ISOutdoors | December 2016

ISOutdoors enjoying the outdoors and sharing it with you

DECEMBER 2016

TROPHY QUEST Kansas Whitetails

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December 2016

CONTENT brant: an eastern shore teasure cold weather bow hunting made easy trophy quest: kansas whitetails following bloodtrails still hunting: the old ways still work

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Brant

An Eastern Shore Treasure

The other dark meat; brant, the overlooked goose of the Atlantic.

by Larry Cook

Interstate sportsman

Wind-driven rain fell straight onto my upturned face. As I attempted to find a spot where I could get out of the downpour and still stay alert to any decoying birds, I was pretty certain this ranked as one of my top three most miserable—as far as weather goes—waterfowling days. In other words, it was perfect!

maker from 100 years ago and owner, with his two brothers, of Cobb Island, the bestknown hunting resort of the 1800’s. I wanted to hunt his hunting grounds, experience his hunting adventures, and re-live, over a hundred years apart, the hunting traditions of this once most-sought-after waterfowling destination in America.

I had come to the Eastern Shore of Virginia to follow in the footsteps of dedicated branters. Many previous hunters have chased this wonderful sea-going goose, but I was especially interested in the experiences of Nathan Cobb, a famous decoy

John Cox, my constant hunting companion, and I had been fortunate to book a twoday brant hunt with Grayson Chesser, a former game warden and, now, the owner of Holden Creek Gun Club.

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Grayson is a well known and respected guide and, perhaps, the country’s premier contemporary decoy carver, especially of gunning decoys. They are carved in the old decoy tradition and, whether afloat on the water or sitting on your mantel, are wooden treasures.

Grayson not only guides, but is also a waterfowl historian. Fortunate enough to grow up in nearby Chincoteague, he was exposed to waterfowling very early in his life. He learned to hunt ducks and geese, then protect them, and now reproduces them in the time-honored handmade, oneat-a-time, carving tradition.

We spent the day before our hunt watching Grayson carve, from scratch, a Cobb Island-style brant decoy. Later, when that same decoy floated directly in front of me, doing its time-honored job. I found it hard to believe that 24 hours earlier it had been a wooden chunk lying on the floor of the decoy shop.

During the carving session, and hours of hunting talk, Grayson literally recited, nonstop, waterfowl history, stories, and tales of the Eastern Shore. He is especially knowledgeable about Cobb Island decoys.

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Holden Creek Gun Club is located on a farm that has been in the Chesser family for more than a hundred years.

The main lodge is a converted 100-year-old barn, with additional accommodations in a building that originally served as a schoolhouse.

To book a hunt with Grayson Chesser, contact him at Holden Creek Gun Club, P.O. Box 12, Sanford, VA 23426, or phone him at 757-8240954 or the lodge at 757824-9666. His web page is www.chesserdecoys.com.

The accommodations are second to none and the food will overwhelm you. Dawn Chesser and her capable staff have culinary skills that are beyond belief. The food alone is worth the trip.

In addition to brant, Grayson offers marsh hunts for dabblers, sea ducks, and snow and Canada geese.

He has, in his decoy collection, a Nathan Cobb redhead that could be considered the best Cobb diving decoy in existence. Loy S. Harrell, Jr.’s book, “Decoys, North America’s One Hundred Greatest” lists this decoy as one of the 100 best.

Also included in Grayson’s collection are other Cobb Island and nearby Hog Island artifacts. Of particular interest are relics from the Cobb Island Hotel, which Alexander Hunter, author of “Huntsman in the South,” wrote about. Hunter was even present at the opening of this waterfowl mecca in the latter part of the 1800’s.

Gunning The Bay Our first day of hunting was at Fowling Point. Jutting into Hog Island Bay, the point faces shallow water where grow many of the food sources brant crave. A few hundred yards to our rear, nestled in the marsh, stood the abandoned and decaying Fowling Point Gun Club. Still opulent even in ruins, it stood as a silent witness to our hunt. I couldn’t help but wonder at the countless other hunts this grand old club had witnessed over the past decades of gunning this wonderful bay.

Suddenly, out of the rainy mist, two brant magically appeared, circled once, cupped their wings, and committed to the wooden counterfeits on the water. It would have caused a strong man to cry if we had missed, but we didn’t, and our first two trophy brant floated among the decoys.

Brant were really moving now, and two more decoyed perfectly. But, as often happens, we called the shot too quickly, and they winged out of danger untouched. Another bunch managed to sneak in, but our late reactions produced only one bird.

If you have never gunned Atlantic brant, they are one of the supreme trophies of waterfowling. They decoy so beautifully, flying in undulating lines across the foamy crests of the waves. Brant rarely fly far from salt water and, until only recently, were never found feeding in grain fields.

Brandt Today We are very fortunate to even be allowed to hunt the Atlantic brant. Until 1931, brant were extremely numerous and were probably the Atlantic flyway’s premier game bird. Around that time, however, an unknown blight hit their feeding grounds and by 1935 their populations had crashed.

In the past 25 years brant have varied as legal game from season to season, primarily because their population numbers have ranged from 65,000 birds to 180,000. Many years a short season with low bag limits is granted. This year, in Virginia, the limit is 3 birds, the highest number since the 1920’s and 1930’s.

Brant are difficult to manage. They nest far North of the Arctic Circle. They have only a small window of opportunity to get their young on the wing before

once again become a succulent Epicurean delight.

The “wildness” of brant shooting has a special appeal to gunners like myself, who feel a degree of nostalgia for the old shooters who chased this magnificent goose from Long Island to North Carolina.

Whether for market shooting or personal pleasure, the brant was always a favorite of these long-ago gunners.

the snow flies again in their nesting ground. If they don’t produce a potential harvest of young, or if the arctic nesting season is a total disaster, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will refuse to grant a brandt hunting season.

Today, most brant in Virginia subsist on the sea lettuce in their feeding grounds. Not only does this algae impart a rather poor taste to the birds, it is apparently low in essential nutients necessary for their wellbeing. Many wintering brant are in poor condition, with low fat reserves and, as I alluded to earlier, a rank flavor. However, several instances of brant feeding in grain fields have been recorded in the past three years and, if this trend continues, brant may

Shooting Like Nathan Cobb The second day of our hunt can only be described as “one for the books.” The wind, rain, and cold continued unabated. Remember, everything happens fast in hunting. We had motored from our shooting spot the previous day, and found where the brant were “using.” Watching hundreds of these birds traveling back and forth, we felt we would have a successful hunt the next morning.

We were not disappointed. We placed our decoy spread near a shallow point, and moored the grassed boat near the marsh.

We apparently “did it right,” for that day we experienced brant decoying and shooting that reminded us of a hunt Nathan Cobb had made near this very spot in the 1890’s,

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when he shot, retrieved, and recovered 190 brant—by himself—in one day!

Within minutes of shooting time, a group of 200 or more birds flew toward our spread. Grayson had cautioned us repeatedly to shoot only single birds. Brant, like redheads, tend to “bunch” when as they set their wings to land, and a careless gunner can easily drop several birds unintentionally. This is another reason brant were such a favorite of early shooters. Large bags could be taken with fewer shots, which was especially important in market hunting.

We bagged six in that first bunch, which meant we could only take three more birds for our three-man limit. Brant were on the wing everywhere and group after group decoyed. It was a golden opportunity for pictures and experiencing the decoying marvel of these birds. It didn’t take long for us to finish our limits. I wasn’t even sure we had been hunting—it had felt so easy.

We motioned for P.G. Ross, Grayson’s able understudy, to join us. He, too, quickly garnered his three-bird limit.

This brant-hunting episode will be forever etched in my memory. Hunting with Grayson Chesser over carved, wooden decoys is

hunting with a link to the past. Shooting at Hog Island Bay, with its decades of ancient shooting history, and learning about that history from a man who lived it made this an unbelievable waterfowling experience.

And, finally, shooting this magnificent sea goose—here today, gone tomorrow—is one of the highlights, if not the grandest highlight, of my waterfowl career.

You go to hunt brant, and only brant. The lonely marshes and turbulent bays are his domain, and his alone. If you want to experience the brant’s world, you must journey to those special places, for he will not invade your lakeside or pond domain. He is a worthy adversary and a supreme compliment to your waterfowling experience.

A mount of a beautiful brant, alighting to Grayson Chesser’s hollow Cobb Island-style brant decoy, will grace my waterfowl room for the rest of my shooting life. It will forever link me with the mystical wildness of Virginia’s Eastern Shore and the experience of gunning in the shadow of men whose traditions I can only re-live by walking in their footsteps, through the printed word.

Brant shooting is one of the holy grails of our hunting world. It is one trip you don’t want to miss in your lifetime.

Getting the jump on whitetail in December is easy, thanks to some high-tech hunting aides.

COLD WEATHER

BOWHUNTING MADE EASY

by Brock Ray A growing number of states now allow bowhunters back in the woods during December and January. The waning days of the season are not an easy time for bowhunters to take a whitetail, but surprisingly this is when many of the biggest bucks get careless with their daytime movements.

The challenge to late-season success is twofold for bowhunters. First, remain in your tree stand all day to take advantage of unpredictable buck movement. Secondly,

escape the notice of these animals by being as invisible as possible to their eyes and nose, even though you are hunting in an environment that is bare of cover compared to back in mid-October.

December and January are also the coldest whitetail hunting months of the year.

Staying out all day is virtually impossible if you are not comfortable. If you have bowhunted as long as I have, you know how uncomfortable you feel when your toes are cold, or when a strong wind slices like a

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sharp knife through your clothing. Two decades ago wool, down feathers, and what insulating materials that are now outdated were all the makers of hunting clothing had to keep you warm. They understood the problem, but they still needed materials and garment construction techniques that exceeded those available at that time.

Two decades ago, staying dry—an important component of staying warm while hunting—had not progressed since the

late 1800s. Waterproofing hunting garments was limited to the use of waxed/ oiled cotton and shells constructed from polyurethane. While polyurethane is waterproof, it does not breath, meaning your own perspiration under that protective shell can leave you wet and, therefore, cold.

Waxed/oiled cotton repels water, but once it is soaked through, you get wet.

Wool is an outstanding insulator—the only natural insulating material that retains a

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portion of its value when wet. I have relied on wool all of my hunting career, but you can still get chilled wearing wet wool. Coats insulated with down feathers are excellent choices, until these feathers become wet.

Down insulates by “loft,” i.e.,. the space between individual feathers that traps body warmth. When the downt becomes wet, it clumps together, and—presto!—its wearer is destined to freeze. Down also has little ability to curb the effects of the wind when the temperature is freezing.

Time Made The Difference Twenty years ago, two other industries exerted a radical influence on the makers of hunting garments. A fast-growing hiking industry, lead by companies like Columbia Sports Wear, developed clothing made from super-strong, high-denier nylon, in designs that provided greater comfort, with more pockets and options for their wearers. At about the same time, W.L.Gore also introduced the Gore-Tex membrane, in essence an ultra-thin version of Teflon. This membrane revolutionized hunting wear.

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Unlike polyurethane, which repels water drops, but is unable to pass the moisture of perspiration produced by your body, Gore-Tex has a molecular structure that not only repels water drops, but allows water vapor, i.e., perspiration, to pass through. Think of it like a net:Water drops are the size of a basketball, so they are stopped by the webbing, but perspiration vapor, equivalent to the size of Ping-Pong balls, freely passes through holes in the net.

Soon, makers of quality hunting clothing included a Gore-Tex shell in their garments. In short order GoreTex was available in gloves, hats, and hunting boots.

Highly durable—unless you poke a hole in it—to this day Gore-Tex and its clone materials are found inside quality hunting wear.

When Gore-Tex was first made, the company made it available to clothing manufacturers, some of whom did not understand how tha material had to be used—they merely cut the membrane and sewed it. But anywhere the Gore-Tex membrane is cut or stitched, it will leak and allow in water drops. Today, everything you buy that contains Gore-Tex actually has a complete sealed-seam membrane shell, over which your coat, boots, gloves, or overalls are constructed. Yes, it is tricky work that has few shortcuts.

And It Gets Better Seven years ago, W.L.Gore introduced Windstopper, which is a spin-off of the Gore-Tex membrane

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Adding The Final Dimension Of Warmth In such weather, if you are not moving about, you need the best insulation you can get –unless you are willing to cocoon yourself into an immobile blob. But even the most modern insulation material, hightech outer shells, and wool socks are limited when you need to keep warm for 6 to 9 hours. When hunting, the bulkiness of too much clothing can prevent you from safely climbing a treestand or even from shooting your bow. The creation of heat to supplement that produced by your body is required to curtail the need for cumbersome, bulky clothing.

During my early trips to the extreme cold weather whitetail hunting lands located in Canada’s prairie provinces, I used Hot Hands packets. When activated by shaking, the resulting chemical activity of the granular matter produces pleasing warmth for 8 to 9 hours. Activated packets were placed in every available pocket I had. I credit these for making it possible to stay in a stand on one ultra-cold day when I endured freezing wind until dusk, allowing me to fatally arrow a 167-point B&C buck.

Once You Are Warm...

Once you are confident you can dress

warmly enough to stay all day in your treestand, the next challenge is fooling the eyes and nose of your quarry. At this time of year, there is little in the way of leaves to conceal bowhunters from being spotted.

Great camo patterns are essential. When hunting where there is lots of snow, such as in Iowa, I recommend the Realtree Hardwoods Snow pattern. It is like their popular Hardwoods pattern, but takes out much of the bark and leaves. It is an extremely open pattern, blending perfectly with snowcovered terrain, which almost always has dark areas of bark, rocks, or dirt breaking up the predominance of white. Hardwoods Snow is the ideal concealment for hunters in areas where snow is a possibility.

For hunting southern hardwoods and other similar terrain where you are often perched in bare trees, I recommend Realtree Hardwoods HD0—a pattern so realistic that it is almost lifelike. Realtree Hardwoods is a great pattern nationwide, but is most effective from mid to late winter.

Both of these patterns are available on an almost infinite array of cold weather clothing items.

TROPHY QUEST:

kansas w

whitetails “Your odds for taking trophy bucks in Kansas are the best in the country.”

by Bob Foulkrod

When you were in school, did you ever tell anyone you had a Saturday night date with a cheerleader?

Yeah, their eyebrows went up, eh? Mere mention of the tidbit that your date was a cheerleader was sufficient to evoke the looks of envy and admiration you wanted from a buddy. Well, you can get the same response from fellow hunters if you mention you have hunted in one of a handful of wellknown whitetail hunting havens. Just tell a hunting buddy you are going to Alberta or southern Illinois, and watch his eyes get big.

Kansas is one such whitetail hunting spot. Until recently, times it was the closely-guarded secret of its resident hunters, many of whom for years successfully convinced their state wildlife agency that nonresident whitetail hunters were not needed. However, in keeping with the philosophies of other states’ game management departments, Kansas wildlife officials finally opened whitetail hunting in that state to those living elsewhere.

In my opinion, the farmlands of southwestern Kansas provide the state’s best trophy buck whitetail hunting.

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Kansas has less public hunting land than just about any other state. In fact, the wildlife department leases what is known as “walk-in” lands from private landowners to help resident hunters find a place to hunt. For nonresident hunters, an outfitter or landowner who has exclusive access to private lands is the way to go.

I had such a hunt in southwestern Kansas.

Just as one might expect from “table-top flat Kansas,” the terrain consists of gently rolling grasslands and wheat fields. Trees are generally sparse except along creek meanders, and those creeks are important keys to understanding whitetail movement in this region. Streams and small rivers wind through the countryside, usually

flanked by the steep ravine walls, sometimes more than 100 feet deep, that they have cut through the soft glaciated soil and substrata.

Trees such as oaks and cottonwoods grow to considerable size along these waterways. Thickets are common there, and are used extensively by whietail. When standing along the edge of one of these creeks, you sometimes feel like you are in what we call a “hollow” in Pennsylvania. Deep gullylike draws occur frequently along these waterways. These lead to the top of the ravines, where the surrounding terrain is flat. These gullies are excellent bottleneck ambush points for catching bucks moving from the grain fields and grasslands, where

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they feed, to the safety of the creek bottoms.

Find The Food My hunt occurred in southwestern Kansas wheat county, but the area also holds an abundance of prairie grasses relished by deer. In addition to this, acorn-bearing oaks are abundant along the creeks.

The ranch also had numerous green food plots for attracting whitetail.

I began hunting from a ground blind, located where a 400-yard-long alfalfa field narrowed to a bottleneck. Deer trails leading into this field were wide enough drive a jeep along! It had gotten quite bright when I spotted a nice buck milling lazily about, only 75 or 80 yards out in the brown alfalfa.

Everything went well as the buck closed the distance between us but, when it was within arrow range, I was hit by the worst charly-horse cramp in my leg I had ever experienced. Yes, I missed the buck. Yes, I was upset. End of that story.

That afternoon we tried in vain to stalk a buck. We attempted to cut it off as it browsed its way down the creek, but it spotted us. We had fun, but the wind was tricky, and Lady Luck was not there to lend

a helping hand.

On the first day of my hunt, I had passed on a nice eight-point buck. During the rest of the week, I didn’t return to that spot, but on the afternoon of the last day, I remembered the buck and took a chance it would still be there. My guess was good. Shortly after we set up, we spotted the buck coming along the rim of the ravine overlooking the creek.

This time luck was not against me or the cameraman. My Satellite broadhead sliced between the ribs protecting the lungs and heart of the animal. The buck ran less than 50 yards across the open field before collapsing. The eight-pointer was a nice one-not as big as I had hoped for, but still a buck I was proud of taking home.

So how good is whitetail hunting in southwestern Kansas? On a scale of one to ten with ten being only slightly short of Heaven, I give it a 9.8.

Following

Blood Trails

Failure to recover game is never acceptable.

by Don Kirk When hunters take up the trail of a wounded whitetail, they should go at it with an open mind. I say this because there are misconceptions that can change the effectiveness of any trailing situation. One example is the amount of blood the tracker sees. Some bowhunters have gotten the idea that very little blood indicates a superficial wound.

Nothing is further from the truth. While an arrow through the vital lungs and/or heart area will usually leave an easy-to-follow blood trail, it is not necessarily a rule; shot angle and penetration pay a role in the blood trail.

Several years ago, a friend of mine shot a small buck that was standing only a few yards from the base of his tree. The arrow entered the deer at the top of the shoulder, but failed to exit underneath. Although the arrow severed one lung and the heart, no blood ever reached the ground. After searching more than an hour to find a blood trail that did not exist, we recovered the seven-pointer 80 yards from the place where it had been shot. Shots through the

paunch will cause similar blood trailing problems, but they do not indicate a superficial wound.

Another misconception involves the areas where the hunter should look for blood.

Anytime we begin trailing, it is human nature to look to the ground for signs. Many times, however, blood is left higher up on the brush. This is particularly true after a whitetail runs a short distance from where it was hit. The hide becomes saturated, and begins wiping off blood on high grass or any other brush the animal passes by.

Hemorrhage caused from sharp broadheads determines the effectiveness of the shot. An extreme loss of blood can lead to death, whether it occurs quickly or not, and it does not matter if the bleeding is internal or external. When trailing arrowed deer, I prefer to have one other hunter assist whenever possible. Two sets of eyes are helpful when blood trails begin to subside.

In fact, after the blood diminishes, it helps to have as many fellow hunters as possible to assist. Beginning bowhunters should also seek the assistance of experienced trackers. They can make a significant difference in finding the animal, as well as teaching the novice a great deal about tracking in the process.

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When tracking alone, or in unfamiliar territory, use survey tape to mark your course.

When you do not know the area, you can easily become confused. In some situations, I have accidentally backtracked because of this. If you do not have survey take, toilet paper is perhaps the best trailing aid available. Whether I am in a woods or a thicket, the toilet paper remains easily visible when hung about head-high. I prefer to hang a piece of it about every 30 to 40 yards, or wherever the deer changes direction or beds down.

Blood trails seldom begin where the deer was shot; the blood will usually not reach

the ground until the deer has run 10 to 20 yards. This has misled many bowhunters, because they spent too much time looking for a trail which did not yet exist. There are exceptions, however. Arrow hits that produce an exit on the underside of the deer, long scrape wounds, and muscle and artery shots cause blood to quickly reach the ground.

Complete penetration is usually verified by the spent arrow, or blood on both sides of the trail. A high entrance hole can prevent this—then the only blood that reaches the ground will be from the exit hole as the body cavity fills up

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with blood. The blood can also tell you whether the deer is running, walking, or standing. All three show entirely different track patterns, and each can be important toward your recovery of the animal when the vitals have been spared.

A running deer, for example, will usually leave less blood, and the splatter fingers will be above each drop. This also tells you the direction of travel. A walking deer will leave splatter fingers that surround each drop. The standing deer also leaves blood drops surrounded by splatter fingers. The only difference lies in how much blood reaches the ground. When you trail a running or walking deer, the drops will usually be spaced. If you suddenly find several droplets together, you can bet the deer stopped there.

The type of terrain will have a lot to do with how readily you see blood. Leaves provide an excellent base for the blood trail, but leaves are not always available. Often, only thick underbrush or high weeds are there to catch the blood. Even worse is having only soil. Blood has a tendency to soak in quickly when it hits dirt, and slow trailing becomes very important.

Tracking without blood is difficult, but not impossible. A whitetail hoof will depress leaves enough for the trail to be seen. Many times I have been forced to trail deer by their tracks alone. But caution has to be used; you must move along the sides of the deer’s trail so your tracks will not interfere with the deer’s sign. A deer in thick brush usually does not leave tracks as noticeable as those it would create in leaves, but some sign will be there.

If the vegetation is high, the deer will often noticeably bend the foliage.

Tracks alone can also tell you if the deer is walking or running. The common pattern of the walking deer is tracks that switch from one side to the other. Two tracks only appear side by side when the deer is running. Then you will find the tracks in sets of four, spaced about 2 1/2 to 3

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feet apart. A running deer pushes off by bringing the back feet ahead of the front, in a bounding motion.

I would suggest packing along one of the blood verification sprays now available.

These sprays help identify blood when you are in doubt. Sometimes local berries that have dropped to the ground secrete fluids that can mimic bloodstains and fool a bowhunter, and the spray helps solve the mystery.

The best practice is patience, followed by determination. Any wounded deer should be trailed slowly. When you make it a habit to use patience, you will commit yourself to more effective tracking methods when and if the blood trail stops.

Finally, don’t give up until you find your deer or KNOW the wound is superficial. It is always the blood trail that gets you started, but many times it is your determination that recovers the deer.

STill HUnTing WHiTETail:

The Old Ways Still

Work

Treestand hunting is not the only way to deer hunt.

by Brock Ray

Most of my hunting for whitetail is done from a treestand.

However, experience has taught me that there are often times when stalking is the only opportunity I may get against a buck.

There are times when these animals do not move and, if you want a chance at taking a buck, you have to actually go to that animal. Once you master the basic skills and get the confidence needed to make it happen for you, still-hunting will make you a vastly better hunter.

By definition, still hunting and stalking are the same. It is a game of strategy between you and a whitetail buck. He is

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armed with incredible hearing, eyes that can almost spot movement when they are closed, a keen nose, and enough intelligence to evade most humans.

Toss in the home-court advantage, and it is easy to see that you face a formidable opponent. You, on the other hand, are armed with a modern bow that is deadly up to 40 yards or more, vastly superior mental prowess, and the determination to kill your opponent. To win, all your quarry has to do is evade your efforts.

When you are still-hunting, resist the urge to move

too fast, or cover too much ground too quickly.

Sound A buck’s defense mechanisms often factor into whether or not a still-huntis successful. Out-of-place sounds often need to be complemented by visual or olfactory stimuli, although once you alert the ears of a buck with noise, your chances of success fall dramatically. If you think you can approach a buck without making every effort to reduce the sounds of your footsteps, and other sounds, such as your bow scraping against a limb or rattling when striking a rock, you need to stay in your treestand.

The ground is the key, followed by vegetation and your equipment. Wet ground and leaves are ideal for stalking, while crisp, dry leaves or ground with loose rocks are the toughest challenges.

Most of the time, it is only necessary to move slowly and avoid stepping on twigs and leaves, or kicking loose rocks. Even if a whitetail hears something amiss in its world, it may not bolt.

My rule of thumb is to make it work—no matter what the circumstances are. When I first began doing this, I used to take off my boots and stalk in my socks to reduce noise. But that was before I tried Bear Feet, made by Crooked Horn Outfitters. Bear Feet slip over your hunting boots, and have an outer sole that is cushioned just like the paw pads of a bear. They are an incredibly useful aid.

Smell Scent interpretation is a key to the whitetail’s existence. It not only is how they communicate, but also how they locate food

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and foes. If you are winded during a stalk, that marks the end of the game.

There are two basic rules that cannot be circumvented if you wish any real chance of hunting success. The first and most important is still-hunting with the wind in your favor. Succinctly, that means approaching your quarry from downwind. This cannot be ignored.

When there is a strong wind in your face, it is easy to determine your approach. When there is little wind evident to you, the task becomes a little dicey. You can pour dust from your hand or use a squeeze dust bottle to determine wind direction. A few seasons ago, I began using wind floaters. “Wind floaters� is my name for those fluffy white wings that are attached to the seeds packed into a milkweed pod. When hunting, I carry a dozen or so of these chickenegg-size seedpods then, when stalking, I crack open a pod and cast the seeds into the breeze. Wind floaters are 100 percent natural, and reveal the slightest breezes without tipping off your location.

Once a buck is spotted, or you know of a likely spot, you want to approach without alerting any whitetail you suspect might be

there, so your approach should be tailored to put the wind in your face. As long as you move into the wind, it is unlikely that you will be scented.

So what happens if you are within close proximity of a buck and the wind shifts so that it is neutral to you or, worse still, against you? This is when you find out just how effective your personal odor suppression efforts are.

Sight Sight is the third obstacle whitetail hunters must overcome when still-hunting. Whitetail have exceptional vision that is geared more toward noting movement and out-ofplace things in their world than it is to deciphering visual stimuli that is not moving or which tends to blend into their surroundings. To suggest becoming a chameleon is helpful would be accurate. Realtree makes a selection of camouflage patterns that were conceived to help you blend invisibly into virtually any habitat where whitetail live.

As mentioned, a whitetail’s vision notes movement. Movement is essential when still-hunting, but is also a potential bane to your efforts. The challenge is moving close enough to launch an arrow, without

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being detected. There are circumstances and terrain where virtually no one can stalk within 40 yards of a buck, and there are settings where even a novice can accomplish this. Forgiving terrain is a godsend. Nothing beats a gully or enough trees, rocks, or other obstacles that can be used for hiding places during your approach. But even with good cover, choosing your approach route carefully is the heart of successful still-hunting with a bow.

tion in mind—for example, just moving along into the woods on a windy day when whitetail are not moving, the same slowmotion advice is doubly important. Make a few steps, then stop, listen, and look. Gusty winds will, for the most part, largely cancel out your movement noise, but unless you are alert for the often-shrouded existence of bedded whitetail, the odds of you jumping one before you realize their presence is high.

When plotting my approach along the last couple of hundred yards of a stalk, I invest a lot of time in glassing every detail of my route. Many times, I will use my laser rangefinder to precisely determine the distance between cover where I can hide during a stalk. My most successful stalks have occurred when I had an approach blueprinted in my mind that enabled me to know exactly where I could catch my breath and settle my nerves without being spotted.

Reading the Buck When still-hunting where you can see the buck, keep a close eye on the animal you are approaching. The deer’s body language, such as fidgeting or its ears going up in an erect position, may indicate it is responding to noise. If you see nervous body movement, or ears snapping from side to side, I strongly recommend that you freeze where you are for a few minutes. Give your quarry an opportunity to return to a calm state, them continue your stalk.

When you are still-hunting, resist the urge to move too fast, or cover too much ground too quickly. If a buck is not moving, odds are that it will stay where it is while you are trying to stalk it. Moving too fast ups increases the odds you will be noticed. If you are still-hunting without a specific destina

Try your hand at still-hunting, and invest the time needed to hone these skills. When whitetail are not moving, or following the hunting script you wrote, then climb down out of that treestand and join them in the woods.

Interstate sportsman

Hunting tHe elusive

Tule Elk

by Bob Foulkrod

Part of my five-year-long Obsession Quest included taking a tule elk. They are the rar-

est surviving North American subspecies of wapiti, and are found only in very limited areas of California. The Silacci’s provide guided hunts for these very special animals

in what I regard as the world’s most unique elk hunting environment.

A Little Bit About Tule Elk Tule elk are the smallest of all of North America’s subspecies. These animals are native only to California, never having been noted outside of its borders even

by Spanish explorers. The adult bulls have an average weight of 450 to 500 pounds, with really big bulls occasionally hitting the 700-pound mark. Antler growth is like that of other North American elk although, as with body size, somewhat smaller. The current top spot holder in the SCI record books scored 353 3/8, and was taken in California’s Solano County in August of 1990.

Prior to the California Gold Rush of 1849, great herds of tule elk inhabited the California Central Valley grasslands and central California’s Chaparral and Woodlands areas.

Unfortunately, thirty years later tule elk numbers were reduced to near-extinction by unregulated hunting and habitat loss.

Prime dwarf elk range was converted into grasslands for livestock, while wetlands were drained for agriculture. Had it not been for a wealthy cattleman named Henry Miller, we probably would have lost the Tule as we did the native elk that were once

common east of the Mississippi River. Miller held extensive tracts of land in the southern Central Valley, where he established a preserve. Fifty years later, the remnant herd received permanent protection at the 950-acre Tule Elk State Reserve, near Buttonwillow in Kern County.

Today Rule elk numbers are on the rise, as animals from the park have expanded to inhabit adjacent areas of mainly private land.

Additionally, ongoing efforts to re-establish these animals in suitable habitat have been successful. n 1978 tule elk were reintroduced to the Point Reyes National Seashore in Marin County, north of San Francisco.

The herd has since grown to over 500 individuals in two herds. Another herd lives in the Ohlone Wilderness in Alameda County, a preserve maintained by the East Bay

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Regional Park. The current population there is about 2,000 animals. Hunting on private land was reopened relatively recently, and there are a very limited number of permits.

The name tule loosely refers to any of several bulrushes growing in the marshy lowlands of California and the southwest United States. When the Spanish colonized America, they co-opted the Nahuatl word “tollin” that meant “bulrush.” English-speaking settlers in turn adopted the Spanish word tule to denote the marshy land where

the native elk were most abundant; thus the origins of their most common name.

A Unique Hunting Environment The Salacci ranch is located near Salinas, only 25 minutes away from the Monterey Bay. The area enjoys year-round cool to moderate temperatures, due to the “natural air conditioner” winds that convey ocean air and fog from the Monterey Bay in toward the Gabilan and Santa Lucia mountain ranges, which border the Salinas Valley to the east and west, respectively.

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The region is better known as the area where John Steinbeck (1902-1968), one of the best-known and most widely read American writers of the 20th century and winner of a Nobel Prize for Literature in 1962 and a Pulitzer Prize in 1940, was born and raised, than it is for being a prime hunting destination. However, make no mistake about it. If you want to take a trophy class tule elk, this is the best place on the planet.

Pete Salacci has been a wildlife-conscious rancher all his life as is his son, Kevin, who is little more than half my age. Pete is a salty ole bird who reminds me of my late father, Ed Foulkrod. To say that we hit it off like peas and carrots is no exaggeration; they later joined me in Quebec for a caribou hunt, and I later returned to their ranch to hunt blacktail deer.

Although it was the height of summer, temperatures were mild during my stay, rarely reaching 80 degrees. Mornings, on the other hand, were always 45 to 50 degrees.

The overhead sky was clear, but the most prominent aspect of the climate during this elk hunt was the pervasive fog. As the Silacci’s ranch is located only 10 miles from the ocean, every morning the low-hanging

mist swept in from the west, where the Pacific Ocean was clearly visible, to engulf the valley and sometimes consume the whole area. During the first hours of the hunt, we donned rain wear in order to stay dry.

Later in the morning, the rising sun would burn off the fog. You could literally sit and watch the misty veil retreat up the mountainside, where it ultimately disappeared.

Only then was it time to hunt. Before the fog lifted, at times the suspended moisture was so thick that you literally couldn’t see your hand in front of your face, so glassing or subsequent stalking was impossible.

After The Fog Prior to the first day of actual hunting, we did a bit of basic scouting and I got a fabulous orientation to the property. The rolling terrain between the mountains to the east and the ocean to the west reminded me a lot of pronghorn antelope country n Wyoming. However, the frequent views of the deep blue Pacific Ocean are what always grip the corner of your eyes when you are

Interstate sportsman

here. This was not always in the case, as this is a very large ranch and numerous bands of tule elk are scattered about its nooks and crannies. The bulls were out of velvet and making their presence known to the cows, but there was very little in the way of bugling by the normally vocal big boys.

That first day, we saw quite a number of dwarf elk, as the tule elk are sometimes called, at a distance. I recall seeing one especially nice bull, who had parked himself under the shade of a grove of trees where he could bed and see over the valley below. My guides told me that they believed this same elk wouldn’t move far from this spot the next day, and getting him would be something of a waiting game. We went back down the trail to return to the lodge, where we had a great supper and talked about elk hunting.

The first day we hunted was fruitless, and in many ways became only an extended tour of the ranch. The daily fog covering really gives these wary elk the upper hand in spotting a hunter’s approach. The second day was little better, though not for elk.

While riding from one end of the ranch to the other, we spotted a band of wild boar.

These feral swine were following the dissipating fog up the side of the mountain,

and I took a large tusker with a single shot from Browning A-Bolt .300 WSM. Talk about a reliable killing machine…

On the third day, we again caught sight of the big bull we had seen on the first day.

We glassed him for a long time, and decided to break for lunch at the lodge, then return to make an approach from the high ground to the west. When we returned, at first we noted only cows browsing in the field near the last known place the bull had been seen. In short order, however, we discovered that our elk was still there, only now he was up and milling around occasionally, bumping his cows.

Now located above these animals with a slight breeze from the ocean in our faces, we moved down the slope for a better look.

At 300 yards, we stopped to set up for a shot. It was a classic downhill, one-shot kill.

The instant the bullet smacked his shoulder, down he went. Later, when reviewing footage of this shot, my cameraman was ecstatic that his camcorder had captured the image of a really cool vapor trail from the bullet to the animal on film. I was as pleased as punch at the success of the day — a very respectable bull that green scored in excess of 300 points.

Interstate sportsman

Phanthoms Of The Sage

by Larry Cook It’s the end of September and here, in the South, the first crisp mornings of Fall have arrived. I have just returned from a twoweek vacation to the great states of South Dakota, North Dakota and, my favorite, Montana. Although I was not there to hunt, my thoughts were not far from gunning, because I hold fond memories of past hunts in two of these states.

Montana was the scene of an upland bird

hunt, a few years back, that I consider the high-water mark of my upland game bird experiences. Though I took pheasants, sharptails, chukars, and Huns, my fondest memories of the hunt center around the lonely denizen of the open plains and sagebrush flats, the noble and majestic Sage Grouse.

Arguably, the Sage Grouse is the West’s most spectacular native gamebird and is the USA’s largest grouse. An adult cock can weigh upwards of six pounds and, when

flushing, he does a fair impression of a B-52 bomber struggling into the air; hence, cocks are often referred to as “Bombers” by hunting devotees. A hundred years ago, the birds would gather in flocks that numbered in the thousands and amazed hunters. Around 1890 George Bird Grinnell wrote from Wyoming that the number of grouse that flew over his camp reminded him of the old-time flights of passenger pigeons. Sadly, it’s been a long time since anyone has seen flights like that.

Every year there are discussions—serious ones—to place the sage grouse on the endangered species list. Hunting does not

seem to be the culprit, although hunters often get the blame. States that allow hunting have short seasons and twobird limits. But the true reason Sage Grouse numbers continue to plummet is pretty simple: Like many other problems with game management, It all boils down to habitat. Sage Grouse depend on grass and the low-flowering plants that grow under and around sagebrush. This low cover helps hide broods in their early weeks, and provides a steady diet of insects.

Overgrazing has removed much of this understory. Another factor is the destruction

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of the sagebrush itself. Millions of acres of former sagebrush environment have been converted to croplands and pastures, resulting in the disappearance of the birds over much of their former range.

But limited hunting is still available, and this hunting allows a hunter to explore some of the best landscapes in the West.

These birds, because of their need to inhabit great areas of country, provide the opportunity for adventure and exploration—an opportunity and excuse to roam

the wide-open sagebrush flats. A crisp morning in this country, with the solitude that goes with it, is an experience not soon to be forgotten.

My most memorable hunt was on a 20,000acre ranch in Eastern Montana. Actually, we were only 75 miles or so from Custer’s Last Stand. As we started out that morning, we explored the remains of a large Indian camp from long ago, where tepee rings were still visible. The knowledge that we shared this hunting ground with the spirits

Intestate sportsman

of those long-past hunters added spice to our adventure. We immediately flushed a small flock of grouse, that flew away low to the ground and seemingly sailed for miles before disappearing.

That is one of their traits; they may only go a few hundred yards or they may go miles.

We flushed a small covey of five birds soon after, and took a bird apiece from this flock.

Not wanting to end our hunt too soon, we each vowed, if possible, to shoot a cock bird for our second and final bird. Soon after, a single cock flushed, allowing me an easy shot. He weighed over five pounds.

Today this noble bird resides in a glass habitat case in my trophy room, where he attracts a lot of attention from visiting guests.

As indicted earlier, seasons in the states that have huntable Sage Grouse numbers run from a day or two, to only a few weeks, so you need to research where you would

most likely enjoy success. One of my favorite areas is on public hunting lands outside of Casper, Wyoming.

Some final thoughts—don’t be fooled when the grouse flush. They fly low and labored, and while they are not difficult to hit, they do require a good punch to anchor them. Also, much has been written about their palatability; they are good eating, especially the young birds. A common criticism is they taste of sage, and this can be accurate, but since many grouse-hunting seasons are held in late September and early October, birds are taken before they resort to their winter diet of sage. Hunt this noble grouse, and experience the open plains of the West, with its unbelievable solitude and wildness. It’s a hunt you will long remember and cherish. After all, how many hunters can boast they have brought down a “bomber?”

Interstate sportsman

A Few Of My

Favorite Things

by Craig Haney Every year at this time, it seems like Christmas music is playing everywhere I turn— radio stations, gas stations, grocery stores, the veterinarian’s office—everybody is

playing Christmas music. I don’t want to sound like Scrooge, but sometimes I’d just like to hear Waylon singing about not letting your babies grow up to be cowboys, fly-fishermen, or whatever. However, there are a few songs I enjoy hearing regularly on

Interstate sportsman

the radio’s playlist. In one song, the singer reflects on Christmas and sings “these are a few of my favorite things.”

Since I probably think about fly-fishing more often than is emotionally healthy, I started to ponder on some of my favorite fly-fishing things. There are lots of them and it’s hard to choose, but I wanted to give you a few ideas for Christmas gift for the fly-fishers on your list. Consider them gift wrapped with the blessings of the season.

Rods For Tight Spots My favorite fly-fishing for trout is on smaller streams in remote places—Hazel Creek in the Smoky Mountain National Park or Lime Creek in southwestern Colorado come to mind. If I Google their names to get directions, I might very well get the response “you can’t get there from here.” Hazel Creek requires a seven- or eight-mile hike or a twentyminute boat ride across Fontana Lake just to get to the trailhead. When you get to the turnoff for Lime Creek, you still have a forty-five-minute drive down into the canyon on a road barely big enough for your vehicle, not to mention the one coming toward you with seemingly no place to go.

About 18 years ago, I bought a fly rod which, for me, is great on this type of stream; a Scott G series 7-foot 7-inch, 3-piece rod, 4 weight, made from lower modulus graphite. It has a sensitive tip that allows me to precisely place my Parachute Adams, whether I cast it from 10 or 30 feet away.

You’re probably thinking, “How can that rod be any good, since it’s not the latest hightech, high-modulus graphite 37 with plutonium scrim and kryptonite guides?”

Interstate sportsman

I guess the answer is that Scott got the design right back then, so they just keep selling. The hollow internal ferrules, along with Scott’s flex rating of the individual rod pieces, make an extremely smoothcasting rod that feels as if it is part of my arm when casting. I can fish a tiny BWO or a size 8 Wooly Bugger and this rod doesn’t care—it delivers either effortlessly and with accuracy. I also use it for small stream bass and bluegill fishing closer to home. It delivers a size 8 Boogle Bug popper tied to an 8-pound tippet just as easily as it does dry flies. It has been a lot of fun for a lot of years.

Another favorite rod is my Winston BIIX 8½-foot 5 weight, which I bought earlier this year. I didn’t really need another 5 weight rod, but my friend Bill had one of these and I knew it cast wonderfully. What sealed the deal was that I could order the rod with a full Wells grip (for an upcharge) that would fit my hand better than a slimmer grip. Like most Winstons, this is an extremely smooth-casting rod. I’ve used it on larger streams, in the Smokies as well as out West, using everything from midges to hoppers to wooly buggers. Like the Scott, it feels as if it is part of my arm when casting and I feel I am painting the stream with

my fly. With this year’s drought in my part of the world, I decided to use this rod for bass fishing on the streams near home, instead of my usual 8 weight. It did a great job with Boogle Bugs, Clouser minnows, and wooly buggers. For 2011, Winston has tweaked the rod to make it even better and renamed it the B IIIX. Gear And More Gear “My name is Craig and I’m a gearhead.” No, I don’t go to meetings for the problem, but I probably should. My wife says that I could probably buy my grandson a car if I would use E-bay to list and sell all the excess gear I own. But she she doesn’t understand the difference between excess gear and backup gear. Actually, I feel as though I am helping the economy with my purchases and we all know the economy needs help.

Carrying fishing gear requires specialized equipment, too. After trying more fishing fanny packs than I can remember, I finally found one that has become my favorite.

Made by Fishpond, the Guide pack has room for all the gear I need, plus some I don’t. Inside the two main compartments are smaller compartments to help you be more organized with your gear, such as leaders, floatant, peanut butter crack

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ers, etc. The third compartment unzips to reveal a large foam flypad that doubles as a workstation and has a couple of smaller pockets perfect for leaders. On the outside are two mesh pockets for tippet spools. I guess what makes this guide pack a favorite for me is that it is extremely comfortable to wear and has the toughness and quality I’ve come to expect from Fishpond.

Essential Flies All the fly-fisherman I know prefer to catch their quarry on topwater flies. Since I discovered Boogle Bugs, I haven’t bought another brand of cork popper for bass fishing. In more than 40 years of bass bugging, these are the best-looking, toughest, fishcatchingest bugs, period! ‘Nuff said.

Cut To The Chase I always have a pocketknife with me when I’m fishing or involved in any other outdoor activity. For the last several years, I have also carried a fixed blade with me in my fanny pack or vest. I like it better than a folder for slicing summer sausage or whatever I have brought for lunch, as it is much easier to clean and much safer to use. A few years back, I had a folder close on my right forefinger, and it took a hand surgeon to repair the digit and three months of thera

py before I was able to use it again. A fixed blade is also better for emergency situations because, being one piece, it is inherently stronger.

There are a lot of good knives on the market with three- to four-inch blades for the fisherman/outdoorsman, but there is a new one that is becoming a my new favorite. Although it is called the J.Wayne Fears Deer Hunters Knife, it works equally well for anyone who needs a great knife for other outdoor pursuits. Its oil-stained ash handle fits my hand comfortably, and the four-inch 1095 high-carbon steel blade is perfect for use around camp. The leather sheath is excellent and holds the knife securely, whether on your belt or in your pack.

Wishing you good health, happiness and dumb hungry fish in the coming year!

For more information about the products mentioned, contact these manufacturers.

Scott Fly Rods: www.scottflyrod.com Winston Fly Rod: www.winstonrods.com Boogle Bugs: www.booglebug.com Fishpond Guide Pack: fishpondusa.com Fears knife: protoolindustries.net

“NOW YOU’VE MADE ME HUNGRY.” —FREDY REIHL, SHOOTING SPORTS NEWS PUBLISHED BY SKYHORSE PUBLISHING 307 WEST 36TH STREET NEW YORK, NY (212) 643-6816 SKYHORSEPUBLISHING.COM

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Snared

By Old Traps

by Don Kirk Dear Mr. Kirk: After selling my grandfather’s old farm in central Vermont this summer, one of my tasks was to clean out his storage sheds. He was an avid sportsman and, like this father and grandfather, was a woodsman and man of the earth. I found two wooden boxes containing steel traps, including some pretty big ones that were in fantastic condition, thanks to the fact that they had been

wrapped in oily rags.

The biggest one is stamped Newhouse Slickpan bear trap, and is about 34 inches long. There are also several Newhouse #14 ATC Wolf Traps, some which are marked Newhouse # 2 1/2 Otter Traps, and over a dozen #4 Newhouse Beaver Traps. I have been told that that some sportsmen collect old traps. What can you tell me about these traps, what they are worth, and who might buy them?

Debra W. Providence, RI

Debra:

Community were immediately considered

Wow—another jackpot spin by an IS Out-

far superior to their European counterparts,

doors reader!! Yes, you are correct that

and news of their quality quickly spread

traps are collectible—highly collectible, in

throughout the United States and Canada.

fact. Newhouse traps are not rare, but they

The fur trade was very significant to the

are the gold standard in this fast-growing

development of the United States during

hobby. Before discussing value, allow me

the 1800s.

to first tell you about that old trap-making company.

Your bear trap is in great shape. This trap was made between 1858 and 1865, before

The Oneida Victor Company got its start in

they made the raised lettered pans, and is

the 1840’s in upstate New York. The Oneida

complete with all its teeth. As it is tough to

Community was a tight-knit, utopian soci-

find old Newhouse bear traps in this condi-

ety that was very religious and practiced a

tion and as it is quite a piece of old Ameri-

communal lifestyle, in which the members

can history, I estimate its value between

were all viewed as part of the same ex-

$200 and $600. The other traps are worth

tended family. Most members participated

$75 to $300. Unless you plan to begin trap-

in manufacturing various products sold

ping in Rhode Island, I recommend con-

by the community, including animal traps,

tacting the North American Trap Collector

chains, silks, silver knives, spoons and forks,

Club for better estimates of their value and

and canning products.

to find out who among them might like to bid on these traps.

In 1852, Sewell Newhouse began making traps in Oneida, New York. He introduced

If you have any sporting collectible ques-

trap manufacturing to the Oneida Commu-

tions, please feel free to contact Don Kirk at

nity, and thus inspired much of their early

dkirkemgruppe@aol.com

industrial success. The traps of the Oneida

Interstate sportsman

Snow Goose Hunting Paradise

by Don Kirk When snow goose hunting in the rice country of southern Texas, every day that you hunt is a different experience and setting. Mobility is crucial for staying a step head of these fickle geese. You begin in the darkness of pre-dawn, with all hands helping place out decoys. After this chore was complete, our party of hunters shared a thermos of coffee while our outfitter, Tony Hurst, and his guide huddled to formulate their game plan. The decoy spread was as

nearly perfect as possible., since of all North America’s many species of waterfowl, snow geese are the most decoy shy.

Larry Cook and I have often hunted for the snow geese that winter in Texas. However, since discovering hunting at the Paradise Hunting Club our of Garwood, Texas, we feel like we have found a home away from home for our snow goose outings. Hurst and his guides operate a top-notch snow goose hunting service. The area they hunt is not only blessed with a wintering flock of

Interstate sportsman

snow geese that easily passes the one million mark, but these men have the experience—they have studied the local webfeet long enough to master the fine details of consistently luring them within shotgun range. And they can lure them even under the least productive conditions the weather can conjure up for waterfowlers.

The Break of Morning As the eastern sky grew increasingly pale, we could hear hundreds of noisy snow geese as they came to life in the roosting ponds located several miles beyond our location. At first, the heavens displayed a few long strings of snow geese, winging skyward in the distance. But with each passing minute, the cloudless sky grew increasingly

full of these highly vocal geese.

Lying on the ground amidst our decoy spread, we could see birds passing overhead, suspicious, but checking out our lifelike display of faux geese. The first customers to show real interest were a trio of blue geese, frequent companions of the far more numerous snows. These were three mature “eagle heads,” something of a trophy in the wacky world of snow goose hunting. It is common knowledge among snow goose hunters that no den full of mounted waterfowl is complete without at least one eagle head blue goose—the primo bird of goosedom.

At Hurst’s command to “get em,” we rose,

firing volleys of steel BBB shot at the startled blues. All three of the geese plummeted to the ground before our videocamera’s unblinking eye.

When we called it quits at 10:00 AM, our party had dropped a very respectable bag of 30 snow geese.

Studying the Numbers In recent years, wildlife biologists have taken their closest look ever at snow geese, a waterfowl species that is currently exceedingly plentifu. Not only are there record high numbers of snows, but most of

these birds have dodged hunters for many years. Biologists speculate that the average age for a snow goose is between 8 and 12 years. Comparatively, Canada geese rarely exceed 8 years of age, with 4 to 6 years old being average. Ducks live to 3 to 4 years of age, and the average is 2 to 3 years old. Due to their longevity, snow geese are hunted longer than any other species of waterfowl.

Hurst’s operation is located approximately one hour east of Houston, in the heart of the country’s top rice-producing region, a table flat, almost treeless area. He annually leases exclusive snow goose hunting rights to more than 40,000 acres of territory. Each

Interstate sportsman

hunting season, this corner of the Lone Star State hosts well over a million wintering snow geese. Hurst has access to enough hunting territory that he can keep the snow geese there from becoming quickly overeducated on hunters. To do this, he alternately rests prime areas long enough for the geese there to forget the last hunt.

Hurst and his guides excel at creating inviting decoy spreads that even wary snow geese cannot resist. However, as important as a decoy spread is when hunting these birds, calling is just as vital. These guys understand the latter perfectly, and they rank among the most skilled snow goose callers in the business. Years ago, it was almost universally believed that decoys were the key to reeling in snow geese, but as calling strategies have improved, the value of calling has become more widely recognized.

An excellent case in point: The US Fish and Wildlife Service has relaxed their former prohibitions on the use of electronic callers for hunting snow geese during the current special spring season.

At the end of the hunt we returned to the lodge for a big home style lunch. I do not know about you, but when I am waterfowl hunting I do not mind sleeping with the

dogs and freezing weather if there is plenty to shoot at—as long as the food provided is plentiful and tasty. Hurst’s lodge not only has lots of birds to shoot at, but also first-class accommodations for the weary hunter. However, please indulge me while I wax eloquent for a minute about the food we were served—it teetered on the edge of unbelievable. Each meal was a scrumptious treat—both in terms of quality and quantity. And feeding a table full of alwayshungry waterfowlers is no small challenge.

Another Dawn The second day’s hunt started much the same as the first.. At 4:00 AM we were up— moving about, downing coffee, and eating breakfast before loading up to go to the rice paddies. Hurst has a large operation, able to accommodate more than 40 waterfowlers at a time. Expect to hunt a different area daily. We needed the lights on our vehicles to illuminate the muddy rice field,

Interstate sportsman

where we emptied large sacks of hard- shell and plastic rag-style decoys. Under Hurst’s direction, we placed out every single deke.

It was still dark when party donned our white parkas and nestled into the reclining benches Hurst had provided us. One of the toughest parts about snow goose hunting for middle-aged waterfowlers like us, is lying on your back in the mud, then being expected to spring up like a jack-in-the-box at the command of a 20-year-old guide.

The problem is, there’s not as much spring in any 50-year-old waterfowler as there was 25 years ago. The reclining benches that Hurst provides enable hunters like me to sit in comfort, in a ready shooting position. Using his benches, we did not have to come up from an completely horizontal position, balance, and hope to get a shot off. Snow geese are challenging enough to kill without having to fight gravity and age-stiff muscles from a static, prone position.

Hurst also provides hunters with those previously mentioned white parkas, and makes sure you have plenty of decoys around you to help conceal you. It is the hunter’s responsibility, however, to bring his or her own face mask, and it is also the hunter’s responsibility to sit tight and mo

tionless until the guide gives the command to shoot. Snow geese fly over decoys, inspecting them safely from 100- to 200-elevations, and are keenly alert for movement or anything else that might be out of place or not to their liking. Moving or staring directly skyward when snow geese are about reduces your chances for a good shot.

When making a hunt with Hurst, you can count on seeing lots and lots of snow geese. You will be dazzled when you see the sizes of the flocks from the well over one million white webfeet found in the region. Snow goose numbers in the area begin building in early November, and peak in January. When hunting in the last month of the season, you can count on having 10 to 12 large flocks of these birds working your spread of decoys before the sun is bright overhead. It is a caliber of waterfowl shooting reminiscent of that of a century ago, and an experience that will be indelibly etched in your memory.

For more info, contact Paradise Hunting Club; huntingplus@earthlink.com; telephone 800-368-4769.

Interstate sportsman

Bear & Son MGC 8-Inch Damascus Steel/India Stag Bone Guthook

by Don Kirk

Brock and I have long carried hunting and pocket knives made by Bear and Son MGC. Recently I field tested that knife maker’s legendary 8-inch Genuine India Stag Bone Guthook fixed-blade knife. Compact and practical, this little jewel has superior balance and it’s incredible Damascus steel blade performed like a champ on two recent hunting trips. It is one of dozens of fixed-blade and folding knives made by this southern knife manufacturer, which is one of the last remaining US companies to offer production-line knives.

Bear and Son MGC has a skilled and experienced workforce capable of performing many of the extra hand operations that go into the making of their products. Located in Jacksonville, Alabama, the Bear & Son Cutlery factory is unique; it is fully self-contained. While some companies only assemble parts brought from various suppliers and put their names on the product, everything at Bear and Sons MGC originates in the USA and. likewise, all work is done in-house, from building blanking dies to heat treating, grinding, assembly, and hand

finishing. These steps insure that Bear & Son Cutlery is of excellent quality and a real value.

Making Damascus knives is a very old art form. The India-made blades were first seen in Damascus, Syria, giving them their name. In later years, the complex art of pattern-welding very nearly became lost but, due to the recent interest in knife making the past 30 years, it was re-discovered and has come a very long way since those early days.

These Bear and Son MGC blades begin as a USA produced slab of 440 carbon steel that is cold hammer pressed to half of its girth, then re-heated, doubled over and hammered flat again. This process is repeated hundreds of times; heat/ hammer power welding layer upon layer of steel. The end result is a blade which, when sharpened, is razor sharp to the touch, but which actually has a micro finish that functions much the same as a hacksaw blade. The edge is enduring and efficient. Additionally, the scrolled finish on the blade is stunningly lovely. No one can resist one, once they have held one in their hands.

All hardware used in the assembly of the 8-inch Genuine India Stag Bone Guthook fixed-blade knife is USA made, including its impressive leather sheath. On a scale of 1 to 10, I rate this knife a solid 10.3. For more info, visit www.bearandsoncutlery.com

Interstate sportsman

The Big Bad American

45/70

that special chill of Autumn. It is the first day of moose hunting season. Bob, my hunting partner, Martha, my wife, and I are way out at the end of a long dirt road, by an old abandoned airstrip. We have been here for a couple of days, scouting and setting up stands.

by Kurt Steiner (provided courtesy of Guns and Patriot Magazine) “Where’s Martha?”

“I don’t know. I think she left out a little early for her stand.”

“Why are we whispering?” It’s well before sunrise, and the air is starting to take on

It has been a very dry summer; we can go a little deeper, because some of the normally impassable swamps are dry this year. Bob and I, of course, have been pushing the limits. We are out there about as far as we can go,and we have our big magnums sighted in at a couple of hundred yards. We have toiled and struggled to build the perfect setups.

Martha, on the other hand, is fed up with years of extreme Alaskan hunts. This year, she has chosen to hang out a couple of hundred yards from camp, in a comfy little

ground blind, with a good book. She figures she is about 25 yards from the moose trail and refuses to lug her 30-06 around.

With a little silent chuckle, I said she could use my 45-70. I told her it was zeroed at about 50 ft and an easy carry.

I just love that gun—every time I grab it, I feel like a cowboy and, when I cycle the lever, look through the iron sites, and squeeze the trigger, I feel just a bit more like a real man. I keep it around for protection, mainly. It’s not much good for hunting the wide-open spaces of Alaska.

“Damn, she’s out early” “Yeah, I think she was looking forward to sleeping in her blind on the soft peat moss instead of on the ground in the tent.”

“Alright man, you know the plan. We are pretty alone out here, so if you hear a shot, it’s probably me. Bring your big boy panties, cause it’s gonna be a monster!”

I was pretty confident in my location, my equipment, and my abilities. After all, this is serious moose country, and we have superior access this year. Bob’s no slouch, but I think I planned it out right this year—that trophy moose is going to have to pass by me to get to Bob’s site.

About 45 minutes later, I crawled into my stand. Finding it in the dark and the dense morning fog of the deep swamp was a little tricky, even with GPS. I settled in, and waited for first shooting light. The sun was going to come up at my back, and illuminate the far boundary of the swamp about 200 yards off. I knew that the only thing between the other side of the swamp and Russia was a couple of hundred miles of moose country and the Bering sea. I knew this was a good place and, God willing, this was going to be a successful hunt.

I entered that hyper-vigilant state that only the hunter knows. All of my senses peaked,

Interstate sportsman

each nerve raw against the chill of the morning.

The light of dawn was just starting to reflect off the willows. I could make out some promising shadows, as I slowly and methodically glassed every inch of the tree line.

BANG!, CRACK!. The report came from somewhat of a distance, and rang hard off the dense fog. I hadn’t see anybody else on the way in, but the shot didn’t sound as if it had come from Bob’s direction. Furthermore, it didn’t really sound like a rifle. It was a stout sharp crack, instead of the zing of a high-velocity round.

Sounds bouncing around a swamp in the fog can be very deceiving. I was pretty sure it wasn’t Bob’s 300, but I figured that, if it was, my radio would soon crackle with his excitement. But I heard nothing.

I kept intently glassing for my own quarry; there were a couple of cows mulling around the good grazing areas, but nothing with antlers yet. I love to watch wildlife going about their daily business. Hunting is not always about shooting—many times

it’s just about spending quality time with the beasts in their home.

I still hadn’t heard anything from Bob, so I forgot about the shot. I figured it must have been some far-off hunter, and the sound had just carried well in the still morning air.

“Hey, can you guys hear me?”

My radio startled me out of my stupor.

Damn it, what does she want? Doesn’t she know we’re hunting? “Yes dear, I hear you, what do you want?”

“Ah, er, I need some help…”

I took a deep breath—the kind of deep breath a man takes when his wife asks him to paint the kitchen during the Super Bowl.

I said a little prayer for patience.

“Can it wait till I get back to camp at about noon?” I said with controlled and contrived calmness.

“I suppose it could, but I’m worried about bears” “We’ve been over this, dear. The camp is pretty clean and we don’t have to worry about bears until after we hang some moose.” I choked on the last word as it hit me.

“Yeah, ah, that’s another thing... he’s a little too big for me to get back to camp by myself.”

I could almost hear Bob cracking up.

Long story short, after making my way back past camp to where Martha had chosen to sit, there, lying literally in his own tracks, was an atypical spike fork moose about three years old. This animal would easily tip the scales at over 1,000 pounds. He was legal because he was seriously atypical; if he had been symmetrical, his paddles would have probably seen 45 inches, but he only had one paddle, and a deformed rail with 3 brow tines on the other side. She had made a good call in taking this moose.

She dropped him in one shot, with my camp gun! The deep last impression of his front hooves betrayed the almost unimaginable impact of the 400-grain “nothing fancy” hard-cast lead. She had hit him broadside with enough force that he actually fell uphill! I paced it at 75 feet, and asked her where she held--needless to say, she didn’t know.

Bob and I just stood there and shook our heads. I’ve seen other moose killed with only one shot, but they usually make one final lunge. This one just tipped over.

To Take Him Down The shell used—the .45-70 Government— was developed at the Springfield armory in 1873 as a refinement of the .50-70, which was one of the first center-fire cartridges officially adopted by the US military. Its official designation was .45-70-405, which designation meant a .45 caliber (.458 diameter) , 405-grain bullet sitting anxiously on

Interstate sportsman

70 grains of blackpowder. (Okay, I added the anxiously part.) Back in the day, it was all about throwing big lead. Believe it or not, the .45-70 was considerably smaller than its contemporaries. But to this day, one look at the imposing stature and girth of the cartridge is enough to send chills down your spine.

The first gun officially chambered and distributed (or issued) for the .45-70 round was the Springfield model 1873.

(They were so creative with their model numbers.) This gun is known today as the “Springfield Trapdoor.” Back then, accurate, aimed fire out past 300 yards could be considered black magic. Eventually the gun’s design was beefed up to handle a new 50- grain bullet. This offered little better downrange ballistic predictability, but the trajectory was still more like an ICBM than a rifle cartridge. Just imagine the damage a 500-grain bullet hitting a target at a reentry angle must have produced.

With the development of smokeless powders, and flatter- shooting cartridges such as the .30-40 Krag, the .45-70 became obsolete—at least for military use—by the turn of the century. I do, however, remember using a modified Trapdoor with a blank

.45-70 cartridge as a line-throwing gun in Reagan’s Navy.

In a way, the seminal platform for this cartridge kept its sporting potential obscured for many years. The old trapdoors were built with an action stout enough to withstand a maximum volume loading of blackpowder, but would not stand up to the higher pressures of smokeless powders.

To this day, factory .47-70 ammunition, if you can find it, is “downloaded,” so as not to feed any lawyers representing dismembered owners of the older platforms.

Over the years, manufacturers continued, off and on, to produce guns chambered for the modern incarnation of the old round.

But it was not until I moved to Alaska, and asked around about effective bear defense, that I learned of the Marlin 1895 “Guide Gun,” and its potential as a bad-ass sporting cartridge. Though I consider myself to be a bit of a modernist, the first time I laid eyes on the romantic lines of this leveraction saddle gun, I had to have it. I had seen many tricked-out versions of this gun labeled as “Wild West guns” in Anchorage, but those versions didn’t keep my mind from wandering back to the simplicity of the factory gun. I am not one to own a gun

because it is pretty: I am more attracted to functionality. Why pay for all the glamour of a tricked- out gun, if the factory gun will make the lead fly the same? Besides, my guns tend to spend way more time in hostile environments than in the cushy silk sheets of a gun safe.

But this gun was special. I saved up, and plunked the money down for a standard blued peasant’s gun. I resisted the urge to put some fancy optic on top. I did buy two boxes of factory ammo, so I would have some brass to work with. Then, I went to work.

I learned about gas checks, and why the bullets were (at the time) all blunt nose. I found a local source for lead, and I developed an even deeper bruise on my right shoulder. Man, this thing was fun! Nothing like holding 8 inches high to zero at 100 yards. I gradually increased loads until I started to mess up the accuracy, then I backed down a little for prudence. I finally settled on a 350-grain hard-cast gas check on top of 54.5 grains of H4198. My Marlin makes this fly at around 2,200 FPS. Do the math—that is more than 3,700 footpounds of pure bear-stopping, all-American torque! Damn, I’m getting excited just

writing about it!

This gun goes everywhere with me. It is absolutely my preferred camp gun. Last year it spent 4,000 miles hooked to the saddle of my motorcycle when I took an adventure ride through Canada. The year before that, I used bungee cords to fasten it to the wing strut of a Super Cub plane that we used to chase wolves through the interior. All this winter, as in past winters, it will slide into the custom scabbard on my dogsled for my adventures in the frozen north. I never have to guess as to its reliability or effectiveness.

I have made friends shake in their boots when I insisted they give her a whirl , and made men out of little boys by graduating them from the little guns to this cannon.

And, of course, there was that one time at moose camp when I lent it to my wife, who used it to put two years worth of good organic meat in the freezer with one shot!

EDITOR’S NOTE: Please visit www.humanevents.com

Interstate sportsman

Bad River Bucks & Birds Draper, South Dakota

Bad River Bucks & Birds, LLC, is run by Brett Waibel, who has been involved in the hunting industry for 12 years, six of which with Bad River Bucks & Birds, LLC,. Brett has great experience in the field, spending more than 3oo days in the field each year hunting or observing game. He and Scott Mathews strive to

ensure an abundance of cover and food plots to maintain a healthy population of deer, upland game, turkey, and other game.

This operation truly provides North America’s ultimate upland game adventure. It is typical, during the season, to see 500 to 1,000 birds a

day, plus a wide variety of other animals. You owe it to yourself to come up and watch their well-trained dogs flush bird after bird after bird. There are very few places in South Dakota that can compete with the bird numbers per acre here. Hunters have access to tens of thousands of acres and, in addition to upland birds, may also hunt prairie chickens.

Bad River Bucks and Birds is based out of the historic Hermann Ranch, which for over a century has provided hunters with the experience of enjoying some of the best hunting

waterfowl, prairie dogs, and coyotes Newly constructed in 2002, the deluxe 10room western-style Bad River Lodge features rustic Dakotan décor and custom-made knotty pine furniture. All rooms include daily maid service, a private bath, and either two Queen or one King and one Twin bed. The Hermann Barn, built in 1905, has been fully refurbished from its ranching days and serves three hearty square meals every day: an allyou-can-eat country-style buffet breakfast ; an oversized field lunch; and a family-style dinner with the freshest grilled meats. The

in the United States. Quarries found on this large working ranch include trophy-class whitetail and mule deers, pronghorns, Merriam turkeys, ringneck pheasants, sharptail grouse, prairie chickens, partridge, dove,

barn’s game loft is stocked for entertainment: pool and poker tables, a big screen TV and a full wet bar. Thereare also a skeet-shooting range and a horseshoes court provided for your entertainment.

Bad River Bucks & Birds, LLC

27619 Hermann Ranch, Draper, South Dakota 57531 • 605-669-3440 info@badriverhunts.com, or visit www.badriverhunts.com

Interstate sportsman

Lorpen Bayou Sock Lorpen’s new Bayou is a over-the-calf Snake Boot sock is extra tall (17”). The Bayou is made with it soft to the touch, comfortable Merino wool which provides excellent moisture management. The Merino is blended with Modal yarn (a sustainable fiber made from beech trees) to move perspiration away from the foot. The Bayou sock also offers cushioning in the shin and sole for added comfort. Other features include Lycra cuffs so the socks don’t slouch, and a seamless toe seam to prevent irritation. For more info visit www. lorpen.com Hunter Specialty Scent-A-Way Tek 4 Clothing Hunter Specialty’s new Scent-AWay Tek 4 Clothing is designed and engineered with permanently bonded silver antimicrobial yarns for unmatched odor control and breathable wick

ing agents that leave the hunter dry and comfortable. Scent-A-Way Tek 4 keeps you warm when it’s cool and cool when it’s hot and it feels like silk. Available in lightweight and heavyweight base layer shirts and pants, head nets, gloves, socks, boxer briefs and headwear. For more info visit www. hunterspec.com Rapid Flyer Lucky Duck Edge’s new Rapid Flyer Lucky Duck takes motion waterfowl decoys to the next level.

Light weight flexible wings and innovative drive system creates a realistic flapping

motion. The shiny wing surface reflects light, creating the same flash that you get with the light/dark coloration on the spinning wing decoy wings. Wings quickly and easily remove for transportation and storage. It is remote controlled and has a battery run time of 8-hours. For more info visit www.edgebyexpedite.com

Trophy Bag Kooler Game Fresh System Trophy Bag Kooler’s new Game Fresh System includes everything you need to keep meat as fresh as possible from the field to the processor or taxidermist. The Game Fresh Spray is an antimicrobial spray, that when applied to dressed and cleaned meat, helps disinfect and control the growth of bacteria and microorganisms on wild game or raw meat. Our specially formulated KoolerGel is re-useable and stays colder longer than conventional ice. For more info visit www.trophybagkooler.com