From the Chair I hope this newsletter finds everyone healthy as we put 2020 in the rearview mirror and give our full attention to 2021. I also hope everyone had a successful hunting season by whatever measure you use. It’s hard to believe hunting season is already behind us and the hard water season is upon us. Where I come from “hard water” had a totally different meaning, who knew one could actually walk on water, drill a hole through it, and drop a line...Crazy! The New York chapter is ...

Together with Gerber, we’re proud to announce the winners of the 2020 Public Land Owner Photo Contest. With hundreds of images pouring in from across North America, the 2020 Public Land Owner Photo Contest was our most successful photo contest yet. The images submitted capture the spirit of our public lands and waters, the experiences we have on them, and will be essential in communicating the value of our wild landscapes to our representatives in office and the greater public. Four winners ...

The day before my “unplanned” hunt, I was at a customer’s Block Plant in Chattanooga.  My customer asked if I had my hunting gear with me.  “Yes sir!” I replied.  He said he would get someone to show me where their lease was so that I could hunt that afternoon and/or the next morning.  The place was flooded with tracks.  So much it looked like a velociraptor pen.  I finally started hearing a few gobbles before dark.  I had to step aside for a few minutes to record a “Strut Report” for the ...

April 25 – May 1, 2020 Oklahoma Me and my buddies’ adventures this spring would take us to Western Oklahoma for some hard-gobbling Rio Grande Turkeys.  Jacob was able to get out there a day before me and do a little scouting and was able to put eyes on at least one gobbler, but turkeys turned out to be scarce in those parts.  The afternoon I arrived, we worked a creek bottom nearby where Jacob had seen the tom, but we found no sign and heard zero gobbles.  The next morning, we switched ...

As the alarm was going off, I looked over at my buddies and said “We gotta find better hobbies. I mean who gets up a couple hours before daylight to go mess around in freezing temps. Hell, best case scenario we’re a long ways and downhill from the truck and have to drag dogs and a stinkin pig out….” We’d woken up many times before in the dark ready to go, from when we first met, as enlisted men. Just a couple Jarheads and a Corpsman ready to run through whatever came in front of us…   The ...