OutdoorLife.com (Blogs)

After an action-packed morning at the annual World Turkey Hunting Championship in La Cygne, Kansas, Team SPG 2 took our first bird. Here’s how the hunt went down.

We asked the guys at First Lite which new product they were most excited to introduce at this year's SHOT Show, and we were pretty skeptical when they produced an oversized mitten. But by the end of their pitch, we were itching to try one out. This new Grizzly Mitt features, among other things, oversized finger compartments, a removable shearling fleece liner, a waterproof shell, and a giant snot pad. This wonder-mitt is versatile for a variety of situations, which makes the heftier price tag easier to justifiy. Читать дальше...

The Sound Shield shooting glasses we found at SHOT Show are a clever idea from Browning. The temple tips (that back part of the arm) hide earplugs that retract on a simple tether. 

This new thermal imaging device does the same thing that top-end thermal imagers do, just at the fraction of the cost. It allows you to see the heat signature of animals and people in the dark (and the light for that matter) at more than 100 yards away, through a variety of color palettes. 

At the Archery Trade Association show in Louisville, we got a look at Mathews’ brand new Halon series. The bow featured in the video above is the Halon X, which is the tall version of the bow. It has the following specs:
IBO speed: 330fps
Axle to Axle: 35”
Brace Height:7”
MSRP: $1,299

The faint crescent of an elk print at the edge of the trail was what I had been walking for a week to find. Tracks from perhaps six or eight more elk had nicked the frozen ground between clumps of bunchgrass. A long time ago my plan would have been to rush right ahead on the tracks.  But the decades have taught me patience and braked my gait.

For all its moving parts, a compound bow is a fairly simple machine. At its core is a block and tackle, first described by Archimedes in 250 BC. Limbs, risers, and other components complement the strings and pulleys, transferring user energy into arrows sent downrange.

The most important reason for a bowhunter to wear an armguard is not to protect your arm from getting slapped by the string (which shouldn’t be happening anyway if your bow fits you properly and you’re using correct form). It’s to keep your clothing from snagging the string and throwing your shot. Take a look.

Shanon Beck with her Oklahoma Rio on April 25. Photos courtesy of Kip Peck

I spent much of last week futilely chasing Rio Grande turkeys in western Oklahoma with Todd Rogers, who operates Rut N’ Strut Guide Service out of Elk City. That futility was borne partly of my own doing and partly of a series of vicious springtime storms, the likes of which this region hadn’t seen in five years or more, according to Rogers. “If you think about it, there isn’t a gobbler living around here that’s ever seen weather like this,” he mentioned at one point.
    
The day before... Читать дальше...