The 35 Best Hunting and Fishing Towns in the US | Outdoor Life
April 13, 2012
by The Editors
Now in its fifth year, our annual “Best Towns for Sportsmen” feature is an OL institution. Readers love to argue the merits of their burgs based on our rankings; local newspapers crow about the inclusion of their town; and realtors call to ask for extra copies of the issue.This year we’re forgetting all the socio-economic data and focusing on what matters most: hunting and fishing. In the next few pages, you’ll find the 35 towns in the U.S. where we would live right now, based solely on the outdoor opportunities there. Some boast bass and deer, others elk and trout or ducks and redfish. Regardless, each of these towns is an outdoors mecca in its own right, and from sea to shining sea, they offer the best hunting and fishing in America. Click link below to see who is number one!
via The 35 Best Hunting and Fishing Towns in the US | Outdoor Life.
NBC Shows Anti-Gun Bias . . . Again
April 13, 2012
By Larry Keane
In an attempt to combat failing ratings, NBC’s Rock Center on Wednesday night aired another biased and sensationalized piece on Remington Arms, and America’s firearms industry. The Rock Center reporter, Scott Cohn, has a well established anti-gun bias — as evidenced by his 2010 “story” on the Remington 700. Cohn and NBC alluded to an unwarranted government regulation of the firearms industry by the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC). There should be no doubt, last night’s segment was just another piece of agenda-driven “journalism” clearly designed to promote a CPSC takeover of the firearms industry.
Moreover, the firearms NBC chose to demonize were the Remington Model 870 and 1100 shotguns — firearms that have been in production for almost 60 years and are among the most popular models of shotguns in America. They are used by millions of sportsmen, target shooters and for home defense, as well as the U.S. military and thousands of law enforcement agencies all across the country. There are more than 20 million of these firearms in circulation through which billions upon billions of rounds have been fired without incident.
So while this latest attack by NBC may be aimed at Remington, it is really aimed at the entire firearms industry. After all, if NBC can get away with propagating spurious claims about an alleged defect in a 60-year-old firearm model in an effort to push its anti-gun political agenda, then no firearm manufacturer is safe from such an attack.
In looking at the claims NBC is leveling against Remington, it is important to note that they are all based on the opinion of plaintiff’s attorneys and a paid so-called “expert” — hired guns if you will. The so-called expert has made a living testifying against at least 16 other firearms manufacturers. The “opinions” of the so-called expert, who has been paid to give opinions against firearm manufacturers, have consistently been rejected by courts and juries. In my opinion, he just lacks any credibility — watch here.
As a former products liability attorney who represented many in the firearms industry from baseless product liability claims, I can tell you that reports like NBC’s are nothing more than a marketing tool for ambulance-chasing attorneys and “expert” witnesses looking to make a buck. The truth is that product liability claims are exceedingly rare in our industry, especially when one considers there are more than 300 million firearms in civilian ownership in the United States. At one point, one of my former clients — one of the oldest and largest manufacturers — had no pending product liability cases, not even a frivolous one.
My concern with last night’s piece, however, is more industry based. We cannot allow NBC to launch an unwarranted attack against any manufacturer as a means of generating support for a CPSC takeover of the entire firearms industry. Every manufacturer, retailer, distributor and gun owner should be concerned and, more importantly, engaged. Way back in the 1970s when Congress set up the CPSC, it expressly exempted firearms and ammunition products because it feared that the CPSC would be used to advance gun control. That fear is as real today as it was 40 years ago. To ensure the CPSC doesn’t start to control guns, we need to be sure to elect a pro-gun majority to Congress. So #gunvote — Don’t Risk Your Rights.
Consider contacting Brian Williams at Rock Center. Let him know that for a network news show trying desperately to attract viewers, throwing credibility out the window is not a good place to start.
A PhD in turkey hunting? New e-book offers advanced tips. | al.com
April 9, 2012
Author John Phillips shows a nice Alabama gobbler. Phillips has just released an e-book, "PhD Gobblers", on advanced turkey hunting tips.
By Frank Sargeant, Huntsville Times
We’re getting to the time in the turkey season when more is less. The surviving gobblers have heard pretty much every symphony the assembled majesty of thousands of hunters have played for them, and are starting to turn up their noses at the whole thing.
But John Phillips of Birmingham, one of America’s best-known outdoors writers, says it’s still easy to bag a bird if you take a few tips from the nation’s top callers and hunters.
In a new $3 e-book called “PhD Gobblers”, Phillips reviews tips assembled from many of the best of the best over his 40-year career of traveling the country with the top pros. Some of his suggestions are highly-applicable to hunters on both public and private lands of North Alabama.
“The first tip several of the pros gave me when I was researching this book was to stay longer, call less,” says Phillips. “By mid-season, the turkeys are call-shy in a lot of places, so it’s a matter of putting in time in the woods, listening and looking but not doing a lot of calling–if you call much to hard-hunted birds, you might get them to gobble but you’ll rarely get them to come in.”
Phillips sights Ben Rogers Lee, one of the first national calling champions who went on to win the title five times.
“Ben always said you have to decide whether you want to hear turkeys or kill turkeys,” says Phillips. “For smart birds, he suggested hunting them as if you were hunting deer; you scout a lot, look for tracks, feathers, dusting areas, and learn the bird’s daily patterns, where it goes after coming from the roost, where it goes when the day heats up, where it goes prior to flying up in the evening–and then put yourself in position on one of those locations and wait.” Click Link Below For Full Story!
via A PhD in turkey hunting? New e-book offers advanced tips. | al.com.
Turkey hunting could be dicey this year | The Columbus Dispatch
April 9, 2012
Paul Brown
Spring’s early arrival makes spotting prey more difficult
Good neighbor Jim wasn’t exactly complaining the other day as much as just saying that the gobbler season in Ohio arrives too late for optimum hunting.
This after the guy next door said he’d seen a wild turkey in full fan that very morning in March.
“Yeah, the gobblers are out there strutting,” said Jim, who was standing outside in shirtsleeves, though April was a day away.
Asparagus was shooting up from a row nearby, and a couple of peach trees had bloomed and faded, hopefully pollinated by whatever bees survive pesticidal assault. Nature was tossing freakishly warm, but temperature had little bearing on Jim’s point.
“By the time the season starts, the hens are already on their nests,” he said.
Jim’s suggestion was clear: Callers mimicking hot hens in order to drive amorous turkeys in their direction are about as likely to get the desired results in late April and May as do young men honking their horns in an emptying parking lot at closing time.
Hunter experience notwithstanding, the biologists at the Ohio Division of Wildlife believe they have this figured out.
The length of daylight choreographs the hormonal calypso that awakens wild turkey lust. Thus, the balminess of March and, perhaps, of April isn’t likely to throw Ohio’s 200,000 or so gobblers and hens off their dance steps. The premature sprouting of trees and undergrowth, though, can make hunter and hunted less likely to find each other.
The hunt begins on April 23 and runs through May 20, with the youth season scheduled for April 21-22. Click Link Below For Full Story!
via Turkey hunting could be dicey this year | The Columbus Dispatch.
Turkeys are in midseason form, but 2012 hunt won’t get started until Saturday | The Courier-Journal
April 9, 2012
This year’s warm, generally dry spring weather could have turkeys running ahead of schedule in their breeding activity. Hunters should adjust their tactics accordingly. / KDFWR photo
By Gary Garth | Special to The Courier-Journal
Steven Dobey was pretty sure he knew that Kentucky’s 90,000 or so turkey hunters are a determined, dedicated and tenacious group, both in their efforts to protect the resource and their skill in bringing a bird home. But last year’s recorded spring kill of 32,191 birds erased any doubts he might have had. Not that 2011 was a record season. It wasn’t. That came in 2010 when hunters bagged 36,097 turkeys.
But last year’s spring hunt was wet. Soaking wet, with record rains and record flooding. Wet weather and successful turkey hunting don’t often go hand in hand.
“It was very wet last year, and we killed 32,191 birds,” said Dobey, the turkey program coordinator for the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources and a hunter himself. “That told me that the drive of our turkey hunters is undeterred. That was a testament to their determination.
“I hunted opening morning and was lucky enough to harvest a bird. It had been raining but stopped, then started raining later that morning. And then it seemed like it rained every day the rest of the season.”
It didn’t actually rain every day of last year’s 23-day hunt, but rain did fall during most of the season, leaving hunting conditions ranging from challenging to miserable. Click Link Below For Full Story!
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