Sportsmen love their toys. Of course, they prefer to consider these toys as indispensable tools for the outdoors. Sometimes the best gift one can give an outdoorsman is a tool or device that he might not either think to buy for himself or feel comfortable buying. For example, my mother-in-law always had an uncanny knack […]
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Taking the offensive to protect hunters’ rights
Now that we have been successful for the second time in defeating the bear referendum, we can go about our business. Our opposition, the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), has gotten the message and will move on to more fertile soil. Right? Wrong on both counts. We cannot afford to let down our […]
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Outdoors in Maine: Early returns on the deer harvest
The November deer season has come and gone. Hard to believe. Those still waiting to fill the freezer have a week to two weeks to close the deal (depending upon which wildlife management area you choose to hunt). What kind of a deer season was it? The Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife (MDIF&W) […]
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Outdoors in Maine: A hunt turns into a lesson in futility
You would think that I would learn after a while. Big game can be hit hard with a high velocity bullet and leave no trace. When my wife Diane shot a cow moose a decade or more ago with a .35 Remington, the animal disappeared into a fir thicket. There was no indication on the […]
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Outdoors in Maine: The aftermath of the bear hunting referendum
Well, we can heave a sigh of relief. Maine bear hunting, as we know it, survived Round Two of another well-funded and well-organized assault from the antihunting factions of this country. Who is “we”? Bear guides and outfitters? Yes, they make up part of the “we.” But there is more to it. Much more. Although […]
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Outdoors in Maine: Dealing with wounded deer
Most deer hunters will sooner or later in their hunting careers wound a deer and not recover it. It happens. The causes differ. A rushed shot. Buck fever. A gun with an inadequate caliber. A bullet’s impact or trajectory compromised by a tree limb. Often, particularly with inexperienced hunters, shots at a deer are taken […]
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For deer hunters, season looks mighty promising
Contrary to a recent press release issued by the Maine Department of Inland Fisheres and Wildlife, Maine’s 2014 firearms season for deer kicks off with a Maine residents only on Nov. 1, not Nov. 2. Starting the following Monday, Nov. 3, the deer season is open to all licensed big game hunters. ( If you […]
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Outdoors in Maine: A changing of the guard with same customer service
Not unlike the old general store, the traditional Maine sporting goods store — to the hunter or angler — is a special place. It’s where you go to trade a gun or find a new one, or have a scope mounted, or buy live bait for that ice fishing trip. Or you just might stop […]
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Urban bow hunting offers many challenges
Before I took up the bow, deer hunting was quite conventional. You layered up with long johns and wool clothing, grabbed the .30-30, some shells, a compass and then you spent a quiet — usually uneventful — day in the solitude of Maine’s woods. Now, long before November, I hunt deer in September during the […]
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Getting the moose can be Herculean task
During the first few years of Maine’s October moose hunt, before the animals were as wary as they are today, it was common for a hunter to drop his big bull either on a logging road or close by. Not so today. Many of the clearcuts have grown up and the hunter’s visibility has declined […]