Outdoor Adventure USA

Hunting started out as a fundamental need to provide food and fiber essential to sustaining life, and most beings were either directly or indirectly involved in the hunt, from tracking the game, to harvesting the game, to preparing the game for consumption or use, and to celebrating the harvest. Today, hunting is generally less fundamental to sustenance of the modern being, yet continues to be widely practiced throughout the modern world.

The net tonight is intended to talk about hunting in general, including who hunts, why they hunt, what they hunt, how they hunt, and where they hunt.

A series of Forum Polls will be used to help guide the discussion. You are encouraged to respond to the Forum Polls leading up to the Destination Hunting net.

Please take a moment during the net Check-In tonight to visit the five OAUSA hunting polls. You can use the links below to locate each poll. After answering a poll, return to this page and select the link to the next poll. Each poll takes about 30 seconds to complete and there are five of them.

Poll #1 - viewtopic.php?f=70&t=4335
Poll #2 - viewtopic.php?f=70&t=4334
Poll #3 - viewtopic.php?f=70&t=4333
Poll #4 - viewtopic.php?f=70&t=4332
Poll #5 - viewtopic.php?f=70&t=4331

Hunting in the United States
Who Hunts?

The demographics relative to hunting in the United States are showing significant changes, generally showing a decline in the number of individuals taking part in hunting. There does not appear to be a reliable count of hunters in the United States, but there are pretty good records of the number of hunting licenses issued, at least since the early 1960s. Granted, a single hunter may hold multiple hunting licenses each year, but let's assume that we can use hunting licenses as a surrogate indicator of the number of hunters in the US...and those numbers are in decline on a per capita basis.

There was a decline in the per capita number of hunters in 41 of 50 states.
Once population growth is factored in, some states showed net increases in the numbers of hunters.
Here's an overall summary of the changes in number of hunters in the US. The numbers go up and down by year, but clearly, the trend is towards a net decrease in hunters in the US despite increases in population. Note the general correlation between the rural population and the hunting population. https://www.outdoorlife.com/why-we-are- ... to-fix-it/

What are the demographics of the hunting population?

Hunters include both men and women, but the sport is predominately men. Women are now considered to be a critical demographic to bring into the sport, and that's great news for women as more and more gear manufacturers build gear specific to the needs of women, from firearms to clothing.
The participation rate in hunting tended to increase with age until individuals reached 65 years of age, and thereafter it declined. The age group that contributed the most hunters was the 55 to 64 years’ group.

Are you a hunter? Let's take a look at the OAUSA poll. viewtopic.php?f=70&t=4335

The question, "Why do you hunt?" seems to elicit a different answer from each hunter that answers. Discussions with many hunters and reading hunting blogs leads me to conclude that while the answers vary considerably, many of the answers can be categorized as follows:

• The Challenge;
• The Connection;
• The Harvest; and
• The Memory.

The Challenge
Most hunting is far from an easy slam dunk. My personal experience is that I harvest game in less that half of my hunting trips. The challenge to the hunt comes in several forms.

First, there is the challenge to plan and prepare for the hunt. Planning means figuring out what species you want to hunt, getting appropriate licenses and tags, arranging time off to travel and hunt, identifying legal hunting areas, and making sure you have all the gear you are going to need. Preparations usually include getting your gear and equipment ready, including sighting in your firearm or bow.

Second, there is the challenge of the hunt itself. Remember, the game one is hunting lives its entire life outside in the wilds, and the hunter is entering the game's domain. That can be dangerous if one is not prepared for the challenge of living outside the creature comforts of modern society. There is the challenge of finding signs of game activity, tracking the game sometimes for miles in rough terrain, and then positioning to intercept the game for the one-shot kill. There is the challenge of field navigation, reading the map and keeping track of your locations, otherwise you might stumble onto private land or restricted, no hunting areas.

Third, if you are both lucky and skilled and take an animal, there is then the challenge of retrieving the game and initial field processing, and then the challenge of getting the harvest back home for final processing. This might mean first linking up with an approved observer to validate the harvest and the tag, perhaps done at a fire station, courthouse, or ranger station. Then, unless you are ready to process perhaps hundreds of pounds of meat, there is the challenge of getting the game aged, butchered, packaged, and frozen.

The Connection
Hunting provides a unique opportunity to simply "connect." The connections may be with nature, yourself, your hunting partner, your equipment, or others.

My connection with hunting goes back to when I was a kid, and my dad would hunt with his uncles. By the time I was old enough to go along, dad's uncles got to old to hunt and dad stopped hunting (a family of six likely had something to do with that). Fast forward 1/3 of a lifetime, and one day my son decides he wants to go hunting. So late in life, I took up hunting as something to do with my son. And we've had some amazing experiences on our hunting trips together, connections that seemed richer and deeper than the many other things we do together. Later, my son and I together introduced his nephew and my grandson to hunting, which provided a sense of connection there as well.

A connection to nature is an huge part of the attraction to hunting. Being out in the hills, mountains, plains, woods, etc. well before sun up, watching the natural world come alive with the day is an amazing experience, as is being in the same places when the day turns into night. The smells a grass, of trees, the wetness of the vegetation, the sound of the stream, the whisper of the breeze, all seem to connect the dots on what's good in life.

The Harvest
While I have never had a bad hunting trip, for a majority of the hunting trips I take, the only meat I bring home is jerky from the roadside specialty jerky shops. I will admit however, that I do really like it when a hunting trip results in the harvest of game, whether it be a few quail, a few pheasant, a big wild pig, or a blacktail. I have been fortunate to be able to hunt enough to have been able to keep wild game of some sort in my deep freezer constantly for the last 15 or so years with consumption of some several times per month. While the birds go pretty quick due to the bag limits, bringing home a 250# wild pig or a nice blacktail provides for a nice full freezer and many pleasurable meals.

Wild game, properly, but simply prepared is nothing short of amazing, even when compared to grass fed or grain fed beef.

The Memory
Every hunting trip results in a memory. To facilitate the memories of my trips, I usually take a few photographs, and when game is harvested, I like to save the spent casing...just a look at the photos or spent casings brings back memories of the trip. Having hides tanned or having taxidermy done are other great ways to help one remember a great hunting trip. I still remember the hamburgers my son and I ate on both our first hunting trip.

So why do you hunt? Let's take a look at the OAUSA poll. viewtopic.php?f=70&t=4334

The United States has an amazing array of species available to the licensed hunter.

Big Game (e.g., Deer, Bear, Elk, Pronghorn, Antelope, Bighorn Sheep, Wild Pig)

Blacktail Deer Black Bear - From Dark Brown to Cinnamon Elk - California is blessed with three species of Elk: Rocky Mountain Elk, Tule Elk, and Roosevelt Elk (Good luck getting a tag!) Pronghorn / Antelope Bighorn Sheep Wild Pigs
Small Game Mammals (e.g., Tree Squirrels, Brush, Cottontail and Pigmy Rabbits, Hare, Jack Rabbits)

Tree Squirrel Brush Rabbit Cottontail Rabbit Jack Rabbit
Non Game Mammals (e.g., Coyote, Bobcat, Mountain Lion, Weasel, Skunk, Opossum, Moles, Rodents)
Coyote Bobcat Mountain Lion Exotics (e.g., Fallow Deer, Sambar Deer, Axis Deer, Sika Deer, Aoudad, Mouflon, Tahr)

Aoudad Axis Deer Sambar Deer
Upland Game Birds, a.k.a. Small Game Birds (e.g., Dove, Quail, Grouse, Snipe, Chukar, Pheasant, Turkey)

Turkey Pheasant Quail Chukar Snipe Waterfowl (e.g., Ducks, Geese)

Ducks Geese
Non Game Birds (e.g., English Sparrow, Starling, Domestic Pigeon, American Crow)

Starling Domestic Pigeon American Crow
What do you hunt? Let's take a look at the OAUSA poll. viewtopic.php?f=70&t=4333

Hunters can employ a wide range of hardware to accomplish their hunt:

• Long Guns,
• Hand Guns,
• Archery, and even
• Spears.

The responsible and ethical hunter will always bring sufficient hardware to the hunt to effectively and efficiently dispatch the game being pursued. Generally speaking, the bigger and more dangerous the game being pursued, the more powerful the hardware needs to be.

Classification of Game by Size and Hardiness

• Class 1: 50 pounds or less; rapid expansion or fragmenting bullets for small game, varmints and small predators, including squirrels, rabbits, marmots, coyotes, foxes, etc.
• Class 2: 51-300 pounds; controlled expansion bullets for thin skinned animals with light muscles and bones, including deer, antelope, sheep, goats, black bear and caribou.
• Class 3: 301-1,000 pounds; delayed, controlled expansion and deep penetration bullets; large framed, heavy animals with tough skin, heavy muscle tissue and large bones; elk, moose, zebra, kudu, eland and wild Texas long-horns.
• Class 4: Unlimited; controlled expansion or solid bullets designed for dangerous predators (leopard, lion and the great bears) and thick-skinned game, including Cape buffalo, hippo, rhino, elephant, wild water buffalo and American bison.

Generally Suitable Firearms by Game Classification

The Hornady Index of Terminal Standards (HITS) servers as a guide to choosing acceptable cartridges for hunting the three classes of big game animals. While there is no perfect system for estimating killing power, Hornady's system includes such factors as bullet weight, sectional density, ballistic coefficient and impact velocity at 100 yards to derive HITS ratings to estimate and compare the killing power of rifle cartridges and loads at that distance.

Keep in mind that a cartridge suitable for a certain class of game at 100 yards may not be suitable at a longer distance. Keep all shots within the sure kill range and stalk closer when necessary, rather than attempting a long range shot.

The HITS ratings are based on the use of modern, controlled expansion bullets suitable for the game in question. Varmint bullets, match bullets and military type full metal jacketed bullets are not big game hunting bullets and should never be used as such.

Adapted from work by Chuck Hawks: https://www.chuckhawks.com/restrictions ... g_game.htm

• Requirements for hunting all Class 1 game: Minimum calber, (0.172");
• Requirements for hunting all Class 2 game: Minimum caliber, 6mm (.243"); HITS rating 500-900
• Requirements for hunting all Class 3 game: Minimum caliber, 6.5mm (.264"); HITS rating 901-1500
• Requirements for hunting thick-skimmed Class 4 game: Minimum caliber, .33 (.338"); HITS rating over 1500

For Class 2 game, two popular deer cartridges and loads are the .243 Winchester shooting a 95 grain bullet at a muzzle velocity (MV) of 2950 fps and the .30-30 Winchester using a 150 grain bullet at 2390 fps. The HITS ratings for those two cartridges are 587 and 664 respectively, indicating they are adequate deer and antelope cartridges.

Compare those numbers to the 283 HITS rating of the .223 Remington shooting a 60 grain bullet at a MV of 3115 fps, or the .220 Swift shooting a 60 grain bullet at a MV of 3600 fps for a HITS rating of 328. You can see why even the most potent sub-.24 caliber cartridges should never be used to hunt big game.

For Class 3 game, .30-06 with a 180 grain bullet at a MV of 2700 fps scores 1215 HITS and the Hornady .45-70 factory load using the 325 grain FTX bullet at 2050 fps scores a similar 1242 HITS. These numbers are well above the 901 HITS lower limit for this class of game and both of these are proven elk and general Class 3 game calibers.

Conversely, the .25-06/117 grain bullet at 2990 fps scores only 814 HITS indicating that, although it is an excellent deer cartridge, it would be a poor choice for hunting Class 3 game.

For Class 4 game, the 9.3x62mm is about the minimum recommended cartridge when shooting a 286 grain bullet at 2360 fps, it scores 1863 HITS, comfortably above the required 100 yard HITS rating of 1501. The elephant busting .458 Winchester Magnum, launching a 500 grain bullet at a MV of 2140 fps, has a HITS rating of 3205.

How does your preferred catridge stack up? For detailed tables, subscribe to Chuck Hawks at https://www.chuckhawks.com/index2.guns.htm, it is a bargain.

What is your preferred hunting hardware? Let's take a look at the OAUSA Poll. viewtopic.php?f=70&t=4332

Hunting opportunities abound in the United States if you take the time to do your research.

Here's a generalized map of the United States that indicates notable hunting opportunities.
https://www.wideopenspaces.com/the-best ... tsman-map/


The United States has 2.3 billion acres of land, with about 985 million acres being public land. Unfortunately, much of this land is not open to hunting even if game species inhabit the area. Whether your intent is to hunt private land or public land, it is imperative that you know where you are at and that you are in a place where is is both legal to hunt and where you have permission to hunt. Fortunately, there are several helpful tools out there to help you make sure you are in the area that you have identified is appropriate for hunting.

The onX Hunt App draws from a huge database of maps and land ownership and ties in with GPS. https://www.onxmaps.com/hunt-app?gclid= ... gLKEvD_BwE

Where do you hunt? Let's take a look at the OAUSA Poll >>> viewtopic.php?f=70&t=4331

Even the most sure footed and steady marksman can sometimes use some support. Shooting Rests, a.k.a. Shooting Sticks can help the new or experienced hunter optimize their ability to make a better shot under a variety of conditions.

"As ethical hunters, we owe it to the animals we're pursuing to make the best shot possible. Using shooting sticks is a great way to do that."
John McAdams (https://www.wideopenspaces.com/author/john-mcadams/)

Primos Hunting has designed, manufactures, and sells a line of quick adjusting shooting sticks that can help the hunter improve shots. Primos Shooting Sticks are available from Primos at https://www.primos.com/shooting-sticks/, at Bass Pro Shops, Cabelas, and other outdoor gear retailers.

Mono-Pod Shooting Sticks feature one adjustable leg for support. $85.99 MSRP (Tall) Bi-Pod Shooting Sticks feature two adjustable legs for support. $138.99 MSRP (Tall) Tri-Pod Shooting Sticks feature three adjustable legs for support. $187.99 MSRP (Tall)

Product Spotlight

In light of this week’s topic I thought it would be interesting to highlight an outstanding product that is well suited to hunting pursuits. The product is the Edge Hunting Knife with a disposable razor blade style knife. When I first saw this knife I was skeptical. However, it is an outstanding solution for dressing game.

The one thing that can be very frustrating is trying to process game with a dull knife. For those that have ever caped an elk, deer or even pronghorn, know that even the sharpest knife can dull very quickly.
This Razor Blade knife is extremely sharp and holds its edge surprisingly well.

Here is a link to this very reasonably priced tool

https://www.basspro.com/shop/en/outdoor ... lade-knife

Mule Deer Hunting in North Dakota Badlands

These are a selection of pictures representing our mule deer hunting in the Badlands of North Dakota. I spend some time reviewing prior year to pull out pictures that represent various aspects of hunting. Just looking at the pictures inspired me. I wish I was there now. I have put in for the lottery. It had to be submitted by June 6th. Only 4% of the licenses are allocated for out of state hunters. But, I already have my airplane ticket. I am going even if I have to sit in the cabin and drink tequila because I didn't win a license in the lottery.

The pictures are in no particular order. I think they capture the ins and outs of a great hunting trip into some beautiful area.
Read the captions under the pictures.

Early checkin please.

PASSING ON THE HUNTING TRADITION

As with any tradition, the failure to pass it on to the next generation, usually means the end of the tradition. While it may seem like an easier task to keep the hunting tradition alive in rural areas, it just ain't necessarily so. If you are a hunter and are interested in seeing the tradition preserved, there is never a shortage of ways to make it happen. Yes, of course, its nice to be able to walk out your front door and be in hunting country, but for those who live in the city, there are excellent and very effective ways to get the family into the hunting lifestyle, with some terrific side benefits.

Since I can only speak for the success I have had, I offer the following, but make no mistake, there are a limitless number of other ways, all of which you need discover as the best for your "next generation." So, for me, when done properly, I have yet to meet a kid who who didn't really enjoy a shooting trip with dad or mom. Spend a day, or better yet. a weekend camping with the family, teaching them how to safely handle and shoot firearms. Invite them to go hunting with you. Let them be a part of the pre-season scouting trips. Teach them respect for the animals. Let them be a part of the meal preparation for the game you and they have bagged. invite your kid's friends (and their parents) to join you on your trips. AND, keep actual picture albums of the trips

For my next generation, I found that upland game was a terrific way to introduce young people to hunting. The age at which this happens depends entirely on their level of maturity, as well as how soon they can pass the necessary hunter's safety courses. Incidentally, along with all the fun of shooting and hunting must come the responsibility of cleaning the firearms after the shoot. Doing this "chore" is best performed as a joint effort involving child and parent (guardian, or responsible adult that hunted with them.) Spending quality time in the garage with your son or daughter, taking care of the tools of hunting, should be a part of the positive memories of growing up.

These hunters have all grown up, and still enjoy a well prepared meal of our favorite upland game.

THEN



NOW