Carl Akeley had never been to Africa. Daniel Elliot, one of Akeley’s mentors and the curator for the zoology department of the Field Columbian Museum in Chicago, invited the 32-year-old in 1896 on an eight-month expedition to Somaliland. Akeley ...
Hunt
Hunting Trip for Veterans Could Be a National Model for Better Health
This article was originally published on Dec. 6, 2020, on Coffee or Die Magazine. Steve Houghton’s rugged face shone orange in the firelight as he pulled in a deep breath of the frigid Montana backcountry air and shifted in his ...
Becoming the Squirrel: Hunters vs. Vegans on Social Media
Maybe hunters and vegetarians — and even vegans — aren’t all that different? Biologist, explorer, and filmmaker Donnie Vincent raised this question in a recent chat he had with Evan Hafer on the Free Range American podcast. “I don’t like the ...
Who the Fuck Is Tim Montana?
It’s about a quarter past 11 on a drizzly July morning in Butte, Alaska, when Tim Montana and his entourage roll into the dirt courtyard of Jeff Heard’s property and pour out of an SUV for a day of four-wheeling in the Alaskan ...
2020 FRA Holiday Gift Guide: The Hunting Wish List
When we’re not making coffee or printing T-shirts, you can bet the crew here at Black Rifle Coffee Company and Free Range American are out hunting. How into hunting is this team? The HR department gives away hunts for filling out internal work ...
A Vegan Hunter and Her First Deer Kill
G is a vegan. Her kids and my kids became friends at Montessori. On our first few play dates, we talked a lot about meat, about hunting, about her experience training as a veterinarian in factory farms. We talked about killing, and sadness, and ...
When an Archery Pronghorn Hunt Goes Wrong
Sitting in the cab of Miles Fedinec’s pickup, beside a dirt road on a high sage flat in western Colorado, I can see through binoculars a pronghorn buck. He’s a half-mile away, standing in the 94-degree heat, and my arrow is pinned ...
The Art of Conservation: Yeti Presents ‘Wild Sheep’
“There is no half way. After his first exposure, a man is either a sheep hunter or he isn’t. He either falls under the spell of sheep hunting and sheep country or he won’t be caught dead on another sheep mountain.” — Jack O’Connor This book is for ...
How to Prepare a Wild Turkey Thanksgiving
I was patiently sitting, hands nipped with cold, listening to my own breath and the occasional squeak sqwuak eek eek from Chad Mendes as he made turkey calls in the Kansas morning frost. We sat for hours, listening to the echoes of gobbles from ...
How the Hunter Recruitment Project Recruits New (Adult) Hunters
Have you wanted to get into hunting but didn’t have anyone to take you growing up? Did you hunt a few times in your early years with friends and family but became overwhelmed by the unending number of questions, such as What camouflage do I buy? Do I ...
Wildfires, Hunting, and Fishing: How the Fires Will Change Your Next Trip
I’m beyond angry. I’m pissed off, standing with two US Forest Service employees while my good friend and hunting partner Anthony Noriega, almost a mile away and 1,000 feet higher than us, inspects the ruins of a man-made fire high in the Idaho ...
How To Deal with Trespassers on Private Hunting Land
Realizing that someone has been trespassing on your hunting property is not a good feeling. This year after gaining permission to hunt a piece of land, I went to scout it in preparation for a friend coming to hunt. There were multiple trail cameras ...
Super Meat: Fortify Ground Beef with Game Liver
Nose-to-tail or holistic eating has gained momentum in culinary and hunting communities recently, but we humans have been eating organ meats since we first started walking upright. Organs are the most nutrient-dense part of the body, so it makes ...
Photo Essay: Elk Hunting Sucks, or The Life of an OTC Archery Hunter
For the last four years, I have been archery hunting Colorado’s over-the-counter, or OTC, units for bull elk — with mixed results. OTC means the elk tags are sold to the general public literally over the counter, anywhere you can buy a Colorado ...
Meet Morgan Mason, BHA’s New Armed Forces Initiative Coordinator
Morgan Mason has done a lot. The Kansas farmboy went overseas for the invasion of Iraq as an intelligence analyst with the US Army. After returning home, he bummed around the Rocky Mountains — and Baja, Mexico — hopping between various outdoor jobs. ...
Mountain Goat Backstrap Over an Open Fire
In September, Cole Kramer and I guided a mountain goat hunt on the savage landscape of Kodiak Island, Alaska. The best part — or one of the best parts — was backstrap over an open fire. After several long days and cold evenings spent trudging over ...
How to Find a Last-Minute, Affordable Hunting Lease
We could be in for one crazy deer season. With more and more folks interested in hunting and putting meat in the freezer during the coronavirus crisis, there’s a good chance that there will be a lot of hunters in the woods this fall. That could mean ...
Man Versus Mountain Lion: A Near Deadly Encounter Caught on Video
Snapping jaws, claws swinging through the air, the mountain lion came in hot and ready to pounce, driven to protect her cubs with a lethal barrage against an unfortunate 26-year-old trail runner who happened to stumble upon them. Kyle Burgess of ...
Ishi, Pope, and Young: The History of Modern Bowhunting
In 1912, Ishi crouched behind a bush and put his index and middle fingers to his lips. He made a sharp, high-pitched kissing sound — a rabbit distress call. To his left, Saxton T. Pope watched in amazement as a small group of rabbits came within ...
It’s Time to Cut the BS in Deer Hunting
Our deer-hunting culture is changing. A whole generation that has grown up with trail cameras, food plots, and hunting television shows is after much more than a giant buck this fall (though we’ll shoot one if we get the chance). If you listen to ...
Wild Game Jerky: The Ultimate Guide to Killer Meat
For as long as there have been hunters, there’s been wild game jerky—at least as best we can tell. Ötzi the Iceman—a 5,300-year-old hunter found frozen solid in the Italian Alps—had a last meal of dried ibex and red deer meat. Archeologists have ...
Kicking Off Fall With a Tennessee Dove Shoot
Nothing marks the start of hunting season like a good old-fashioned dove shoot. Across the Southeast, Texas, and parts of the Midwest the ceremonial beginning of fall is often a gathering of friends and family — around a planted sunflower ...
Blood Brothers: Theodore Roosevelt and Frederick Selous
Nineteen days after leaving the White House and his second term as president, Theodore Roosevelt kissed his wife goodbye. He boarded a train in Oyster Bay with his son Kermit, bound for a steamship, bound for Africa. Roosevelt was embarking on a ...
Camp Pendleton Marines Engage in the Ancient Art of Bowhunting
CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. — Appreciation and understanding of various weapon systems are a part of Marine culture. Typically, the M16 or the M240 are the first to come to mind. However, there is a more traditional weapon system being utilized by Marine ...
More Than 80,000 Acres of Public Lands Inaccessible to Hunters, Anglers
More than 80,000 acres of federal, state, county, and municipal public lands in the Mid-Atlantic are inaccessible to hunters and fishermen, according to a new report from onX Maps and the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership (TRCP). The ...
Q&A with Biologist, Explorer, Filmmaker Donnie Vincent
Donnie Vincent is being watched. The biologist, explorer, and filmmaker has made three feature-length documentaries on hunting and his connection to wildlife and wild places. His style is slow, thoughtful, philosophical, with long, bracing shots of ...
Texas Hunting Nonprofit Encourages Vets to Bond with Nature, Each Other
Suicide and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) have become widespread issues within the U.S. veteran community. According to the 2019 National Veteran Suicide Prevention Annual Report, the most recent data available, an average of 16.8 veterans ...
The Everyman’s Approach to DIY Archery Elk Hunting
I’m a self-taught bow hunter with a passion for elk hunting. The first time I heard the bugle of a bull elk echo out of my computer speakers, I knew I had to go and experience it in person. So that’s exactly what I did. In 2017, my first season, I ...
The Fitness Regimen That Will Prepare You for Elk Hunting
There’s no doubt that hunting elk in the Rocky Mountain West is a physical activity. If you don’t live in a state like Colorado, where the average elevation is 6,800 feet above sea level, then you are already going into the season at a disadvantage. ...
What It’s Like to Hunt With Eagles in Mongolia
Lauren McGough and her Kazakh mentor rode on horseback through the Altai Mountains until they caught up to their golden eagle, who was removing the fur from the fox it had just caught. Because of their language barrier, the two recreated the ...
