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ЛЫЖИ, ЗУБРЫ И КИНО ❄️ Новинка! Ещё один зимний экотур на 1 день Это путешествие пройдет вдоль берега Западной Березины, по заснеженным тропам, через старые еловые 🌲 и

ЛЫЖИ, ЗУБРЫ И КИНО ❄️ Новинка! Ещё один зимний экотур на 1 день Это путешествие пройдет вдоль берега Западной Березины, по заснеженным тропам, через старые еловые 🌲 и смешенные леса. Настоящая зимняя сказка, не иначе!) В местных лесах обитает много диких животных, 🐾 следы которых мы изучим и определим. Отличительными особенностями этого тура станут новая трасса зимнего маршрута, новая уютная усадьба прямо на берегу реки, зубриное сафари утром 🦬 и тематическое вечернее кино на проекторе! Но, как и прежде в наших зимних путешествиях вас ждут специальные широкие лесные фотогеничные лыжи, наши природные гиды, четкая организация, забота и уют 🤗 Это путешествие вы можете подарить в виде сертификата 🎁 своим друзьям и близким). Мы всё оформим, подготовим и вышлем вам почтой. Или можете получить оперативно сертификат в электронном виде. Желаем прекрасного зимнего настроения!

Post: 3 January 09:16

В США зафиксировали случай превращения оленя в «зомби». Об этом пишет The Guardian. Сообщается, что смертельное заболевание CWD, которое является одним из видов коровьег

В США зафиксировали случай превращения оленя в «зомби». Об этом пишет The Guardian. Сообщается, что смертельное заболевание CWD, которое является одним из видов коровьего бешенства, поражает мозг оленей, заставляя их бесцельно бродить в округе, пока не умрет. При этом животное перестает реагировать на внешние раздражители и не боится людей. По словам ученых, болезнь не лечится и чрезвычайно заразна. Ученые опасаются, что болезнь может мутировать и начнет заражать людей. На данный момент она зафиксирована в 31 штате США и двух канадских провинциях. Подъехали спойлеры на 2024 год.

Post: 27 December 11:12

Une bonne journée de réussite et de rigolade, l’occasion de sortir le beretta aux petits gibiers avant les fêtes, j’aurais l’occasion de prélever deux bécasses et deux fa

Une bonne journée de réussite et de rigolade, l’occasion de sortir le beretta aux petits gibiers avant les fêtes, j’aurais l’occasion de prélever deux bécasses et deux faisans, beaucoup d’oiseaux de vu concernant les bécasses c’était excellent, mais j’ai fait mon plus beau loupé sur un faisan je peux vous le dire 🤣 Un superbe arrêt des chiens, tout était au top sauf le tireur 🥳 Tout le monde avait les yeux sur moi en plus 😆 Voilà rien à ajouter vive la chasse et les copains 🤩😂 #chasse #petitgibier #becasse #faisan #Season20232024 #harkila_official #beretta #berettaofficial #chasseenfrance #chassepassion #huntinglife #hunterxhunter #Hunt #lovehunting #chasseurs #winchesterammunition #chasseresse #huntress #passionchasse #faunesauvage #faunesauvagedefrance #outdoor #shotgun #Hunting_outdoors #bellejournee #berettashotguns #copains #cartridge #Hunter #shooting

Post: 22 December 09:11

I shot this button buck Saturday night while sitting at the base of a giant oak tree. Three does came out of the cedars earlier that evening, but they were about 155 yard

I shot this button buck Saturday night while sitting at the base of a giant oak tree. Three does came out of the cedars earlier that evening, but they were about 155 yards away and moving at a pretty good clip. Then this young deer came out, and when he finally moved out from behind a couple trees in front of me, he stopped quartering toward me and gave me a shot at about 75 yards. I don’t prefer to hunt with a muzzleloader, but the December season seems to be about the only time I get the opportunity to hunt deer. The shot rang and after a moment of blindness, the smoke cleared. I saw the deer bolt about 50 yards to my right. I thought I’d missed him, but as he approached a couple lone cedar trees in the open, he made a sharp, confused U-turn, and then crashed down into the dry creek bed to the north. I almost expected him to get up and continue running over the hill, or slip away down the dry bed. Trembling, I reloaded my gun. If he was there, I needed to give him time to die without the shock of my presence. But I couldn’t wait too long. It was getting dark, and I am not an experienced tracker. Finally, I worked up the nerve to walk up. I looked up and down the dry creek bed, but saw nothing. Then I walked toward the cedar trees, and there he was, lying at the edge of the dry bank. As I watched the last bit of life leave his eyes, I gave out a cathartic sob, the tension of the last few minutes releasing like the valve on a pressure cooker. Then I wiped my face, got myself together and called my friend and colleague at the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission Cassidy, who was already making her way toward me. Cassidy made an offering of water as “last drink,” because there was no sage nearby to place into his mouth. She spoke words of grace and gratitude over the fallen animal — I’ve always admired my friend’s way with words. My bullet tore up his liver, which caused massive bleeding and a quick death. Cassidy and I dragged the deer to the truck in the dark. Back at the cabin, I seared his tenderloins in a hot pan and made a quick pan sauce of balsamic vinegar and jelly that I found in the kitchen. We enjoyed our celebratory deer camp meal with wild watercress soup, which I picked while scouting that morning.

Post: 21 December 18:48

One for the Road Pachydermia The fading symbol of Africa To the wide world, the elephant is the symbol of Africa. Hunters might hold out for the lion, and the greater

One for the Road Pachydermia The fading symbol of Africa To the wide world, the elephant is the symbol of Africa. Hunters might hold out for the lion, and the greater kudu has it advocates, but ask the average person what animal he thinks of when you mention Africa and the answer will almost always be “the elephant.” This fact is important when you consider the coverage given to game conservation generally by the mainstream media. The mountain nyala may be seriously endangered, or the eastern bongo, or giant sable, but mention those to the average journalist—or, more to the point, the average editor—and you will likely get nothing more than a strange look. Every couple of years, The Economist, London’s highly respected international news magazine, remembers the elephant and sends someone to take a look at its status. One expects high quality journalism from The Economist, and usually gets it. Its most recent articles on elephant are broadly excellent, but with one curious blind spot: Nowhere that I can find do they mention legal trophy hunting, either as a means of raising revenue or controlling elephant numbers. And nowhere do they credit hunting organizations such as Safari Club International for their efforts to save wildlife in general, and the elephant in particular. The Economist’s writers, who are anonymous, seem to operate under the same biases that afflict journalists everywhere. Certain subjects are taboo. Saying anything good about big-game hunting is one such. The corruption and venality of African politicians is another, especially if that politician was somehow connected with “freedom fighting.” For example, in the 1970s, Jomo Kenyatta’s wife (one of them, at least) was acknowledged to be one of the biggest traffickers in illegal ivory in East Africa. Was this ever mentioned in The Times when it wrote about the massive elephant slaughter that occurred back then? Never, that I know of. Kenyatta, one of the least admirable of all the immediate post-independence leaders, was given almost saintly status, and this particular wife enjoyed the same untouchable reputation. I knew foreign correspondents in Nairobi back then who were well aware of the situation and filed stories about it, but these were invariably spiked or all references to Frau Kenyatta removed. Twenty years ago, Gray’s Sporting Journal dispatched me to Africa with instructions to come back with an in-depth story on the status of the African elephant, which was widely believed to be seriously endangered. Of course, it was not endangered in the least. At the time, the numbers were estimated at about 750,000 remaining—a far cry from 2.5 million, or even the 1.5 million estimated in the 1970s, but still a long way from endangered. Certainly, in some areas, notably Kenya, numbers were down drastically due to poaching, but in other areas, like Kwando in Botswana, elephant numbers were burgeoning to the point of serious habitat destruction. I spent time with various elephant biologists, and all told the same story: The major obstacle to any positive action on behalf of elephants was public misconceptions about the actual situation. No question, the situation was dire, and probably terminal in some areas. But in others, circumstances were totally different, and totally different actions were required—actions that were blocked by supposedly well-meaning people who thought they knew best. The essential problem, I was told, lay in one fact. In the mid-1800s, when Europeans began arriving in central Africa, they found islands of people in a sea of elephants. Today, there are islands of elephants in a sea of people. That’s fact number one. Fact number two is that, historically, these vast numbers of elephants moved in continuous migrations, covering thousands of miles. Fact number three is that elephants, all their admirable qualities aside, are intensely destructive animals. They kill and uproot trees, devour vegetation, and generally devastate their environment. As long as they were migrating, this was not a problem; quite the opposite, it was an essential part of regeneration, just like periodic veld fires. Once they could no longer migrate, however, once they were confined to a particular area, the devastation became intense, not only to their detriment but to all the other animals, birds, and reptiles that called it home. This is really an insuperable problem, since the expanding human settlements and infrastructure of Africa block migration routes, and this is almost certainly going to get worse. Some do-gooder conservation groups look at this situation and suggest that the answer is to take elephants from where there are too many and relocate them to areas where there are too few. This is an attractive proposition, especially when it conjures images presented in movies of a baby elephant in a sling beneath a helicopter, squealing with glee as it is transported to its new home. First of all, where do you put them? When elephants have been eradicated from an area, it is usually for a reason. Either they threatened the human population or they were easily vulnerable to poaching. Will those people want elephants returned? Unlikely. Would they be safe from poachers? Unlikelier still. As for relocating them in the first place, it’s a massive, expensive undertaking fraught with difficulties. They need to be relocated in family groups. They need to be transported in a sedated condition, in heavy vehicles, for long distances, over bad roads, with veterinarians in constant attendance, and even then they can only be sedated for short periods. Intelligent elephants may be, but they don’t seem to accept the explanation that all of this is for their own good. Ask the average person about legal hunting, or even culls, to reduce numbers, versus relocating surplus animals, and everyone will say they should be relocated. When was the last time you saw an article in The Economist, The Times, or anywhere else, about the realities of relocation? In its most recent article about African elephants, The Economist concluded that the causes of elephant poaching were poverty and bad governance and law enforcement. No kidding. Really? In another Economist article several years ago, looking at the plight of elephants and rhinos in the Northern Frontier District of Kenya (the NFD, as it was known years ago), the writers concluded that the animals needed somehow to be given economic value in order to encourage the local tribes, like the Turkana, to protect rather than poach. Nowhere in the article did they even mention legal sport hunting as a possible means of helping to do so. Legal hunting has been a thing of the past in Kenya since 1977. That is not going to change, and the idea that rich eco-tourists will want to visit the hostile environment of the NFD, and pay enough money to make it worthwhile, is a pipe dream. Other Economist articles have stressed how dangerous it is to even approach the NFD, and it’s been closed to outsiders because of that, off and on, for years. The advantages of having a legal hunting infrastructure are well known: You have camps with armed men in them, you have regular patrols as hunting vehicles crisscross the territory, you provide permanent employment and a source of hard currency for the locals, and you give the game department more revenue with which to hire and pay game scouts. The abolition of legal hunting in 1977, with the resulting elimination of all of these benefits in and around protected areas, was a major factor in the explosion of uninhibited poaching of elephants and rhinos in Kenya in the late ‘70s and ‘80s. There was little to stop them. Yet the hunting ban was widely applauded as a positive move toward game conservation when, in fact, it was the polar opposite. The other advantage of having such a hunting community is that it gives it hunting a constituency, and a constituency has a voice in government. No voice in government? Then no one cares. Would a big-game hunter pay big bucks to hunt elephants in the NFD? Probably he would, but once you start looking at all the different aspects and difficulties of such an idea, the possibility is extremely remote. In an area where tribes depend on cattle, where grass is scarce and water scarcer, trying to convince herdsmen to value elephants and rhinos over cattle and goats is a waste of time. To my mind, probably the best use of the mountains of “save the elephant” donations held by the big wildlife funds would be straightforward bribes to the tribesmen, along with giving modern weapons and substantial salaries to the guards, and instituting a shoot-on-sight anti-poaching policy. The alternative is having game scouts and guards who are outgunned by the poachers, who have no qualms about shooting anyone in uniform—or anyone else for that matter. In today’s environment, the surest way to raise an outcry is to have some predominantly white organization try to tell a black government what it should do. In between the black and the white lies the grey of the elephant, at the mercy of politics, political correctness, and irrevocable change. Elephant in the Okavango. Botswana has one of the few remaining healthy elephant populations—healthy to the point of threatening their own well-being through habitat destruction. Proper elephant management is difficult because of international opinion, made all the worse in the age of the Internet. By Terry Wieland

Post: 15 December 09:27

A Night in Hippo Heaven By Donald J Stoner It is said that hippos kill more people in Africa than any other animal (if you exclude mosquitos). But does that qualify

A Night in Hippo Heaven By Donald J Stoner It is said that hippos kill more people in Africa than any other animal (if you exclude mosquitos). But does that qualify them to be classified as dangerous game. I have certainly had my doubts until, that is, an experience I had one night in a farmer’s field. There is no question that an animal that weighs two tons, can run up to 20 mph and has huge teeth, has the potential of being dangerous. The danger is highest if you happen to catch a hippo on the land. Water is their preferred environment and they seem less threatened there. I don’t think any predator will attack a full-grown hippo in the water, although a big croc will certainly snatch a small hippo given half a chance. On the other hand, lion, especially a large pride, will attack a hippo if they catch it on land. This may have something to do with hippo temperament when they are away from water. Threaten a hippo on land, and it will head straight for the nearest water and run over or through anything foolish enough to get in the way. This is usually not “charging”; it is simply escaping. Of course, if you happen to be between the hippo and the water, the effect for you is not much different. He will not hesitate to kill you as he goes by. Since I have never really considered hippo “dangerous” game, I have never had a great desire to hunt one. Shooting a hippo in the water, while it can be challenging, is hardly dangerous. Thus, hippo was never on my “wish list”. However, in 1996 when on safari with my wife, an unusual opportunity arose that changed my opinion of hippo. I had a wonderful safari in a game-rich area bordering the Kruger Park. During that safari I had taken both lion and leopard. The leopard had not been planned but the opportunity came due to heavy predation on a nearby farm. The hunt for lion and leopard consumed almost all of our three weeks scheduled safari time, but in addition to taking a lot of bait, I had also taken several quality trophies. I was well past satisfied with the success of the hunt, so I had packed up my rifles and gear and planned to enjoy another couple of days in camp before catching the plane home. On the morning of our next to last day in camp, my PH excitedly came to our room and asked if I would like to take a hippo. “Well, not exactly! But I will listen to your proposition.” He then explained that a sweet potato farm in an area about an hour from our camp had just called him because they had been given a problem permit to kill a hippo that had been raiding their farm every night for two weeks. This was a real problem because the hippo was consuming an estimated 450 pounds of potatoes a night and doing great damage to the remaining plants. He then explained that the farm was near a reserve that was fenced off from private farm land to protect the crops. The fact that the hippo was leaving the reserve indicated it was probably a young male that had been driven out of the pod by the dominant bull. When displaced, they can become quite a problem as they search for new territory. Because of this behavior, my PH thought the offender would not be a trophy bull, but since the price was right, he suggested we take the job. He explained that we would have to be certain we killed the culprit and to do that we would have to catch him feeding on the field at night. He explained that we would have to wait till late evening and then, every hour or two, we would start near the river and walk the fields, working our way toward the back of the farm moving in absolute silence and darkness. We would find the hippo by sound since they make a lot of noise chewing up potatoes. Once located, we would get as close as we could and then turn the lights on him. That would trap the hippo. He would have to come by us to get back to safety and would probably try to kill us as he went by. His selling point was not the trophy, but rather that it was indeed a dangerous hunt. OK! Now you have my attention. I unpacked my .375 and solid ammo and my PH began making the arrangements with both the farmer and the game management department. Late in the afternoon we drove the hour or so to the farm where we met the farmer and his farm manager. They showed us around the farm just as it was getting dark. In doing so, we surprised a sounder of bush pigs which they also needed to remove, and I made a lucky shot from a moving vehicle at a running pig and put him down. It was a good start to the evening. After we surveyed the farm and developed our strategy, we parked under an old tree near the riverside of the farm and had some coffee and a light snack. It was a clear, cold night and the miles of plowed fields soon were shrouded in darkness. I was then given strict instructions that I will never forget. “You must remain absolutely silent until we locate him and get the light on him. As soon as the light hits him, you start shooting. Shoot for the head or neck, but get as many shots into him as you can. I will be standing next to you and the second I don’t see empty cases flying from your rifle, I will start shooting. This is serious and you must put him down quickly or someone will get hurt. Do you understand?” OK, I think I had the picture! I better shoot fast and well or you are going to do it for me and if I mess up, we will all be in a lot of trouble. I got it. Yea, right! Can I go home now? This was not exactly what I expected. Stumbling around in the dark with a hippo, not to mention all the other interesting things you might stumble into like mambas, cobras, adders and who knows what else, scarcely seems like fun.

Post: 15 December 09:24

In Chile, an Animal Whose Numbers Please No One CERRO SOMBRERO, Chile — The guidebooks for Tierra del Fuego somehow fail to mention the gunfire. From the mist-shrouded

In Chile, an Animal Whose Numbers Please No One CERRO SOMBRERO, Chile — The guidebooks for Tierra del Fuego somehow fail to mention the gunfire. From the mist-shrouded Patagonian steppe to the dense beech forests, shots pierce the air here for months on end each year. Hunters armed with telescopic rifles roam this archipelago at the southern tip of South America in pickup trucks as they pick off their prey: the guanaco. Humans have already hunted the guanaco, a wild cousin of the llama, out of existence across big swaths of the continent. While hunting the animal here is legal, the culling of Tierra del Fuego’s guanaco herds is setting off a fierce debate over the fragile recovery of a native species and the sway of powerful ranching and logging interests, which contend that rising numbers of guanacos are competing with sheep for pasture and foraging in commercial hardwood forests. “We’re witnessing a grotesque subordination to businessmen who view a creature of remarkable beauty and resilience as little more than a nuisance,” said Valeria Muñoz, a prominent animal rights activist in Punta Arenas, the regional capital. “It’s a return to a 19th-century mentality, where logging and sheepherding triumph over everything else.” Elsewhere in South America, the hunting of animals for population control has largely focused on curbing invasive species. In Colombia, hunters have targeted the descendants of hippos imported by Pablo Escobar. In Ecuador, park rangers in the Galápagos Islands mounted an eradication campaign against goats that compete for food with native species like tortoises. Chile’s hunting of guanacos seems more akin to the disputed control of native species in other countries, like Australia’s kangaroo hunts, raising the ire of animal rights groups and tourism officials who say the culling stains the reputation of a remote place where visitors are often stunned to come across herds of wild guanacos. Guanaco hunting is prohibited along the main roads cutting through Tierra del Fuego — a land divided between Chile and Argentina that juts out from South America’s mainland like a spike — but along the back roads during the hunting season in the Chilean winter, the signs of the killing are clear. Gunshots from the hunters’ rifles echo through the forests of lenga trees. Blood from recently hunted guanacos blemishes the snow. Communicating with the hunters by walkie-talkie, work crews fan out on private lands in search of the carcasses, hoisting them into pickup trucks for transport to slaughterhouses. Ranchers who are allowed to carry out the hunts argue that they are victims of policies that have expanded Tierra del Fuego’s guanaco herds in recent decades. As recently as the 1970s, only a few thousand guanacos were thought to remain on Tierra del Fuego’s main island, an area larger than Belgium, after widespread poaching. A crackdown by Gen. Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship on firearms ownership (and by extension hunting) opened the way for guanaco conservation efforts; the number of guanacos in Chile’s portion of Tierra del Fuego has climbed to about 150,000, according to Chile’s Agricultural and Livestock Service. The authorities allowed as many as 4,125 guanacos to be killed this year. “Aside from competing for food with our sheep, there are now so many guanacos in Tierra del Fuego that they represent a risk for motorists trying to avoid them when the animals cross our roads,” said Eduardo Tafra, a rancher who butchers guanaco meat at his slaughterhouse in Cerro Sombrero, a windswept outpost on the plains. “We do not want to exterminate the guanaco,” Mr. Tafra explained, “but we cannot idly sit by and watch it threaten our livelihood.” Tierra del Fuego’s ranching culture has roots in the sheepherding operations established near the end of the 19th century, largely by British settlers who displaced nomadic hunters of guanacos. By the early 20th century, the Selk’nam, the indigenous people who had lived in Tierra del Fuego for thousands of years, had been almost completely wiped out in a brutal extermination campaign. Throughout it all, the guanacos, one of the main sources of food for the Selk’nam, persisted in Tierra del Fuego and other parts of Patagonia. The animals are thought to have first been glimpsed by Europeans in 1520 when Ferdinand Magellan, the explorer who sailed through the strait that now bears his name, described seeing a “camel without humps.” Part of the camelid family, guanacos once numbered as many as 50 million in South America, their numbers exceeding other big hoofed creatures around the world like the caribou, African wildebeest and saiga antelope, according to the American zoologist William G. Conway. “Enormous numbers of guanaco haunt these grim plateaus,” the British explorer H. Hesketh-Prichard wrote in “Through the Heart of Patagonia,” a 1902 book in which he describes no-holds-barred hunting for guanacos. “They were about as tame as English park deer, allowing us to approach on foot to within 70 or 80 yards.” As herds of nonnative sheep expanded in Patagonia, the number of guanacos plummeted, reaching a current level of only about 500,000, said Cristóbal Briceño, an expert on guanacos at the University of Chile. Guanaco herds have dwindled significantly in other parts of Chile where they were once plentiful, he said. While the guanaco is not threatened with extinction on a continental scale, the animal still faces serious threats of poaching and the degradation of rangelands, and is likely to disappear from several of the regions that make up its historical distribution range, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature. The Chilean authorities have quietly allowed hunting for guanacos in Tierra del Fuego over the last decade, arguing that the culling is needed to maintain a “sustainable” population that does not adversely affect other underpinnings of the regional economy. Residents here generally abhor eating guanaco, so most of the butchered guanaco meat is exported to Europe. (An exception can be found at La Cuisine, a restaurant in Punta Arenas that offers Guanaco Grand Veneur, a stew of the camelid in a red wine sauce accompanied by mashed potatoes and pumpkin.) “We closely monitor every aspect of the hunting to ensure it is carried out in a proper way,” said Nicolás Soto Volkart, an official with the Agricultural and Livestock Service in Punta Arenas. “We’re convinced this is good policy after guanacos recovered in numbers since the 1970s.” Still, tensions run high over the hunting of guanacos, herbivores that eat everything from cacti to lichens and fungi. A proposal in 2012 to expand the program by allowing tourists to take part in the guanaco hunts was shelved after it met with fierce criticism. Advocates of “rewilding” forests — essentially restoring ecosystems to something resembling how they once functioned — say that guanacos could help areas where they are reintroduced by dispersing seeds for certain types of trees. “Guanacos seem to be an important missing species that used to play an important ecological role,” said Meredith Root-Bernstein, a conservation scientist at Aarhus University in Denmark. Pointing to a growing resistance in Chile to hunting of various types, officials at the Agricultural and Livestock Service remain on edge after protesters attacked their building in Punta Arenas this year with firebombs in response to a separate proposal to allow the hunting of feral dogs accused of attacking sheep. Even during the hunting season, the silhouettes of guanacos can still be glimpsed on stretches along the Strait of Magellan. The guanacos often gaze at approaching vehicles before sprinting away across the steppe. “Hunting these animals is an aberration that reflects our skewed priorities,” said Enrique Couve, the president of Tierra del Fuego’s chamber of tourism. “The guanaco is a treasure of Patagonia that brings a sense of wonder to people who are fortunate enough to see it,” he said. “And here we are, watching it be killed as if it were some sort of pest.”

Post: 14 December 09:44

WHY YOU NEED TO BE HUNTING SQUIRRELS RIGHT NOW What if I told you about a hunting opportunity that’s happening right now, which offers abundant access to productive land

WHY YOU NEED TO BE HUNTING SQUIRRELS RIGHT NOW What if I told you about a hunting opportunity that’s happening right now, which offers abundant access to productive land, requires a minimum of technical gear, and provides the chance to bring home tasty meat that is routinely overlooked for its palatability? You’d probably think I was blowing smoke, but I’m talking about one of the most neglected and productive hunts in the U.S.—for common tree squirrels. Squirrel seasons start now, in the lazy days of late summer, giving you time (and an excuse) to get out in the woods to scout for deer while also ground-truthing the gear that you’ll rely on all autumn. But you don’t need an excuse to go squirrel hunting. The first argument in its favor is that squirrels live almost everywhere, from the leafy hardwoods of the East to the piney woods of the South to the mountains of the West. Squirrel hunting is also a great way to introduce new shooters to small-game hunting. The two squirrel species most often pursued by hunters are the largest and most widely distributed: the fox (or red) squirrel, and the gray squirrel. While peripheral habitats can hold squirrels, you’ll have the best luck finding summertime squirrels in their core habitats of nut-producing hardwoods, especially oak and hickory stands. But here’s the other appeal: hardwoods define a lot of public land east of the Mississippi, from small tracts of county land to larger state game lands and wildlife management areas, to big U.S. Forest Service tracts. Find hardwoods, and you’ll almost certainly find squirrels. But don’t neglect private land, either. Your chances of getting permission to hunt a patch of farm-country hardwoods for squirrels is orders of magnitude better than getting on that same land for deer. SUMMER SQUIRREL TACTICS Now that you know where to find them, how do you hunt squirrels? You’ll change tactics once the leaves drop, but for summertime squirrels, when the critters can be hidden in the dense green foliage, the best approach is to first walk and then sit and listen for rustling high in the branches. Patience is a virtue with this style of hunting, because not only must you positively identify that the movement is being made by a squirrel, but you must wait for a clean shot. Try sitting near the top of a steep hillside that drops into a ravine or creek drainage. Your elevation will provide you with a better view of the upper limbs of trees that hold squirrels, and you can look over several acres of trees on the slopes below you. Another benefit to hilltop stands, especially for rifle hunters, is that your shots will be traveling safely downward, often with a tree trunk or limb behind the squirrel to stop your bullet. A small binocular—either an 8x24 or 8x32—is useful for this sort of surveillance. Scan areas where you hear or see leaves moving, then be ready to follow up positive identification with a rifle shot. The perfect set-up for this type of hunting is a .22 rimfire topped with a 4-power scope. Your shots won’t be much over 50 yards, but the scope enables you pinpoint aim, an important advantage when you often see only pieces and parts of leaf-hidden squirrels. Your goal should be head shots. If you’re a morning hunter, get in the woods early and sit against the base of a large tree with a wide vantage of the woods around you. Squirrels are often active on the forest floor in the mornings, and you can have good shooting as long as you can move quietly from place to place. Once you’ve shot a couple times, squirrels will get nervous and remain in the sanctuary of the treetops. This is also a good time to try calling. If you know squirrels are hanging out of sight in the treetops, blow or push a chatter call. You’ll need to experiment with the rhythm and volume (as well as various brands), but the idea is to mimic the sound of an agitated squirrel, causing the real chatterboxes to show themselves, often with their tails puffed out, standing on an exposed limb. A call is a great device to use with a buddy. Your friend calls, you get ready to shoot. After you’ve bagged a tree rat, switch jobs and call another one. LATER-SEASON SQUIRRELS Visibility in hardwoods improves greatly once fall arrives and trees drop their leaves. Squirrel hunting can be red-hot for the first few weeks of the bare-branch season. This is the nut-gathering season for squirrels, and they’re working overtime to store acorns, hickory nuts, and chestnuts for winter consumption, so they’re often visible and vulnerable. If summer was .22 season, the fall is a better time for a shotgun. Walk the woods and look for snap shots on the forest floor as squirrels run from tree to tree and scamper up trunks. But if you prefer a rifle, then sit on a hillside, wait for the forest to settle down from your intrusion, and then take longer shots at squirrels pausing from their nut-gathering mission. This can also be a wait-and-listen game, only at this time of year, you’re listening for the loud rustle of squirrels moving through dried leaves. You’d be amazed how often a 2-pound squirrel can sound like a 200-pound whitetail buck moving through the woods. GUNS & LOADS The most effective all-around squirrel gun is a scoped .22. You want a rifle that can repeatedly stack shots inside a 2-inch bullseye at 50 yards. Good options include the durable Ruger 10/22, Browning’s T-Bolt, or Marlin’s Model 60 or 795. An accurate .22 pistol, such as Browning’s Buck Mark, topped with a red-dot sight is another great squirrel rig. If you want to opt for a little more range, consider a .17 rimfire; the light, fast Savage A17 in .17 HMR is a good choice. A suppressor is a smart addition, because its blast-taming muzzle keeps you from announcing yourself to squirrels with every shot you take. For shotguns, there’s no need to go heavier than a 20 gauge, and a 28 gauge or even .410 is a better choice. In fact, the introduction earlier this year of Federal’s Heavyweight TSS (Tungsten Super Shot) is a wonderful squirrel load. Designed for turkeys, the size 9 shot delivers great penetration and range and is a good choice for a walk-about squirrel hunter who doesn’t want to lug around a heavy shotgun. OTHER GEAR CONSIDERATIONS A vest with a bloodproof game bag, a good knife, some snacks, water and a binocular round out your gear needs. Here’s one more: a good shooting stick to settle your gun for longer shots. Look for a telescoping monopod or tripod with a head that fits the forend of your rifle, and then use it on different pitches of slope or any time you can’t find a tree trunk or other support to stabilize your gun.

Post: 13 December 17:47

4 NEW WAYS TO TAG PUBLIC-LAND TURKEYS RIGHT NOW Try these four surefire guerilla tactics to bag your public-land gobbler this spring. 1. START SCOUTING EARLY February is

4 NEW WAYS TO TAG PUBLIC-LAND TURKEYS RIGHT NOW Try these four surefire guerilla tactics to bag your public-land gobbler this spring. 1. START SCOUTING EARLY February is usually a gloomy month for outdoorsmen. Waterfowl and whitetail seasons have recently closed. It’s too cold to go fishing, and cabin fever seems to be a common illness. However, this time of year offers the best chance at getting a jump-start on killing a spring gobbler. To beat the February blues, I like to grab my .410 for squirrels and rabbits, and lace on a good pair of hiking boots. Boots on the ground is one of the biggest factors in setting the table for spring gobbler success as knowing the lay of the land is critical. The foliage is off the trees this time of the year, which makes a walk through the woods fairly easy. The snakes and ticks usually haven’t made their warm weather debut quite yet, either. And since whitetail deer shed their antlers this time of year, you can keep a lookout for sheds while you search for turkeys. Before I set foot in the woods, however, I use satellite imagery to locate roads, ridges, hollers (the bottom of deep hardwood ravines), edges (where pine trees and hardwoods meet), and crop fields, which are all prime places to find turkeys. Once I begin walking, it’s important to keep an eye out for tracks, droppings, dusting sites, and feathers. If I find a track or feather, I’ll come back later in the spring and have a listen. 2. CONCENTRATE ON BURNS For thousands of years, fires have been used as a tool to regenerate the forest floor and activate growth that directly benefits the wildlife that calls the understory home. On public lands all across the country, there are seasonal prescribed fires conducted by professionals to enhance the ecosystem. Since these areas are normally open to hunting and other outdoor activities, fire warnings, burn areas, and fires breaks are usually visibly marked with signs for safety. Since professionals conduct these burns, forestry agencies keep detailed maps and records of burn areas and fire breaks for logistical and safety reasons. Visit the forestry office that manages the area where you want to hunt and ask to see these maps. Foresters are usually willing to share their knowledge of the woods. Once you have located fresh burn areas, finding a turkey is usually not very difficult as these areas draw turkeys like a magnet. Firebreaks provide easy trails to sneak along and call in search of a willing gobbler, but they also create edges within vast tracks of timber. In my experience, gobblers love to strut and feed along the edges of these burned areas. Fire exposes many dormant seeds and produces new green growth at turkey level, providing a natural food plot. Unfortunately, every year there are uncontrolled forest fires across the country that burn with devastation, but they also have a positive effect on the ecosystem. The same tactics can be applied to finding and killing a long beard in these areas where natural burns have occurred. 3. TRY AN AMPHIBIOUS APPROACH Successful public-land turkey hunters all have their own unique tactics that set themselves apart from other hunters. Sometimes finding birds requires going farther than most hunters are willing to go. When looking for new areas to find turkeys, water sources of all kinds are an excellent starting place. Turkeys love to roost over rivers, creeks, swamps, sloughs, and lakes because of the safety water provides from predators. Fortunately for us, most of the water sources turkeys like to roost over are fairly easy to navigate with a kayak, canoe or jon boat, allowing for a somewhat silent approach to gobblers off the beaten path. Even a set of waders or hip boots can be worn to quietly walk up creeks and ditches to get close to roosted turkeys. 4. TAKE ADVANTAGE OF AFTERNOONS When thinking back through my years of successful turkey hunts, nearly half the birds I’ve taken died in the afternoon. In the peak of the breeding season, hens will leave gobblers in the late mornings and afternoons to go sit on their nests, leaving gobblers lonely and looking for love. I prefer to tackle afternoon hunts in one of two ways. The first is covering as much ground as possible, walking and calling loudly or using various locator calls (crow, owl, or red tail hawk) to strike up a lonely tom. Oftentimes, if a bird gobbles in the afternoon, they will come quickly and willingly to the call. The second method emphasizes patience. When I have located or established a pattern on a tom and I know the general area he likes to strut, roost, or feed in, I will quietly sneak in to those locations, set up, and softly call every 20 minutes. The openness of the terrain and the hunting pressure in a given area will usually determine whether I use a decoy or not. A lot of hunters normally hunt the roost and once gobbling activity shuts off for the morning they pack up in frustration and leave the woods. That’s a mistake. Take advantage of the afternoons because they are often the most exciting and rewarding times to tag a turkey. One word of caution, however. Hunting public land can be extremely gratifying, but it also presents a certain level of danger. Always be cautious of other hunters when hunting public land. I rarely use a decoy on public-land hunts. If the situation calls for one, I only use a hen decoy to lessen the chance that another hunter might confuse it with a gobbler and accidently fire in my direction. After a successful hunt, wrapping my dead bird in a blaze orange vest and simply wearing an orange hat and vest for the walk out are two precautions I take to ensure safety in the turkey woods. Ultimately, success on public land requires time afield, so step outside and go explore our wild public lands. They are teaming with turkeys.

Post: 13 December 17:45

SUMMER PREP EQUALS A BETTER FALL DEER SEASON Don't wait until the season starts. It’s hard to think about frosty mornings at hunting camp this time of the year. The outs

SUMMER PREP EQUALS A BETTER FALL DEER SEASON Don't wait until the season starts. It’s hard to think about frosty mornings at hunting camp this time of the year. The outside temperature for many of us is still hovering around the triple-digit mark, and the air is so thick you could probably squeeze water out of it if you made a fist. But now is exactly when you need to be putting in the work for the upcoming season. UPGRADE YOUR GEAR Think back to last season. Did a fogged scope cost you a big buck? Did your treestand squeak when you tried to get into position for a shot? Did you leave a hunt early or skip going out altogether because of inclement weather? Now is the time to remedy all those problems. Available stock on sporting goods always seems to be in short supply just before season. Don’t wait until the gear you need is sold out before you start shopping. Purchasing early also allows you to get familiar with your new equipment, particularly firearms and optics. Not having to stop to think about where the safety is on a new rifle can mean the difference in getting off a shot and watching your quarry disappear into the cover. Summer is also a great time to score deals on merchandise that will be full price as fall and early winter hunting seasons draw near. Many retail and online suppliers drastically mark down leftover merchandise from last season before new stock comes in, and you might be able to upgrade gear that needs replacing without spending as much as you will later on. PUT IN THE RANGE TIME Not everyone is lucky enough to have the space to safely practice with their favorite hunting firearms on private land. That means regular trips to a public shooting range or an investment in a gun club membership will be the solution. As hunting seasons draw near, these ranges get crowded, though, and long waits, lots of distractions and short time limits don’t make for quality practice time. Go to those same ranges in the month or so before the official start of autumn and you often have them to yourself. That means more time to work with multiple firearms, less downtime for target changes and easy access to multiple lanes for various firing distances. MOUNT A NEW OPTIC If a fogged or malfunctioning scope messed up last year’s deer season, now is the time to upgrade. You’ll need a few tools to mount a new scope to your rifle, starting with a set of gunsmithing screwdrivers with bits that fit tightly into your scope mount choice. The right bits lessen the chance of one slipping out and scratching your rifle or scope. A quality torque screwdriver, preferred by many gunsmiths, can also prevent overtightening a screw and either snapping it off or stripping the threads. Most scope manufacturers recommend 20 to 25 pounds of torque to adequately tighten screws without causing damage. To keep your screws from backing out from repeated recoil, a drop of thread-locking compound like Loctite applied to the screw threads before tightening is a good idea. Clean the screws with alcohol or a commercially produced gun scrubber to remove any oil from the threads before applying the thread locker. When it comes time to mount the scope, place your rifle (unloaded, of course) in a vise and, while sitting in a normal shooting position, adjust the scope back and forth until you can see the full scope diameter while looking through it. A dark ring around the view means your scope is too far away. Slide it back a bit until you get a full view through the scope. Take care not to move the scope too far to the rear—no one likes to get cracked in the eye by their scope when their gun recoils. For most scopes, three to four inches between the scope’s eyepiece and your eye—the eye relief—is about right. The scope’s manufacturer also states the eye relief for whatever model you have. Once you have your scope positioned correctly for eye relief, use a scope level to ensure your crosshairs are vertical. (Tip! A scope level also helps you keep your rifle aimed in a level way and can help you correct cant, or tilt, in your gun before you pull the trigger.) When everything is to your liking, apply the thread locker and install the screws to the recommended torque. Tighten them in rotation—left, right, front, back, repeat—until tight. Give the thread locker 15 to 30 minutes to dry before firing your rifle. STOCK UP ON AMMO Walk through the ammo section of your favorite store these days (the summer of 2020, with coronavirus pandemic news still in focus) and the empty shelves might shock you. You may have to do some internet digging, place an order with your favorite retailer or start hitting the road to find a dealer further out that stocks what you need now, because if you wait until just before season to stock up, and you might be plumb out of luck. Not every firearm shoots well with every brand of ammo or even every load within a brand. Luckily, hunters have a dizzying number of choices across just about any caliber imagined, and summer, with its less-crowded ranges, is a good time to get together with your hunting buddies and compare loads. If you happen to shoot the same caliber, share a few loads with each other and test them in your rifle. You might find a new favorite. Don’t know anyone who shoots the same caliber you do? Pick three to four factory loads with different velocities, bullet weights and styles applicable to the game you hunt and test each one. Chances are good that one will outperform the rest. Once you’ve found your load, stock up all that you can (especially in this unusual year) to get you through the season so you don’t find yourself scrambling to find more when inventories are at their traditional lowest. The one caveat about summer rifle shooting is that once temperatures do drop, you’ll want to hit the range again and confirm your zero. This is especially true for really cold mornings. The first shot out of a cold rifle is going to be the same cold shot you take on a deer, so you want to know where it’s going to go, and it’s likely going to be different than that first shot out of a barrel on a 90-degree day. Shoot often and reconfirm as conditions dictate. It’s all about knowing your gun. SAFETY CHECK FOR TREESTANDS AND OTHER GEAR Summer—not the weekend before season opens—is the time to get out treestands, ladders, climbing sticks, harnesses, and safety ropes for a safety inspection. (Stand placement and placement timing are a column all their own; we’re concerned with safety here.) Check stands for worn straps or chains, rusted bolts and cables and any missing nuts or hardware. Most companies offer replacement parts for stands, allowing you to do any needed maintenance to keep you safe. Go over your safety harness and safety ropes, inspecting for worn, nicked or frayed areas. Check clips and carabiners, too, to make sure they open and close correctly and aren’t bent or dented. Lubricate any moving joints on stands and other equipment so they will operate quietly while hunting and to give any lingering odors time to dissipate before season. If a squeak got you busted last year, the value of this will not escape you. Besides eliminating the worry and stress of rushing to get everything together at crunch time, knowing your gear is ready to go frees up your fall for important things like scouting, hanging stands and running trail cameras. As your hunting buddies rush frantically from store to store trying to locate everything they need for the upcoming season, you’ll be kicking back, making a game plan for getting in close to a big buck.

Post: 13 December 09:33

HOW TO HUNT DUCKS THE EASY WAY Follow these six easy steps to enjoy your first duck hunt this season. Duck hunting is one of the easiest hunting sports for new shotgunne

HOW TO HUNT DUCKS THE EASY WAY Follow these six easy steps to enjoy your first duck hunt this season. Duck hunting is one of the easiest hunting sports for new shotgunners to expand into. Ample public-land hunting opportunities abound for waterfowlers and the gear you’ll need to get started is not overly expensive. Hunting ducks is also a great way to spend some quiet time with your kids or grandkids, while introducing them to gun safety and hunting. Best of all, you can get started with just a few simple tips. Follow these six easy guidelines to start enjoying gorgeous sunrises in the blind and the thrill of whistling wings coming in to your decoys this season. KEEP IT SIMPLE Learning to become a proficient waterfowler takes time and experience, but you can begin enjoying the fun right now. If you have a friend or someone at your local gun club who can take you out your first time or two, that’s best. They can share their knowledge and you’ll pick up a lot of tips on your first trip out. Hiring a guide can also get you started down the waterfowling path quickly as they have years of knowledge and all the gear you’ll need. I recently spent two great days hunting ducks at Beaver Dam Lake (see sidebar) in Tunica, MS. Their full-service operation featuring experienced locals guides and top-notch accommodations is a good example of how a well-run operation can bring the excitement and tradition of duck hunting to newcomers and veteran waterfowlers alike. WHAT YOU’LL NEED The beauty of waterfowling is that it doesn’t involve a huge investment. You probably have a lot of what you need to get started right now, but here are a few of the essentials to consider. Shotguns: While nearly every major gun manufacturer makes waterfowl-specific shotguns, the autoloader or pump you’re using for trap and skeet may be just fine for your initial outing. Either 12- or 20-gauge guns will work perfectly well for waterfowling when paired with proper loads designed for ducks and geese. Chokes: For ducks in close over decoys using steel shot, improved cylinder (or even skeet) is ideal. For longer-range pass-shooting opportunities, you’ll want to step up to modified. Loads: Check your state regulations, but non-toxic shot is required for waterfowl in most areas. No. 2 steel is a good all-around choice, but you should pick up several different brands/types of non-toxic shot to see what patterns best in your gun. Splitting the ammo costs with a friend or two and patterning your guns together at your local range will help all of you get off to a good start. Decoys: A dozen decoys will easily get you started making simple spreads that will bring ducks in close. Look for close-out sales at the end of the season or pick up a set of used decoys on Craigslist to minimize costs. Camo: A simple waterfowl parka with a hood, worn over layered clothing will block the wind, keep you dry and let you blend into surrounding cover. I used insulated bibs and a wader jacket top with a zip-out liner from Banded camo on my recent hunt and it worked really well. Given that temperatures can be at freezing in the mornings (even in southern regions), make sure you bring warm gloves and an insulated hat that covers your ears. Waders: In the early season when temperatures are still relatively warm, hip boots or the waders you like to fish in will work fine. As temperatures grow colder, you’ll want to transition to insulated knee-highs or waders. Again, shop online for bargains. Calls: If you book a guide, they’ll do all the calling, but you don’t need a fancy call to do it yourself. Ask your local dealer what they recommend, but choose a model that’s easy to make a few simple calls with. Hearing protection: Don’t forget earplugs as the report of guns in an enclosed blind is greatly amplified. TRY THIS BASIC SPREAD While decoy spreads can become an elaborate art form, they don’t have to be. A basic “fishhook” or “J” pattern with just a dozen or two decoys is all you need in many small pothole areas or shallow warm-water sloughs, to get plenty of ducks headed your way. It’s perfect to use on days when you have a strong wind blowing consistently from one direction. (A simple “C” or “horseshoe” pattern, with the open ends of the C extending out from the shoreline, works great on days when winds are lighter.) Put a few “feeding decoys” right in front of your blind. Extend the foot of the fishhook out and away from the shore on the upwind side of the blind. These visible decoys will be your attractors. Let the tail of the hook trail down and out from the shoreline to the downwind side. Ducks will normally come in heading upwind, see your attractor decoys and hopefully set down right in the open hole created by the hooked end of the spread. Set your blind up on the open (downwind) end of the pattern. Figure about 30 to 40 yards from one end of the hook pattern to the other. Try to keep the sun at your back as much as possible. This will keep the sun in the birds’ eyes to minimize their picking up your movements. Brush in your blind and keep your movements to a minimum. DO’S AND DON’TS Don’t overcall.Let the decoys do the work. Here are some simple pointers from veteran Beaver Dam guide, Lamar Boyd, on how to bring ducks into your spread. Minimize movements: Ducks are sharp-eyed. Keep movements to an absolute minimum, especially when birds are on the approach to your decoy spread. Any false movements or upturned faces that catch the sun will cause birds to flare. Be patient: Wait for ducks to fully commit to landing before you pop up to shoot. Know the regulations: Regulations on bag limits and what kinds of ducks you can legally harvest vary by state. A quick visit to your state’s DNR website will familiarize you with the regulations for wherever you’re hunting. Be safe: Gun safety is always of vital importance and is critical in crowded blinds and excited conditions when ducks come in. Go over the ground rules with your party to make sure muzzles are always pointed in a safe direction and safeties are always on unless you’re shooting. Make sure everyone unloads and actions are clear before anyone ventures out to pick up downed birds. THE ABC’S OF LEAD Like any moving target, ducks require lead. The biggest mistake beginners make in shooting any moving target is that they simply stop the gun. They see the bird, they swing to the bird and then they stop. You must keep the muzzle of the gun moving out in front of the bird and train yourself to “follow through” even after you’ve pulled the trigger. When taking passing shots on ducks, the simple acronym “butt, beak, bang” can help. Here’s how it works: A. As the duck crosses in front of you, bring your muzzle up from behind the bird. B. Swing through his butt and past his beak, then pull the trigger. C. Keep the muzzle moving out ahead of the bird after you’ve fired to finish your follow-through

Post: 13 December 09:21

CHOOSING THE RIGHT HUNTING KNIFE 1. CLIP POINT KNIFE The tip on this knife curves upward and allows you to pierce the hide and cut a pattern. The pattern is the initial c

CHOOSING THE RIGHT HUNTING KNIFE 1. CLIP POINT KNIFE The tip on this knife curves upward and allows you to pierce the hide and cut a pattern. The pattern is the initial cut you make down each leg and up the belly before removing the skin. You can skin your animal with this knife but the shape of the blade tends to cut holes in the hide while skinning. This particular knife is a folding model, easy to carry in a pocket. 2. DROP POINT KNIFE This is your skinning knife. You’ll notice the tip doesn’t sweep upwards like a clip point knife. A drop point knife is less likely to accidentally poke through the hide. You can skin faster, without being as careful. Also notice the blade length. You don’t want too much blade on a skinning knife, it will just get in the way. This little knife has skinned an entire elk on more than one occasion. 3. CAPING KNIFE If you’re going to keep the hide or mount the head you’ll want a caping knife. A caping knife has a shorter, narrower blade with a distinct point which allows you to make difficult cuts around the eyes, lips of your big game animals, or while skinning the feet on bears. 4. BONING KNIFE When I was a kid we would section deer using a big old basic hunting knife. Years later after working in meat-packing plants I discovered a real boning knife. What a difference! To cleanly remove meat from the bone you’ll want a semi-flexible blade but not too flimsy or you can’t control the blade while working. I like a six-inch blade for this purpose. 5. RAFTING KNIFE For comparison, here’s a rafting knife for camping and general outdoor use. You’ll definitely want one of these for cutting cordage, chopping and making shavings for a campfire, but this design is unwieldy and difficult to use on game.

Post: 12 December 17:52

PREDATOR HUNTING—HOW TO GET STARTED THE EASY WAY CLASSIC COYOTE SETUPS There are three basic types of coyote hunts: A silent stand in which you post up and hope to sho

PREDATOR HUNTING—HOW TO GET STARTED THE EASY WAY CLASSIC COYOTE SETUPS There are three basic types of coyote hunts: A silent stand in which you post up and hope to shoot coyotes passing by. A calling stand in which you hunker down and call coyotes into gun range; What I call a “run-and-gun hunt” in which you drive rural roads and stop periodically to call, then set up when you get a response. 1. SILENT STANDS Looking at the silent stand, your standard deer-season treestand or ground blind can work beautifully, especially if it is situated between deer feeding and bedding areas. Those are the same habitats that coyotes work, so as long as the wind is favorable—that is, blowing away from where you expect to see coyotes—then you should expect a shot. This silent-stand hunting is not a numbers game. You are relying on a dog to simply show itself, and if you shoot, or do anything to alert animals that you’re in the area, then you might be in for a long, slow day. But you can make good use of your time by observing deer, seeing how their forage patterns have changed since November’s buck seasons, and looking for antler sheds. You can also blow a predator call periodically to lure coyotes and foxes into range. We’ll cover calls below, but know this about coyote behavior, no matter the stand type: They will almost always circle around your calling location, trying to smell you before they come into view. So, keep a close eye on your downwind side, and try to see and kill a coyote before it sniffs you, or you’ll never see the coyotes that were in your area. 2. CALLING STANDS This is the most common way to attract coyotes. You walk into an area with abundant sign, sit down, blow a call, and shoot a dog. Of course, it’s never that simple, but the idea is to remain undetected and sound so realistic that a curious or hungry coyote or fox will shed its inhibitions and come to you. Wind and terrain features are the big factors here. You want to enter the area stealthily, using a ridgeline or a gully or timber to hide your approach. Stay as high in the terrain as you can, to maintain visibility over a wide area, and use both good camouflage—including face masks—and shade to melt into the cover. This is a good game for a partner, one of you running the call and the other set up to shoot. Use either an electronic or a hand call. The advantage to an electronic call, sometimes called an “e-caller,” is that it can mimic the sound of dozens of prey species, ranging from housecats to crows, and because most have remote-control capabilities, you can set the speaker many yards away from your location, misdirecting the laser focus of an incoming coyote. Hand calls can sound more realistic, and you can control the volume and cadence better than you can with an e-caller. The universal coyote call is a rabbit being tortured. It might be a cottontail or a jackrabbit, but the death wail is the same – a high-pitched scream punctuated by growls and squeaks. Other effective coyote calls mimic deer in pain, mice squeaking, birds squawking, and coyotes howling to either challenge or court another coyote. Most calling hunters plan to sit at each stand for no longer than 30 minutes. They typically call softly to start, to lure in nearby coyotes, and then escalate the volume and intensity of the calls for several minutes, pausing for a half-minute between to scan for incoming coyotes that might be coming from farther away. 3. RUN-AND-GUN This type of hunting requires abundant access to good habitat and a road system to get you around. Park in a place where your vehicle isn’t noticeable – in a dip or in cover – and blow your call. If you hear or see a coyote respond, set up to shoot. If you don’t drive on and repeat until you hit a receptive coyote.

Post: 12 December 17:50

Охота в Болгарии Широкое разнообразие трофейных животных Сочетание массивных горных хребтов и широких равнин обеспечивает идеальную среду обитания для оленей, косули, лан

Охота в Болгарии Широкое разнообразие трофейных животных Сочетание массивных горных хребтов и широких равнин обеспечивает идеальную среду обитания для оленей, косули, лани, серны, муфлона, кабана, волка и рыси Необычные природные ландшафты Большинство из наиболее отдаленных регионов Болгарии остаются неразвитыми и не открытыми туристами, оставляя много места для обширных популяций животных и обеспечивая настоящий опыт охоты в дикой природе Культурные и туристические возможности Болгария славится своими прекрасными черноморскими пляжами, изысканными винами, монастырями и историческими и культурными достопримечательностями, включая Пловдив, самый старый постоянно проживающий в Европе город, который стоит изучить до или после вашей охоты

Post: 11 December 09:30

Cambodia Wildlife Travelers to Cambodia may find that although Cambodia is not primarily a wildlife viewing destination, some isolated pockets of forest may offer some o

Cambodia Wildlife Travelers to Cambodia may find that although Cambodia is not primarily a wildlife viewing destination, some isolated pockets of forest may offer some of the best opportunities for wildlife spotting in all of SE Asia. Cambodia’s wildlife diversity is at critically low levels due to deforestation and habitat destruction. It is home to about 16 globally endangered species and 2 critically endangered species. Some larger mammal species found here are dholes, elephants, deer, panthers, bears, tigers, cormorants, cranes, crocodile, and wild water buffalo. Many organizations are working together to try and protect Cambodia’s remaining wildlife diversity. Wildlife is mostly isolated to pockets where intact habitat still remains, including the dry forest along the Lower Mekong, the Elephant Mountains, and the Cardamom Mountains. For wildlife enthusiasts traveling to Cambodia for a short time, one of the most iconic places to spot wildlife in Cambodia is in the Cardamom Mountains, which were also the last stronghold for the Khmer Rouge in 1979. Tourists to this region are kept to low levels and multi-day treks out of Chi Phat offer the chance to explore the area. Minimal human presence has created a fairly isolated region where the forest has stayed largely intact, offering what is considered to be the most 'wild' and biodiverse region in all of Cambodia, and arguably all of SE Asia. The forests here support a number of endangered species, including the tiger, Asian elephant, sun bear, gibbon, clouded leopard, and the gaur. It is estimated that over 450 bird species live in the canopy. The rivers provide habitat to the Irrawaddy dolphin and humpback dolphin, as well as the rare Siamese crocodile, and at least 34 amphibian species, 3 of which are newly discovered.

Post: 5 December 17:50

Hunting in Zimbabwe Set to Beat Levels Before Pandemic Struck The $100 million sector sees sales growing 15% this year Nation offers 500 licenses to tourists to kill elep

Hunting in Zimbabwe Set to Beat Levels Before Pandemic Struck The $100 million sector sees sales growing 15% this year Nation offers 500 licenses to tourists to kill elephants Zimbabwe’s hunting industry expects to attract more visitors this year than before the coronavirus pandemic, even as the war in Ukraine and other economic challenges weigh on numbers. The hunting season, currently underway in the southern African nation, is experiencing “exponential growth” from traditional markets including the US, Emmanuel Fundira, president of the Safari Operators Association of Zimbabwe, said by phone from Harare on Monday. Revenues are forecast to be 15% higher this year than the $100 million earned before the pandemic, Fundira said. The bounce back will help the industry recover from the freezing of global travel in 2020 as governments shut down borders to contain the virus. The lack of revenue made it difficult to sustain wilderness areas, villages and animals. Hunting is expecting to lure 10% to 15% more people in 2022 than three years ago, even as travel from central and eastern Europe has dried up, according to Fundira. If the Ukraine conflict becomes even more protracted there may be further declines, he said. Read More: Elephant Hunts For $70,000 to Fund Zimbabwe National Parks To protect against future disruptions, the industry is working closely with tour operators to provide charter and private-air transport for “high-end clients,” Fundira said. Zimbabwe offers hunts for animals including, elephant, buffalo, lion and leopard. In addition to paying for the license to track them down, tourists pay professional hunters to guide them and have their trophies treated by taxidermists and exported home. Elephants make up the bulk of the nation’s hunting licenses, of which 500 are available this year, according to Tinashe Farawo, spokesman for the Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority. They cost $10,000 each.

Post: 5 December 09:24

France revises hunting rules but stops short of Sunday ban France's government on Monday announced tighter rules against hunting under the influence of drugs or alcohol,

France revises hunting rules but stops short of Sunday ban France's government on Monday announced tighter rules against hunting under the influence of drugs or alcohol, and protection for walkers and local residents, but stopped short of a hoped-for Sunday ban. Although a weekend "no hunting day" is popular with the public, President Emmanuel Macron is wary of alienating rural voters and adding to anti-government resentment as he launches a major pension reform. Instead, junior environment minister Berangere Couillard said hunting under the influence would be banned, training and safety rules for hunters strengthened and digital systems developed to warn other countryside users away from active hunting zones. Punishments will also be upgraded, including hunters losing their licences if they are involved in a serious accident. "My goal is to aim for zero accidents," Couillard said on a Monday trip to the Loiret department south of Paris. "We want to see better safety, seven days a week," she added. Statistics show hunting accidents have been on the decline in France over the past 20 years. But cases of injury or even death from stray bullets remain highly emotive and are often widely covered by the media. Some 90 accidents were recorded during the 2021-22 hunting season, eight of them fatal, according to the OFB biodiversity authority, which manages the sport. Just this weekend, an 84-year-old hunter in Corsica accidentally shot himself dead as he was stowing his gun in his car. Almost 80 percent of the French public favour a hunting ban on Sundays, polling firm IFOP found in December. The government had not ruled out such a move but sources within the executive told AFP last week that "nothing in the statistics points to Sunday being a more accident-prone day than any other". Meanwhile Willy Schraen, the head of the influential FNC hunting lobby, said last week he couldn't imagine hunting-free Sundays "for a single second". He has claimed there would be uproar in rural areas if there were a ban. "We have to share access to nature," the leader of the Greens parliamentary party, Marine Tondelier, retorted on Sunday. "This shouldn't just be discussed between Emmanuel Macron and Willy Schraen". The FNC (National Hunters' Federation) has backed a new criminal offence of hunting under the influence, similar to that in force for drivers. There are 1.1 million active hunters in France, according to the FNC, and some five million people possess a hunting licence.

Post: 4 December 09:29

AUSTRIA LAUNCHES MEDIA CAMPAIGN: “THAT IS HUNTING” FACE is pleased to announce its support in the launch of the Austrian information campaign “Das ist Jagd” (“That is Hu

AUSTRIA LAUNCHES MEDIA CAMPAIGN: “THAT IS HUNTING” FACE is pleased to announce its support in the launch of the Austrian information campaign “Das ist Jagd” (“That is Hunting”) by Jagd Österreich, FACE’s national member. The campaign aims to dispel misconceptions about hunting and highlights the core values and societal importance to a broader audience. The “Independence Day of hunting” event on July 4th was held in multiple locations around Vienna and was attended by key leaders in Austrian and international hunting and conservation organisations, including the Landesjägermeister (State Hunting Directors) and Bezirksjägermeister (County Hunting Directors), as well as local and national government representatives and politicians. FACE was represented by Tristan Breijer, Policy Advisor for Social Acceptance of Hunting, who is coordinating FACE’s national efforts for social acceptance. Lutz Molter, Deputy Secretary-General of Jagd Österreich, explains the background to the campaign: “Nature and hunting are often discussed emotionally. This has led to prejudices and myths over the years. We see a need for action to communicate clearly the services of the hunting community for nature, the environment, and wildlife in a broad and effective manner. Of course, we achieve this best using online communication today, with attention-grabbing subjects and creative actions.” Following a well-attended press briefing in the morning, the event moved to the Wilheminenberg Castle for a lunch together with the attendees. The participants were given a tour of the Institute of Wildlife Ecology from the Veterinarian University of Vienna, which is partially funded by contributions from the local hunting organisations. This is also where the launch took place to a resounding applause from the assembled Austrian hunting community. The campaign “Das ist Jagd” (“That is Hunting”) seeks to raise public awareness of the many and multifaceted contributions, which hunting makes to society, including its connection to conservation, ecological sustainability, high-quality and organic food, the appreciation of nature, and the knowledge of local flora and fauna. It also highlights the strong voluntary commitment that Austria’s 132,000 hunters make to conservation. Tristan Breijer, FACE’s Policy Advisor for Social Acceptance, said, “This campaign is an excellent example for other countries in Europe to follow. It’s crucial to measure and enhance the social acceptance of hunting to ensure a strong future for hunting and conservation in Europe. FACE is proud to support this initiative from our member and looks forward to seeing its positive impact in Austria and Europe”. FACE commends Jagd Österreich for taking a proactive approach in addressing the growing disconnect between nature and society, particularly in urban populations. The campaign’s focus on online and social media outreach is expected to effectively engage younger demographics, thereby fostering a better understanding of hunting’s crucial role in society and nature.

Post: 29 November 17:47

Ontario set to expand areas where dogs can learn to hunt live coyotes in penned areas Ontario wants to expand a licensing regime that allows residents to unleash dogs in

Ontario set to expand areas where dogs can learn to hunt live coyotes in penned areas Ontario wants to expand a licensing regime that allows residents to unleash dogs in an enclosed area to teach them how to hunt captive coyotes, foxes and rabbits. Hunters say there is a growing demand for the dog sport, which is often referred to as training and trialing, while animal advocates call it a cruel practice for the captive prey. The province’s natural resources and forestry minister said the government wants to allow more of the hunting facilities to prevent the sport from moving underground. “These facilities are going to become less and less over time unless we take some level of intervention,” Graydon Smith said in an interview. “The one thing that we also wouldn’t want to see is in the absence of these facilities that dog owners and their handlers are out doing this on other private land or Crown land where there could be unwanted interactions with both people and wildlife.” In 1997, then-premier Mike Harris’s Progressive Conservative government began phasing out the practice by ceasing the issuance of licenses required to operate dog trial areas in the province. It also made it illegal to sell or transfer those licenses. At that time there were upwards of 60 such areas across Ontario. They are all on private property and must be completely enclosed. There are now only 24 licensed train and trial areas across the province. The province has proposed to grant new licenses through a one-time 90-day application period and allow licenses to be transferred to new owners, a summary of proposed changes on the Environmental Registry of Ontario shows. The prey that will be hunted, usually coyotes, must be caught legally, often through traplines, the registry says. “This isn’t about active hunting or anything like that,” Smith said. “This is about animals that are bred for this purpose.” The government’s proposals were sent out for public comment in early April and close on May 18. The proposed changes are part of an omnibus bill tabled in early April called the Less Red Tape, Stronger Economy Act. John Bell, the president of the Ontario Sporting Dog Association, said Wednesday at a legislative committee studying the bill that the closure of dedicated training and trialing areas have forced hunters to “run their dogs” in the wild. Christine Hogarth, the parliamentary assistant for the solicitor general, who is in charge of animal welfare in the province, pressed Bell on the safety of all animals in the training and trialing pens. Bell, who owns a large pen for the sport and trains his dogs to hunt coyotes, said there are rules in place for animal safety. “The regulations call for us to have brush piles, dens, or man-made escape units, we call them pods,” Bell said. He has built pods on his own 225-acre pen that includes concrete culverts leading to buried 45-gallon drums that are vented above, he said. The pods are baited with food so the coyotes learn where to hide. “If they are in danger, they’re in the ground,” he said. “And I can assure you there’s not very many dogs going to go in a 10-inch culvert when there’s an alligator at the other end.” There are now 33,000 members in the Ontario Sporting Dog Association, which lobbied the government over the past year on the training and trialing licenses. The dog sport also has competitions. Judges stand throughout the enclosures — some are hundreds of acres in size — to score how well dogs are tracking and hunting down coyotes. The first dog trialing competition in Ontario took place in 1887, Bell said. The dog trial proposal also has the support of the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters. “This has been a priority for us for since the beginning of the changes in 1997,” said Kristen Snoek, a wildlife biologist with the federation. But Camille Labchuk, the executive director of advocacy group Animal Justice, argued the entire practice is inhumane. “They do some of these contests where dogs chase terrified coyotes around an enclosed pen, and they also train the dogs to kill the coyotes so that they can later use those dogs for hunting,” she said. She said the current Doug Ford Progressive Conservative government could learn from the Harris government in the late 1990s. “The Harris government did a number of things to protect wild animals from some of the worst hunting lobbyists by ending the spring bear hunt and phasing out penned coyote hunting,” Labchuk said. The Liberal government reintroduced the spring bear hunt in Ontario as a pilot program in 2014, which Ford’s government made permanent in 2021.

Post: 27 November 17:48

3rd First Nation group wants use of Jasper National Park, saying they were evicted in 1911 By Bob Weber The Canadian Press Posted October 31, 2023 2:24 pm Updated Octo

3rd First Nation group wants use of Jasper National Park, saying they were evicted in 1911 By Bob Weber The Canadian Press Posted October 31, 2023 2:24 pm Updated October 31, 2023 5:17 pm A third First Nation wants Parks Canada to give its members increased access, including limited hunting rights, to Jasper National Park, saying they were evicted when it was created in western Alberta. “Aseniwuche Winewak calls on Parks Canada to immediately enter into negotiations … restore our access to the park and to prioritize our involvement in the co-management of Jasper both as the park’s current neighbouring Indigenous Peoples and its former inhabitants,” said an Oct. 27 letter from the band to Jasper National Park superintendent Alan Fehr. Last weekend, Parks Canada held a ceremony in the park to help celebrate the re-establishment of an ancient treaty between the Simpcw and Stoney First Nations under which the two nations agreed to share the resources of what has become Jasper. A Parks spokesman said at the time the ceremony was part of a larger move to reopen parks land to the First Nations that originally used its resources and restore their influence over parks management. The deal was marked with a hunt, the first in Jasper since 2017, which was also conducted under an agreement with Parks Canada. Fehr said the ceremony didn’t grant any new rights to any First Nation. But David MacPhee, president of the Aseniwuche Winewak, said his people were being left out. He said they also were evicted from the park in 1911. The band’s oral history says the Mounties were brought in to remove them. “At one point they had their rifles confiscated,” said MacPhee. “That was an attempt to starve them out.” About 550 band members remain, mostly in the Grande Cache area. The band is recognized federally and provincially, and has applied for adhesion to Treaty 8. Members continue to use lands immediately adjacent to the park. “We are mountain people,” MacPhee said. The band’s letter said its claim to historic ties are at least as strong as those of the bands recognized by Parks Canada. “We are at a loss to understand why Parks prioritized agreements with two First Nations that are far removed from the park over reconciliation with Aseniwuche Winewak, the resident Indigenous Peoples of the park, who continue to live adjacent to the park and rely on the land and waters of the region to support our culture, well-being and way of life,” it said. MacPhee said his people were completely left out of discussions between Parks, the Stoneys and the Simpcw. Fehr denied that they were ignored. He said the weekend ceremony was primarily about the Stoneys and the Simpcw celebrating the renewal of their treaty and didn’t confer special rights on either of them. “This wasn’t something that Parks Canada initiated,” he said. “The Simpcw and the Stoneys came to us.” He said more talks with Indigenous groups will be held over all activities in the park, including limited hunts. “The AWN are more than welcome to participate,” he said. The Aseniwuche Winewak Nation is based in Grande Cache and its website said it is not included in Treaty 8. It was signed in 1899 and includes all of northern Alberta, as well as First Nations from northeastern B.C., northwest Saskatchewan and part of the Northwest Territories south of Great Slave Lake. “Whether it was the remote location of our community, lack of communication or the grueling two-week trip it would’ve taken our Ancestors to get to the closest commissioner, AWN members do not have status,” the Nation’s website said. “We do not fit under what the Government of Canada defines as First Nations or Métis under the Indian Act. We are not recognized as an Indigenous group and therefore do not share the same rights afforded to recognized Indigenous communities across Canada.” — With files from Karen Bartko, Global News

Post: 27 November 17:44

Jamaica Inn calls time on 100 years of hunts meeting on its land This article is more than 1 year old Cornish pub used in Daphne du Maurier novel says there are no pluses

Jamaica Inn calls time on 100 years of hunts meeting on its land This article is more than 1 year old Cornish pub used in Daphne du Maurier novel says there are no pluses, just minuses to hunt visits A pub that was the setting for a novel by Daphne du Maurier has banned hunts from meeting on its land after 100 years of the practice. The Jamaica Inn in Cornwall – immortalised in the 1936 novel of the same name about smuggling – announced the decision after the East Cornwall Hunt invited the Beaufort Hunt to meet there on Saturday, a move the pub called “extremely ill-advised”. Both hunts said the venue on Bodmin Moor, its staff and customers had been targeted by “activists” online. The Jamaica Inn, which was built in 1750 as a coaching inn for travellers, wrote on Facebook that it had never supported hunting but had allowed “hunts to start from the inn because of the 100-year tradition of doing so”. It said: “Last Saturday the local hunt invited the Beaufort Hunt to join their usual modest gathering which the owner sees as extremely ill-advised. Taking this fully into account and the passionate views of some of the inn’s customers, the owner has decided to no longer allow any future hunt at Jamaica Inn.” The inn’s owner, Allen Jackson, said some people had cancelled hotel and restaurant bookings since Saturday because of the association with hunting. He said that after hunts, “hundreds and hundreds of people, seemingly reasonable and rational, were telling us they were anti the hunt”. Jackson told the BBC: “These were not extreme views but reasonable views. We have always lost money because some people won’t come here because of the association with hunts. There are no pluses, all we get is minuses. They never spent any money here – they never came in.

Post: 24 November 09:10

Wisconsin deer hunt's underwhelming opening weekend blamed on warm weather, lack of snow Over 11,000 fewer deer killed in WI this year compared to 2022 A lack of snow an

Wisconsin deer hunt's underwhelming opening weekend blamed on warm weather, lack of snow Over 11,000 fewer deer killed in WI this year compared to 2022 A lack of snow and warm temperatures that suppressed deer movement led to a lackluster opening weekend of Wisconsin's nine-day gun season, with hunters killing thousands fewer deer than last year. The state Department of Natural Resources released preliminary data Tuesday that showed hunters registered 92,050 deer compared with 103,623 deer last year. That's a 16% drop-off from 2022 and 10% fewer deer than the five-year average for opening weekend. Hunters also registered 51,870 bucks, down 13% from 56,638 over opening weekend in 2022. The number of potential hunters didn't vary much from last year, however. The DNR reported that sales of all deer licenses stood at 774,369 as of midnight Sunday, with 421,525 of those licenses exclusively for gun use. Overall, sales of all deer licenses were down 0.61% from the same time last year. WISCONSIN SOON TO OPEN GUN DEER-HUNTING SEASON THROUGH NOV. 26 The DNR's deer specialist, Jeff Pritzl, speculated during a news conference that the lack of snow across the state likely helped deer blend into the landscape, making them harder to spot and trail. And warmer temperatures on Saturday and Sunday likely discouraged deer from moving, he said. Pritzl said, too, that he'd heard anecdotes of areas with a lot of acorns on the ground, which means deer don't have to move much to find food. He added that northern Wisconsin saw a particularly severe winter last year, which may have led to heightened deer mortality and a sparser herd in that region of the state, he said. Forecasts call for cooler temperatures and dry weather for the rest of the nine-day season, which could spark more deer movement in the woods, DNR officials said. Hunters killed 203,295 deer during last year's nine-day gun season. Pritzl said about half of the season total comes during opening weekend; that would put the state on pace for a 184,100 deer harvest this season. WISCONSIN DECLINES TO CHARGE BOW HUNTER WHO KILLED COUGAR IN SELF-DEFENSE Separately, DNR officials reported two firearm-related injuries over the weekend. On Saturday morning a 53-year-old man in Forest County shot himself as he was adjusting his rifle sling on the way to his tree stand. On Sunday morning a 62-year-old man in Adams County was hunting from a vehicle on private property when he shot at a dog that he thought was an antlerless deer. He missed the dog but hit the 47-year-old woman who was walking the dog in the stomach. The woman was taken to a hospital, Lt. Mike Weber, a DNR warden who serves as administrator of the department's hunter education efforts, said during the news conference. Asked if the hunter would be charged, Weber said the man was disabled and as such was allowed to legally hunt from a vehicle, but the incident remains under investigation.

Post: 23 November 17:51

Maine and Massachusetts could soon see bans lifted on Sunday hunting In the US, there are 40 states that have no prohibitions on hunting on Sundays Some states are stea

Maine and Massachusetts could soon see bans lifted on Sunday hunting In the US, there are 40 states that have no prohibitions on hunting on Sundays Some states are steadily chipping away at longstanding bans on Sunday hunting, and there's a push to overturn the laws in Maine and Massachusetts, the final two states with full bans. Maine’s highest court is considering a lawsuit asking whether the state's 19th century law, which prevents hunting big game animals such as deer, moose and turkeys on Sundays, is still necessary. In Massachusetts, where hunters are also lobbying for Sunday hunting rights, there is a renewed effort to change state laws forbidding the practice. Forty states have no prohibitions on hunting on Sundays. The bans stem from so-called "blue laws" that also regulate which businesses can remain open and where alcohol can be sold on Sundays. Animal welfare groups, conservation organizations and others are rallying to defend the prohibitions, but the end of the laws might be in sight. Other states such as Virginia and South Carolina have in recent years rolled back what remains of their own limitations on the Sunday hunt. Residents of states where hunting is part of the culture are divided on the subject. Some hunters argue the laws protect private landowner rights, while others say the rules take away hunting opportunities — or are just plain silly. Sportsmen who oppose the laws see them as a vestige of the blue laws dating to the 17th century and limiting what activities citizens can engage in on a day governments once dedicated to prayer. Jared Bornstein, executive director of Maine Hunters United for Sunday Hunting, said allowing seven-day-a-week hunting would allow people the opportunity to harvest their own food in a state with many poor, rural communities that cannot afford soaring grocery costs. "I'm not saying that Sunday hunting is going to save the world economically, but I'm saying for a group of people, there's more of an objective benefit to it," Bornstein said. "It’s a generation’s last vestigial attempt to control the working class." The states that still have full or partial bans on Sunday hunting are all on the East Coast, where every fall sportsmen pursue wild turkeys and white-tailed deer with firearms and archery. Last year, South Carolina opened limited hunting on public lands on Sundays, and the year before that Virginia made a similar move. A few years prior North Carolina began to allow Sunday hunting on some 75% of its public hunting land, according to the Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation. Laws were also loosened in Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Delaware in the past five years. Maine's ongoing court case, which could legalize Sunday hunting, concerns a couple who filed a lawsuit stating the "right to food" amendment in the state's Constitution, the first of its kind in the U.S., should allow them to hunt on any day of the week. The Maine Supreme Judicial Court has heard arguments in the case, but it's unclear when it will rule, said Andy Schmidt, an attorney for the couple. The state first banned Sunday hunting in 1883. In Massachusetts, where some sources date the ban all the way back to the Puritan era, a campaign to repeal it made progress before stalling in the state Legislature in 2014. Some are continuing to try to strike the law, which is "discriminating against hunters," said John Kellstrand, president of the Mass Sportsmen's Council. A new proposal to authorize Sunday hunting via bow and arrows was introduced earlier this year. The efforts to roll back Sunday hunting up and down the East Coast face opposition from a broad range of interest groups, including animal protection advocates, state wildlife management authorities and private landowners. Maine Woodland Owners, a group representing rural landowners in the most forested state in the country, sees the Sunday hunting ban as critical to keeping private lands open for hunting access on the other days of the week, Executive Director Tom Doak said. "We're not asking for money. We're not saying pay us. We're not asking for anything but to be left alone one day a week," Doak said. "They will close their lands. They absolutely will do that." Sportsmen's groups, including the National Rifle Association and Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation, have long lobbied to overturn Sunday hunting restrictions, and have had much success over the past 30 years. In that time, states including New York, Ohio and Connecticut have loosened Sunday hunting laws. Lifting bans has created hundreds of jobs and millions of dollars in economic activity, said Fred Bird, assistant manager for the northeastern states for the Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation. Getting rid of what's left of these laws would remove "a regulation that has no basis in wildlife management," Bird said. "Simply put, if hunters do not have available days to go afield, they must decide whether their time, energy, and financial resources should continue to be allocated to a pursuit they are unable to fully participate in," he said. Wildlife managers in states with Sunday hunting have sometimes pushed back at efforts to overturn the bans. The Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife testified against a proposal earlier this year that would have allowed Sunday hunting with a bow and arrow or a crossbow. Agricultural, land owner and conservation groups also came out against the proposal, which had support from the Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation and some hunters in the state. The Maine Farm Bureau Association testified it's important for land owners to have "one day of rest without disruption." The proposal was ultimately voted down in committee. However, the odds of a similar proposal coming before the Maine Legislature again seem high, testified Judy Camuso, commissioner of the wildlife department. "The topic of Sunday hunting has been a heated social debate for years," she said.

Post: 23 November 17:46

Labour accuses Government of being ‘complicit’ in trophy trade Delays to the Hunting Trophies (Import Prohibition) Bill have led to accusations that Conservative peers a

Labour accuses Government of being ‘complicit’ in trophy trade Delays to the Hunting Trophies (Import Prohibition) Bill have led to accusations that Conservative peers are slowing the Bill intentionally. Labour has accused the Government of being “complicit” in trophy hunting after a bill that would see imports banned in the UK became tied up in the House of Lords. Commons leader Penny Mourdaunt has insisted that MPs will get another chance to debate the Hunting Trophies (Import Prohibition) Bill, though more Parliamentary time will have to be allocated. Opposition politicians accused Conservative peers of filibustering and trying to prevent the Bill from becoming law. Added amendments were branded last week as “death by a thousand cuts” in Parliament, with 62 being added separately. Those making changes have denied trying to “kill the Bill”, instead insisting they want to improve it. Labour is urging the Government to stop “dither and delaying” and revive the Bill’s chances of being passed, accusing them of being on the side of the killers. If made law, the Bill would prohibit bringing into the UK body parts of species of conservation concern. Thousands of trophies have been brought into the UK over the last decade, including from endangered species. Eight years ago, the death of Cecil the lion brought trophy hunting to the attention of the British public and the Government has since announced its intention to ban bringing them to this country. Labour has also promised to ban importing trophies to the UK if it wins the next election. Steve Reed, shadow environmental secretary, said: “Hunting endangered animals is barbaric and must be confined to history. “We must stop the selfish trophy hunters who want to slaughter then display endangered animals’ body parts for their own perverse self-gratification. “The Conservative Government must stop siding with these killers. If they refuse to act, they will be complicit in the slaughter as they break yet another pre-election promise. “The next Labour government will do the right thing and ban the sickening import of these trophies.” The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs was contacted for comment. Conservative peer Lord Mancroft, who has expressed concerns over the Bill and tabled amendments, said on Thursday: “Although the House of Lords was given very little time to discuss the Bill, it was noticeable that it had virtually no support from any party.” Committee stage saw several Tory opponents voice their concerns while discussing their proposed amendments. Speaking at this stage earlier this month, Lord Mancroft branded the Bill “socialist legislation” before noting: “It is supported entirely on the Labour and Liberal Democrat benches and clearly has very little support on our benches. “It is an odd thing for the Government to do.”

Post: 22 November 17:33

How the return of poaching threatens India’s tiger success story 50 Years of Project Tiger: India’s wildlife authorities insist poaching is not happening at an ‘alarming’

How the return of poaching threatens India’s tiger success story 50 Years of Project Tiger: India’s wildlife authorities insist poaching is not happening at an ‘alarming’ rate, but campaigners and local rangers say grim incidents of dead tigers being found without claws, whiskers and teeth are part of a bigger and growing problem. Arpan Rai reports from Madhya Pradesh, India The poachers who killed T32 in India’s Madhya Pradesh had a simple plan, and executed it at night. Running wire through a field and applying a strong current, they electrocuted the tigress as she patrolled her territory, beating her to death after she lost consciousness. They then pulled out her canines, whiskers and claws before dumping the body in a village well, weighted down by a stone. T32 was declared missing by rangers, until three days later the stone gave way and her remains floated up to the surface of the well. The grim image of the tigress’s mutilated body floating in the water sent ripples of outrage through the conservation community. Here in the dense forests in the heart of central India, the reserves of Madhya Pradesh are playing a crucial role in what the government says is the success story of Project Tiger. Launched 50 years ago, the country’s flagship conservation programme has seen tiger numbers rise from 2,967 to 3,167 as of the latest census released by prime minister Narendra Modi this April. Yet while this figure was lauded as “an achievement not only for India, but for the entire world” by Modi and celebrated by the country as a whole, conservationists say this actually represents the smallest increase in tiger numbers for a five-year period going back at least two decades. Another number, they say, should be getting more attention – the 324 tiger deaths India has seen in just the last 29 months, equivalent to the loss of one tiger every three days. At least 87 tigers have already died this year alone. Some deaths must inevitably be the result of old age, sickness or natural competition between these fearsome and territorial predators. But poaching is also a major factor, one which is rarely acknowledged, let alone debated, in the official conversation around India’s tiger success story. The last time tiger poaching got out of control in India it had a devastating impact on the overall population of the animals: official figures show that between 2002 and 2006, the country lost a total of more than 2,200 tigers. A return to those days is many conservationists’ worst nightmare, and there are concerns that Madhya Pradesh is emerging as a new hotspot for poachers, accounting for more than 90 of the deaths between 2021 and April 2023. Besides the way the body had been disposed of, the fact that T32 was found with claws, whiskers and canines missing is an unmistakable indicator that she was poached, says Vincent Rahim, who was the top forest official at Bandhavgarh national park at the time. During Rahim’s tenure another star tigress also died in suspicious circumstances. Solo was seen as the park’s friendliest tiger and a tourist’s delight, undisturbed by the noise of jeeps and canter vans and always happy to put on a display. In October 2020 she was found dead alongside her cub, and while no official reason has ever been given for her death, officials and locals believe she was poisoned. “Some traces of poison were found in her stomach in the autopsy,” says Rahim, adding that mystery remains over why she was targeted. One theory is that Solo was poisoned by villagers, possibly angered by the threat she and other tigers pose to their livestock. Villagers have been known to use commonly available pesticides as a reliable method of killing big cats, says Kuldeep Chaturvedi, a member of the tiger protection force in Bandhavgarh tiger reserve. Rahim describes Solo’s death as a “huge loss for the park”, and as sad as it was shocking. But the cause of death was not a surprise, recognised as one of the two most common ways in which tigers are deliberately killed in India. “[This is] how tigers die – either they are poisoned out of vengeance or they are electrocuted,” the tiger reserve’s current sub-divisional officer Sudhir Mishra tells The Independent. “You cannot rule out poaching, it is not going away, ever,” he adds. Some poaching of tiger parts is most likely opportunistic – villagers kill an animal who was threatening their farms, and then try to sell some of the remains knowing they will fetch large prices on the black market. Poached tiger parts can go for anywhere between £1,000 and £100,000 in Nepal and China, officials told The Independent. Such amounts draw organised criminals as well, as was suspected to be the case in Tamil Nadu earlier this year when a group of men and women travelled from northern India to seek employment as labourers in the Nilgiris tiger reserve in order to hunt the big cats at night, police say. They were caught during one such poaching attempt and arrested in February. “The modus operandi was simple, they would trap a tiger, skin it and sell it along with the bones and canines,” says a top forest official in Nilgiris who was directly involved in the arrest. The official says they are now investigating the poachers’ possible connections in other parts of the country, as well as the established logistics network that transports the tiger parts via train to port cities like Chennai, and from there to Bangladesh, Nepal and China. It means the rangers in Madhya Pradesh are always on the lookout for both the poachers and their support networks – keeping one eye on the forest inside the reserve, and the other on key railway junctions like Katni which connects central India to major ports. While the most lucrative black markets for tiger parts are in traditional medicine abroad, there are also plenty of superstitions and occult practices around the animals in India that create local demand for parts. “If you mix tigers’ whiskers in your enemy’s food, be assured that the person will die within a month and a half. No medicine in the world can stop it,” one villager employed in the national parks tells The Independent. Tackling such views and creating a sense of pride in tiger protection among locals is one of the most important and challenging tasks for forest officials. There are more than 5,000 people living within Bandhavgarh tiger reserve, with small pockets of villages having schools, pharmacies, local grocery stores and even grounds for holding social functions within the protected area. It is the perfect set-up for human-animal conflict. Gudda, a 50-year-old villager who was attacked by a tiger in February this year while grazing his cattle, says the attack occurred at a time when tigers are normally not active – around 1pm in the afternoon. Gudda tells The Independent he had no warning before the attack apart from the gentlest rustling of nearby leaves. He turned and saw nothing, but then was slammed off his feet by a force that felt like a hurricane. He landed face-to-face with a snarling fully-grown tiger, a dominant male well-known to those who live in the village which he counts as his territory alongside a fellow tigress and their cubs. The tiger looked Gudda in the eye and then went for his face. The cattle-herder reacted instinctively by raising his right forearm, offering it to the tiger instead. “I wanted to stop the tiger from eating my face,” he says. Gudda howled for help, screaming “come running, save me, I am being eaten alive”, but with the nearest houses still far away he had little hope of rescue. “I knew I was going to die just like hundreds of other villagers who previously succumbed to tiger attacks,” he tells The Independent. Then suddenly, almost as if he changed his mind, the tiger walked off. Chaturvedi says this part of Madhya Pradesh sees between 10 and 15 such instances a year of tigers charging villagers while they graze their cattle, and that deaths are also not uncommon. Persuading these same villagers to help protect tigers from poachers is not always easy. Many of the villagers living around or in tiger reserves consist of tribal communities long associated with tigers, like the Baheliyas – which is also the Hindi word for hunter. Though big cats are no longer on the menu for these groups, many continue to survive on bushmeat from spotted deer and peacocks – and tigers are inevitably caught in their traps from time to time. Traps are also laid as a protective measure by farmers, to keep grazers off their agricultural land. SP Yadav, a top official with India’s National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the additional director general of Project Tiger, suggests these kinds of incidents are more likely than deliberate poaching of tigers for their parts. “There have been a few instances of electrocution of tigers and poisoning happening in Madhya Pradesh,” he admits. “Sometimes the electric fence which is used by farmers for protecting their crops has unintended consequences when a tiger strays into the field.” He says the Indian government is working hard to prevent these accidental deaths. “Now no new [power] transmission line is permitted in protected areas [of the tiger reserve] without insulating them or bushing them,” Yadav tells The Independent. This year, authorities have found just one case of a tiger’s skin being poached in Madhya Pradesh, he says. “In the current year, though there are 55 tiger deaths reported so far (nationally, up to March) only four cases pertain to seizure of skin, which can be attributed directly to poaching,” he says. The Modi administration, he says, is “very well aware about the real threat posed by the trans-national poaching syndicates”. Yadav says the NTCA maintains a national repository of camera trap photographs of tigers. “So in case of seizure of tiger skin, it is matched against the databases of the park as well as the national database to identify the origin of the skin. “Poaching of prey and sometimes tiger cannot be ruled out, but it is not at an alarming rate,” he says. Prominent wildlife activist Ajay Dubey disagrees, claiming that the only difference in the 50 years since Project Tiger was launched in 1973 is that hunting the animals has become illegal – but only on paper. “Poor conviction rates along with zero tightening of legal provisions on the state level has led to the decimation of the tiger population in India,” he says, calling on the government to release state-by-state figures of the tiger population so it can be verified by local experts. Dubey alleges that the claims made by the NTCA of rising tiger numbers on a national level do not tally with what he and other campaigners are seeing on the ground, adding that the tiger reserves of India are failing in conflict management between humans and tigers. Mishra says his forest department in Bandhavgarh is putting the majority of its resources towards protecting wildlife and averting poaching, rather than boosting tourism or other logistical requirements, as the park is, if anything, facing a problem of plenty. He says there are more than 150 tigers vying for space and their own territory in the reserve, with some inevitably forced to the periphery where they risk running into humans. “Mark my words: there is a population explosion among tigers, much beyond what our existing capacity permits,” he says. Rahim, Bandhavgarh’s former head, says reserves in Madhya Pradesh “are reaching their saturation point. Of course there will be violence and natural selection.” Does that imply more deaths among tigers and villagers to come? “Nature and the wild will take care of it,” he says.

Post: 22 November 17:28

🎯 10-year-old tipster qualifies for TIP reward A 10-year-old, home sick from school, witnessed the poaching of a buck deer from the front yard of a residence. The poac

🎯 10-year-old tipster qualifies for TIP reward A 10-year-old, home sick from school, witnessed the poaching of a buck deer from the front yard of a residence. The poacher trespassed onto clearly marked private property and shot in the direction of an occupied residence to take the buck deer. The youth witnessed the incident and appropriately made a report. The 10-year-old was the only witness to the incident. The poacher was located and criminally cited for: ➡️ Hunting on cultivated or enclosed land ➡️ Illegal take/possession of buck deer ➡️ Recklessly endangering another person The youth was nominated for a $1,000 Turn-in-Poachers (TIP) reward through the Oregon Hunter’s Association since the tip led to a citation. #YourOregonStatePolice #FishandWildlife

Post: 22 November 09:06

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