by Phil Bourjaily
Today’s tip: Have a backup plan, and have a backup to your backup plan.
This morning’s Plan A was to hunt a gobbler I found earlier in the week. The season is almost over and the wildlife area I hunt has been de…
Author Archive
May 16th, 2012
Turkey Hunting Tip: Have a Backup Plan
May 15th, 2012
Forbes Model 24B Rifle: A Light Gun at a Great Price
by David E. Petzal
Melvin Forbes started Ultra Light Arms (now New Ultra Light Arms) in 1986, and is still very much in business, which is a towering tribute to the quality of his rifles. Small gunmakers riseth up and are mown down, but Melvin is stil…
Go to Forbes Model 24B Rifle: A Light Gun at a Great PriceMay 14th, 2012
Shooting Clays: Field Stocks vs. Target Stocks
by Phil Bourjaily
As I mentioned previously, raising the comb of a field gun with moleskin or a slip-on comb pad makes it work better for clay target shooting–especially trap. The question arose in the comments to that post: Why should guns have dif…
Go to Shooting Clays: Field Stocks vs. Target StocksMay 11th, 2012
Armed Citizen Alliance: Shoot the Gun You Carry
by Phil Bourjaily
Two years ago when I took my tour of Smith & Wesson, S&W’s Paul Pluff talked with me about current the boom in gun sales. He told that something like 50% of recent gun buyers were first time gun owners. He said the chall…
May 3rd, 2012
Reflecting on The Greatest Generation
by Phil Bourjaily
As we come up upon VE day (May 
we should reflect that even the youngest WWII veterans are in their mid-eighties by now, a fact I’m well aware of, since my dad died in 2010.*
I was reminded of the “Greatest Generation&rd…
May 3rd, 2012
Reflecting on The Greatest Generation
by Phil Bourjaily
As we come up upon VE day (May we should reflect that even the youngest WWII veterans are in their mid-eighties by now, a fact I’m well aware of, since my dad died in 2010.*
I was reminded of the “Greatest Generation&rd…
May 2nd, 2012
DVD Review: ‘The Essence of Elephant Hunting’
By David E. Petzal
The late Finn Aagaard, who was a PH for many years, claimed that elephants were the greatest of all African dangerous game, and among people who have hunted the Big Five, I doubt you’ll find much disagreement. “The Essen…
Go to DVD Review: ‘The Essence of Elephant Hunting’April 27th, 2012
Red-Hot Turkey Hunting This Spring
by Scott Bestul
I’ve been hunting turkeys for about 30 years now, and have experienced just about every type of spring imaginable. This year (actually, our season is about 10 days old now) has some of the best hunting I’ve seen in a while…
Go to Red-Hot Turkey Hunting This SpringApril 25th, 2012
Shotgun Tip: Staying In The Zone
by Phil Bourjaily
Talk to good shotgun shooters, and they will tell you they get “in the Zone” where targets look as big as trashcan lids and birds seem to fly in slow motion. I get in the Zone sometimes, but the difference between ordina…
Go to Shotgun Tip: Staying In The ZoneApril 18th, 2012
What Makes a Shotgun a Classic?
by Phil Bourjaily
We are filming my parts of Gun Nuts, Season III, even now. One of the segments we’ll be doing again this year is reader questions. I asked for them a while ago and have picked some to answer on the show.
Here’s one that un…
April 13th, 2012
Trap Shooting Tip: Look at the Bottom Edge
by Phil Bourjaily
I have given a lot of shooting advice to a lot of high school kids on our trap team in the past four years. If you threw out 99.9 percent of what I’ve told them, trap can be boiled down to two things: “Keep your head on th…
April 13th, 2012
Make Mock Scrapes Now to Score Big Bucks Later
by Scott Bestul
Knowing that bucks visit scrapes year-round, savvy hunters often make mock ones well before the rut. Now is not too early. In fact, early spring is an ideal time because the lack of foliage, compared with late summer or early fall, mak…
Go to Make Mock Scrapes Now to Score Big Bucks LaterApril 13th, 2012
Best Ground Blind Ever?
by Scott Bestul
After three decades of hunting from elevated stands, I’m learning to come down from the trees. I’ve been using ground blinds for deer — with varying degrees of success — in the last few seasons, mainly when taki…
Go to Best Ground Blind Ever?April 12th, 2012
A Brief Rant On Mounting Shotguns
by Phil Bourjaily
Last weekend I took a National Sporting Clays Association class for my Level I instructor certification. It was a wonderful experience, I learned a ton, and I’ll be writing a column about it in the magazine in the future.
Howe…
April 11th, 2012
MN Officer Cleared of Wrongdoing in Shooting of “Pet” Deer
by Scott Bestul
Every year, state wildlife officials warn the public to not mess with wild baby animals. And every year, couples like Jeff and Lee Ann Carpenter ignore those warnings. Last summer the Carpenters, of Forest Lake, Minnesota, “adop…
Go to MN Officer Cleared of Wrongdoing in Shooting of “Pet” DeerApril 10th, 2012
Hearing Loss: Only You Can Prevent Brain Rot
by David E. Petzal
In order to have some hope of conducting business with mankind in general, I wear hearing aids, but not very often, since I’m indifferent to what most people say, and I find that being able to hear all the little noises I had f…
April 6th, 2012
March Madness: Remington Model 700 is the F&S All-Purpose Whitetail Rifle Champ
by Dave Hurteau
Well I don’t think any of us can pretend to be surprised. (If we did a shotgun tourney, the 870 would surely win, too.) But getting here was fun, and in the end it came down to mystique vs. legendary accuracy.
Here in the northe…
April 5th, 2012
March Madness: The F&S All-Purpose Whitetail Rifle Championship
by Dave Hurteau
There may have been a few surprises along the way, but the Championship matchup is all chalk. It’s the top-seed Winchester Model 70 vs. the top-seed Remington 700, just as several of you openly predicted and many of us no doubt e…
Go to March Madness: The F&S All-Purpose Whitetail Rifle ChampionshipApril 5th, 2012
Take The 2012 Gun Nut Nation Survey, Answers Will be Published in July’s Magazine
by Phil Bourjaily
A lot has changed in the world since we ran a questionnaire like this one six years ago. There has been one economic meltdown and two gun buying booms – or maybe just one long boom. It’s an election year. The shooting spor…
April 4th, 2012
Wisconsin’s "Deer Czar" Releases Preliminary Report
by Scott Bestul
What’s wrong with the deer management in Wisconsin? Plenty, if you ask James Kroll. Kroll—long known as “Dr. Deer” and now as Wisconsin’s “Deer Czar”—has released his much-anticipated &ld…
Go to Wisconsin’s "Deer Czar" Releases Preliminary ReportApril 3rd, 2012
Shed Hunting Dog Super Bowl 2012 Coming to MN
by Scott Bestul
The Super Bowl for shed hunting dogs is going to be held in my backyard this year. The North American Shed Hunting Dog Association’s (NASHDA) World Championships is coming to Northfield, Minn. — a mere 90-minute drive from …
Go to Shed Hunting Dog Super Bowl 2012 Coming to MNMarch 28th, 2012
Scientists Fight Lyme Disease in Virginia With Pink Dye
by Scott Bestul
In the latest —and perhaps oddest— development in the battle against Lyme disease, the Fairfax Wildlife Biologist’s Office has installed special deer feeders at 20 locations across Virginia, The Washington Post report…
Go to Scientists Fight Lyme Disease in Virginia With Pink DyeMarch 23rd, 2012
March Madness: The Sweet Sixteen of All-Purpose Whitetail Rifles, Division II
by Dave Hurteau
After more than 3,000 votes per matchup, the Division I Elite Eight rifles are settled: The Model 70 crushed the 7600, the Savage bolt thumped the Marlin lever, the Vanguard put away the Encore, and in a mild upset, the Ruger 77 inched…
March 22nd, 2012
Tuff Writer Contest Winner Announced
by Dave Maccar
You guys really got creative for this one. And there was so much animosity toward the idea of a tactical pen, I was a little taken aback. The Chuck Norris ideas were amusing, as usual. Buckhunter’s “Set the pen in front…
Go to Tuff Writer Contest Winner AnnouncedMarch 22nd, 2012
Write the Best Caption, Win a Cabela’s Pack
by Dave Hurteau
Cabela’s Bow and Rifle Pack won an F&S Best of the Best Award last fall. I have one, like it very much, and figured you might like one, too. So I called the folks over there, asked if they’d supply one for a prize and t…
Go to Write the Best Caption, Win a Cabela’s PackMarch 21st, 2012
Three Generations of Sander Family Claim 2011 WI Ethical Deer Hunter Award
by Scott Bestul
Say what you will about modern deer hunters, the Sander family understands ethics and lives that way. Last fall, they not only allowed a young man to track a wounded buck onto their hunting property, they sacrificed hunting time to ass…
March 20th, 2012
The Elegant Firearms of Tiffany & Co.
by Phil Bourjaily
When I visited Smith & Wesson a couple of years ago, I saw the in-house museum on my tour. Among the guns on display was a beautifully decorated revolver with an elaborate art nouveau-style silver grip, the result of a collaborat…
Go to The Elegant Firearms of Tiffany & Co.March 9th, 2012
When Talking Fair Chase, ‘Kill’ Plots and Bait Are The Same
by Dave Hurteau
Sorry folks, I’ve been away from the blogosphere for a bit, but in the meantime I see you’ve had plenty of time to respond to the last two polls. And I find the results fascinating.
To recap, here they are after almost 2,…
March 8th, 2012
Sarah’s First Deer
by Sarah Smith Barnum
Editor’s Note: Sarah works for both Field & Stream and Outdoor Life, and wanted to share the story of her first hunt with both websites.
In May of last year I was packing up my dorm room for the last time, getting r…
Go to Sarah’s First DeerMarch 7th, 2012
Do Weather Conditions Effect When Sheds Drop?
by Scott Bestul
I’m far from a shed hunting fiend, but I pick up my share of antlers every spring. That is, until this year. I’ve put in a few miles looking for sheds, and have yet to find my first. And this is perfectly understandable whe…
Go to Do Weather Conditions Effect When Sheds Drop?