had never pooped outdoors before filming the MeatEater series; not caring if you live or die when you're young; a reminder to get tickets for Chester + Trampled By Turtles' concert in...
Kona crabs, also known as spanner crabs, are known for their sweet and mild flavor. While you can boil these crustaceans for consumption, we prefer to eat them raw and enjoy every bit of succulent flesh simply dressed with seasonings and spice.
Be sure to tune into the latest episode of SpearChef to watch us cooking up more fresh catches.
The term “trolling” carries with it one very specific tactic. You drop a line in the water let it flow out behind the boat and drive around in circles hoping to stumble across a fish. But we’re deer hunters, right? Trolling has no application in the woods. Except, there is. I was hunting with a good friend somewhere around eight years ago when I first tried it. We talked about the concept for several seasons. Finally, while on a trip West and...
We just had our third frost here in Maine, which means people are starting to sniffle and sneeze. It also means that it’s time to make a new batch of fire cider—an age-old tonic for human health during cold and flu season. There’s really no telling exactly when the first fire cider was made. I think it’s a safe bet, though, that it was shortly after people realized if you forget a cask of wine in the cellar, it turns into (something we now know...
Kona crabs, also known as spanner crabs, are known for their sweet and mild flavor. While you can boil these crustaceans for consumption, we prefer to eat them raw and enjoy every bit of succulent flesh simply dressed with seasonings and spice.
Be sure to tune into the latest episode of SpearChef to watch us cooking up more fresh catches.
The term “trolling” carries with it one very specific tactic. You drop a line in the water let it flow out behind the boat and drive around in circles hoping to stumble across a fish. But we’re deer hunters, right? Trolling has no application in the woods. Except, there is. I was hunting with a good friend somewhere around eight years ago when I first tried it. We talked about the concept for several seasons. Finally, while on a trip West and...
We just had our third frost here in Maine, which means people are starting to sniffle and sneeze. It also means that it’s time to make a new batch of fire cider—an age-old tonic for human health during cold and flu season. There’s really no telling exactly when the first fire cider was made. I think it’s a safe bet, though, that it was shortly after people realized if you forget a cask of wine in the cellar, it turns into (something we now know...
This week, Cal talks about Snort's coyote encounter, sneaking on antelope, shooting bills, the crime desk, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Two men have been charged with theft, aggravated assault, and battery stemming from an incident that took place on Oct. 15 in the Shale Creek area of Greys River, Wyoming. Jared Michael Olguin, 35, of Elizabeth, Colorado, and Shea Patrice Sanchez, 30, of Green River, Wyoming, are accused of assaulting two Wyoming hunters, Dawson Handley and Joseph Boster, and stealing Boster’s backpack, which contained several expensive hunting-related items. The...
Public land offers up some seriously great opportunities to target waterfowl. But chances are, you won’t be the only one out there. Here are a few tips for hunting public land waterfowl with courtesy and respect so we can all leave our blinds with birds for dinner and without hatred for our fellow hunters.
Charges are pending following a heated confrontation between a landowner and a group of waterfowl hunters in North Dakota’s Eddy County. The incident took place on the morning of Friday, Oct. 21, and was recorded by Jacob Sweere of Madison Lake, Minnesota, in a now-viral video. The group of hunters had set up a spread between a cut bean field and a cut cornfield. They bagged several birds, but it wasn’t long before the owner of the cornfield...
Deer decoys aren’t just for the Midwest. You don’t have to be immersed in agriculture fields or extensive, well-manicured food plots (but they can certainly help). From my experience, pinpointing your local peak breeding window and exactly where does will be in late October and early November are key factors. I’ve always believed the best decoy is a doe, and I’ve killed many good bucks using that style. Why mimic a doe in heat? Well, consider...
Public land offers up some seriously great opportunities to target waterfowl. But chances are, you won’t be the only one out there. Here are a few tips for hunting public land waterfowl with courtesy and respect so we can all leave our blinds with birds for dinner and without hatred for our fellow hunters.
Two men have been charged with theft, aggravated assault, and battery stemming from an incident that took place on Oct. 15 in the Shale Creek area of Greys River, Wyoming. Jared Michael Olguin, 35, of Elizabeth, Colorado, and Shea Patrice Sanchez, 30, of Green River, Wyoming, are accused of assaulting two Wyoming hunters, Dawson Handley and Joseph Boster, and stealing Boster’s backpack, which contained several expensive hunting-related items. The...
Charges are pending following a heated confrontation between a landowner and a group of waterfowl hunters in North Dakota’s Eddy County. The incident took place on the morning of Friday, Oct. 21, and was recorded by Jacob Sweere of Madison Lake, Minnesota, in a now-viral video. The group of hunters had set up a spread between a cut bean field and a cut cornfield. They bagged several birds, but it wasn’t long before the owner of the cornfield...
Deer decoys aren’t just for the Midwest. You don’t have to be immersed in agriculture fields or extensive, well-manicured food plots (but they can certainly help). From my experience, pinpointing your local peak breeding window and exactly where does will be in late October and early November are key factors. I’ve always believed the best decoy is a doe, and I’ve killed many good bucks using that style. Why mimic a doe in heat? Well, consider...
There’s no reason to stop eating homegrown meals just because your growing season is wrapping up. Using these five preservation methods so you can eat from your garden all year round. For canning recipes and food safety information check out the National Center for Home Food Preservation.
Every week this fall, I’ll be providing updates on whitetail buck movement for the entire country. These reports are based on intel from whitetailers in each region and my own observations as a traveling deer hunter. For more info like this, subscribe to the Rut Fresh Radio Podcast and Whitetail Weekly Newsletter. Rut Fresh Reports are powered by onX. As I said in last week’s Rut Fresh Report, the end of October is a good time to be in the...
Every week this fall, I’ll be providing updates on whitetail buck movement for the entire country. These reports are based on intel from whitetailers in each region and my own observations as a traveling deer hunter. For more info like this, subscribe to the Rut Fresh Radio Podcast and Whitetail Weekly Newsletter. Rut Fresh Reports are powered by onX. As I said in last week’s Rut Fresh Report, the end of October is a good time to be in the...
There’s no reason to stop eating homegrown meals just because your growing season is wrapping up. Using these five preservation methods so you can eat from your garden all year round. For canning recipes and food safety information check out the National Center for Home Food Preservation.
When pondering whether to post vintage hunting photos on the internet, heed this advice: Don’t make claims about the time, place, hunters, and quarry unless your family’s photo albums hold the originals. Even then, skip all such details unless you can vouch for Great-Grandpa’s memory and integrity, and verify Great-Grandma’s scribblings on the photos’ borders or backsides. Realize this: On Instagram alone, you’re challenging a pool of 1.3 billion...
Archery seasons are well underway, and rifle hunting opportunities are right around the corner in most of the country. Unfortunately, that means hunters in more than 30 states have to contend with deer, elk, and moose that might be infected with chronic wasting disease (CWD). CWD is an always-fatal prion disease that infects members of the cervid family—other diseases like mad cow, scrapie in sheep, and Creutzfeldt-Jakob’s in humans are thought...
The debate has raged for as long as gun hunters have taken animals with tiny, fast-moving metal projectiles: what type of bullet is best? These days, that debate revolves mainly around solid copper bullets and various jacketed lead bullets. Unfortunately, as MeatEater’s Janis Putelis pointed out, reliable, real-world information can be tough to track down. “A lot of folks come up with very strong opinions about which one is best for what animals...
This week on the show Dan Johnson returns to the show to help Mark Kenyon break down his successful hunt on opening night in Michigan and the lessons we can all learn from it and apply the rest of this season. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
When people think about hunting rutting whitetails, they typically think of ag land in the midwest. In this episode of Cutting the Distance, Jon Gabrio talks about hunting mountain whitetails in the state of Washington. Jon dives into scouting year round to figure these bucks out, setting stands once he has found a target buck, how he plays the wind with stand locations, and how he goes about getting a buck to walk by his stand. Connect with...
When people think about hunting rutting whitetails, they typically think of ag land in the midwest. In this episode of Cutting the Distance, Jon Gabrio talks about hunting mountain whitetails in the state of Washington. Jon dives into scouting year round to figure these bucks out, setting stands once he has found a target buck, how he plays the wind with stand locations, and how he goes about getting a buck to walk by his stand. Connect with...
Spatchcocking gamebirds is a great way to ensure a juicy, even-cooked bird. This method removes all the bones, so be sure to save those for a stock. If you’re looking for recipe inspiration, try out Danielle Prewett’s spatchcock pheasant, the spicy dry rub will translate great to duck meat.
Spatchcocking gamebirds is a great way to ensure a juicy, even-cooked bird. This method removes all the bones, so be sure to save those for a stock. If you’re looking for recipe inspiration, try out Danielle Prewett’s spatchcock pheasant, the spicy dry rub will translate great to duck meat.
When many of us think of sheep wool, we think of yarn and knitting projects. And while spinning wool into yarn to then make into cozy clothes and accessories is certainly an excellent use for your sheep fleeces, it’s not the only project to consider come shearing time. Below you’ll find the basic steps for processing your wool post-shearing, as well as a few different ideas to get you started on how to use all that gorgeous wool. Cleaning The...
When many of us think of sheep wool, we think of yarn and knitting projects. And while spinning wool into yarn to then make into cozy clothes and accessories is certainly an excellent use for your sheep fleeces, it’s not the only project to consider come shearing time. Below you’ll find the basic steps for processing your wool post-shearing, as well as a few different ideas to get you started on how to use all that gorgeous wool. Cleaning The...
This is a Caliber Battle for the ages. American gun enthusiasts have been debating the comparative merits of the 9mm Luger and the .45 ACP since the first U.S.-made 9mm handguns hit the market in the 1950s. While some claim the debate is over, the continued popularity of “9mm vs. .45 ACP” articles and videos suggests that everyday gun owners haven’t made up their minds. We won’t settle that debate today. As with most things gun-related, the...
Teddy Roosevelt’s first National Waterfowl Refuge, the Lower Klamath NWR on the California-Oregon Border, has gone dry. So has its neighboring National Wildlife Refuge, Tule Lake. The issue is multi-faceted, a perfect storm of politics, crippling drought, and an unwillingness to compromise. The Importance of the Klamath Basin For a background of the basin and its importance as waterfowl habitat, I called the Fish and Wildlife Service Biologist...
This is a Caliber Battle for the ages. American gun enthusiasts have been debating the comparative merits of the 9mm Luger and the .45 ACP since the first U.S.-made 9mm handguns hit the market in the 1950s. While some claim the debate is over, the continued popularity of “9mm vs. .45 ACP” articles and videos suggests that everyday gun owners haven’t made up their minds. We won’t settle that debate today. As with most things gun-related, the...
His name was Ernie. The sun has just gone down on the last day of the Vermont deer season when the flannel-clad old man with a white beard backed his rusty Chevy into the parking lot with the antlers of the biggest 10-pointer I’d ever seen sticking up from the tailgate. I was 17 years old, sitting in my car outside the general store and big game check-in station, eating beef jerky and begrudging my rotten luck. I hadn’t gotten a buck and had only...
His name was Ernie. The sun has just gone down on the last day of the Vermont deer season when the flannel-clad old man with a white beard backed his rusty Chevy into the parking lot with the antlers of the biggest 10-pointer I’d ever seen sticking up from the tailgate. I was 17 years old, sitting in my car outside the general store and big game check-in station, eating beef jerky and begrudging my rotten luck. I hadn’t gotten a buck and had only...
Teddy Roosevelt’s first National Waterfowl Refuge, the Lower Klamath NWR on the California-Oregon Border, has gone dry. So has its neighboring National Wildlife Refuge, Tule Lake. The issue is multi-faceted, a perfect storm of politics, crippling drought, and an unwillingness to compromise. The Importance of the Klamath Basin For a background of the basin and its importance as waterfowl habitat, I called the Fish and Wildlife Service Biologist...
On this episode of the Bear Grease Podcast we’re talking whitetailed deer, but this isn’t the typical tips, tactics and biology that we hear so much about. That stuff is useful, and we love it, but the foundation of why that knowledge is even desirable is found in the onion a layer deeper. We want the knowledge because of how valuable whitetails are to us. Whitetail deer hunting culture in this country is uniquely Americana, there’s nothing else...
This is the FIFTH episode of Rut Fresh Radio of the 2022 Season! In each episode, K.C. and Tyler interview deer hunters from across the country in search of the freshest, most current information on Whitetail Buck movement and hear stories of hunting success. This week we get to hear from hunters in Missouri, Ohio, New York, and Texas. There’s also report of two public land bucks going down in NEBRASKA by two fellers you know! The common theme...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia with Steve Rinella, Seth Morris, Kelsey Morris, Jim Heffelfinger, Brody Henderson, Chester Floyd, Cory Calkins, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
Cheating is everywhere. A quick flip through the pages of a newspaper or scrolling through newsfeeds on your phone makes this quite clear. Most of us can recall scandals in football, basketball, and even chess in the not-so-recent past. The much less popular sport of walleye fishing has now taken its turn at the plate. While many people don’t realize that walleye tournaments are even a thing, this type of behavior has been going on much longer...
Traditionally, piccata is an Italian dish of pounded veal or chicken cutlets lightly floured, browned in butter, and finished in a sauce packed with briny flavor thanks to a copious amount of capers and lemon. Honestly, this sauce works with almost any meat you throw at it. The twist I've offered here is doing this dish with some good ole Minnesota walleye and using lobster mushroom powder in the flour mixture, which perfectly complements the...
There are a host of elements that are essential for healthy garden crops, but the three that are most limited in our natural environment are Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium—commonly referred to by their chemical symbols N, P, and K. Most gardeners know what aisle of the big box store to find bags of fertilizer, neatly containing roughly 10 percent of each of those critical elements, but few know how to create their very own organic fertilizer...
Traditionally, piccata is an Italian dish of pounded veal or chicken cutlets lightly floured, browned in butter, and finished in a sauce packed with briny flavor thanks to a copious amount of capers and lemon. Honestly, this sauce works with almost any meat you throw at it. The twist I've offered here is doing this dish with some good ole Minnesota walleye and using lobster mushroom powder in the flour mixture, which perfectly complements the...
Cheating is everywhere. A quick flip through the pages of a newspaper or scrolling through newsfeeds on your phone makes this quite clear. Most of us can recall scandals in football, basketball, and even chess in the not-so-recent past. The much less popular sport of walleye fishing has now taken its turn at the plate. While many people don’t realize that walleye tournaments are even a thing, this type of behavior has been going on much longer...
There are a host of elements that are essential for healthy garden crops, but the three that are most limited in our natural environment are Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium—commonly referred to by their chemical symbols N, P, and K. Most gardeners know what aisle of the big box store to find bags of fertilizer, neatly containing roughly 10 percent of each of those critical elements, but few know how to create their very own organic fertilizer...
On today's episode, Tony talks about how important it is to try to develop confidence in all aspects of your deer hunting game. He also explains how getting too cocky can kill your chances of success as well. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Steve Rinella talks with Jim Heffelfinger, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Seth Morris, and Corinne Schneider. Topics discussed: How Jim got canceled from Instagram and how to help him make a comeback by following him at @cervidnut; Jim's book, Deer of the Southwest, is back in print; the forthcoming bible on black-tailed and mule deer of North America; antlerogenesis and how antler bone resembles cancer growth; testes the size of peas; check out...
Steve Rinella talks with Jim Heffelfinger, Janis Putelis, Brody Henderson, Seth Morris, and Corinne Schneider. Topics discussed: How Jim got canceled from Instagram and how to help him make a comeback by following him at @cervidnut; Jim's book, Deer of the Southwest, is back in print; the forthcoming bible on black-tailed and mule deer of North America; antlerogenesis and how antler bone resembles cancer growth; testes the size of peas; check out...
A Tennessee man surprised state wildlife officials last month by catching a monstrous blue catfish weighing in well over 100 pounds. Angler Micka Burkhart caught the 118.7-pound blue while fishing on the Cumberland River last month. While awaiting official certification, Burkhart’s catch from Sept. 24 will likely hold the new Tennessee state record, shattering the previously held for over 24 years. Burkhart was fishing with his wife on a stretch...
A Tennessee man surprised state wildlife officials last month by catching a monstrous blue catfish weighing in well over 100 pounds. Angler Micka Burkhart caught the 118.7-pound blue while fishing on the Cumberland River last month. While awaiting official certification, Burkhart’s catch from Sept. 24 will likely hold the new Tennessee state record, shattering the previously held for over 24 years. Burkhart was fishing with his wife on a stretch...
Inspired by loaded potato soup, this version made with cauliflower and leeks makes a the perfect fall starter or a cozy weeknight meal with some crunchy dipping bread. The pureed cauliflower adds its own creaminess, but definitely don’t skimp on the bacon and cheddar cheese toppings.
I’ll start this with a point of clarity: I have spent more money than I care to remember leasing ground to hunt. I’ve leased ground in my home state of Michigan as well as in about five other states. For the most part, I don’t regret it but, at the same time, I can’t say that I was really better off for having done so. Leasing is a fickle kind of thing, in my experience. These days, I’ve learned from those experiences and have adopted a simple...
This week, Cal talks about beyond most meats, 1/3 acre in Newport Beach for 13k, ancient amputation, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Steven Rinella talks with Bill Vanderheyden, Janis Putelis, Chester Floyd, Hayden Sammak, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics discussed: Who stole the office fish?; graduating first in your engineering class out of 1,232 students; Brandon Palaniuk wins angler of the year; get tickets to see Chester open for Trampled By Turtles on Dec. 1 in Atlanta; when hunter safety advises that you keep your harvest covered so as not to offend non...
This week, Cal talks about bad mixers is triple sec to blame, elk season, monumental shrinkage, and so much more. Connect with Cal and MeatEater Cal on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
I was confused when I first saw the roads carved into the bean fields, perturbed when I heard the extra-long flatbeds hauling down the road, and downright bummed when I witnessed the previously undisturbed agricultural lands being swarmed by packs of orange vested workers. As windmills were erected throughout my hunting neighborhood, I couldn’t help but feel like a squadron of alien spaceships had descended from space to occupy my once pastoral...
Okra was first cultivated thousands of years ago by farmers in current-day Ethiopia. From there it traveled North making its way across the fertile crescent where it became common fare in the Arab world and eventually in India. Okra was most likely brought to the Americas by enslaved Africans. During the lean times of the 1600s and 1700s, they taught French colonists how to use okra to thicken their soups. This culinary fusion led to what we now...
Burnt ends are a staple of Southern cooking. This rendition of a classic uses the belly of a boar smoked until the meat melts in your mouth and flame finished to give that distinct burnt end crunch. Check out the most recent episode of Duck Camp Dinners here to see how it all comes together.
Velvet hunts are all the rage these days. With states like North Dakota, Nebraska, Kentucky, and a handful of western states offering early September openers, the options are plentiful. They’re fun, too. Velvet bucks are predictable in a way that hard-antlered deer usually aren’t. The food-to-bed-bed-to-food reality of these bucks makes them as attractive as the novelty of a fuzzy-antlered mount on the wall. There are some downsides to these...
Gnocchi, pronounced "no-key," is a pasta consisting of little potato pillows of love that are the perfect vessel for a variety of sauces and toppings. Freshly foraged chanterelle mushrooms really shine with this homemade pasta and are accompanied with a sauce that comes together quick but offers an incredible depth of flavor. In my opinion, gnocchi is probably the hardest pasta to get right. It's finicky, relies heavily on the moisture...
We know lead is a toxin, and we know the list of animals that have fallen ill from lead poisoning is a long one. This is not disputed, but we must differentiate between the science of lead poisoning and statements driven by advocacy intended to influence policy changes. The issue of lead ammunition as it relates to wildlife conservation is so complex it should be broken up into bite-sized pieces. Pat Durkin covered the issue of non-lead bullet...
On this week's episode, Tony chats with Michigander Andy may about how he finds deer, how he keeps his options open for ambush sites, and how he occasionally runs into dumb bucks -- even on public land. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Here’s a remix of a well-loved Chinese-American appetizer. Instead of using imitation crab to fill these rangoon puffs, this recipe uses smoked trout. Personally, I think it tastes better than the original. You can make the filling ahead and chill for up to one day. And if you don’t want to use all that oil for frying, lightly brush the raw puffs with vegetable oil and bake or air fry at 370 degrees Fahrenheit until crispy, about 10 to 15 minutes...
There’s a difference between book smart and bar smart. You may not be book smart, but this series can make you seem educated and interesting from a barstool. So, belly up, pour yourself a glass of something good and take mental notes as we look at the fastest small-arms cartridge ever produced. In August of 1964, Guns & Ammo published a cover story detailing what the magazine’s editors enthusiastically dubbed “the world’s hottest .22!” The...
Spencer Neuharth hosts MeatEater Trivia from the First Lite flagship store in Hailey, ID with Steven Rinella, Bridget Noonan, Ford Van Fossen, Kevin Harlander, Clay Newcomb, Ryan Callaghan, Sean Weaver, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.
On this week's episode of the Bear Grease [Render], Clay and the gang circle up to talk about the slave, soldier, and bearhunter, Holt Collier. But first: Brent gets sentimental with a good-luck charm that he carries with him everywhere. Misty clarifies her stance on tattoos. Isaac shows off his new boots. Gary extols the virtues of love above all else. Clay tells us about getting stuck in an apple tree wearing nothing but his Coon Light and a...
On today's episode,Tony talks about how important it is to have as many ambush options as possible to avoid spot burnout and stay productive throughout the entire season. Connect with Wired To Hunt and MeatEater Tony Peterson on Instagram MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch
Colorado officials are searching for an archer accused of poaching a moose in Pike National Forest, just west of Colorado Springs in Teller County. On Sept 18, 2021, Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW) received a call from hunters who stumbled upon a moose carcass near a creek. Travis Sauder, an assistant area wildlife manager and lead officer on the case, along with officers Aaron Berscheid and Ben Meier, arrived on the scene to find a dead bull...
Steak Diane is a classic dish prevalent of fine dining restaurants in the middle of the 20th century. Traditionally made tableside, the dish involves a technique called flambé where the pan is ignited with alcohol. This creates the signature flavor, while also removing any uncooked alcohol from the sauce. While snow goose is used in this recipe the technique could be applied to any lean meat with excellent results, just take care to not overcook...
We’re all a bit guilty of profiling. Now I don’t mean in any sort of that creepy uncle you don’t invite to Thanksgiving anymore type of way, but rather as hunters and anglers. It’s not our fault, of course, it’s just that in the natural world it just seems certain things go together. Agricultural fields make us think of big whitetail bucks hiding in the tree line. Deep muddy rivers make us think of catfish cruising along the bottom, and high...
We’ve all read the headlines claiming that opening day is your ticket to filling that buck tag. This can definitely be true, especially if you’re hunting a state with an early archery opener. Bucks are visible during daylight hours and are likely still exhibiting their day-in-day-out summer feeding patterns. But the harsh reality is that the overwhelming majority of us will go home on opening day with a tag still in our pocket. If there was one...
There is little that’s more satisfying than relaxing on a cold winter morning with a cup of steaming herbal tea you grew and processed yourself. While the undertaking might at first seem intimidating or complicated, there are in fact many herbs that work quite well in tea and are simple to grow in most climates. And once you get used to growing your own tea, there’s no turning back! The Basics The very basics of making your own herbal tea...
Andy Moore of Elkhorn, Nebraska, may not have done well in a recent fishing tournament on the Missouri River, but he snagged the biggest catch of the day: a 90-million-year-old “bulldog fish” fossil. After a lousy cast, his lure hung up on a rock, so he paddled his kayak over to free it up. He spotted some bones that he assumed were recent remains of a deer or catfish, snapped a quick pic, and returned to fishing. He didn’t think much of it until...