TROC II

RVing and Fishing Florida's Campgrounds

2011-10-17T19:20:00.000-04:00

Fish and camp Florida's Historic Forts!

Fishing Florida's Historic Forts: An RV Itinerary

Try as we may, we can't all raise families who share our obsessions. Fortunately, for the fisherman who can't bear a day away from the water (but whose spouse or kids might favor other pursuits), Florida doesn't require much of a compromise for anglers. Down here, it's easy to balance a vacation between water time and family fun.

For a road trip that will please every member along for the ride, it's hard to beat a tour of Florida's historic forts. Beyond the obvious historical draw, many of the state's military landmarks are now protected within the State and National Park system. That means plenty of hiking, camping, and just-plain-relaxing along the way. And best of all? Florida's strategic forts also happen to harbor some of the state's best fishing spots, from land and boat.

For a taste of the entire state, start in Pensacola and slowly make your way to Key West. On Pensacola Beach, make your first stop at Fort Pickens, part of the Gulf Islands National Seashore (http://www.nps.gov/guis/planyourvisit/fort-pickens.htm). In addition to this well-preserved landmark's importance during the Civil War, it's also home to a short but deep-water fishing pier. It's a great place to keep your line singing -- use cut mullet for bait, and you'll likely be helping the kids pull in small sharks and even Spanish mackerel. The grass flats to the east of the Pickens pier are a great place to stalk tailing redfish.

Fort Pickens includes a National Park campground, with plenty of amenities offered at just $20/night (http://www.nps.gov/guis/planyourvisit/campground-openings-in-florida-and-mississippi-districts.htm). And, of course, there's all the fun to be had on Pensacola Beach as well, where the 'whitest sands on earth' have (luckily) survived serious damage from last year's oil spill. It's such a nice spot to park your RV that you'll be tempted to stay, but there's a whole state left to explore.

Head east down I-10 toward Jacksonville, to Fort Clinch State Park, one of the best-preserved 19th century forts in the nation (http://www.floridastateparks.org/fortclinch/) Six miles of nature trails wind through the beautiful peninsula, bordered by the Amelia River to the west, Cumberland Sound (and Georgia) to the north, and the Atlantic Ocean on the east. 53 campsites offer both privacy and proximity to the entire park, which includes a half-mile long pier on the ocean side, making deep water fishing possible without a boat. With Egans Creek curving through the park's marsh, jetties to the north, the pier, and the option of surf casting on the beach a short walk from your RV, it's hard to beat Fort Clinch as an all-around saltwater fishing destination.

Next, head southwest toward Inverness, home of Fort Cooper State Park. Take the scenic route through beautiful Ocala National Forest, a part of Florida most visitors never experience (http://fs.usda.gov/ocala). The dense forests of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings classic book, The Yearling, are still alive and thriving here in the north-central swampy woodlands.

Arriving at spring-fed Lake Holathlikaha, the azure water looks much as it did in the 1830s, when U.S. soldiers rested here at Fort Cooper, between skirmishes with the Seminole Indians. Due to low water levels, fishing and swimming were temporarily restricted during early summer 2011, but with rain, that could change at any time. Paddleboats and canoes are available at the park. This is the spot to paddle out with your toddler and drop worms for bream and largemouth bass.

Although Fort Cooper offers primitive camping, to park your RV, try nearby Riverside Lodge along the Withlacoochee River (http://www.riversidelodgerv.com/). The campground includes free canoe rentals, so after a day at Fort Cooper you can still get in an evening session along the river.

From here, head down the coast to Fort De Soto Park, situated on a truly stunning spit of land south of Tampa (http://www.fortdesoto.com/). Five interconnected keys make up De Soto, the largest park within the Pinellas County park system. Despite boasting 238 camping sites, it's a good idea to make reservations here -- this beach won Trip Advisor's Top Beach in America prize in 2009, and over 2.7 million visitors flock here each year. Still, with 1,136 acres, it's easy to find some alone time.

De Soto has two fishing piers, on both the Gulf and the bay sides, and each sells bait. There's a two-mile canoe trail, and a ferry to remote Egmont Key. Whatever your target species is, it's easy to find a superb fishing spot among these crystalline waters, where the Tocobaga Indians once harvested their own seafood bounties.

If time allows for a full tour of Florida, you'd be missing out not to journey through the Keys, arguably one of the prettiest drives in America. Fort Zachary Taylor allowed the Union to control the sea at Florida's southern tip, and has been impressively preserved as a state park (Try to visit near Halloween, when the fort is transformed into a Civil War-themed haunted house; http://www.fortzacharytaylor.com/home.html)

It's hard to beat the view when fishing from the fort, at the entrance to Key West Harbor. It's the finest place to watch a sunset in town, and you might just bring home dinner to an RV full happy, sun-kissed campers.

About the Author

Joe Laing is the Marketing Director for El Monte RV Rentals. Be sure to check out their new Professional Football (NFL) Tailgating and RV Tailgating to College Football Games pages in preparation for the upcoming seasons.

Boating Safety: Online Boat License Courses

2011-06-01T12:31:00.002-04:00

Getting a boat license online!
© 2011 Albert A Rasch and
The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles™
$g&m f9bd 45kd q!?5.

Well my good friends,

Summer is almost here and boating season will soon be in full throttle throughout our great Nation! Millions of people take to the waters throughout the boating season to enjoying our oceans and waterways.

But are you truly prepared? Have you taken the proper precautions and educated yourself on the in and outs of safe vessel operation? I got to thinking about this when I bumped into a couple of articles from this past summer relating some terrible boating accidents that resulted from a simple lack of familiarity with basic boating rules and regulations.
Read More at:
The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles: Boat License

Albert A Rasch
Member: Qalat City Tent Club
Member: Hunting Sportsmen of the United States HSUS (Let 'em sue me.)
The Hunt Continues...

Though he spends most of his time writing and keeping the world safe for democracy, Albert was actually a student of biology. Really. But after a stint as a lab tech performing repetitious and mind-numbing processes that a trained capuchin monkey could do better, he never returned to the field. Rather he became a bartender. As he once said, "Hell, I was feeding mice all sorts of concoctions. At the club I did the same thing; except I got paid a lot better, and the rats where bigger." He has followed the science of QDM for many years, and fancies himself an aficionado. If you have any questions, or just want to get more information, reach him via TheRaschOutdoorChronicles(at)MSN(dot)com.

Jeremy Chan Interview

2011-05-10T02:00:00.003-04:00

Trinidad State Junior College Gunsmithing Program!
© 2011 Albert A Rasch and
The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles™
$g&m f9bd 45kd q!?5.

Jeremy Chan: Gunsmithing Student, Locavore, Blogger

Fellow sporting enthusiasts!

I have the distinct pleasure of introducing you to a young man who is now studying to become a gunsmith at Trinidad State Junior College in Colorado. Jeremy Chan is now immersed in the famous gunmithing program started by none other than PO Ackley famous writer, gunsmith, and wildcatter.

I bumped into his blog serendipitously. Actually Blake did, and forwarded the link to me. But let me tell you I was really taken by some of the work this fellow is already doing with only a few semesters under his belt.

The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles: Jeremy, thanks for joining my readers and I here on The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles!
Jeremy Chan: It's a pleasure!

TROC: Let's get started then! What did you used to do, and what made you decide become a gunsmith?
JC: I have always been in a lead or management position in every job I have had since joining the working world. I am currently working part time as a Customer Service Manager at Wal-Mart while going to school to help finance my academic studies. My last job I was a Receiving Manager for a warehouse in Montana, I was responsible for all the inbound freight and managing the stocking team. We supplied convenience stores and restaurants for western Montana, parts of Wyoming and Idaho. I made pretty good money there but I wasn't very happy doing it, I always felt that I should be doing something else with my life. After hitting a breaking point, I decided to follow my love of guns and move to Trinidad and attend Trinidad State College. I would rather be broke and happy than rich and unhappy!

TROC: What's it like at Trinidad State College? I understand that it's in a picturesque town in the mountains.
JC: Picturesque, yes. But Trinidad is a SMALL town. Something I'm still struggling to get used to. There isn't a lot to do around here... But that is probably a good thing since there will be less distractions and I can focus on school more.

TROC: Jeremy, I'm sure many of the readers would like to know what courses you've taken, and what the experience was like. I know I'm curious, actually, more than curious...
JC:I have taken several courses now, let me list them:

Image Credit: Jeremy Chan

Bench Metal Class- The main focus of Bench Metal Class is on learning to use hand tools, learning how to polish and how to work with metal.

Metal Finishing - Hot bluing, rust bluing, parkerizing, nitre bluing, and little bit on nickeling.

Firearms Conversions - Converting a military rifle into a sporterized rifle, as an adjunct you also learn how to tig weld.

Machine Class 1 and 2 - Involves learning to use the lathe and mill, probably the two most important tools a gunsmith will use. We get introduced makeing tools and tooling, and the art/ skill of turning a barrel from a blank

Custom Pistol Smithing (elective) - Converting a factory 1911 into a competitive firearm. That's been lots of fun!

Checkering (elective) - Checkering stocks and metal.

Tools and Fixtures (Elective) - Making tools and fixtures for gunsmithing

I have been lucky enough to maintain a 4.0 GPA so far; at first Bench Metal and Machine class was difficult for me because I had never seen a Lathe or Mill before coming here, nor had I ever used any hand tools before coming to the gunsmithing program. About half way through first semester I really took off, once I got the hang of what I was doing and my confidence was up I started doing a lot better.

Image Credit: Jeremy Chan

TROC: I want to show our readers a little side project you did for your brother. Jeremy, that is some beautiful color case hardening you did there! What facet of gunsmithing appeals to you most?

JC: I like the machining side of it most. I really enjoy seeing something take shape before my eyes, and I get real satisfaction when it works too. Most of our projects have a +/- 0.005" tolerance that we are allowed to be in. My last 2 projects (one of them being the barrel I turned from a blank) I have hit all of my dimensions to a 0.0005". I was very pleased with myself.

TROC: What other skills have you aquired?

JC:On the machining side, I'm pretty good at it. Fitting parts and fabricating them is a skill I am competant in. I can build 1911's, convert a Mauser military action to a sporter, but I am still working on metal finishing... I think I could use some improvement in my polishing. Other than that I feel pretty confident in everything I have learned so far. I'm always willing to learn, and anything you give me, I give my all.

TROC: Great attitude! A good attitude will get you much further along, and with less gray hair!With everything you're learning, what are your plans for the future?

JC: When I graduate I would like to work for someone for a couple years and continue learning more about the trade and how a shop runs. Eventually I would like to open my own business.

TROC: You were inteested in gunsmiting when you applied and entered Trinidad, but what have you learned about yourself and your interests?

JC: I came to the school with a main interest in target and varmint rifles. I am very interested in accurate rifles. After taking the custom pistol smithing class, I found that I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would. The next year I will be taking Stockmaking 1and 2, Repair 1 and 2 as well as Machine 3. This summer I will be taking a class on tuning cowboy action guns, and I hope to be able to take an elective on revolver-smithing. I wonder what else I may find that I like doing.

I am enjoying every minute I am at the school, It doesn't even feel like work when I am there, even when I am doing a tedious task it doesn't seem like I'm working.

Image Credit: Jeremy Chan

TROC: What is it they say? Work at something you love, and you will never work a day in your life! I should look into that myself... Anyway, tell our readers about some of your other interests, what outdoor pursuits are you interested in?

JC: I enjoy hunting and fishing. While I was in Montana I tried to live off of only what I could hunt and kill for 2 years. No commercial meats, really gets you motivated to fill that freezer, I picked up bow hunting (unsuccessfully) to extend my hunting seasons, but it was fun to learn and get out into nature. I also lost a lot of weight doing it. I love to be on the rivers with a fishing pole in my hands.

TROC: A little Locavore action?

JC: umm lets see... I guess it started with my growing dissatisfaction with the local meat market at the time, simultaneously, I had been really getting into hunting. My tv was permanently fixed on the outdoors channel and hunting shows all the time. I saw Ted Nugent and he was talking about his "kill it to grill it "philosophy. It was like a light bulb went off in my head; I said that I should give it a try. It was hard at first, giving up chicken, pork and beef, but the motivation to go out and hunt went through the roof.

It was rough, but once I started filling my freezer, things started to get easier. It changed my whole mind set, everything became about "what can I do to fill my freezer" and "what can I do so that I'm not eating deer all the time". I started doing more bird hunting and fishing. During the summer I would be on the river with my canoe 2-3 times a week, and I never had any trouble filling my bag. I would stockpile my freezer and when it got full I would take them to my friend and have her smoke them for me. I did some bear hunting and harvested a black bear that had been feeding off of an apple orchard. The meat was great. I tried to take up bow hunting to extend my hunting season but after a few failed attempts at turkey hunting I gave it up. I had maintained this life style for 2 years until I moved here to Trinidad for school. My busy schedule between school and work, and lack of knowledge of the surrounding area forced me to revert back to commercial meats. I lost a lot of weight during those 2 years, probably the best physical condition I had been in since highschool. I enjoyed the lifestyle and fully intend to do it when I settle down again.

TROC: Jeremy, that's great! If more people did as you have, we would see a an upswell and determination to protect and nurture our wild areas for the benefit of all.

As if your plate wasn't full enough, you started blogging. What possesed you to do so?

JC: The reason I started blogging was when a classmate told me about a student from the Pennsylvania gunsmith school who had a blog up, WillsWorkBench I think it's called. (TROC: Will'sWorkBench was deleted by the author.) I never could find it, or it might have been taken down when I tried looking for it. Anyways after hearing about the blog I decided to give it a try, mainly so that my family and friends could see the stuff that I'm doing. Also hopefully a potential employer could look and see what I can do, kinda like a work portfolio.

Image Credit: Jeremy Chan

TROC: Let's get you Internet intell out there in case anyone cares to contact you

JC: Sure thing it's nerdgun (at) gmail (dot) com

And my Blog is: http://www.nerdgun.blogspot.com/

Best Regards,

Albert A Rasch

Member: Qalat City Tent Club

Member: Hunting Sportsmen of the United States HSUS (Let 'em sue me.)

The Hunt Continues...

The Range Reviews: Tactical: Getting a Contracting Job

2011-05-04T06:07:00.000-04:00

The Range Reviews: Tactical: Getting a Contracting Job: "Recently I recieved a very polite email from a young man desiring to become a contractor out here in Afghanistan. He had found several of my posts on Afghanistan and US Government contracting and got in touch with me with some very good questions. I thought it would be interesting to discuss it and perhaps help a few of you out with some pointers."

StickBow Archery's Michael Lee

2011-02-17T13:50:00.003-05:00

Handmade bows at a great price! Real Value and performance!
© 2011 Albert A Rasch and
The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles™
$g&m f9bd 45kd q!?5.

Fellow archery enthusiasts! Here is a new bowyer I have had the pleasure of meeting, though the circumstances of our initial introduction were less than auspicious. None the less, I am pleased to introduce him to The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles family of readers!

StickBow Archery's Michael Lee has been building bows for ten years, and commercially for three years, and has established an enviable reputation for building quality bows at a very fair price. You won't find fancy, exotic tips, or handrubbed oil finishes on his bows. What you will find is a well finished bow that is light, responsive, and fast!

Michael will be sending several bows to me so that I can review them. I'm really looking forward to shooting them, and reporting the results here on TROC. If his eBay feedback is indicative of the quality and value of his bows, I feel confident I'll be very pleased.

Lets get started!

The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles: Michael, tell us how you got in the business.

Michael Lee: Well I kind of got into it in a round about fashion. I had been making bows for myself for almost ten years, when I met Dave Ruff, the owner of Siegeworks Creations. Dave gave me the opportunity to apprentice with him. Dave's a real nice guy and helped me get a start.

TROC: That's only half the story...

ML: Ummm, the rest of it is kinda rough. Dave got into a bind with some personnel issues. The truth is that he let a couple of bows slip past him and the people that he owed them to weren't too happy about it. I was still an apprentice and wasn't ready to shoulder the whole thing. I couldn't yet tiller the recurve bows really effectively, (I was too slow still!)and the best I could do was rough out the shelves or grind out to the lines. Then Dave busted his collar bone riding and shooting the horsebows he was working on, and that really put us behind. I did the best I could, and I really did learn a lot, but it wasn't pretty.

TROC: Go on, this is just getting interesting!

ML: Well we made good on 99 percent of our bows. Like anything built by hand, there were going to be a couple of things that might have gotten by us, but Dave was always willing to do the right thing and get it fixed. But his timetable revolved around the shows he was involved with, and sometimes repairs took a back seat. Again 99 percent of them got out ASAP, but there was always the one that came back to haunt us.

TROC: Michael, as I mentioned to you when I emailed you, I was digging deep into this. I learned of a few instances where Dave over promised and under delivered. That would piss anyone off! In the end though I believe he got squared up with almost everyone correct?

ML: Yes sir, he did. Except for a couple of bows that he is still working on. But the strain and agravation got to him.

TROC: I can imagine it did. I checked the forums like Bowsite/Leatherwall and TradGang and found quite a few unsubstantiated accusations. But in the end, I found that only three bows were owed. In one case I spoke with the gentleman and between his secretary and my questions, it was ascertained that he had never been charged for the bow. He apologised for the oversight and his new bow is on its way. Ihave assurances from Dave that the other two are being built and will be delivered when they are done. The people in these tight knit communities are too quick to take each other's word. They should be ashamed of themselves. I wrote another piece on it here.

ML: I had no idea you had gone that far to check. Anyway, then he offered to sell me everything for a price I could afford. I felt I was taking advantage of him, but it was either that or I would be out a job too! I took him up on it and here I am, a bowyer!

TROC: As far as I can tell Michael, you are pretty much are building a very similar line of bows. Tell me about them

ML: Well I was lucky enough to get all the forms for the bows he used to build, like your American Longbow. I do not build horsebows, those are a difficult to build and to be truthful, I do not like to build them, so I am staying away from them. I changed the SideWinder around - modified the tips so they would not be as rough on the strings and changed the limb taper slightly making the bow a true 200+ FPS bow. Now it really hits like a tiger and (has) the manners of a kitten. I mainly offer take down bows to 56" which is probably my most popular bow, the Asian line I call the Rebellions and the popular, tried and true longbows like yours. We are working on a 60's style recurve and of course the wood stick bows.

TROC: Now your selling on eBay! Why eBay?

ML: I am trying to build a business doing something I love, and with those bigmouths at the sites you mentioned were dragging me into the mess they created; then my online sales stopped dead in their tracks. Sir, I do this for an income too. I thought Ebay was a great way to get a good reputation in real time, you get the real time feedback of quality, service, communication, speedy deliveries, and you might not believe this, there are some cool people there!

TROC: Interestingly enough I found a thread on one of the forums exhorting people to buy your arrows, and then leave poor feedback. I would be happy to forward you a screen shot of the same. Along with the names of the authors, and their LinkedIn profiles....

ML: Thank you for the offer, but I saw it and sent it straight to eBay.

TROC: Nice! Those bullies and miscreants will get what's coming to them sooner or later. Remember, here at TROC, we are always happy to help out!

Alright, that's enough of that! So, you've got some great bows but I want to know what are some new ideas you're exploring?

ML: A classic 1960 - 1970 type recurve and the Rebellion series. The Rebellion is the off shoot of the old sidewinder but the tips have been addressed and the limb tapers different. Its a smooth bow, fast and light. Best of all its a good looking bow. Have sold a few on Ebay with great feedback on them, as well as some of my takedowns.

TROC: Come on kid, don't hold back on me, I know what else you're cooking up, and I want you to tell my readers about it.

ML: You're going to drag it out of me aren't you?

TROC: Yeah, pretty much...

ML: It's a survival bow that I think will really take off with the bushcraft crowd. I'm building it with the same emphasis on quality and value that I am building my reputation on.

Thanks again for taking the time to talk with me Michael, I'm looking forward field testing your bows and reporting on them here on The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles

Key word list: Traditional Bows, custommade bows, custom made traditional bows, custom made long bow, longbows, recurve bow, take-down bow, laminate bow, handmade bow, handmade bows

They Call Themselves Sportsmen

2011-02-09T17:39:00.009-05:00

Fighting CyberBullies and CyberPunks with the Facts!
© 2011 Albert A Rasch and
The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles™
$g&m f9bd 45kd q!?5.

Nothing like a little controversy to get the digestion! For you fellows spoiling for a fight, you've come to the right place. Here are the rules: You can say whatever you like, as long as it is based on fact. Not hearsay, rumor, so and so said so. Keep the profanity to a low roar. Don't be stupid because I will tie you up, spank you, and then laugh at your discomfiture.

03May2011 Zabul Province Afghanistan: I see some of you have in fact found your way here. Butch L. before you go around throwing words like sychophant about, look at the facts. Only one person out of all the people who claimed to have been "ripped off" that I asked for information ever came forward to provide such. In that case, he provided me with dates and facts, which I then used to make things right. I tried very hard to be fair and impartial; remember I have over six hundred posts, and thousands of readers every month on my blog. I pride myself on good journalism. Please notice that there is not a single comment, not one. If there was someone, anyone that was taken, why havn't they contacted me?

Mr King, how many people, exactly, were cheated out of their money? I'll even settle for inexactitude at this point.
Capt: It pleases me that I amuse you...
Butch L.: Again I ask you what conclusion did you reach after reading everything written here? Where are the holes in my reasoning? This is an open floor and forum. But I expect the same courtesy I extend to you. You call me a sychophant on another forum, not even to my face so to speak.

Do you condone what Pastor Grosko said people should do? Seriously guys, that isn't even something a true sportsman would remotely consider... or have we fallen so far?
I've never liked bullies, and that is what a whole bunch of people are acting like. I can't fathom how grown men can't resolve there differences and get on with their lives. Some of you dislike my tenacity in defense of Dave. To be clear I am not defending his buisness dealings or how he conducts himself with respect to you, but rather I am defending him from false accusations, rumor mongering, and a pack mentality that makes every sportsman look bad. I was the victim of a Cyber-Stalker, and let me tell you, it's no fun trying to defend yourself from anonymous enemies. You all can see I am not anonymous and I stand for what I say.

If you personally had a problem with him, then take it up with him personally, man to man.

Now, once again, I invite any and all of you to comment on the facts I have presented. I ask that you show me proof, or at least show me where I have made an error in my logic.

Best regards,
Albert A Rasch

THE FACTS:
I purchased a Siegework Creations "American" Longbow in 2008.
I wrote a positive review with my impression of the bow.
I lost touch with Siegework Creations shortly thereafter.
I was contacted by a bowyer and member of Bowsite/Leatherwall concerned with the thread, review, and banner I had on TROC.
I was invited to view the threads against Siegeworks Creations on the traditional archery forum Leatherwall.
I reviewed that hate filled and vitriolic thread and several others on Leatherwall, and then reviewed several more on other forums.
The threads' comment's main themes were bows not delivered, and faulty or poor craftsmanship.

At this point I found myself wondering what in the world might have happened. As you, my fair and illuminated readers know, I pride myself on a reasoned approach, analyze the available information and evidence, and then I open up the proverbial can. I couldn't imagine that the accusations made were accurate...

but then again I've been surprised before.

So I kept on digging...

I pored over the forum archives. If I am correct, and I am willing to be corrected with appropriate proof, it appears that four people did not receive their bows in a timely fashion. As of now, two received their bows, and two more still are awaiting theirs.

Of the two that did receive their bows, one is still not satisfied. "He wants a thousand dollar bow for a hundred bucks." Hey, not my words but his friend's. I just report the news.

Unfounded attacks and semi-spurious claims:
An example of the unfounded attacks is evident on this thread on Bowsite: http://forums.bowsite.com/tf/bgforums/thread.cfm?forum=2&threadid=387308&MESSAGES=12&FF=2

A young man buys a bow and shares it with others. Almost immediately he is questioned, and then the allegations are thrown out. The inference being that why buy from someone with a questionable background, when you can get it from one of the other fine bowyers here... The only alleged questionable background I could find is the unsubstantiated drivel put out by people that have never purchased a bow from Siegework Creations.

On another forum I used to stop by, I left a note concerning the review on August 24th 2009.
http://www.nodakoutdoors.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=50&t=73499
Almost a year later, there was a complaint posted that a customer had not received his bow. Then a series of low or single posters jumped in with similar complaints. I've emailed one for clarification, and I recognize one as having posted a comment on TROC. A comment was made that there were a number of complaints to the BBB. At least one individual made multiple complaints, and having dealt with the BBB when I was in business, I do not put much stock in it. One gentleman with a single post alleges he ordered a bow. He was never charged for the bow because his Credit Card did not go through. But that's enough reason to post a negative comment isn't it...

I was sent a screen copy of a thread started on Nov 10th on Leatherwall: ..."I would get on Ebay, send him a message and tell him you will be posting Negative feedbackon his Ebay site revealing the truth. You may have to buy a dozen arrows off his site to post feedback but that looks like it would cost 15.99 and you could turn around and resell the arrows. Ebay Negative feedback will shut down your business pretty quickly." The thread was started by Pastor Ed Grosko and quickly taken up by Jim Terrio.

The moderators, afraid that the posters had gone too far, pulled that thread, but not until it had sat there long enough for miscreants to use the tactic. Now it seems that there is a definite conspiracy. Note the following by Terrio:
"I'm going over to Ebay right now and try to post a negative question. I have no dog in this particular fight but I sell bows here and on Ebay and if this clown is still scamming then we need to "get him". Dr. Evil."

So Pastor Grosko and Jim Terrio, you were taken by Siegework? Or did you just jump on the bandwagon? Did you see an opportunity to cut down on the competition? Now imagine if someone decided to use the same tactics against you Grosko... A little uncomfortable now?

Anyway, the eBay company in question has nothing to do with Siegework. Nice move.

I found were my brother in arms commented on poor fit and finish on a Scythian Bow, fair enough., but it wasn't bad enough for him to do anything about it. http://leatherwall.bowsite.com/TF/lw/thread2.cfm?threadid=218281&category=88#2889805

After that, I found very little on Siegeworks Creations other than the negative commentaries on Leatherwall.

Siegeworks tries... and fails.
So, it appears that Siegework Creations has attempted to fulfill those obligations. Unfortunately it was a case of too little too late, exacerbated by a series of unfortunate events. Communications were poor and oftentimes inaccurate. Be that as it may, the obligations were being met, albeit more slowly than would have been preferred by the recipients. In this day of immediate communications, it is unacceptable to not communicate your intentions accurately, and if unable to perform say so.

The Chronicles tries...
Ok, I posted a comment on Leatherwall, and after having my integrity questioned, well... I got a little snarky. When I was called on the carpet, I apologized immediately. Anyway, that really isn't relevant, but some of the members of Leatherwall seemed to think it was.

I asked for proof of their accusations against Siegework Creations, and to this day, not a single photo, email, PM, or snail mail letter has been delivered to me! None, not a single one of them has posted a jpeg on any forum. There is no proof that any bow that was built by Siegework Creations was poorly made, defective, or in any way failed to meet the advertising. Whereas I understand that a customer may feel reticent in sharing information with a complete stranger, I should think that a quick perusal of TROC would convince any of the parties to share their information and get to the bottom of the issue.

As I said in my review, I am really impressed by the fit and finish, the quality of the materials; for the money you cannot go wrong!" And I still stand by that assertion, if you google up the bow or company, my posts are all on the first page, so it would have been easy to drop me an email, or leave a comment right here on TROC! But they didn't... What does that tell you?

Well Executed Walnut and Maple Laminations

There is one outstanding issue that I have not been able to corroborate, and that is the one about the horsebows. Siegework Creations was offered the opportunity to provide the acclaimed horsebows they created to Spike TV's Deadliest Warriors. Not to put too fine a point on it, but these are highly temperamental bows, twisted and tortured to the limits of the materials they are made of, and not for the casual shooter. According to Siegework Creations, 12 were provided, of which 7 broke during the filming of the episode. Stuntmen performed several stunts with the bows resulting in damage to the bows. The broken bows were sent back to Siegework for replacement. Upon examination the bows showed signs of abuse, overdrawing, and modification.

As it so happens, I know one of the consultants on the show. I met him in Bagram last year. I have emailed him and hope to get an email address for the producers of the show, along with his introduction. I sure hope I can communicate with them and ascertain what has transpired.

Siegework Creation is sending two of those bows to me so that I may inspect them carefully and document what I note. Furthermore, I am taking them to a Materials Engineer who will also check them over and give me his opinion. I don't want to be placed in a position were I adjudicate the damage I observe even though common sense may be enough to figure out what has happened.

My conclusions:

Folks, I believe I have done a good job of checking this entire melodrama out and in performing my due diligence. If you feel that there are any holes in my investigation, I would appreciate you pointing them out so I can tie this one up all nice and neat.

I submit:

Siegework Creation fell behind on deliveries.
Siegework Creations made promises that weren't fulfilled in a timely fashion for a number of reasons.
Siegework Creations failed to communicate properly, effectively, or promptly.
The bows in question have either been delivered, or are still in the process of being built.
A campaign of Cyberbullying was initiated by at least two individuals.

The people on Leatherwall/Bowsite that have made accusations have exaggerated the circumstances. Others have gleefully jumped on the bandwagon and careened roughshod over the bowyer. Several individuals have made it their job to lambaste and skewer Siegework Creations and its owner, taking their accusations to other forums, but not to TROC.

In a small community like that of the Traditional bow user, any ill word can start of a cascade of bad feelings. Compound that with a craftsman that has a difficult time communicating his desire to be cooperative, especially in the face of a determined campaign of culmany, and you can be sure that in a very short time, he will explode, be driven from his craft, or both. Which is exactly what occured.

I have emailed back and forth with Dave Ruff, the gentleman in question. He certainly acknowledges his part in this, and his failure to communicate quickly with and deliver to those few individuals. I believe that he sincerely and wholeheartedly will furnish the bows owed to those parties that have not received the bow they ordered. The young man that he sold his molds and forms to is building the rough blanks, which will then be finished by Dave, to the same standards that my bow was.

As a token of my commitment to put my reputation on the line for fellow outdoorsmen, I invite those that are still waiting on their bows to contact me, and I will certainly mediate and facilitate this exchange.

Forums and Advertisers:
The fact that a forum can be used as a springboard to demolish a small businessman is a travesty. You would think that the moderators of Bowsite/Leatherwall would stop that kind of foolishness, or do as I have, start an investigation to determine the accuracy of the claims. A conspiricist would consider that the moderators, bowyers themselves, might have had an active hand in this. A conspiricist might... I am certain that if the advertisers aren't aware of the vitriol and threatening demeanor exhibited by all parties, they certainly will be in a very short time. No one likes to associate with a place or people that act that way or tolerate that behavior in their midst.

Forum Participants:
As to those of you that decided that you could badger and drive the man out of business, I hope you are satisfied with yourselves.

You call yourselves sportsmen. You should be ashamed of yourselves.

Epilogue: I have noted that it did not take long for the forum moderators to realize that a fair and impartial observer would in fact, note the discrepancies in on their site. They have chosen to take down the thread. I did of course, make a copy of the whole thread up to my last post. Let's just say I like keeping things accurate for the sake of posterity...
Dave Ruff is no longer making bows for the traditional community.

Michael Lee, a young man that I am now interviewing has bought all of Siegework Creation's molds and forms, and is now producing fine handcrafted bows under the name StickBows. You can expect a whole series of reviews on every single type and style of bow that he is making. Every single one.

I will be reposting all of my reviews on Siegework Creation's "American" Longbow.
I want to thank the bowyer on Leatherwall that initially invited me to participate in the discussion.

Keywords: Siegework, siegeworks, siegework creations, siegeworks creations, siegework bows, siegeworks bows, siegework horsebow, siegeworks horsebow, horsebow, Siegework sidewinder bow,

Post of Interest:

The SWC American is Here!
The Range Reviews: SiegeWorks Creations American Longbow Part I
The Range Reviews: SiegeWorks Creations American Longbow Part II

Albert “Afghanus” Rasch
The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles
Albert Rasch In Afghanistan
Member: Shindand Tent Club
Member: Hunting Sportsmen of the United States HSUS (Let 'em sue me.)
The Hunt Continues...

Though he spends most of his time writing, keeping the world safe for democracy, or pummeling Cyber-bullies, Albert was actually a student of biology. Really. But after a stint as a lab tech performing repetitious and mind-numbing processes that a trained capuchin monkey could do better, he never returned to the field. Rather he became a bartender. As he once said, "Hell, I was feeding mice all sorts of concoctions. At the club I did the same thing; except I got paid a lot better, and the rats where bigger." He has followed the science of QDM for many years, and fancies himself an aficionado. If you have any questions, or just want to get more information, reach him via TheRaschOutdoorChronicles(at)MSN(dot)com.

Wildlife Photography with Holly Heyser

2011-02-05T14:19:00.002-05:00

Holly Heyser's Wildlife Photography

The Incredible Art of Nature Prints

As you know, I am always on the lookout for any venture that my blogging friends are involved with, and I make it a point to support them and spread the word. Those of you that have monetized your blogs can rest assured that I always click on your sponsors and view their offers. It's an easy and painless way to support my fellow bloggers! Folks that have small business ventures will find that I am always amenable to putting up their banners.

Recently, Holly Heyser of NorCalCazadora started a new artistic venture that is sure to catch the eye of any discerning outdoorsman. I first found out about it through her post, Introducing the coolest duck feather ever - and my new feather photo website

I'll let Holly tell the story in her own words:

My boyfriend Hank (Hunter Angler Gardener Cook) and I hunt ducks, and we pride ourselves in using as much of the duck as possible. Not only do we pluck them whole, but we use the gizzards, livers, hearts and even feet (those enrich duck broth). But one thing we’ve been throwing away for years is the feathers. Until this year.

I teach at Sacramento State, and one of my students came to school one day wearing beautiful feather earrings. I asked where she got them, and she said her mother made them. Bingo! This was someone who’d appreciate the piles of beauty on my plucking-room floor (a.k.a. the garage). To save feathers for her, I had to examine them more closely, and as I did, I became fascinated with their beauty and decided to write about it Serendipity, Hunting Art and Happiness, and to do that, I needed to take photos of them.

This part was easy: One of the things I do besides blog about hunting is shooting food photos for Hank, who blogs about wild game cookery (http://www.honest-food.net/), so I have a lot of photo and studio equipment for photographing small items. Using a macro lens, I was able to get incredibly detailed shots of the photos. When my mom read the blog post with those photos in it, she immediately emailed me asking for prints so she could hang them in her house. That’s what made me realize these photos might be a great form of art that hunters would appreciate, and that they could hang anywhere without offending people who are squeamish about hunting.

A couple months later, I’ve now shot probably 2,000 photos, and the very best of those are on my new website, Holly Heyser's SmugMug!, where people can buy prints directly. I still have more to shoot, but I think my very favorite will be the shot of one of my happiest discoveries ever: Drake gadwalls have feathers on their breasts that look like smiley faces! Every drake gaddie I’ve shot this year has them, and they vary as much as human smiles. (See photo at top!)

I think that may be the photo hunters appreciate the most. Non-hunters often think I’ve faked this photo because it’s so unbelievable, but hunters can verify it for themselves.

I’m really excited about my new venture. Most photography I do is for Hank’s blog and other writing (magazine, book), and this is the first project I’ve done for myself. I’m hoping hunters will spread the word, and I hope they’ll see these photos as art they’d like to hang in their own homes or offices.

And let me add that it's important to note that I went with SmugMug because I had purchased a photo through that company by dynamite waterfowl photographer Fred Greenslade of Delta Waterfowl. I was really impressed with the quality of printing and the incredibly sturdy packaging that ensured photos would not be damaged in transit.

Holly Heyser

Well my faithful and stylish readers, I hope that you will consider adorning that special area of your home with some of Holly's art work. Not only will you be supporting your fellow outdoorsman, but you will be adding a splash of duck feather panache to your home!

Prices are very reasonable, and sizes range in the following dimensions:
$14.00 for a 4 x 6 Print
$24.00 for an 8 x 10 Print
$24.00 for an 8 x 12 Print
$32.00 for a 12 x 18 Print
$42.00 for a 16 x 24 Print
$48.00 for a 20 x 30 Print

Please click on the Holly Heyser's SmugMug page and take a quick look at the variety and beauty of the feathers she has documented!

WhitetailWoods.Blogspot.com

2011-01-31T15:36:00.008-05:00

Folks, I am experimenting with tables...

Don't ask me what I am doing as I am really not too sure!

What I did, is copy this table looking thing from a website. I pasted it into the compose tab, then looked at it in the HTML tab. By playing around witht he numbers, left and right, and erasing things to see what happens, I figured out some of the stuff. What I am hoping to accomplish is to understand how to create small for comments, notes, or how tos in a post. That and throw in my usual link stuff.

More to follow!


	A Chronicles' Favorite Whitetail Woods Whitetail Woods


	A Chronicles' Favorite Whitetail Woods Whitetail Woods

Rasch Outdoors Media Group: Link List 22 Jan 2011

2011-01-30T15:59:00.000-05:00

Rasch Outdoors Media Group: Link List 22 Jan 2011

http://inastan.blogspot.com/2010/12/bagram-air-field-rocket-attack.html

http://inastan.blogspot.com/

http://trochronicles.blogspot.com/2010/05/its-tuesday-at-mess-hall-that-must-mean.html

http://americanlongrifles.org/forum/index.php?topic=12365.135

http://woodworking.com/forum/showthread.php?29837-Stanley-no-71-router-plane-How-s-it-work

http://woodworking.com/forum/showthread.php?54384-Scratches-on-a-plane-sole

The Range Reviews: Tactical: 300 BLK by AAC: An Introduction

2011-01-29T13:05:00.000-05:00

The 300 ACC BLACKOUT, designated 300 BLK, is a 7.62x35 round that was developed in response to military requests for an M4/HK-416 platform to launch 30 caliber rounds both subsonic (suppressed) and supersonic. AAC's new caliber offers loadings ranging from 110 grain for hunting and self defense to 220 grain for suppressed weapons - AAC's undisputed area of expertise.

Read More: The Range Reviews: Tactical: 300 BLK by AAC: An Introduction

Link List 01/28/11

2011-01-29T11:50:00.001-05:00

http://huntlikeyourehungry.blogspot.com/2011/01/quagmire-week-five.html

http://americanlongrifles.org/forum/index.php?topic=14328.15

http://americanlongrifles.org/forum/index.php?topic=14369.0

http://americanlongrifles.org/forum/index.php?topic=14357.msg134983#msg134983

http://thewildlife2.blogspot.com/2011/01/mr-hunting-expert-bites-back.html

http://norcalcazadora.blogspot.com/2011/01/something-to-cling-to-as-duck-season.html

http://suburbanbushwacker.blogspot.com/2011/01/bagpipes-cooler-than-you-thought.html

http://trrtactical.blogspot.com/2011/01/more-on-300-blk-from-shot-show.html

AR15, AAC, AAC300, AAC 300, AACBLK, AAC300BLK, AAC 300 BLK, Advanced Armament Corporation, 300 ACC BLACKOUT, 300 BLK, 7.62x35 round

The Range Reviews: Tactical: 300 BLK by AAC: An Introduction

The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles: Top Nine Turkey Hunting Tips!

2011-01-27T14:21:00.001-05:00

The Best Tips for Hunting Turkeys!

With Wild Turkey season quickly approaching, I scoured the Internet for the best tips for turkey hunting. This is the top ten tips for turkey hunting. I have set them up in the order I think you should consider them. If you have a favorite tip that’s not included, please let me know, and we will put all the new tips in the Turkey Hunting Tips II post!

Read more at: The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles: Top Nine Turkey Hunting Tips!

Bulk Ammo

2011-01-27T14:16:00.002-05:00

Just a quick plug for my friends at BulkAmmo.com who hooked me up with a very, very good deal on ammo for my Colt Gov't Combat 45.

When I needed bulk 45 ACP Ammo I went to BulkAmmo.com, and placed an order for some 230gr Lawman a product from the good folks at Speers.

I wasn't aware that Speer put out their own ammo, but as you know their bullets are excellant and I'm sure the ammo will be as good as any other out there. I will be doing a review on the ammo itself, but that will ahve to wait until I get home and can make some range time.

They have a lot of In Stock 45 ACP ammo, and if Speer isn't your cup of tea, they have another dozen manufacturers and loads to choose from.

If you're looking for a good deal on ammo, ammo that's in stock, and quality ammo, Check out what BulkAmmo.com has available. You won't be disappointed!

Best Regards,
Albert A Rasch
Member: Shindand Tent Club
Member: Hunting Sportsmen of the United States HSUS (Let 'em sue me.)
The Hunt Continues...

Drying and Preserving Fruit

2011-01-19T00:10:00.003-05:00

Quick Facts on Drying Fruit...

Successful drying depends on heat, air dryness and good air circulation.
Select fresh, fully-ripened fruits.
Pretreat fruit pieces by dipping in an ascorbic acid, citric acid, or lemon juice solution.
When dry, allow fruit to condition for four to 10 days before packaging for storage.
Package dried fruits in tightly sealed containers and store in a cool, dry place.

Drying has to be the simplest, most cost efficient, and most natural method of preserving food. I was able to get the basics on drying fruit from Carol W. Costenbader, the author of The Big Book of Preserving the Harvest. Drying is a creative way to preserve foods and use home-grown fruit, extra produce (e.g., ripe bananas) and roadside market specials. Like all methods of preservation, drying causes some nutrient loss.

Here are seven easy steps from selection of the fruit, to storage of your dried treasure!

1. Select the Fruit
Use only blemish-free fruits that are fully ripened. Immature produce lacks flavor and color. Overmature produce can be tough and fibrous or soft and mushy. Drying does not improve food quality.

2. Prepare the Fruit

Thoroughly wash and clean fruits to remove dirt or spray. Sort and discard any fruit that shows decay, bruises or mold. Such defects can affect all foods being dried. Now, pit and slice the fruit again discarding any pieces that do not meet quality expectations. The smaller the pieces, the quicker they will dry, but keep all pieces uniform in size so they’ll dry at the same time.

3. Pretreating
Pretreating fruits prior to drying is highly recommended. Pretreating helps keep light-colored fruits from darkening during drying and storage and it speeds the drying of fruits with tough skins, such as grapes and cherries.

As indicated below, some methods work better for some fruits than others.

Blanching (apricots, apples)
Put slices in a steamer (or a colander suspended in a pot of boiling water) for five minutes then place fruit in ice water to stop the cooking. Drain and dry on towels.

Ascorbic Acid Dip (all fruits)
Ascorbic Acid Pretreatment: Ascorbic acid (vitamin C) is an antioxidant that keeps fruit from darkening and enhances destruction of bacteria during drying. Pure crystals usually are available at supermarkets and drug stores. Stir 2 1/2 tablespoons (34 grams) of pure ascorbic acid crystals into one quart (1000 milliliters) of cold water. For smaller batches prepare a solution using 3 3/4 teaspoons (17 grams) of pure ascorbic acid crystals per 2 cups of cold water. Vitamin C tablets can be crushed and used (six 500 milligram tablets equal 1 teaspoon ascorbic acid). One quart of solution treats about 10 quarts of cut fruit. Cut peeled fruit directly in ascorbic acid solution. Soak for 10 minutes, remove with a slotted spoon, drain well and dehydrate. Research studies have shown that pretreating with an acidic solution enhances the destruction of a host of potentially harmful bacteria during drying, including E. coli, Salmonella species and Listeria!

Pectin dip (peaches, berries, cherries)

Mix 1 box of powdered pectin with 1 cup water. Boil together for 1 minute, then add ½ cup sugar and enough cold water to make 2 cups.

Honey dip (bananas, peaches, pineapples)
Mix 3 cups waters and 1 cup sugar. Heat and then add 1 cup honey. Stir well.

Juice dip (peaches, apples, bananas)

Combine 1 quart pineapple juice, 1 quart lukewarm water and ¼ cup bottled lemon juice.

4. Drying

Sun Drying
a) Spread your sliced or cubed fruit on a screen for two to four days, turning slices over half way through the drying process.
b) Don't forget to bring your screens inside at night to keep dew from collecting on the fruit. (Or coons stealing them!)
c) This method works best in climates with 100 degree heat and low humidity.

Oven Drying
a) You can place fruit directly on the racks or first spread cheesecloth over the oven racks.
b) Set the oven to 145 degrees and prop the door open with a wooden wedge (about a half inch) to allow the moisture to escape.
c) Give it anywhere between 4 to 12 hours, checking regularly to see how the fruit is drying.
d) Food should be dry but pliable when cool. Test a few pieces to see if the batch is ready.

5. Curing
When done, place your dry fruit in an open bowl in a warm and dry location where there is some air movement. Cover it with a piece of cheese cloth to minimize dust or insects landing on your dried fruit. Flip it around once or twice a day for a couple of weeks.

6. Pasteurize
You need to pasturize your dried fruit in order to store it for any great length of time; this will insure that you destroy any insect eggs. When drying is complete and you have cured your fruit slices, freeze the fruit for several days at zero degrees in a deep freeze. It must be a deep freeze as a regular refrigerator cannot get the temperature down far enough. Alternatively, heat in a 175 degree oven for 10-15 minutes.

7. Storage

Store in airtight ziplock bags or glass containers kept inside paper bag to protect from light. Store in cool dry place. Since a refrigerator is cool and moist, keep the dried fruit there only in the heat of summer, but make sure the package is air tight.

There you have it my friends. Simple process that yields yummy and nutritious results. It is a great way to preserve fruit, take advantage of sales, and generally speaking is a great skill to have.

Other Posts of Interest:
Planting Fruit Trees

Drying and Preserving Fruit The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles

Best Regards,
Albert “Afghanus” Rasch
The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles
In Afghanistan

Scott Croner Albert A Rasch Albert “Afghanus” Rasch Albert A Rasch Scott Croner Nebraska Hunting Scott Croner, Merriam's Turkey Hunting Albert A Rasch Scott Croner Albert A Rasch Albert “Afghanus” Rasch Albert A Rasch Scott Croner Nebraska Hunting Scott Croner Merriam's Turkey Hunting Albert A Rasch

The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles: Big Cutters, Rank Hogs, and Coffee

2011-01-11T12:39:00.001-05:00

The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles: Big Cutters, Rank Hogs, and Coffee

© 2009, 2010 Albert A Rasch and
The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles
$g&m f9bd 45kd q!?5.

Hunting Big Hogs in Florida, Chronicles Style!

I had shot that three hundred pounder right through the cheekbone!

We had been hunting hog at a friend's ranch an hour or so from where I lived. We had been carefully stalking this bad boy for the better part of two hours. There were sows and piglets to contend with, mosquitoes, and the occasional pygmy rattle thrown in for fun. Actually, I was pretty sure those damned chiggers were, at that very moment, burrowing into my tender flesh and making themselves at home.

Skirting palmetto clumps, and patches of scrub oak, we finally got into position with out spooking him or the other hogs with him. taking a prone position in an open patch of sandy dirt, I took off my leather hat, laid it in front of me, and used it as a rest for my light hog hunting rifle, a 30/06 Weatherby Eurosport. I wanted an instant kill; I had had enough of chiggers, ticks and skeeters for the day, so I carefully lined up for a spinal shot. I was certain of my shooting ability, and I have complete confidence in my Weatherby and the Remington Safari Grade ammo I use.

180 grains of copper clad and partitioned lead went right under his left eye, through the hog's sinus cavity, and smashed right into his spinal column where it demolished nine inches of bone and nerves, disrupting much of his motor functions. But it wasn't enough. By the time I had crossed the forty or so yards between us, he had regained some use of his body. His jaws worked to and fro, slashing at the under growth, hooking roots, branches and the occasional shrub. Apparently he could use his back legs, and had some use of his front right one. He stumbled as he tried to charge me.

I had stoked the Weatherby with another Remington Safari Grade Swift A-Frame before I was even up. As I raised the Weatherby for a follow up shot, Matt put his hand on my shoulder. "Wait, don't waste the bullet, let me finish him with my .22." Moments later the big hog was down.

And what a hog! Scarred and cut up from slugging it out with the other males, he was a brute; three inches of whetted tusks stuck out either side. I had him mounted, but unfortunately over the years he has deteriorated to the point that it was, in my mind, disrespectful to his memory to have him displayed in that condition. So he now resides sealed in a large bin with a desiccant package and a pest control devise. Maybe, when times are a little better, I can have him refurbished, and he can take place of pride over my desk again.

I really need to get out hog hunting...

But that's not why I tell the tale. Cooking, that's what I want to talk about.

It all started, innocently enough, when I happened upon Miss Jamie's blog Borderland Adventures: Her Perspective and her post Stinky Little Pigs.

Now I like pigs. I like them as livestock, pets, and wildlife. I like them alive and I like them roasted. Now Miss Jamie is actually writing about the New World equivalent of the pig, that being the peccary also known as the javelina. Miss Jamie does an excellent job of explaining their natural history and taxonomy; and she does it with great humor. In addition you will find great narratives of the border area, posts on cooking both in the home and out in the field, and a product review. Not only that, but she has some great photography too! I heartily recommend visiting her Blog Borderland Adventures: Her Perspective.

Now back to the cooking. As it turns out both peccaries and that big ol' hog I took, have similarities. They both stink real bad. As in rank.

I don't like to waste game. But a rank old hog is unpalatable. Simple as that; just plain inedible. I had Matt carve out the tenderloins, if that's not a misnomer I don't know what is. I also got the two roasts. Matt got the rest to grind up for sausage.

When I got home I threw a box of coarse salt over the meat and ice in the cooler. I figured that would buy me enough time to figure out what I was going to do.

I've got one of those big enameled roasting pan, and I always have a lot of garlic. Work with what you got I always say. As I was trying not to pass out from the testosterone induced odor, I remembered reading somewhere that instant coffee neutralized the odor and helped to tenderize the meat. I couldn't remember how much was recommended, so I dumped a big handful in there. I mean I poured it into my hand and dumped it over the roast. With that done, I took a knife skewered that roast and stuffed garlic into every hole I made. I doused it thoroughly with some white wine, the cheap stuff I keep for those meddlesome neighbors, and put the cover on it.

I set the oven on low (325 F) and came back to it about four hours later.

Holy smokes! It worked! The smell was gone, and in its place a delectable and genuinely delicious aroma of cooked pork with subtle tones of garlic. After due deliberations though it was decided that a couple of more hours wouldn't hurt. I cut up some more garlic, potatoes, carrots, and celery, and poured in some more wine and water.

A couple of hours later we were sitting around the table enjoying a tender and tasty roast.

I've tried it out with other cuts of tough meat both wild and domestic with similar results. Oh and there is no taste of coffee either. What is in the instant coffee that does that is unknown to me. All I know is that it works.

Amazing what you can do with some coffee...

Best Regards,
Albert A Rasch
Member: Shindand Tent Club
Member: Hunting Sportsmen of the United States HSUS (Let 'em sue me.)
The Hunt Continues...

Update:
While cruising the Blogsphere this morning, I came upon this "The Bacon Weave." For those of you that don't have enough cholesteral in your diet, this is a sure fire way to get it up there! Brought to you by the fellows at BBQ Addicts!

AAR

Scott Croner Albert A Rasch Albert “Afghanus” Rasch Albert A Rasch Scott Croner Nebraska Hunting Scott Croner, Merriam's Turkey Hunting Albert A Rasch Scott Croner Albert A Rasch Albert “Afghanus” Rasch Albert A Rasch Scott Croner Nebraska Hunting Scott Croner Merriam's Turkey Hunting Albert A Rasch

Hunting and Instincts

2010-10-20T11:52:00.001-04:00

© 2009-2010 Albert A Rasch™ and
The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles
$g&m f9bd 45kd q!?5.

(I was going through the archives and I found this one from last year. We had lots of comments, and I thought it would be nice if some of our newest members and readers had an opportunity to read and comment on the subject. Your friend, AAR)

"In a very real sense our intellect, interests, emotions and basic social life - all are evolutionary products of the success of the hunting adaptation."

SL Washburn and CS Lancaster

All the PeTA drama of the last couple of weeks, plus the great intellectual stimulation that I have been fortunate to have when discussing animal issues with Brendan of Screaming Chicken Activism, got me to think more deeply as to why I hunt. I think it was Brendan that mentioned to me that I really didn't need to hunt, and that he thought there was a dichotomy in the desire I have to hunt and kill, and my love of animals.

I believe that when I made the comment that it just sort of came to me. I know it was late and I was tired, so it was more subconscious than deduced and thought out. The answer that I gave him was that I have always been a hunter, even as a child. Not in the sense that I was formally inducted into the hunting fraternity by cousins, uncles, or my dad, no one in my family hunts. But ever since I was very young I stalked animals, bugs, people, birds, even fish. My mother got plenty of phone calls, and not more than a few visits from concerned parents and the occasional police officer with young Albert in tow! (I think it was suggested in hushed tones that perhaps a professional should have a look at me, but luckily my parents figured I would outgrow it... What did they know...) I don't remember how many bows I made from anything remotely flexible, and the scar on my thumb is from a Gillete single edge razor blade that sliced me down to the tendon while I was sharpening arrows made from bamboo.

As I have been contemplating this, it occurred to me to question how much of that was some deep instinctual behavior, versus an observed or learned one. Well, it seemed to me to be more an instinct than anything else. First, I had no role models to instill the desire to hunt in me. Television in the sixties did not have Sportsman Channel or Outdoor Channel. As a matter of fact it was black and white for those of you that aren't familiar with non cable TV! Another factor would be that I was raised in New York City. I only recall two times that I saw a hunter with a deer strapped to the hood of the car. It wasn't like my neighbors encouraged hunting as a leisure activity.

So where did my instinct to hunt come from then?

Why it has to be from the Paleolithic Era of course!

We have been "civilized" for a little over 10,000 years. But for 2.6 million years before that, we were little more than roving bands of hungry humans looking for our next meal, and avoiding becoming one.

2.6 million years as Homo Sapiens, but about 5 million years if you include Homo Habilis, followed by 10,000 years of so called civilization, that has also been punctuated by famines, diseases, and pestilence. 5 million years of evolution and not much has really changed as far as I can tell in the 0.5% of time we have been "civilized."

I'm thinking that my instinct theory is getting some traction here. If all humans are animals, then it stands to reason that we have some instincts left. Just because we are the only reasoning animal on the planet, doesn't mean that we have no instincts left. I and many others must still feel the pull of the outdoors and the need to pit our abilities, as considerable as they are, against nature.

That we don't need to hunt may not be an accurate statement. I am now, more than ever convinced that we not only need to hunt, but it is unnatural to subvert or suppress that need or instinct. As I told Brendan, I could no more be a non-hunter, than he could be a carnivore. Though I think that it might be easier for Brendan to eat a hunk of steak if he was hungry enough and not suffer much emotional discomfort, than it would be to keep me from the outdoors. I think that is very indicative of the importance of the instinct, the natural desire to be the top predator in nature's tapestry.

The more I think about this, the more I conclude that to deny the nature of being human, that is to deny the parts of us tat are still driven by instinct, is just asking to be sick both emotionally and physically. If any of us was forced to forego our basic human nature, physical and emotional harm would soon follow.

For me it all boils down to this: I am a hunter. I am driven by a passion greater than that of those around me because I acknowledge and accept that which nature bestowed upon me. As long as I treat nature and her gift to me with respect, I will continue to be whole... and human.

Best Regards,
Albert Rasch™
Veteran Paints Lures in Smokin' Hot Colors!

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TROC: Helping Bird Rescuers

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Spoons: They're Not Just for Cereal!

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Back Home from the Afghan Front

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The Range Reviews: AGI Armorer's Course Colt 1911

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Pictures from the Front: Kandahar Airfield Bread Maker

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The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles: Afghanistan, Permaculture, and Beekeeping

Best Regards,
Albert A Rasch™
The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles: Avoid Gettin' Snake Bit!

Hunting in Nebraska AirSoft: It's Not Just for Kids!Yo-Yos for Troops!Nebraska Hunting CompanyCupidFish.comScott Croner

2010-10-20T02:40:00.001-04:00

Albert Stung by the Bees!

AirSoft: It's Not Just for Kids!

2010-09-04T13:42:00.000-04:00

Thinking about AirSoft?

I recently received a very nice email from John Durfee, Marketing Manager for AirSplat.com. John is a Gulf War veteran and also participates in outdoor and adventure activities. He kindly volunteered to write a post on AirSoft arms, equipment, and activities.

My only exposure to AirSoft has been at the SHOT Show, where I saw many full scale and very realistic AirSoft versions of firearms.I was very surprised by both the level of refinement, and the vast number of manufacturers of AirSoft and number of accessories available to the enthusiast. Since then I have learned that AirSoft originated with the Japanese as a way of collecting firearms. (AirSoft Info: History) There are several different types of AirSoft - spring, gas, and electric powered.

Clubs have formed around AirSoft, both users and collectors. The users tend to play the simulations and tactical scenarios, while collectors can vary from a little of everything, manufacturer specific, or even period firearm collections.

I would like to thank John for offering to write a Guest Post and I invite anyone with an interest in AirSoft to visit AirSplat.com!

Survival Adventures

by John Durfee

You've been patiently watching them, they're full of energy but still young, they don't know what to look for. You're staying in the shade of the tree line, and they're out in the open field. It's time to see if they've learned what you taught them.

You crouch low and make your way to their rearward left flank. When you're 7 yards away you draw your Colt 1911 from its holster and get into position. SNAP, you stepped on a twig, rookie mistake. Your son swings around, dropping to a knee quickly, much faster than you thought he could, his M4 aimed right at your center of mass, it takes you by surprise. CRACK CRACK, two shots hit you right in the chest. There's a sting but you're grinning with pride. That was a really good shot kiddo!

What I've just described was the sport of airsoft, and while fun, can be great for teaching kids and families the importance of firearm safety and shooting skills.

What It's About

Airsoft is different from air rifles and pellet guns in that they use standardized 6mm plastic bb's that weigh far less than metal pellets or sabots, and are perfectly safe in a controlled play environment.

Airsoft is preferable to paintball to train with because the equipment requirements and initial cost are much lower. For airsoft electric guns (AEGs), only bb's, a battery, and a charger are needed. With gas powered airsoft, you'll need bb's and green gas (the pressurized gas needed to run the guns) Also, Airsoft is cleaner because you avoid having to wash your clothes after a day of play.

There are an increasing number of airsoft clubs and organizations popping up around the country. Most can be attended for a flat fee. They're busiest on the weekends, when the kids and parents are off from school and work. Usually centered around military scenarios, the core skills practiced are valuable to real world preparedness. There are varying degrees of immersion, ranging from "play and go back to the car for a snack" to full milsim (Military Simulation), where one acts, functions, and performs like a real military force for the entire duration. The former are great for family outings, as you can walk out between games at your leisure. Airsoft also teaches proper weapon usage, maintenance, and safety precautions. Most airsoft guns in the mid-range price look, feel, and function as close to the real steel guns as possible. Some airsoft pistols even disassemble the same way as the real thing! It's an unsurpassed way to become familiarized with firearms and learn how to use them properly in a safe and relatively controlled environment.

Valuable Lessons

Airsoft is safe, but it does require a certain level of responsibility and honesty. People need to call out when they are hit. This is a great structured way to teach kids fair play, gun safety, and sportsmanship. Family ties are strengthened because each member relies on one another to work as a team. With all the running around it provides a great workout for everyone: dad and mom get in their cardio and the kids and burn off their energy. And sibling rivalry can play itself out in new and interesting ways.

For parents it provides an opportunity to train in real self-defense type scenarios. In the event you ever need to use these skills, you'll have practiced it before, which helps to make these skills more ingrained.

For children it's a great segue into teaching them about real firearms and gun safety. You can ingrain muzzle safety, trigger control, and aiming techniques. Many airsoft guns have the same safety mechanisms and levers as their real counterparts, so you can teach your kids where they are and how to use them. You can impart the sense of safety and care needed to handle firearms with the peace of mind they're doing in with a completely safe device

The most important thing these events teach is mindset. You have to work in a team, placing your trust in each other. You have to be constantly aware of your surroundings, as your family trusts you to be a set of eyes and ears. You learn to distinguish between friend and foe. You'll hone your aiming and marksmanship skills on real targets who will react and move. You'll train yourself how to respond - rather than react to surprises and potential threats. You'll be instilling in your children quick decision making skills, gun safety, and a fair amount of athleticism. And if you're "killed" you can learn from your mistakes, and do better next time.

To be honest airsoft bb's can have a bit of a sting to them. But throwing on a heavy sweater or light jacket will make sure you feel them, but it will be more of a poke than a pinch. And remember the cardinal rule, ALWAYS WEAR EYE PROTECTION, while they may not have weight, bb's fly very fast and you need to protect your eyes and those of your family. One last note, you'll want to bring lots of water and hydration. Your family will be running and sweating a lot more than you think!

Where To Play

Most airsoft fields (indoor and outdoor) have an open entry policy, you can play for a few hours, and go home. Many paintball fields are now becoming dual use fields, for both airsoft and paintball so you might want to call any local places to confirm.

Try googling the term 'airsoft' and your state, you'll find forums where people get together and arrange outings. Airsplat has a comprehensive listing of US airsoft fields. So get out there with your kids and have a safe and fun time!

(PS Always check with your local law enforcement about regulations, wear proper eye protection and NEVER try to modify the orange tips on your airsoft gun.)

John Durfee is a Gulf War veteran and the marketing manager for Airsplat, the nation's largest retailer of Airsoft Guns and Airsoft Apparel.

** * **

Again, allow me to thank John Durfee of AirSplat.Com for writing an informative and interesting post on AirSoft equipment and activities. Should you have an interest in the sport of AirSoft, please contact John, or visit the AirSplat website.

Best Regards,
Albert A Rasch™
Member:Kandahar Tent Club
Member: Hunting Sportsmen of the United States HSUS (Let 'em sue me.)
The Hunt Continues...

Sporting Classics: The Oldest Song, presented by Bernard and Associates

2010-08-17T06:41:00.001-04:00

The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles, in association with Bernard and Associates, proudly presents Sporting Classics. Widely recognized as the premier outdoor magazine, with award-winning graphics and the country's top writers, Sporting Classics focuses on the best hunting and fishing throughout the world. Whether it is wingshooting grouse on theScottish Highlands, stopping Cape Buffalo on the plains of Tanzania, or landing delicate rainbow Trout on 2 weight bamboo fly rods, Sporting Classics and its stable of renowned authors covers it with class and finesse.

And now, The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles has been chosen as one of the few Outdoor Bloggers to share content from a well respected and well known magazine in the outdoor community!

Please enjoy the following advance publication. I would like to thank the Bernard and Associates team and Sporting Classics for choosing The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles as a partner in their endeavours!

The Oldest Song

"He could no more stop hunting than he could stop breathing.

The music played too loudly in him."

by Dr. T. C. Jennings

Five a.m., opening day breakfast hadn’t changed much. Hank, Frank and Floyd, two of the brothers nursing hangovers, Pastor Fred, Harry and Earl still commandeered the corner table, raucous as crows in a cornfield. Earl owned the place, “The Shot,” he named it, one of those small town bar/breakfast joints that smelled of coffee and smoke and burned bacon and eggs, good smells to a deer hunter. Folks ladled out jam and jelly with a communal spoon and poured cream from the same pitcher and sugar from the same jar. Winston still tasted good like a cigarette should, everybody carried lever actions and wore wool, and most downed a deer by season’s end. A shot of Earl’s coffee in the morning, a shot at a deer during the day, and a shot of Earl’s whiskey in the evening . . . no matter what, everybody took a shot. Hence the name. Time seems to stand still in a small town.

"The Shot"

Jack Troutwine sat in a back booth sipping bitter black coffee and listening to their voices. Twenty years gone as a boy and back as a man, no one had recognized him but he remembered them, the rhythm and cadence of their words familiar as old friends. Snippets of conversations reached across the restaurant and across the years to his booth, making him smile.

“Dogs and dopes are going to inherit the earth and I hope it’s the dogs,” Father Fred intoned, disgusted with some chicanery somewhere.

“Not the poor?” Frank winked at Floyd, figuring he’d goosed Pastor Fred in the gospel for once.

“Hell no. That’d mean dopes like you two would be in charge. Give me a Chihuahua anytime. At least it has enough sense to sit in an old woman’s lap instead of chasing her from bar to bar half the night and throwing away good money hand over fist.”

Whistles and jeers greeted the retort, flushing the brothers deep red as the Woolrich coats that hung from their chairs. “Don’t think I didn’t hear about you two boys stuck in a poor man’s hoist last night.”
The brothers glared accusations at one another before Frank spoke. “How’d you know we were in the ditch? We didn’t tell anybody, did we, Floyd?”

Floyd shrugged. “I sure didn’t.”

Pastor Fred grinned like he had God in his back pocket. “The Lord is my shepherd, boys, and keeps a good watch out for the wolves who threaten my flock.”

About then Earl’s wife dropped steaming plates of breakfast around the table, stilling the din for a second, long enough for Hank to lambaste the food starting with the bacon, an opening day tradition.

“Hey Earl, these pigs of yours fly?”

“What do you mean, Hank?” Earl winked and played along while everybody leaned in for Hank’s jibes, wondering how he’d outdo last year’s tirade.

“Pardon me, Pastor, but for chrissakes, Earl, the bacon looks like a couple of hummingbird tongues, the eggs look like scrambled canaries, and if I didn’t know better, I’d say the toast is burned blacker than the stain in a hobo’s undies. You expect us to eat this mess?”

Laughter and disgust drowned most of the conversation and as the restaurant filled, the last voices Jack heard were Harry’s complaining how his deer-chasing shorthair always ripped his tongue on briars and bled like he’d “swallowed a box of knives,” and one of the brothers bragging how his new girlfriend could swat down grouse like she was “backhanding stepchildren.” From their gestures, though, he knew they’d turned to buck stories, each measuring invisible spreads bigger than the others.

Finishing his coffee, Jack rose to leave, never able to eat on opening day, his nerves likely to jitterbug with anything in his stomach, his excitement keen as ever.

“Jack? Jack Troutwine? Well I’ll be damned,” Pastor Fred remarked, catching Jack’s eye and rising to stand unsteadily on his cane.

Jack reached across the table, careful not to squeeze the pastor’s hand too hard, and nodded at the others. He noticed a walker behind Hank, his face a geography of gullies and ravines, and grey hair curling from beneath the brothers’ caps. Even Harry, the youngest, wore a web of spider veins in his cheeks, the patina of age purpling his skin. Time had found another entrance, separating then from now.

“Home for the hunt?”

“Yessir.”

“How’s your father? I haven’t seen him in a month of Sundays.”

“Good. A little slower.”

“Aren’t we all.”

“You hunting the marsh or the swamp field?”

“The swamp field, I think.”

“It’s as good an opening day spot as any, I suppose. Been an awful dry summer, though. From what I heard, even the turtles were packing canteens. Collar-up weather today, though.”

Jack grinned and nodded. “How ‘bout you?”

“None of us old farts hunts much more than memories, Jack,” Pastor Fred responded for the group. “We still do breakfast, though, and talk deer like when you were a kid, and Earl still antes up a free drink if you shoot a good one. Right, barkeep?” He slapped Earl on the back and laughed.

Small talk gave way to pause, allowing Jack to leave before the silence stretched to awkward. Good lucks followed him out the door where a light snow drifted across the parked trucks, swirled into small tornadoes by the wind. Backing out, he glimpsed crow tracks walking the edge of his eyes, shook his head ruefully and pointed his headlights toward the swamp field.

Rituals remain, he thought, hearing the whispers of his own mortality, but we don’t. Grateful to still be part of the hunt, he watched the restaurant fade in the rearview mirror.

An hour later Jack Troutwine shivered in the darkness before dawn, happy with his discomfort while awaiting the most important morning of the year. He believed in hunting the hard way, with no blinds or bait, just an overturned bucket in a field overlooking a cedar swamp with the wind in his face. Jack had always hunted this way, believing a level playing field made the experience true.

Pulling the gun to his shoulder like an old friend and aiming at an oak across the field, he felt confident knowing it fired where it pointed and huddled down into the rhythm of the hunt as snow stung his skin like slivers of ice. Weaving among ragged, grey clouds, a half-moon glowed like a gem in the black ear of night and the sky wore a sparkly number sequined with stars, both promising sunrise despite the snow that powdered the trees and clung to his coat. It reminded Jack of an old time ticker-tape parade layering the landscape with confetti.

The snow also coated the fur of a swollen-necked buck resting under a cedar deep in the swamp after a night of carousing. If Jack had known, he would’ve shivered with more than cold.

The morning’s music was sung by the usual choir, owl song and pheasant reveille followed by mallard chuckle and the whistle of wood ducks seeking refuge elsewhere. Woodpeckers banged the timpani, startling loud-winged doves onto the low branches of a hawthorn. Bluejays shouted the sun’s coming as the sky brightened beneath clouds turned to cotton candy in the pink wash of dawn, pools of blue forming between them as if someone had broken through ice. Across the field young maples mixed with birch and poplar began to glow like sparklers in the gathering light, their yellow leaves bright as finches, while a clump of shrubs blushed red knowing nakedness was soon to come. Of all moments, these were Jack’s favorite, the hymn of color and sound that foreshadowed morning.

Minutes later three apparitions hugged the swamp edge. The color of shade, they eased from the cedars cautiously and angled toward him, jittery in the wind, ears alert, ghosting into the brown grass invisible as chameleons. Lifting and lowering their heads in syncopation, they moved with stealth, furtive and shy and impossibly silent as they closed within 15 yards, eyes locked to his, sensing wrong. Jack hung a crosshair on the biggest deer when all three heads dipped.

Pow!

He heard the shot in his imagination and watched the doe fall before lowering his rifle, dry run done. Cutting man-scent in a swirl of wind, the deer whirled, grabbed her sisters by the hand, it seemed, and disappeared as if never there.

“Goodbye, girls,” Jack whispered, staring at an empty field except for the trees and grass and rising wind that loosed snow squalls from a bank of black clouds. The rest of the morning snow and sun traded turns as Jack squinted for another glimpse of the supernatural.

By noon his concentration flagged and his mind sifted through memories of other hunts. He remembered every deer he’d ever killed, from the orchard eight-point to the first one as a 14-year-old boy, a doe taken with a .410 slug on the last day at dusk deep in the cedar swamp he studied now. Searching in the dark, uncertain of his aim, he finally found it dead under a thicket of pin cherries when his flashlight reflected green off the doe’s vacant, iridescent eye. Bending to touch its fur, he choked back tears, overcome with joy and sorrow.

Gathering himself, he struggled the deer to a small stream that meandered among the dense cedars, in his mind feeling again the cold water pressing against his boots as he floated the doe downstream through the swamp on a starry, cold night toward camp.

Hearing the shot, his father had waited anxiously in the light of a gas lantern, the hiss of its mantle sinister to the old man as he watched for his boy before breaking into a grin when he caught sight of him holding his gun in one hand and a hoof in the other. Together they gutted the deer and dragged it to the truck, their breath white as moonlight in the cold, before emotion overwhelmed him and Jack cried openly.

“It’s the way you’re supposed to feel,” his father counseled. “If you felt otherwise, you wouldn’t be a hunter who honors what God gives you; you’d be a poacher, which is the same thing as a killer. Wait here.”

He went to the animal and returned to touch its blood to Jack’s lip. “You’re not a boy anymore.”

Jack accepted the covenant, understanding that hunting had imbued in him a compassion and respect for life unlike any other experience, teachings he would honor for the rest of his life, and he knew that day he could no more stop hunting than he could stop breathing. The music played too loudly in him. The irony of taking a life to revere it, however, was not lost on him, a dilemma he would never resolve, and he knew his elation in taking an animal always would be tempered by grief for its death.

Late that afternoon the resting buck arose rejuvenated and hungry. Sidestepping a downed cedar, he moved silently through the thick underbrush toward the edge of the swamp where a gnarled oak littered the ground with acorns, the same one Jack aimed at in the morning. Wind-gusts paused his pace and the deer stood still as a statue while reading a thousand sights and sounds and smells from the landscape, recognizing them all, sorting safety from each.

Jack saw no movement even after the deer entered the field to follow the doe trail. By now evening veiled the swamp and joined the deer, draping shade over the snow-powdered grass.

Something out of place caught Jack’s eye, something extra, a stump he hadn’t noticed before. Raising his rifle slowly, he laid the crosshairs against the object just as sunset seeped under the clouds to reveal a row of red candles glimmering in the dusk, seven in all, a moment’s menorah.

Swamp buck, Jack thought, noting the reddish-dark horns. Heart racing, he braced his elbow on his knee and aimed. In the instant between the touch of the trigger and the sound of the shot, the buck fell, heart and shoulder shattered by the bullet.

Trembling from the hunt’s crescendo, Jack racked the rifle and watched for the deer to rise and run. Struggling to quell his emotion, he waited 20 minutes before walking toward the oak where the buck lay dead. A red splash darkened the snow like spilled wine. Taking a thin wafer of the dark snow, he placed it to his lips and listened to the wind sing in the field.

“Thank you,” he murmured, kneeling to care for the deer before heading back to Earl’s,
his heart filled with the song of the hunt.

***

Nebraska Hunting Company, Scott Croner

Chronicles' Interview: Bo Parham and Edge Habitat Conservation Contractors

2010-08-11T12:18:00.000-04:00

An Interview with Bo Parham
And Edge Habitat

Folks, once again a great hello and good hunting to you! It's me Albert A Rasch of The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles. Today we are adding to our interview series “The Outfitters Chronicles.” Though Bo and Edge Habitat aren't in the outfitting business, habitat management is an integral part of game management, and it is only fitting that we interview them as only the Chronicles can.

Our interview today is with Bo Parham of Edge Habitat. Bo and I worked on this over a series of e-mails. I had bumped into Bo's blog some time ago, and like many things it kind of went on the back burner. Through a series of "Blog Hops," I bumped back into Bo's blog, and started our correspondence again. I've always been interested in reclaiming damaged environments, and wildlife conservation management is right up my alley.

EH: Albert, first, let me say thank you for taking a special interest in what I'm trying to do.

TROC: Bo, it's my pleasure to sit down and talk to you about habitat restoration and design. After twenty years of construction and related activities, I am super pleased to finally meet someone with the knowledge and ability to either design new wild spaces, or restore damaged ones! But before we go into that, please introduce yourself to our readers.

EH: My name is Jerry Boswell Parham. My Mother and the cops call me Jerry, but most everybody nowadays calls me Bo, a nickname my Dad gave me.

TROC: Then Bo it is! I started right off with how pleased I am to discuss habitat improvement and restoration with you. As a student of biology, it's exciting to know that with a little bit of knowledge and some hard work, you can actually reclaim damaged environments, or improve marginal ones.

EH: That's absolutely correct, Albert. And even in incremental steps, you can make a difference in the quality of the habitat around you. So much emphasis today is placed on feeders and food plots for wildlife, and those concepts certainly have their place. But improving habitat is much more than feeding the animals. And it doesn't have to cost an arm and a leg for hi-protein feed sprayed from automatic feeders or high priced food plot seeds planted in a man-made clearing in the middle of the woods. It can be done by simply utilizing the existing natural seedbank and the existing edges on the landscape. And it doesn't have to necessarily look unsightly to be effective. As I see it, the closely manicured landscapes that we see today have eliminated far too much habitat that could be utilized much more appropriately. Man and wildlife can co-exist, but man can't keep destroying the habitat without destroying the wildlife. This sort of thing has become a passion with me. It's more than just being in tune with nature or having a place to hunt. It's not taking from the environment or taking it for granted, and it's giving something back.

TROC: I think that a lot of folks would like to do something, but have absolutely no idea of where to start. How did you "educate" yourself in Wildlife Conservation Contracting?

EH: I studied biology in college, but where I could afford to go had no formal wildlife biology training. It was more of a pre-med curriculum, but I managed to work in my own independent studies, when I could. I almost got a 2nd major in geology, and I studied agriculture independently. So, officially, I'm not a wildlife biologist, but it's where my heart lies. Quite frankly, I am a synthesizer of other peoples research at this point, but I aspire to help improve or restore habitat in any way I can, whether by writing about it, or offering advice or personal labors. I didn't start Edge Habitat to make money, but to spread the word and to improve wildlife habitat. That is why I welcome any feedback from people who know more than I do.

Prescribed Burn: Another habitat management technique.

TROC: Tell me Bo, where are you currently located?

EH: I live in Clarksville, Texas, Red River county, between Texarkana and Paris. It's right on the edge of the blackland prairie and the piney woods. North of the Red River lies the Kiamichi Mountains and the Ouachita National Forest in Oklahoma. To the west of Paris lies the Caddo National Grasslands. It's a diverse environment, filled with excellent habitat in many places and opportunities to improve habitat in many others, not unlike other places I'm sure.

TROC: I'm certain that you've quite a bit of outdoor experience too. How did your outdoorsmanship get its start?

EH: Hunting and fishing have been ingrained in me since childhood when I could walk out my back door and go hunting, all day... Or fish in the neighbor's stock ponds or the creek a couple of miles away. Unfortunately, those times are long gone, and so is that environment in far too many places. Some of the lucky ones can still enjoy that type of experience, but they are few. It is from those roots that my love of nature and the outdoors has grown.

TROC: I've gotten a little hunting in over the years, no where near enough as far as I am concerned. My problem is mostly that of access. I've seen areas that were once readily accessible and well stocked with game, both large and small, become subdivisions almost over night. I see you've done quite a bit of hunting. What are some of your successes?

EH: As for my hunting and fishing successes, they have been adequate. Besides the 140-class WT pictured on the blog, I have a 6X7 bull elk (unscored), a 160-class mule deer, a half a slam so far in turkeys (best being a 23 lb. 11-in. w/ 1.25 spurs)and 3 double digit largemouth bass (best being 10.96) as my personal best trophies. But Albert, as you well know, every encounter in the outdoors, no matter what, makes you live longer...

TROC: You mentioned that you worked in the medical field for quite some time, how did you get from scrubs to overalls?

EH: I did spend the majority of my life in health care, both as a pharmaceutical representative and a radiology technologist. However, in '08 I was injured moving a patient in the hospital. I lived in Spokane, Washington as a young man, and I worked as a packer and a cook for an outfit in the middle fork of the Salmon River country in ID. Then I went to work as a Hunter Safety Coordinator for the Washington Department of Game in Spokane. There I was able to assist habitat specialists and others in their work. I developed a working knowledge of the subject, along with a sincere love and respect for that type of work. When I became injured and forced into semi-retirement, I sat down and asked myself, "What assets do I have that I can use to make my way and be of service?" and "What would I be most happy doing with the rest of my life?" From that, Edge Habitat was hatched. So, honestly, Edge Habitat is a fledgling enterprise created to try and be of service to both the landowners and the wildlife. It doesn't hurt that it might help an old outdoorsman survive as well!

TROC: What sort of projects have you been involved with?

EH: There have been a few small projects, but nothing special to recall... yet!. I have been trying to get the mayor of our city to hire me to manage the grounds at the local city lake for wildlife; but, there again, there is no money. This would be an excellent project, since it's just across the main highway to the east of me; and it's in dire need of some help. The largest thing that I've done is to advise a friend about how to maintain habitat and prevent erosion post logging on some inherited property of hers. But that was pro bono, and I was happy to do it. It allowed me to put into practice some of the ideas I had been developing, and observe the results over time. Local TX P&W biologists have called me a couple of times about their projects, but nothing has yet to come of it. That's why when you emailed me about this I was pretty discouraged. But that doesn't mean that I don't still think it's a good idea that needs to be pushed. It's a tough sell, especially in this economy, but I haven't given up on being able to get something going.

TROC: Bo, I am always curious, tell me, how did you get started blogging?

EH: The blog idea was a suggestion of my sister to help with cheap advertising. But it soon became a way to express /vent some things and gather information too. Frankly, Albert, the blog, as minuscule as it is, is more successful than the business at this point. People will talk to you about your ideas about the land, but they can't spend the money to do anything in this economy. If they do, they do it themselves; and utilize your ideas or what NRCS or TX P&W has suggested to them. As for suggested projects that people can do on their own, the Edge Habitat blog has got numerous posts to that effect in the archives. Edge feathering, strip disking, regenerating the seedbank, comes to mind. All of these can be done with minimal expense and mostly just some work. I am always open to anyone who might have a question to be discussed; but, mostly, I find I'm talking to myself...

TROC: You know Bo, I used to feel that way also when I first started blogging, but with time, you develop a network of readers and followers. Before long you will be the subject matter expert that folks come to for advise on reclaiming land for wildlife! Now, what would be a dream project for you?

EH: The ideal situation for me would be to land a job with an absentee landowner who has deep pockets and several hundred / thousand acres to manage for wildlife. And I would thoroughly enjoy an opportunity to write about wildlife, habitat, and the outdoors. I think that would be both pleasurable and desirable at my age! But then, there are plenty of younger people out there with more specific degrees in wildlife / habitat / ranch / forestry management to fill such jobs, don't you know. But maybe, just maybe, I can do something by synthesizing information and spreading the word to interested people that will help me find a way. And, like the song says, "Get by with a little help from my friends."

TROC: Bo, I wish you all the best in your endeavours. We need more people in the field that can help us maximize the available habitat, restore damaged habitat, or create habitat out of areas that have been destroyed or altered.

Once again I would like to thank Bo Parham of Edge Habitat for taking the time to interview and introduce Edge Habitat to us.

If you would like to know more about habitat reclamation and habitat restoration. please see Bo's blog, Edge Habitat.

You can reach Edge Habitat at:
edgehabitat@windstream.net

Best Regards,
Albert A Rasch
Member: Kandahar Tent Club
Member: Hunting Sportsmen of the United States HSUS (Let 'em sue me.)
The Hunt Continues...

The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles: Win a Safari for 2 with Africa Hunting.Com

2010-08-06T03:02:00.000-04:00

The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles: Win a Safari for 2 with Africa Hunting.Com

NEWS Nebraska Hunting Company NEWS

2010-07-22T12:57:00.001-04:00

"Nebraska mule deer hunting has been overlooked by mule deer hunters for altogether too long." Says Nebraska resident and well known guide Scott Croner of Nebraska Hunting Company.

Believe it or not, Nebraska is one of a few states where a hunter can buy a hunting license and mule deer tag over-the-counter. Whereas almost every other mule deer hunting state has a draw system or lottery, where it may take years to finally draw the chance at a trophy Mule deer, Nebraska hunters get to purchase theirs without issue.

By the way, the specific unit tag and statewide buck tags can be used for either a Whitetail or Mule deer buck. The required Nebraska State Habitat Stamp is only $16.

Nonresident specific game management unit deer permits are $178.
Nonresident firearm statewide buck permits are $443.50.
Nonresident antler less-only permit are $55.

Compared to other Mid West and Western States where Mule deer are pursued, these tags prices are very, very reasonable. Scott mentions that, "You can't beat the fact that you can go to the local gun shop or outfitter's store and purchase them on the spot." Remember that these permits are non-refundable and non-transferable. And due to the wonders of modern communications, your permits and tags can be purchased online and printed out through www.outdoornebraska.org.

Though Scott specializes in trophy Merriam's Turkey and Snow Goose, Nebraska Hunting Company has some great opportunities for the individual looking to get a crack at quality mule deer. "I only have a limited number of available hunts, and most of those are after the Nebraska Whitetails, and many of my customers are repeat customers of previous years." Adds Scott, "But there are always a couple of Mule Deer opening each season." So it is a good idea to book as early as is convenient for you to do so.

All of Nebraska Hunting Company's leases are free range. You'll be hunting cultivated field edges, river bottoms, or prairie sand hills. Nebraska is known for its varied terrain. There will be no feeders or fencelines to contend with. When you get your Mulie you will have worked for it! Scott recommends that you be in good shape, as some of the areas a mule deer may require a several miles of careful stalking to get within your shooting zone. Mule deer hunting is predominantly a game of spotting the deer, and then stalking to within shooting distance. They are cagey, and they move. Nebraska Hunting Company can tailor a hunt though, to accommodate you.

I spoke with Scott and asked what he recomended with respect to rifles. "Albert," he said, "Bring what you know you can shoot. Shots can be anywhere from 30 yards away to 200 or more yards." Croner feels that if you can honestly shoot minute of deer at 100 yards with a 45-70, then he will do his best to get you withinn 100 yards. If you are comfortable shooting at 300 yards with your 300 WSM, then he will put you in the position to do so if need be. "I want my clients to be as close as possible." Scott emphasizes. "Close in means better shot placement and an ethical take. Both are very important to me." He adds, "I personally prefer 6.5mm or larger, with the flat shooting 7mms being a great choice. The .300 magnums, if you can shoot them well, are probably the most versatile of them all."

That immediately brought us to a discussion on the choice of ammo. "I would rather see everyone show up with one of the premium ammos. I lean towards the Failsafes from Winchester, though I know that you prefer the Remington Premier with the Swift A-Frame. Both will do the job regardless of conditions." Scott favors a bullet that will hold it together for an unexpected close in shot, as well as one that performs at extended ranges.

A good scope on your rifle is a definate plus, especially when shots present themselves at dawn or dusk. Practice with your rifle at the maximum range that you are comfortable shooting at. Then study the trajectory charts so you know what range to sight in at. You want your point of aim to vary no more than 3 inches below the arc of the trajectory. That way, as long as your quarry is within your maximum range you will only have to place the crosshairs where you want to hit. My Weatherby 30/06 with 180gr Swift A-Frames, spot on at my maximum range of 200 yards, is 2 inches high at 100 meters. So anything inside of 200 will get a heart shot if I do my part.

If you are a muzzleloading fan, Nebraska Hunting Company and Scott can help you fill that tag too. Muzzleloading season is during the month of December, so the odds of getting that trophy are even better! You'll have to work extra hard to get that Mulie, but it is the time of year to do it in. The new magnum inline muzzleloaders have the capabilities to make those longer shots, and with the availability of good bullets, you are much more likely to hammer that big one when he comes into view. The December muzzleloader season is almost unknown outside of Nebraska, so take advantage of it! Call Scott for further details on hunting Nebraska's Muzzleloader season.

With some luck and a good dose fortune, I may finally get to go up to Nebraska with Scott and hunt Merriam'sTurkey. But if I ever have the opportunity to make time for Mule deer and Monster Whitetail, Scott Croner and Nebraska Hunting Company will be my outfitter of choice. When it comes to shelling out hard earned dollars for an adventure of a lifetime, you need to choose wisely. The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles and I personally endorse Nebraska Hunting Company.

Nebraska Hunting Company
Phone: 402 304 1192
Email: scott@nebraskahunting.net

Best Regards,
Albert A Rasch
Member: Kandahar Tent Club
Member: Hunting Sportsmen of the United States HSUS (Let 'em sue me.)
The Hunt Continues...

The Hippo Sez

2010-03-26T10:56:00.001-04:00

Hippo on the Lawn, an Ex-Pat living in Luanda is a man of adventure. Not only is his taste impeccable, but his posts are usually entertainingly ironic, spiritually insightful, and undeniably thought provoking.

The Hippo was gracious enough to comment at length on the Python Hunting in the Everglades post, and his comment is so well written and entertaining that by golly, it deserves a Guest Post slot of its own!

So without further adieu; Hippo on the Lawn!

A machete (katana here) is always a good idea.

I used to take RAF aircrew and other personnel duck shooting at Big Falls in Belize. An abandoned rice station, it was heaving with wildfowl and of course the predators that grew fat on them. There were snakes everywhere.

The constrictors never really bothered me. I had quite a collection back at camp. It was the Tommy Goff (Bothrops asper), also know as the Fer de Lance, that scared the pants off me. Unlike most snakes that push off into the undergrowth on sensing your approach or relied on their camouflage, only causing problems if God hated you enough to make you step on them, these buggers would actually go for you.

I was running a live firing exercise on Salt Creek ranges when the advancing line suddenly broke up in confusion, weapons hitherto directed at the butts with the discipline we expect of trained soldiers now being swung in all directions, my erstwhile band of trained killers resembling dancing and shrieking girl guides faced with a tiny mouse.

So from experience, I would not recommend the FN 7.62 (.308 Winchester). God knows how many rounds the panic stricken troops loosed off before they heeded ever more frantic calls to cease firing but the damn snake had easily survived and was only dispatched by a Belizean Defence Force Sergeant with more courage than all of us combined and armed only with a bit of angle iron.

These Tommy Goffs are not just homicidally vicious, they can obviously be recruited and trained by the Guatemalans. What is the probability of the Commander British Forces being bitten by a Tommy Goff? It is not usual for a Brigadier to stray much beyond the route from his residence to his office, let alone stray into the bush but he managed to get bitten and had to be casevaced to Miami losing the larger part of his calf muscle. He would have been armed with a Browning 9mm. Or a crayon.

On another memorable occasion I had taken an RAF Flight Lieutenant to Big Falls for his first squirt with a shotgun. Naturally, he was walking ahead of me on the trail rather than behind. He disturbed a snake which, understandably irate at having its cover blown/territory invaded, went for me.

With a display of marksmanship and snap shooting that would make Herb Parsons look like an amateur, this guy cut the snake in half with a load of SG.

Now I ask you. What would be more terrifying? The sudden appearance of an angry Tommy Goff or staring down the barrel of a semi automatic 12 Bore Browning in the hands of a first timer?

So, from my experience:

7.62 SLR, Dangerously Bad.

9mm Browning, Ineffective.

Crayon, good for scrawling your last will and testament on the pavement.

Belizean armed with angle iron, Good.

RAF Flight Lieutenant with 12 gauge, Awesome.

Regards,
Albert A Rasch
Member: Hunting Sportsmen of the United States HSUS (Let 'em sue me.)
The Hunt Continues...

Ben G Outdoors Reader Appreciation Giveaway

2009-10-17T08:58:00.001-04:00

Press Release 10/2009
Ben G Outdoors

Ben G. Outdoors is proud to announce their
Fall 2009 Reader Appreciation Giveaway.

Ben G. Outdoors a blog devoted to hunting, fishing and outdoor adventure, will be having a Reader Appreciation Giveaway! The contest will run from Monday, October the 19th through Friday October the 31st at 5:00pm. Winners will be posted on the site Monday November 2nd.

The list of Prizes includes Boots, Apparel, & DVD’s.

Please stop by Ben G. Outdoors for more details and your chance to win one of these fabulous prizes.

The Ben G Outdoors Reader Appreciation Giveaway is brought to you in part by Hank’s Clothing, Warrior Outdoors, & Magnet Gun Caddy.

Native Hunt Offers Black Tail Deer Drawing!

2009-10-05T13:59:00.000-04:00

.
From Mike Riddle of Native Hunt
Press Release 10/01/09

Doves, Hogs and the Native Hunt Blog

As always we are doing new, exciting, and innovative things here at the Native Hunt ranches and headquarters.

We just wrapped up our annual Labor Day Dove Shoot and feast, and let me tell you it was quite an event. All throughout California everyone was complaining about the low numbers of Dove and how an early cold front drove most of them in a southerly direction towards warmer climates. Although the numbers were considerably lower this year compared to previous ones out at the Native Hunt ranches, most everyone still was able to fill out both days during the event, and best of all, there were enough of the tasty little birds to go around for our yearly feast this year as well, and I gotta' tell you, Hank Shaw (Honest Food Blog) cooked them up as fine as he did for last year's Dovapalooza, as so coined by Hank himself!

Many, many thanks go out to Hank, Holly (Nor Cal Cazadora) and our very own Evandro Brandao for the five star cuisine during that fun filled weekend!

This year was a bit different from all of the previous years, in that we opened this particular shoot up to the public (in the past this was a "By Invitation Only Event") and we had a few Wild Boar, Ram hunters, Dove shooters out with us this time who took advantage of our package special. Everything went nicely as they always do here at our ranches with everyone filling their tags and then joining us on our dove hunt outing the day afterward.

Phillip and his double ready to shoot some doves!

We have received nothing but positive feedback from all of our guests including very high praises for our Native Hunt Professional Guide Staff, and the consistent theme in the running commentary was "We had fun, Fun, and more FUN during our stay at the Native Hunt Facility's"!

So I believe that we just might run that very same special for next year's event again!

We also began filming the pilot for our Reality Series during this past Labor Day weekend as well. Most all of the outdoor channels which feature hunting shows/videos are in essence, nothing more than giant infomercials that hawk their own wares or are channeled towards selling popular hunting gear, and all of the corresponding products associated with them.Our goal here is to show what really goes on behind the scenes of an outfit such as ours, because this is a business just like any other business, and there is a lot of hard work, detail and logistical planning that goes into a client's happy success on the actual day of their hunt. And yes, we will show all of the bloopers in all of their glory and splendor, this will be a true to life reality series, mistakes and the like, so look for this project to be completed by year's end.

Now on to the good stuff which you all have been waiting for, our current special of the month! This month we are giving away a free hunt to anyone who can bring along 5 other paid guest's at the current rate for a 2 day, full service Wild Boar hunt. Just simply call in and talk to the front office to set your hunt date and for details between the hours of 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. PST. That number as always is 1-888-HUNT-321.

This Ol' boy was snapped from the back of the truck by Jimmy (ranch foreman) in the early morning hours at the Jolon Ranch.The Eurasian Wild Boar sport's a nice wooly coat, even in the middle of summer. Them teeth ain't bad either!

Good Hunting To You All,
T. Michael Riddle
www.NativeHunt.com

P.S. Don't forget to go over to our brand new Native Hunt Blog and leave a message for us in the comment section, your name and contact information will then be placed into a drawing for a FREE BLACK TAIL DEER HUNT for the 2010 California deer season!

Mike

Takedown Recurve

2009-09-29T13:17:00.000-04:00

SiegeWorks Creations Takedown Recurve
Pre-Production Sneak Peek!

Dave at SiegeWorks Creation forwarded a few pictures of his latest bow. These are, as I mentioned, pre-production and unfinished. Think of them as proof of concept and the final step before he releases this design to the bowhunting fraternity.

This newest model is a takedown recurve, featuring short limbs designed to minimize finger pinch at normal draw lengths of 28-29 inches.

Dave tells me, "We designed the recurve to help put the power into the early draw, but help the draw feel smooth and light."

Notice the nice smooth curves of the drawn bow. Dave mentioned, "I will be chrono’ing it in the morning but my eye is telling me 180 feet per second on this short bow."

That is darn fast!

Dave tells me that he will be offering this bow with two sets of limbs, and at a very competitive price. Dave has promised me a closer look at this model when he finalizes the design and moves into production. And don't forget, these are made one at a time, to your order, tuned, and finished by Dave and his small cadre.

SiegeWork Creations is open from 10am to 4pm M-F and closed weekends. On the off chance that they can not answer the phone, Dave and Sara do return ALL phone messages left. Call them at 903-285-4347.

E-Mail: office@siegeworkcreations.com
Web Store: SiegeWork Archery

Post of Interest:

The SWC American is Here!
The Range Reviews: SiegeWorks Creations American Longbow Part I
The Range Reviews: SiegeWorks Creations American Longbow Part II

Regards,
Albert A Rasch
Member: Hunting Sportsmen of the United States HSUS (Let 'em sue me.)
The Hunt Continues...

American Whitetail Targets: King Broadhead Target

2009-08-31T15:00:00.000-04:00

The King Broadhead Target

As part of my reeducation in archery in general and bowhunting in specific, I decided I needed a new target to shoot at. A cardboard box full of newspaper and more cardboard just wasn't going to cut it any more; it's too easy to ruin expensive shafts that way, and I'm trying to run a professional operation here anyway. It was high time I got something appropriate for the job at hand.

There are many types of targets available, from styrene blocks with plastic wrap that are barely adequate for kids' bows with target points, to very expensive and realistic game targets that will help refine your technique and eye; they even have one that looks like a velociraptor. But for those of us stuck in an urban or suburban environment, a big square target is far more practical, and stores easier. What I wanted was the toughest and longest lasting broadhead target on the market. Practicing with what you are going to use is the key to success, and I intend to bring it to the hogs down here. And for that I needed to bend some bow limbs and shoot some arrows.

Make that a lot of arrows.

The beauty of Al Gore's Internet is that almost everything is on it. You want to know something, it is probably on the Net. Bowhunting argets are no different. After doing my research, I narrowed in on the King Broadhead Target by Whitetail Deer Inc. I needed something that could withstand repeated strikes with a broadhead and not disintegrate. It needs to absorb all the shooting I intend to do until such time as I get back in shooting shape.

"I will not trade a penny of profit for a customer's satisfaction. Our broadhead targets will out perform any open layer target when shot with broadheads...period."

Ralph @ American Whitetail Inc

That's the kind of thing I like to see. Performance and customer satisfaction before profits.

The King series is designed around a "Multi Layer Density" system. The target is built up from different density layers of foam to create a variable ratio of friction through the target.

The first layer consists of a layer of low density foam on the front. The soft foam is chosen for superior healing properties. The second layer is a medium density layer chosen for its ability to soak up energy and slow the rate of the arrows travel. Both of those layers back up to a layer of high density foam. As the broadhead penetrates and drives through the low and medium density foam, the arrow's energy is absorbed, resulting in far less penetration of the high density foam which ultimately stops the arrow. This results in a very durable target and easier arrow removal.

Whitetail Deer Inc wanted to"build a target that would stop any broadhead shot out of any bow, have unbelievable durability and smooth, easy broadhead arrow removal." I think they have done an exemplary job in putting together a target for bowhunters that performs exceptionally well at a very reasonable price.

I used both the Browning Cobra which draws 45# and my new SiegeWorks Creations American Longbow that draws #50 on the King. I'm using my new Muzzy Phantom MX broadheads which, by the way, I'll be reporting on in the near future.

I found that, as expected, field points where substantially more difficult to remove. Broadheads came out with considerably less effort. Having only shot about thirty arrows in a half dozen days at the target, I haven't had an opportunity to see how the long term effects of shooting broadheads at the target will be, but I am keeping a log for future comments.

If you plan on shooting field points, then you will have to get an arrow lube like PSE Scorpion Venom Arrow Release Fluid. It is formulated to allow the easy removal of arrows from targets. I ave not tried it, but the commentaries I have read are positive. I think it was originally developed for 3D targets. Think about it; that arrow shaft must be building up quite a bit of heat as it slows down in the target material. The lube helps defeat the grip of the material on the arrow.

There is one more thing. The good folks at American Whitetail Inc. have a weekly drawing for one of their targets, all you have to do is register.

That's right! Every week, American Whitetail Targets will give away a broadhead target. The give away is open to all US residents. To register, simply fill out the form at their website (Here) with your information. (In the notes section you could put down that you saw it here at The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles...)

So enter, it's free, and give it a shot!

King Broadhead Target
MSRP: $36.95

American Whitetail Inc.
Box 299
Ferdinand, Indiana
47532
Ph. 1-888-233-1976
Fax 1-812-937-4157
Email: Tammy@archerytargets.com

There is a pretty good video on YouTube on the King Broadhead Target

As you can see, the King Target takes a licking and keeps on stopping arrows.

"I can wholeheartedly recommend the Whitetail Inc King Broadhead Target without reservation. It is a well made target, made of quality materials, here in the USA, by bowhunters, for bowhunters. The price is very reasonable and it works as advertised. That my friends, is a good American deal!"

Albert A Rasch
The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles

Factual table

2009-08-27T19:03:00.001-04:00

Gator Hunting Class is in Session

2009-08-14T15:26:00.000-04:00

Bubby and Ethan
Go to Gator Hunting School

$g&m f9bd 45kd q!?5.
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission is holding a series of classes on Alligator hunting. Bubby and his best friend Ethan accompanied me to the classes today and we had a pretty good time. There were several vendors of assorted gator hunting equipment, a really neat taxidermy outfit, and several guides.

We learned a few things, though the truth be told, Bubby and I have already caught our fair share of alligators and relocated them. We figured out early on that the end with the pointy teeth should be avoided at all costs. The course covered the legal issues, CITES tags, permits, licenses, permitted hunting gear, and hunting times.

Ethan (left) and Blake study a cleaned alligator skull

There were several learning aids available for perusal. The boys naturally gravitated towards anything dangerous, assiduously avoiding written material that might require reading.

Ethan: What if you sat on this by accident?
Bubby: What if I stuck it in your leg?
Ethan: Cool!
Dad: Put the Damn Thing Down, NOW!

Naturally, I kept a close eye on them for fear of having to carve a barbed head out of someone's leg. Certainly it would add a whole new level of entertainment to the show, but I would just as soon be an observer for the day.

Awesome Coffee Table

Captain Eddie Vitale of Bad to the Bone Taxidermy was there showing off his wares. I was very impressed with the technical quality of work, and the artistic level of execution. Unfortunately the pictures I took do not do his work any justice. Really top notch work.

And in case you are wondering, the Mrs said, not just no, but "...over my dead body no you can't get that coffee table." And she meant my body not hers. I'm not sure how that works ...

Really Nice Diorama of a Gator and Two Shoats

Uhhh... Dad?

You truly can choke on a chicken...

All in all we had a really good time. Both the boys are interested in at least experiencing a gator hunt, and I am all for the adventure!

I'm going to have to get with my buddy Todd Hill at Primitive Point and see about getting a proper hand forged barbed spear head. I guess we'll have to build another pirogue, and learn to stand up in them. I'm getting excited just thinking about it. And the boys, if we survive or at least make it back with most of our pieces intact, well they'll have stories to tell the rest of their lives. You can't beat that with a long stick!

Now, if I can only get SBW here...

Regards,
Albert A Rasch
Member: Hunting Sportsmen of the United States HSUS (Let 'em sue me.)
The Hunt Continues...

July Outdoor Blogger Link Rally

2009-07-25T00:13:00.001-04:00

Great Outdoor Links from Outdoor Bloggers

Rick K. at Whitetail Woods sends us this popular How-To: An Inexpensive Gravity Deer or Hog Feeder.

Julia, the Mother Hen at Henhouse Pottery, feeds her family, raises chickens, and throws clay on her homestead. She sends a great Q&A about chicken poop, compost, Raku firing, and common sense in her post "Raku, Chickens, and Compost."

Snakes and their identification are on Wild Ed's mind on his Texas Snake Roundup, where Ed helps us identify snakes that reside in his home state of Texas. Wild Ed has lots of great posts on Texas fauna on a regular basis as in Proof is in the Pictures.

Our fearless correspondent from Tennessee, Gabe over at EnviroCapitalist, likes his frog legs fresh, and goes about it with relish. Get into it with Gigging!

The Black Rabbit is a knife maker and by golly a good one at that! He has a two parter on making knives that is really a treat! Utility Knife Step-by-step: Part 1 and Utility Knife Step-by-step: Part 2.

The truth is that Hunts Like a Girl at Scent Free Lip Gloss is so cute that I'm embarrassed to go to her website. I worry her husband will see me looking at her posts, figure I'm oggleing her, and then beat the bejeebers outta me. A Diffent Kind of Bull and Lanterns and Poop Chairs are her choice for a good read!

And RKL sends us a travelogue from his trip to Ostia Antica the port city of Ancient Rome. The mosaics are truly breath taking when you consider just how long they've been there!

Scott over at Nebraska Hunting Outfitters has put together a couple of great FAQs on what to expect when turkey hunting Part I and Part II

I found this one on Phillip Loughlin's blog The Hog Blog. Phillip comments on our High Fence discussion with great accuracy, perception, and logic. A must read! Hunting Ethics VS Logical Debate

Albert at The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles and The Range Reviews: Tactical, did some post-graduate schooling on Real Men Hunt.

Don't forget to add a link or two when you get this yourself!

The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles: The Outfitter Chronicles: J Scott Croner Part I

2009-07-24T13:09:00.000-04:00

The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles: The Outfitter Chronicles: J Scott Croner Part I

Outfitter Chronicles: J Scott Croner

2009-07-22T12:22:00.000-04:00

The Outfitters Chronicles: An Interview with J Scott Croner
And Nebraska Hunting Company

$g&m f9bd 45kd q!?5.
Folks, hello and good hunting to you, this is Albert A Rasch of The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles. Today we are starting a new series “The Outfitters Chronicles” interviewing Outfitters and Guides as only the Chronicles can.

Our first official interview is with J Scott Croner of Nebraska Hunting Company. I recorded this over the phone and the only editing done was getting rid of my “uhhhhs,” "Hold Ons," and awkward pauses as I shoved the cat out of my way any number of times. I really need an office…

TROC: First off Scott, I would like to thank you for extending me the opportunity to interview you. I hope you’re not too nervous. I am.

JSC: No Albert, I’m fine. I have been looking forward to the opportunity to reach out to all your readers and talk about Nebraska Hunting Company and some of the issues you have been contending with.

TROC: Well let’s just start right there. Readers, as you know many posts from The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles and Outdoor Bloggers Summit were plagiarized and placed on several aggregator sites. Scott, how did you become aware of it?

JSC: Well Albert, in June when you and I met, Jesse of Jesse's Hunting and Outdoors had called me to tell me what was going on with the Outdoor Bloggers Summit people. When Mark started his on-line assault on me back in April of 2005, I contacted Jesse because we had worked together when Osterholt was at it before.

TROC: Why did you want to get in touch with me and TROC?

JSC: When I went on your Blog, TROC, I was really surprised by the great writing and stories I found there. Really, and I mean this sincerely, you are a great writer!

TROC: Jeez… Enough already! I mean don’t get me wrong…

JSC: No, you do a great job at writing about the outdoors. Anyway through Mike Riddle of Native Hunt, I was able to at least get a message to you. At first I wanted to warn you about the plagiarizer Mark Osterholt. But by the time I got to talk to you, you were already tearing up the Internet looking for him.

TROC: Yeah, I waste no time…

JSC: When I did speak to you, I felt like finally someone else was willing to take on Osterholt besides me. And as I told you I have had my fair share of run-ins with him, as has Jesse over at JHO.

TROC: Tell us about it, and tell us about him.

JSC: I got started in the outfitting business in 2003. I decided that I would try to make a living out of something I really loved and enjoyed and that is to get outdoors and have fun with friends and family. I had very little experience on the internet and none in the marketing aspect of it. I received an email from Osterholt offering mass emails to hunters and fisherman. I also needed a website designed so he put me with Bluewire Studios from Seattle, WA. We cut a deal and I forwarded $1000.00 to Osterholt and his company Internet Concepts. Osterholt was suppose to forward part of the $1000.00 I sent him to them to get started on the new website. I was in touch with Bluewire on a number of occasions while they got started designing my new website. It didn’t take long for both Bluewire and I to figure out that Osterholt was running a scam. Neither Bluewire nor I ever got anything from that $1000! That’s when Mark and I started to go head to head.

TROC: Scott as I mentioned before we started, I did my research and checked everything to the best of my ability. A couple of other things came up at about the same time right?

JSC: Well Albert, I was getting a real lesson in internet marketing and decided to put it to use. I did work for some real estate companies. Long and the short of that is that I got into legal trouble on some technical issues that proceeded to get worse before it got straightened out.

TROC: How bad?

JSC: The real Estate lawsuits were filed because another realtor and I were using an URL to promote her. We informed the parent realtor company that we were doing it within the Real Estate Commission laws however they wanted us to stop. I got a little cocky and we said no, as we were completely within our legal rights. They said it was a trade name violation and filed a lawsuit. The odd thing was that the agent worked for the company, but the URL’s were registered in my name. I believe that the problem was that we out-marketed their marketing company. It was a typical business lawsuit, we turned over all the domains and promised to never use them again. There was NO money paid out.

TROC: During my research I also found this case in particular. There are harassment orders that were then dismissed when everything else was worked out, correct?

JSC: Yes that is right. Like many things in life it started out as a misunderstanding and escalated. I still have a counter-harassment order in place in Douglas County Nebraska to prevent the other individual from bothering me. The person that I was in business with kept receiving phone calls, anonymous emails, and mail. We were trying to come to an agreement to sell the business and she thought that I was somehow involved. After a lot of legwork and a few thousand dollars my name was cleared and we found out that Mark Osterholt was behind much of this.

TROC: That SOB! Here you are embroiled in a business issue, and he uses the information, puts a twist on it, and tries to blackmail you!

JSC: Yes that’s right Albert; I can’t tell you how many nights I’ve stayed up thinking about how Mark Osterholt has tried to use it against me repeatedly!

TROC: Let’s move on to Osterholt. How the hell did you get involved with that lowlife?

JSC: As I mentioned before, Mark Olsterholt and his companies Outdoor Concepts of Las Vegas, NV and Internet Concepts of Aloha, Oregon was presented as a marketing and advertisement firm. Mark is quite convincing…

TROC: A confidence man!

JSC: Right. I thought at first that he was straight up and a legitimate businessman. Boy was I wrong!

JSC: When I called him on the carpet about his scamming me, he started the Nebraskahuntingscam.com website to try and discredit me and ruin my business.

TROC: Hold on Scott. I’ve seen the site and it has some pretty damning information. We have already covered some of it, but how about this client that you allegedly took advantage of.

Joseph Jackson was a client that booked a hunt. When he did book a hunt his first check bounced. I have copies of it, by the way. He would NOT get up to hunt on any morning and was NOT in shape to get in an elevated tree stand. However, I did make him an offer to come back and hunt again at NO charge. His cabin was NOT burglarized at all and NO police report was filed.

(Albert’s Note: For everyone’s information I have had a series of web gurus do some forensic investigations. Interestingly enough the correspondence by “Joe Jackson” originated from Portland, Oregon. The IP # used in that correspondence is identical to, you guessed it, Mark Osterholt's.)

TROC: Ok Scott that’s enough of Osterholt. Look I have been personally investigating Mark Osterholt and besides the fact that he is a known plagiarizer, he is also a convicted animal abuser. He has a terrible reputation on many hunting, fishing, and hockey forums and BBS’s…

JSC: He (Osterholt) just takes advantage of everyone he comes in contact with, and the sad part, is that he really is pretty smart at the marketing aspects, he just can’t seem to stop from trying to scam people. As you are aware, he has scammed Willie A. Vermaak of African Feather, Fur and Scale out of a substantial sum, and Osterholt’s former “roommate” had her identity stolen and several credit cards run up in her name. It is currently under investigation.

TROC: Scott it seems you just had a streak of bad luck exacerbated by Osterholt’s scams and interference.

Personally I am glad he crossed my path.

Scott let’s take a break and come back to talk hunting, outfitting and your competitive tri-athlete hobby.

Folks, Part II will be posted tomorrow. I have to say that this was quite a fun and enjoyable. I'm looking forward to doing more of them in the future and I do have another lined up already.

Hunting Trophy Fallow Deer

2009-07-19T22:53:00.000-04:00

Trophy Fallow Deer Hunting

Image Credit: Matt Burrard-Lucas

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Image Credit: Stuart
At one time, way in the distant past, even before my dad was born, the Fallow deer was native to most of Europe. An important food source for sabre tooth cats and other toothy predators, the Fallow deer was even appreciated by the fur wearing, spear wielding, deer hunting, Palaeolithic man for the tasty, low fat, and tender venison. But as the glaciers receded (or was it advanced?) and areas became more arid, their range became restricted to the Middle East, parts of the Mediterranean, and Persia. Palaeolithic man shifted his diet to include more of the other white meat, Eurasian wild boar, to compensate. But we will pick up that thread later.

Easily tamed, it was the ever practical Romans that sensibly reintroduced them to the various parts of their far flung Empire. Even Great Britain was stocked with Fallow deer by those clever Romans. The Celts thought it a grand idea too! Unfortunately the Romans didn't quite make it to the North American continent, so it was only recently that Fallow deer arrived on our shores. Ranches like Native Hunt in Monterey, California have been stocking and breeding Fallow deer for many years.

Fallow deer prefer to graze on grasses in open areas, but they do like wooded and shrubby areas to shelter in. Winter browse consist of the same woody brush and trees they shelter in. Weather plays an important part in the overall health of the deer and quality of the buck's antlers. Good spring weather followed by a summer with occasional precipitation that creates quality browse and grazing conditions will promote big bodies and maximum antler growth.

Image Credit: oggywaffler

Admired by many for their impressive palmate antlers, fallow deer bucks are a must have mount for any hunter, exotic or otherwise. The Fallow bucks start, like most deer, with "spike" antlers during their first year. For the first three to four years, their head gear consists of primarily a main beam with points similar in shape to a mini elk but without the graceful curves. Depending on genetics and nutrition, at about three to four years of age the bucks start to develop palmations. Some have narrow longer palmations, while others grow deep, wide palmations. Trophy Fallow deer antlers are broadly palmated with several small tines. An exceptional set of antlers will measure in excess of 28 inches in length with an inside span of at least 24 inches.

They are relatively small bodied. An adult male Fallow Deer stands between 32 and 48 inches high at the shoulder and can weigh upwards of 200 pounds. They also exhibit a wide variety of colors,When I asked Mike at Native Hunt about the differnet colors available he said their Fallow deer come in a beautiful white, a warm chocolate, and the spotted variety.

Image Credit: alesimba
Hunting trophy Fallow deer is not for the sedentary or armchair hunter. The terrain can vary from sun baked scrub, to brush choked ravines, making the physical challenge one to remember. There are hunts of course that are less physically demanding, just ask your outfitter for the different opportunities available.

Rifles can be on the light side; anything from a 24 caliber on up is more than adequate. I would suggest a lightweight 243 Winchester, a 6.5X55 Swede, or a 257 Roberts. Of course if all you have is a 308 or 30/06 then by all means bring that! If you are going to hunt wild boars at the same time, then perhaps the 30 calibers would be prudent. The range that they are shot at can vary substantially, so check with your outfitter to determine the conditions you are likely to face, and what they recommend.

My good friend Mike Riddle at Native Hunt has been managing several herds of Fallow deer on his properties for many years. He has SCI Gold Medal Fallow deer that you will be proud to hang on your wall. But even the management deer are trophies in their own right.

"At Native Hunt, we focus on providing guests with absolute Tier I service. Our goal since we began operation in 1990 is that guests should be able to spend their days in the rugged outdoors hunting exotic game or exploring the property with one of our adventure tours, yet still be provided with great comfort and luxury in the wilderness. Native Hunt’s focus is entirely on the guest; giving them a memorable, successful hunting experience, while at the same time providing an extravagant retreat."

Mike Riddle, CEO Native Hunt

The Lodge

If you are considering a trophy hunt for Fallow deer, or perhaps a mixed bag of exotic game, give Native Hunt a call and book a hunt. Mike runs an exceptional operation that caters to his clients needs and desires. Native Hunt is a licensed, state-bonded, and insured hunting guide service. They have been in business since 1990 with ranches located in beautiful Monterey and Fresno counties. A hunt at Native Hunt will be a hunt to remember!

Native Hunt

Contact Native Hunt with any questions or to make reservations:
General Questions: info@nativehunt.com
Hunting Questions: hunts@nativehunt.com
Bookings: 408-837-0733
Or call toll free: 1-888-HUNT-321

Related Posts:
Fallow Deer

Nebraska Hunting Company: Merriam's Turkey

2009-07-13T15:41:00.001-04:00

© 2009 Albert A Rasch and
The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles
Merriam’s Turkey, Merriams Turkey Hunting, J Scott Croner, Nebraska Hunting Company, Nebraska Outfitters, wild turkey hunting, trophy turkey, neoga
While pecking away at the keyboard a couple of weeks ago I came upon fellow Outdoor Bloggers Summit member Scott Croner’s Blog, Nebraska Hunting Company. I meandered off to his company website NebraskaHunting.net, to see what it was all about. I am always curious what fellow bloggers do when they are not beating the keys off the keyboard. As it turns out, Scott is an outfitter based in Nebraska and covers several of the Midwest states in his pursuit of American big game, waterfowl, and turkey. Not only that, but we had some interesting acquaintances things in common, but more on that later.
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Scott has some great pictures of his clients on his website, and on the left hand side is a beautiful turkey that one of his clients harvested. Big turkey too, as far as I can tell.

But before I get into what caught my eye, I think a little bit of turkey talk information is in order! You would be surprised at how much there is to know! I certainly was.

There are two species and four subspecies of turkeys.

Eastern Photo Credit: WL McCoy
There’s the Eastern Wild Turkey. He’s your garden-variety turkey that you see all over the place except on opening day of turkey season, or for that matter the rest of it too. Since the eastern wild turkey ranges the farthest north, individuals can also grow to be among the largest of any of the subspecies. The adult male, can be as tall 4 feet (!) at maturity and weigh 20 pounds plus. As an aside, the turkey came in second as the bird of the National Seal. (They say Ben Franklin was besides himself when they told him the news! Legend has it he said, “$&!% that Jefferson!”)

Osceola Image Credit: CL Evans

These are my own hometown turkeys. The Osceola is named for the famous Seminole Chief, Osceola. They are a bit smaller than the eastern variety and live in the oak and palmetto hammocks where they thrive on palmetto bugs, acorns and palmetto berries, the slash pine woods, and the swampy habitats of Florida. (Basically everywhere else on the southern two thirds of the peninsula.)

Rio Grande Image Credit: TwoTom
The Rio Grande subspecies lives adjacent to what’s left of the Rio Grande. But they are found as far north as Kansas, usually by water. The Rio Grande turkeys are comparatively pale and copper colored, and they are awful long legged compared to their cousins; sort of like that redheaded girl in middle school that you were scared of.

Merriam's Image Credit: Alice Outwater

Further north still, and probably the handsomest (if you don’t include the fellows from south of the border), is the Merriam. This species is most at home in mountainous wooded regions, and it has been successfully stocked in areas far away from its original range in the southern mountains of Western America.

Gould's Image Credit: Ornitholoco
The Goulds, named after J. Gould who, I guess, discovered them in 1856 during his Mexican road trip in search of artisanal agave tequila. The Goulds are pretty rare at about 800 or so in the US, though a substantial population lives in Mexico. Arizona and New Mexico offer limited hunting opportunities for the Gould’s wild turkey, while stocking from Mexico continues to increase their numbers in the South Western US.

Ocellated Image Credit Real Turkeys

The prettiest of them all is the Ocellated turkeys. Both male and female ocellated turkeys have beautiful greenish-bronze iridescent feathers, but neither the male nor female have a beard. Their tails feathers have a blue spot that terminates in orange at the ends, and the head and neck is also pale blue with bright orange warts. They live in the tropical forests on the Yucatan Peninsula in southeastern Mexico. They are truly a remarkable and beautiful bird.

Now I have always known turkey hunters to be a little obsessed. Box calls, slate calls, glass calls, owl hooters (Hooters? Who knew?), camouflage, gilliesuits, blinds, special chokes, shotguns, kneepads, and shells in different lengths, sizes colors and loads. And that doesn’t include the turkey bowhunters!

I had no idea how far the turkey madness went.

Curiosity peaked more than was probably good for me, I found the National Wild Turkey Federation website. Much to my delight it was a virtual warehouse of information, chuck full of all sorts of turkey stuff. Single-handedly, they have managed to complicate the relatively simple idea of killing a turkey, and elevated into well nigh an art form. I was entranced and enthralled by it immediately.

It was getting late when I was reading all this, when I came to the “Slam” page. I assumed that this was the recipe page where turkey, egg, and pancake met. But much to my surprise and glee what I found was the Holy Grail of turkey hunting aficionados. The Slams my friends, are the different levels of madness that one can attain by hunting the different subspecies of turkeys! And you get a certificate (Suitable for framing!) commemorating the event and a pin for your lapel! All that is required is membership in the National Wild Turkey Federation , and the turkeys.

These are the Slams that NWTF awards:

Grand Slams consists of the Eastern, Rio Grande, Merriam's and Osceola (Florida) birds
Royal Slams is the four subspecies listed above in addition to the Gould's bird
World Slams include all five subspecies listed above in addition to the Ocellated wild turkey
The Mexican Slam consists of the following birds harvested in Mexico only: Rio Grande, Gould's and Ocellated. Of course you are required to survive the experience. No posthumous awards issued.
The Canadian Slam consists of harvesting the Eastern and Merriam's bird in the following provinces: Ontario, Quebec, Manitoba, Alberta or British Columbia, and then serving them with bacon.

Unlike many other feats of huntsmanship, like hunting Marco Polo sheep, this one is a relatively attainable goal. The NWTF maintains records of the registered turkeys, and when you complete a NWTF Slam you receive a slam certificate for each slam you complete, you receive the distinctive wild turkey record slam pin for each of your slams and they put you up on their Slam Website! And more importantly you do not have to kill all the turkeys in the same year. So this allows you to plan a great adventure far into the future with your family members or friends. That’s just Slamming!

So of course now I am all crazy about getting turkeys. I have always been interested, but now… I’m obsessed… must get calls…must get more camo…

Sorry, lost my train of thought. Phew! It’s worse than I thought.

Well this brings me back to Scott and Nebraska Hunting Company. While kicking around his site I saw a fascinating turkey. During the 2009 spring turkey hunt, one of Scott’s clients, Mr. Todd Ried, harvested a melanistic or black color phase Merriam’s turkey! As you can tell the turkey is almost completely black, a fascinating and exceptional trophy indeed! Not only is the Merriam one of the lesser-harvested turkeys, but to get one in a color phase is just unbelievable.

Todd Ried with his all-black melanistic Merriam's trophy!

Melanistic mutations occur in almost all creatures from fish to humans. It is much like albinism but not as hazardous to the animal’s health as being all white in the dark green woods! Birds in particular have several other color mutations that can occur, including blue, yellow, and red. Red, or more appropriately copper or rust, is occasionally seen in turkeys.

I want one. In a full mount, flying, so I can take up even more room in our miniscule apartment!

Tom H., Scott C., & Warren P.
I called Scott up to inquire about his turkey hunting concessions (leases) and the general availability and the possibility of collecting a Merriam’s. Scott “Turkey Man” Croner told me of this past season, and I am not kidding you, I was taken aback by his success ratio. I have read and talked with enough hunters to know how difficult turkey hunting can be. I have to admit I was a little skeptical, but after checking his references and talking to several people, I have concluded that he is a very talented and his concessions fantastic! Having good concessions is very important. Good concessions have good habitat and that is what makes or breaks a turkey population.

I called Scott back and we did a phone interview, a TROC first by the way, which will appear in the near future. I have been so impressed by his good character, integrity, and know how, that I will definitely be booking with him when the time comes for me to collect my Merriam’s.

…and the Snow goose.

The turkey is going to need some company.

Contacts:
J Scott Croner
Nebraska Hunting Company
Nebraska Hunting Company Merriam's Turkey Hunting
Mobile: 402.304.1192
Email: scott@nebraskahunting.net

Regards,
Albert A Rasch
Member: Hunting Sportsmen of the United States HSUS
The Hunt Continues...

First Aid for Hunters and Hunting

2009-06-20T13:46:00.000-04:00

First Aid for Hunting Sportsmen

Being prepared before you go out can mean the difference between an incident of minor discomfort, or a full fledged emergency.

You should have a modestly stocked first aid kit in your vehicle at all times, and you should have a pocket kit that goes with you whenever you go out in the field.

Think about what you are doing and then adapt and modify your personal rig for the circumstances. I live in Florida, and hunt around palmetto with its sharp teeth, sawgrass with its sharp edges, and wait-a-minute vines with their sharp thorns. I also have to contend with the fire ants, wasps, rattlers and cottonmouths. I don’t worry too much about them, but I get a lot of cuts and nicks. Now I’m not a big fussy type and most of the time I ignore the cuts and nicks. What I worry about are the deep slices and stabs I occasionally get from foolish mistakes I make, along with sprains to the knee or ankle. If you live up north then you might have different concerns, as would someone out west.

In your personal kit you should have:

* Ibuprofen, Aspirin and Benadryl.
* A cravat
* A couple of cloth bandaids
* Space blanket
* 20 feet of paracord
* A couple of yard size trash bags
* One freezer grade zip-loc bag.

Ibuprofen, aspirin and Benadryl. The Ibuprofen to help minimize inflammation and the Benadryl to counteract any allergic reactions. Aspirin for us older guys, just in case. Keep them in a 35mm film container, or buy one of those little packs they sell at the register and put three or four of each in the container..
A cravat - very helpful in plugging holes or holding pieces of you in place .The cravat makes a sling, bandage, eye cover, head cover, charcoal filter, pot holder, you name it. I consider it indispensible.
A couple of cloth bandaids, preferably the knuckle type. Cloth bandaids hold better and the knuckle ones work on every part of the body from fingertips to your rear end.
Space blanket. Just in case and it serves a dozen purposes from an emergency shelter to a signaling device.
20 feet of paracord. Splints, tiedowns, tourniquet, laces, lashing things together.
A couple of yard size trash bags. Those large yard trashbags can be made into emergency waders, raincoat, water hauler, bandage cover, or additional shelter.

That will all fit in a freezer grade zip-loc, and cover 95% of the injuries you might sustain.

Your vehicle kit should be a little more involved. Remember, your main purpose is to treat minor boo-boos, not perform surgery. Should you run into circumstances beyond your abilities, fall back to basic life saving techniques, stabilize the injured party to the best of your ability and get medical help at once!

The vehicle first aid kit should have back-ups of what is in your pocket kit plus:

A dozen bandaids, again the cloth ones
Antiseptic spray or liquid
Antibiotic cream
Self adhesive stretch tape. Totally great stuff!
A half dozen sterile 3X3 or 4X4 pads
Tweezers
Space blanket
Latex gloves
Insect repellent
Lidocaine or pain relief spray
Pack of single edge razor blades
Butane lighter
Duct tape or 100MPH tape

I recommend the addition of a Tac-Pack QC. In it is everything that you might need for a serious penetrating injury. And in this day and age it is an important lifesaving tool that you may be called upon to use in an emergency. Tactical Medical Packs(1-800-892-2801) will be coming out with a Hunter-Pack soon, which is very similar to the Tac-Pac QC. Again, as I frequently say, it is cheap insurance!

There is also a very good PDF Tutorial by Dr. Maurizio A. Miglietta:

Trauma and Gunshot wounds: What you need to know to save a life.

Image Credit: RedCross GGR

It's very important that when you have an opportunity to attend a first aid class, you do so without hesitation. Listen carefully, read the material given out, and practice your skills when possible. Occasionally refer to any good first aid manual to refresh your memory.

A simple first aid kit packed with essential items is of utmost importance. It's not often that you are going to be presented with a a minor injury, much less a life threatening injury, but being prepared will make the former easy to live with and the latter easier to live through!

Regards,
Albert A Rasch
Member: Hunting Sportsmen of the United States HSUS (Let 'em sue me.)
The Hunt Continues...

The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles wins Prestigous Award

2009-06-13T00:06:00.000-04:00

From The Rasch Outdoor Chronicles

Handfeeding a Baby Mockingbird

2009-05-07T22:47:00.000-04:00

Handfeeding a Baby Mockingbird and
Making Baby Bird Formula

Where is my supper!!!

About a week ago, Mom and Blake showed up after a bike ride with a little half fledged mockingbird.

I'm lost and confused! Where's my Mommy?

Both Blake and Mom know better than to immediately disturb, rescue, or otherwise interfere with any seemingly lost or abandoned animal. They had waited forty-five minutes observing the fledgling before deciding to intervene. So the long and the short of it is that I am charged with the well being and care of this little fellow.

I lined a small box with paper towels, added some tissue paper for fluff, and filled up a Crown Royal bag with rice for a heater. You can use a sock if that's convenient. Microwave the sock for a couple of minutes, and wrap it up in a dishtowel. Put that on one side of the box and the bird on the other. The warmth will seep from the rice, and keep the chick comfortable for a few hours at a time. Just use your judgment as to how much ventilation the box needs.

Mocking birds are probably one of the easiest birds to hand feed and raise. They are quick to learn and figure out within a day or two, that you are there to actually feed them, and not just pry their beaks open and stuff food down their crops.

The handfeeding formula for mocking birds is easy. One hard-boiled egg, the same amount of dried cat food, and half of the egg shell ground up. A stone mortar and pestle is great, but two spoons are good enough. Crunch the shell up to about sand grain size or smaller.

Soak the cat food into mush and mix it thoroughly with the egg. It should be crumbly not too mushy. Now, for variety you can add a little apple sauce, grated carrots, finely chopped cooked chicken, cooked ground beef, mashed grasshopper, wax worms, mealworms and anything else you think of to each serving. I would skip any dairy products even though some folks use it.

About time! Do you know what time it is?

Keep it refrigerated, and take out a little at a time. You need to warm it. You will kill the bird if you feed it cold! I use the microwave for about five seconds, and I stir it up with the tip of my finger very thoroughly. I make sure there are no hot spots that might burn the little fellow.

You may have to pry his little beak apart the first few times. Be gentle, be patient, and get help if you need it! After a few feedings, he'll get the idea and eagerly await your finger feeding. Invent a little three note whistle or sound that you use for feeding time. It lets him know you are going to feed him, and in the future he will respond to it, and if you are lucky, he will imitate it and respond to you, sometimes even calling to you!

Notice that my thumb and forefinger are sideways, and I place the food on his lower beak. When he closes his beak he gets the food.

Hurry up, will you!!!

We are fortunate that we have a screened in porch were he can stay.

Getting a little sun.

Feed him every two hours or so from sun-up to sundown. He'll let you know if you let it slip and he's hungry. Make sure he has a bowl of clean fresh water at all times.

A baking dish with some garden soil is a lot of fun for them, they scratch and poke around in it.

It takes a few weeks to bring him to maturity. I've always waited until their tails were good and long before I released them. At least this way I was certain that they could maneuver well, and avoid a small hawk or cat . They will usually stick around until late summer, usually coming down for a treat at the sound of your whistle.

Yeah right... We'll see about that... Don't you mean barring any "unforeseen" incidents?

Regards,
Albert A Rasch
The Hunt Continues...