Huntress life magazine sept oct 2016 by GL Hollowell Publishing

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VOL 2 ISSUE 5 Sept/Oct 2016

“Traditional Bowfishing with Judy Erwin Branham”

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Articles Hot Mess Hog

By Candace Hubble..........................................................................................4

Class, Sass and a Big Ole Bass By Christy Turner.........................................................................................10 Traditional Bowfishing By Judy Erwin Branham................................................................................12 Acclimating to a Non-Hunting Neighborhood By Lisa Selner..............................................................................................16 Pronoun for Japanese Hand-made Lures RomanMade By Reika Shimizu..........................................................................................20

Game Changer

By Kimberly Snyder......................................................................................24

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Hot Mess Hog By Candace Hubble

June 17, 2016 - Another Friday night at the lease with my husband hunting hogs...the only problem was neither of us have had any success on the new place while hunting with each other; all of our kills had been while hunting with someone else so we were eager to break the curse of the new lease. It was hot...105 degrees hot and I was at the “4 Doe” spot sitting in direct sunshine while Donald was at the “Dirty South” spot enjoying some much needed shade. It was just a few minutes into the hunt when I received a text from him saying he shot a small sow, only to be followed with another text that he shot a small boar too! I was pumped for him and wanted to join him to share his success but my hunt had just started. As he cleaned both hogs and put them on ice, I sat patiently waiting on hogs to show up and the sun to go down. As the hours passed, I was debating how long I wanted to sit. The last feeding is at 9:30pm so

I text Donald and said to come pick me up at 11:00pm. At 10:55 I began slowly packing up my things...backpack, camera, tripod, water & Gatorade, arrows, & bow. I stood and put my backpack on, grabbed my bow and turned around to fold up the chair. As I took 2 steps towards the

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road I heard crunching coming down the road! My first thought was to text my husband not to come pick me up yet because he would spook the hog and I slowly crept back to my spot and waited for him to come into the feeder; he was a solo boar and I knew he would be on edge. The next series of events took place over 20 minutes but required an incredible effort to not ruin the hunt and provides the name of this blog... Hot Mess! First, I had to get an arrow nocked and my release back on because even if nothing else came together I could at least get a shot on him. The boar went behind the feeder, I didn’t have a shot and he wasn’t moving from that spot for a while. Knowing I had some time (hogs tend to eat every kernel of corn before moving on to the next pile, unlike deer who tend to graze a bit more) I wanted to get my backpack off but my water bottle in the side pouch still had some ice in it and setting it down would make too much noise. I tried to sit back down in the chair to release my backpack but I felt my Thermacell dangling off my backpack and knew it would clackitty clack clack on the metal frame of the chair. So I decided the backpack would stay on, I just needed to buckle the chest strap to distribute the weight for a good shot. Could I even attempt to get the shot on film? I knew I couldn’t get the legs of the tripod extended as quietly as I wanted so I just opened it up on the shortest setting, slowly, very slowly, unzipped the camera bag and placed the camera on the tripod. All I wanted was for it to be pointed in the right direction at this stage of the hunt. I stood and watched as the hog continued to feed where I didn’t have a shot. I looked down at the camera and saw some brush was blocking the potential future shot; it needed to be higher but could I pull this off? Somehow I used one hand to unscrew the top portion of the tripod to raise the top pole up as high as I could but accidently unscrewed the adjusting nut too far and it fell on the ground. Ugh! All that work to quietly raise the tripod and I messed it up. I fumbled around quietly in the dark searching blindly for the piece while still keeping my eyes on the hog. I just knew he was going to finally turn and give me a shot when I wasn’t ready.

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Success! I found it and slowly put it back in and began the process of raising it all over again. The camera was as high as it was going to go and I was as ready as I was going to be...or so I thought. The boar finally moved to the right of the feeder and presented a shot. As I drew back I knew something was wrong but the hog moved and I was forced to let down. My release was too loose. I had put it on so quickly I didn’t realize I hadn’t tightened it to my liking. Quietly I re-adjusted my release but the hog had moved into the brush and I didn’t have a shot. As the hog slowly made his way back into view he was now on the shadowed side of the feeder and I needed to use my bow light. As I clicked it on I could tell he was nervous. I was actually surprised he had hung around for nearly 20 minutes already and knew my time and the corn on the ground was running out. As soon as I drew, he backed up and closed off his shoulder with his leg; so I held my draw waiting for the perfect shot opportunity and as he finally put his front leg forward he opened up the sweet spot and I let it fly! As my arrow hit, he turned and ran off with it still stuck in him but I heard a crash shortly after. I wasn’t positive the noise was him going down rather just barreling through the brush to get away. The shot placement felt great but I was worried I hit the other shoulder on the exit and didn’t get a pass through so my blood would be minimal. I texted my husband and told him we should wait at least 30 minutes to give him plenty of time to expire. As I sat there I looked around at everything that was going on and realized what a hot mess this whole situation was. If I had waited just 2 more minutes before packing up I would have been set up better and more comfortable, but nothing ever comes easy for me and I laughed. 30 minutes later my husband came to meet me to help track and to my surprise there was good blood at the impact site and we immediately picked up a blood trail. I was pumped and within just 35 yards I saw him lying in the brush...exactly where I had heard the last bit of crashing after the shot! I couldn’t contain my excitement when I saw him because I could see the bubbles and

lung matter coming out of the entrance wound and he was much bigger than I was expecting! Of course he went into some pretty thick brush but we were able to drag him out. As we hung him up to weigh him, he registered 143.4 lbs on the scale and as we cut him open we saw that my arrow had pierced both sides but it just wasn’t a complete pass through. He broke my broad head off on the exit wound side and splintered my arrow into 3 pieces but the loss of an arrow and broad head couldn’t stifle my excitement! The anatomy inside told the story of the shot and why he died so quickly! My arrow clipped the top part of the heart and punctured both lungs! It was another great night in the woods with my husband and we broke the curse too, although I had to wait a bit longer than he did for my success and almost blew it by leaving too early! What a hot mess of a hunt! Video of the hog hunt here: https://youtu.be/QCeJZkbTE6U

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Class, Sass and a Big Ole Bass! By Christy Turner

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I spent the week down in Austin for my job. I was the only one from my office attending the workshop. I was getting lonely and homesick for my family. While sitting in my hotel room one evening talking to my husband on the phone, he suggested I meet him at our deer lease when my class was through. That perked me up a little bit. Our deer lease was two hours North West of Austin. I was so looking forward to that drive. The next day I arrived a couple hours before Billy would be getting there. So I cleaned our camper that is parked out there from top to bottom and had everything organized. That just makes a mom feel good. After the hours had passed, Billy pulled in with his truck bed loaded down with deer corn and deer protein. I had our game cameras ready with new

batteries and new SD cards. We were all set to fill deer feeders on this sunny, one hundred degree summer day! Everything worked like clockwork and before we knew it, we were finished. That doesn’t happen that way very often. We still had plenty of daylight so Billy grabbed some of our fishing poles and the tackle box we had up at the camper and he said, “Let’s run down to the tank and see if anything is biting.” I jumped back in the truck and said, “That sound great!” We stopped at the first tank that we call the Axis Tank. The Bass were biting good. We had such a fun time and got us a good stringer of fish. We finished early and sat up at the camp that evening. It was the most perfect evening. It had cooled off with a very soft breeze. The stars even seemed brighter to me, with not one cloud in the sky. It truly was the big Texas sky I was sitting under and admiring, listening to the sounds of the outdoors just Billy

and I with no one else for miles. We slept in and took our time that next morning. Then we drove on in to the neat little town of Comanche. We ran some errands and stopped and had lunch at Sonic. I just love a good ole bacon cheeseburger, onion rings and a cherry limeade with their good ice. When we got back to camp we had our things packed up and ready to head home. Billy said once again, “Do you want to stop off at another tank up in the front pasture and see if we can catch a few more fish?” Without hesitation of course I agreed! We had such a great day fishing the day before I never expected for it to be even better today, but it was! It seemed like every time we would throw our line in, we had another bite! The water was so clear you could see all the fish swimming. Billy would be putting a fish on the stringer

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as I was walking over there to add one myself. On our very next cast we would have another bit. It was so much fun I don’t think I ever had a day of fishing like that! The best part of the whole weekend though was when I caught the monster bass! I kept praying while I was reeling him in that my line wouldn’t break. As I got that big fish closer to the bank there was a lot of moss. I was so afraid he would get tangled up in the moss and break my line. I didn’t give any slack in my line and was reeling as fast as I could. When I got him on the bank I couldn’t believe it! Of course I took a selfie with my phone first, I just couldn’t believe I just caught that huge monster bass! Then Billy came running over because I was making such a fuss, he knew I must have caught a big one. I asked him quickly to get my photo with him so I had proof! After our quick little photo session, we released him back into

the water. I just kept thinking what an amazing fish, I would love for someone else to experience what I just did and to watch that monster bass grow even bigger. We released a few more of those big bass that we had caught, but we kept a pretty good stringer over the past two days. I recently got a Fire Disc Grill and I have been itching to cook in it. Driving my three and a half hours’ home from our deer lease, gave me plenty of time to get my plan together on cooking our fish. We had already cleaned the fish at the deer lease and had them rinsed and clean in gallon size baggies. I had the baggie on ice in the cooler on the ride home. When we got home I had a lemon pepper marinade and poured that in the gallon baggie with the filleted fish. I stuck that in the refrigerator while I cleaned and chopped up some new potatoes and onions from our garden. I was almost ready to start cooking but first with the Fire Disc Grill you need to season the grill just like you do with Cast Iron. So we did that first, and then I had thawed from the freezer some chopped up bacon pieces from my daughter Cassie’s show pig. Both my daughters love to help me cook and the Fire Disc Grill made it very easy for all three of us to stand around and stir. Cassie browned the bacon pieces and then we moved it to the side of the grill, then we added the chopped onion right into the middle of the bacon grease. When the onion was cooked we scooted it to the side by the bacon pieces and then added the chopped new potatoes to

the middle of the grill. When the potatoes were soft and tender we scooted those to the side of the grill as well and added the marinated fish fillets to the middle of the grill. We had so much fun cooking with this grill and had a lot of food in it at once. The bacon, onion, and potatoes just stayed warm along the sides of the grill while the fish cooked in the middle. When the fish was done cooking we just brought our plates to the grill and served directly from the grill. It was a wonderful dinner straight from the field to my Fire Disc Grill. What started as a long and lonely week, sure ended amazing.

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I didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t have a fillet knife with me so I just used what was available, but it would have been much easier with the correct knife. Step 1 I cut straight down right behind the gill until I feel the back bone. Step 2 after I feel the back bone I angle my blade to cut length wise with my blade going right down the top of the spine. Step 3 I stop right before the tail, then flip that cut side back to fillet the meat off of the skin. Step 4 Once I have the meat filleted off of the skin, I cut away the triangle shape of the rib cage. Step 5 Rinse and package it up.

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Traditional Bowfishing By Judy Erwin Branham

Photography by Ken Branham

Traditional archery has been a passion of mine for many years. Although I have never harvested any game with traditional equipment I find it very fun to shoot my recurves, longbows and selfbows. I have been known to win a competition or two over the years with my traditional equipment. AMS Bowfishing gear works very well on all my traditional bows. As you can see in the photos although no fish were retrieved I still had a lot of fun. Enjoying time outside in God’s beauty is always wonderful. Raccoon State Recreation Area near my home in Parke County, Indiana is a great place to go fishing, hiking, boating, and camping or just lay on the beach and relax. Cecil M. Harden Lake had a cove with a dozen or so carp spawning in late spring. Trying to hold 12 inches under bowfishing didn’t prove successful from the bank. Nathan Fields, a friend and fellow bow fisherman suggested I should try six inches under bowfishing from a bank. First I used the Compton Traditional Archery’s Pass-around Bow (a 1956 Bear Kodiak). Many wonderful men have used the Pass-around Bow and written their accounts in the journal that is sent with the bow. I am the first woman to ever use the bow. I enjoyed it very much and won the 2016 Cloverdale Traditional National Women’s Recurve 1st Place trophy with it. I have never shot a bow better in my life. This was a great honor and my account is written in the journal also. This 60 year old bow is a straight shooter and I will forever be grateful to the Compton Traditional Archery Club for this opportunity. Using a piece of history and becoming part of that history was a great experience.

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Secondly I used my current Bear Grizzly recurve bow at the waterfalls by the Historic Mansfield Roller Mill and Mansfield Covered Bridge also in Parke County. Swiftly running water made for a nice breeze which cooled the morning air. Fish jumped and flopped making waves from time to time making for another enjoyable day; however, I was skunked a second time.

Thirdly I wrapped the bowfishing gear around my English Longbow made for me by Henry Tweddle of Michigan. I won the Traditional Archery Societyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s World Championship in Womenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Selfbow this year with it at the Farmland Conservation Club in Winchester, Indiana. The AMS Bowfishing gear wrapped around the selfbow nicely and stayed secure. I was worried about this as my selfbow has a slick finish and is very round in shape. The equipment fit great and is light also so it does not affect your shot. Although I enjoyed my time bowfishing I never harvested any fish yet. I will continue this very pleasurable sport forever now that I have had a taste of how much fun it really is. My experiences were great and the AMS Bowfishing equipment and my XTRA Tuff Neoprene Legacy boots were both excellent choices for the excursions. The AMS Bowfishing reel was very easy to use my very first time out. See my product reviews below:

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AMS Traditional Mount Kit for Recurve bows sustains the strength of any traditional bows; such as Recurves, Longbows and Selfbows by mounting with the wrap around straps. No scarring or scratches were caused by my use on any of the bows.

The AMS Retriever® Pro Kit was easy to use. Having never experienced bowfishing previously I quickly became familiar with the equipment and had no problems attaching it to my bows or fishing with it. There are no buttons to push before you shoot and no clumsy spools to hand wind. The line simply and easily stacks in a bottle. As you shoot the line comes out of the reel as fast as the arrow shoots. To retrieve the arrow you simply pull the trigger handle and reel in the line and arrow. The arrow conveniently stores on the reel also while not in use for ease and safety of carry. Durable Construction according to the AMS Bowfishing website: “With heavy-duty brass gear and pinion, aluminum trigger, composite housing and stainless steel fasteners, this reel is built to last!” Check out their website to see all their accessories and products. https://www.amsbowfishing.com/

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XTRA Tuff Womenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Legacy Boot has great tread for bowfishing. The mossy topped rocks out in the waterfall would have been very slippery in tennis shoes or barefoot. My XTRA Tuff boots made it an easy and secure walk on the bank and in the water. These boots protected my legs from the weeds and water as I bowfished. The toughness of the neoprene and outer layers of triple dipped rubber are stiff enough for protection but loose enough for comfort. I love these boots. Check out their website to see their diverse selection of womenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s boots. https://www.xtratufboots.com/category/womens-legacy-collection

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Acclimating to a Non-Hunting Neighborhood By Lisa Selner

Most of my hunting experiences have taken place along the East Coast until these past six years. I relocated to California for work as a wildlife biologist and hunting here has been an altogether different experience for me. The regulations are stricter, the terrain more challenging, and the actual sighting of game in sizable numbers during any given hunt is significantly diminished, depending on the location. There are simply more white-tailed deer per square mile in many of the East Coast habitat types Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve hunted than there are mule deer or black-tailed deer on the West Coast. The game is present, but greater exertion is necessary to be successful. And even then, there are no guarantees that you wonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t come home empty-handed. While living in California, so far I have engaged in and succeeded in hunting black-tailed deer, tule elk, and feral hogs. Having been accustomed to hunting during autumnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s brisk, chilly weather on the East Coast, it took a bit of getting used to hunting in warmer temperatures across an arid landscape in central and Southern California. My first few times deer hunting in California took place in the Los Padres National Forest, where temperatures were well above eighty degrees Fahrenheit, and proceeded to get warmer as the day progressed. I am not a fan of hot weather. Despite the hurdle of dealing with the warmer temperatures while trekking through steep, rugged coastal mountains, I did find a bit of solace while exploring this ancient landscape. There are many prehistoric rock art sites found throughout the forest; as well as the remains of ancient villages, burial sites, rock shelters, and ceremonial locations.

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Los Padres is the second-largest national forest in California. It rises from the Pacific Ocean to almost nine thousand feet in elevation. The area forms one of the richest varieties of ecosystems in the world and includes chaparral, coastal, grasslands, mixed conifer forests, oak woodlands, pinyon-juniper stands, redwood forests, sage scrub, and semi-desert habitats. The possibility of running into larger predators is also likely, and not far from the back of my mind while on a hunt. So far, I have seen a black bear only once while deer hunting in California. It was running in the opposite direction, away from me. Bighorn sheep, bobcats, coyotes, mountain lions, and many other creatures call this place home. The forest is also home to many wilderness areas and Southern Californiaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s last undammed river, the Sespe Creek. One of my most exciting hunts to date was my venture to the foothills of the Santa Lucia Mountains in San Luis Obispo County, California, for a tule elk. Tule elk are the smallest subspecies of American elk (or wapiti), and are found only in California. Bulls can reach over five hundred pounds. Tule elk are sometimes referred to as dwarf elk. The name given to the tule subspecies was derived from a marshland plant it commonly eats. With the onset of the autumn solstice came quite a memorable experience. This was my first time using a hunting guide, and in hand I had a cow elk tag that I desperately wanted to fill. We scheduled several days of hunting. The first evening in the foothills was just enough to get our adrenaline pumping. We spotted several tule elk walking towards a water hole, and the sound of the bugling bulls was truly captivating. We saw wildlife of all sorts throughout the evening. The area was well known for its mountain lion activity. Hiking into the canyon to get a closer look at approaching tule elk proved challenging. We waited patiently until dusk finally set in, not able to single out a suitable entrant and make a good shot before darkness blanketed the area. The following morning began before sunrise. As daylight crept in, we headed towards another canyon, after glassing over the area and listening for bugling. The bulls in this area were just at the end of their rut, so we did not observe any large ones. But smaller bulls were still running amuck. As we followed the sounds of one particular bugling bull through winding trails carved amongst the juniper brush, we came to a spot where we could sit and look across a small canyon to the other side, where several tule elk cows were feeding. We

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sat behind a juniper for a while until the guide felt it was okay to get ready to pick a cow out of the small herd in front of us. Still getting used to the idea of hunting from the ground, without my handy climbing tree stand that I became so accustomed to while hunting back east, I took my seated position beside the juniper, and steadied my rifle on its new set of bipods. Careful not to alert the elk to our presence, I took aim at the larger cow in the herd. After I fired, she took a few steps forward. “Oh, ***, I think I missed her,” I said to the guide. “No, you didn’t,” he answered back. Then two seconds later, she went down. The bullet passed through her lungs on the first shot, and I had quite the smile on my face when I realized I’d just harvested my first tule elk! I made a mad dash further down into the canyon and came up the other side, where the cow elk lay next to the juniper she had been browsing on before I took aim at her from the other side of the canyon. The excitement and adrenalin from a successful hunt seemed to make the uphill portion of the hike a little less demanding. I guarded her possessively until the guide was able to make it down the other side to help pull her out. When we got her back to the bunkhouse, he helped me skin her so I could work on the hide and have it tanned. He handed me her ivories (canine teeth) for safekeeping. He then quartered her for me so I could take my bounty home. My coolers were filled and topped with ice, and I returned to my apartment, just three hours south of the hunting grounds, earlier than expected.

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Throughout my career thus far I’ve always been accustomed to neighbors and fellow hunters who have given me access to their garages or work sheds, where I could process meat after hunts, or work on hides. Living in California, where few people in my neighborhood are hunters, has proven to be a bit more challenging. Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of hunter-friendly locations within the state, but it doesn’t seem as popular where I currently reside, which is not far from Los Angeles. I frequently sneak small projects up into my apartment and out of sight of people who might be sensitive to the act of butchering meat, or working on hides or pelts. Bringing home a quartered tule elk carcass was no exception. But it did prove more difficult to go unnoticed. Having succeeded at my hunt so early in the day, I made it back home late in the afternoon. Residents of my apartment complex were somewhat active around my building, and tours were still being given to prospective tenants around the complex grounds via golf carts. My task was to carry each of the elk quarters up to my apartment without being noticed. The ice in the coolers was mostly melted. Each of the quarters was partially wrapped in a black plastic trash bag to try to hide them. I left blood trails from the melted ice and meat all the way from the parking lot behind my building to my apartment door! I walked past surprised neighbors, and got a dirty look from one of the tour guides who, with his prospective tenants in tow, watched me lug the monstrous chunk of meat across the lot and up the stairs! Nobody said a word, but nobody offered to help me, either. The elk quarters ended up sitting in the bathtub for a while till I could finish emptying my pickup. I was fortunately able to dilute the blood trails with several watering cans full of hot water. By morning, there was no sign that I had ever toted a quartered carcass across the parking lot. I spent the rest of the evening cutting up the meat and prepping the hide on my kitchen floor. Boy, I made one heck of a mess! I did not rest till the meat was in the freezer, and the floors and tub were scrubbed to a sparkling shine. After midnight, I prepared the first batch of meat for the crockpot, and sampled it the next day. It was delicious, and well worth all the effort. Elk meat is by far one of the tastiest of all game meats, in my opinion! I do make the best of my time spent along the West Coast and have taken up other outdoor-related ventures, including falconry, as well. But I look forward to future career moves that may lead me back to more hunter-friendly neighborhoods.

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Pronoun for Japanese Hand-made Lures

RomanMade

By Reika Shimizu

Do You Use Big Bait Lures? In lure fishing, big baits are a particular category with a short history compared to well-known baits such as crank baits or Vibration lures. Once, the big bait market in Japan was believed to be less than 1% of the whole fishing gear industry. The ratio stayed the same in other countries. This is because big baits were thought to be for monster bass hunters, a handful of particular anglers or collectors. As the name suggests, they are a lot bigger than regular lures and more expensive. The casual fishermen didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t even know how to use these lures in this mysterious genre. Today, however, just about any fishing gear store carries big baits and popular makers have added big baits into their product lines. They are not just for a handful of core anglers any more. This trend is found not only in Japan. In the past few years, looking around the globe, the market expansion for big baits is a sight to behold. It is not well-known that just one bass has brought the growth and evolution of the big bait genre.

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Mother of RomanMade In April of 2008, a bass weighing 18.7 pounds was caught at Biwa Lake in Japan. This was a record catch at Biwa Lake back then. As great a shock this bass was to Japanese anglers, more attention was paid to the lure which landed this bass. This lure, Mother was handmade at a local store called RomanMade. Compared to the 27.5-inch bass, it may be hard to perceive the real size, but this lure is 11.8 inches and 0.66LB. Back then and even now, it is the biggest among bass lures on the market. Almost everybody who sees or touches Mother for the first time says, Is this really a lure? Am I able to cast it? I don’t have a rod that can cast this! No way this gigantic thing can catch anything! These are the rejections of fear because of the size and weight. The message was all in line of, Are you crazy using stuff like this? While developing Mother for over five years, RomanMade had been exposed to voices like that. Why did they insist on Mother? Ambition for World-record Bass Mr. Takeyama, the owner of RomanMade and their lure designer says,

“For over ten years, it was known that the Biwa Lake was hiding world-record bass. If they are there, you want to catch them! That’s the fisherman. We, including my fishing buddies, all have sought how to catch only monster bass, and we still are. Even though Mother tends to be passed over because of its unusual size, its size, weight, wooden material and shape are all created for the monster bass at Biwa Lake. While fishing for giant bass, our findings and learning experiences were all shaped into Mother. Many people ask, Why is it so big? I only have to say, To aim at a record bass, it has to be a foot-long and a half pound. We are not after regular big bass. In order to catch record bass, we are making Mother.” RomanMade produces handmade lures At the time of the new Biwa Lake record in 2008, RomanMade wasn’t even incorporated, but just a maker in a garage. Even now as a corporation, all the production from cutting wood, sanding, adjusting weight to painting are done by hand, which makes it impossible to mass produce. However, after the 2008 record catch, a tsunami of orders blew them away. They were in a peculiar phenomenon in which many anglers who yesterday were saying, Are you crazy? now wanted that very lure. Takeyama spent many days shaving wood with just a wink of sleep. Then, anglers nationwide started to send him their reports of monster catches one after another. This was a turning point for the big bait market in Japan. There had been big baits sold before RomanMade. But even to the big bait users back then, Mothers’ size was out of the norm. Then, there was a perpetual waiting list for Mother. It is a curious thing: after people see and use Mother, they start to feel that other big baits are not

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that different from regular-size lures. Around the time when this perception settled among anglers, big baits ceased to be just for monster bass hunters or hardcore anglers. The tidal wave that one bass brought turned another page of history in Japanese bass fishing. RomanMade USA After the 2008 Biwa Lake record catch, the news of the world-record bass from the same lake stunned nations in 2009. But the preliminary race had begun in 2008. Even though the sales were small, RomanMade had started business in the USA in 2010. At the beginning, the US markets response to Mother was, Are you nuts? It was a Deja vu. The birthright to giant swimbaits occurred in the USA many years ago. In fact, some these giant swimbaits where first designed as giant soft plastics used in ocean fishing. Some handmade swimbaits in the USA exceeded 14 inches but it was a very small group of trophy hunters who were brave enough to throw them. Most of the USA fished for bass in traditional methods but the California’s trophy hunters; mostly in located in Southern California (some in Northern California) began giant swimbait fishing in 1980’s secretly. The acceptance of big swimbaits in professional tournament fishing didn’t occur until approximately, the 90’s but it was a well-guarded secret. In Japan, Romanmade created the mother, Japan’s answer to trophy hunting (with hard swimbaits). Today, bass pros in elite series have Mother in their hands. Mother, created just for monster bass at Biwa Lake, has made a global debut and has been accepted. What place in the world will bring the next new record? RomanMade will go on creating romans along with anglers all over the world.

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â&#x20AC;&#x153;Game Changerâ&#x20AC;? By Kimberly Snyder

As a hunter I am always looking for new ways to not only enhance my hunts but to stay safe and continue success. This past year I found what I like to call a Game Changer for my hunts, onXmaps. OnXmaps offers a free trail download for your phone and after 20 minutes playing with this app, I knew that any hunt, any location, anything was possible. There have been many struggles that I have faced when carrying maps, finding locations, marking boundaries. This app actually solved all those struggles and has created a whole new way of thinking for me as a hunter.

To put it simple, they collect the data so I can readily use it on a handheld GPS or simply from my phone. I have been able to find out who owns properties that I have scouted for years and now

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have a resource on whom to ask permission among land owners to either access property or to hunt their parcels. OnXmaps also allows you to find public lands open for public use, from anything to campsites to water access. But my favorite feature is the property boundaries, this past turkey season I put this app to use and was amazed. The evening before my hunt, while I was roosting the turkey, I utilized the features to mark my trail so I would know where to set up in the morning. I marked my location for my blind on the map and used it for easy reference in the morning to find my location. But to my amazement I was also able to see all property boundaries while trying to find the roosts. I donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t only use OnXmaps for hunting; I also used this feature when looking for a new home. We were with our realtor and we couldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t find the property boundary in the thick woods. I opened the app and pro-

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ceeded to the property line on the app, as soon as I came to the marking we looked up and low and behold there was a stake marking the property line. There are so many features within this app, from weather, knowing fire hazards, points of interest, roads, back trails, game management to a topographical functionality. Utilization for setting food plots, picking locations for your tree stands and marking it, GPS location, and now the new world it has opened to me as a waterfowl hunter. I am able to travel waterways, mark blind locations and use coordinates to purchase blind permits from my local Department of Game. This Mobile GPS technology with all the apps has put an entire new world at my fingertips and opened up a new era of hunting! As a waterfowl hunter, you have to find where the birds are and get to them, now I can mark their location, find a way to get to them and even ask permission if needed to hunt them. With the upcoming season it is time to start the process of scouting and preparing for those big hunts. No matter what state you are hunting, you can get this app for that state and find your way to success. This is the tool, the game changer and the future of hunting that anyone can use anytime right at their fingertips. Photo credits to Ed Gramza, Jared Smith, Shawn Hurla, Angela Haralson and Tyson Woods

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