The best hunting buddies push you to go farther and work harder than you would on your own.
IT WAS HIS jackleg float tube that really drove me crazy. I’d bought a brand-new camo belly boat for duck hunting—one of the first models that involved more than a Cordura-covered truck-tire inner tube— and my buddy Lee Davis and I had scouted the perfect duck swamp to give belly-boat hunting a whirl. When Davis showed up in the dark, however, he toted a Beverly Hillbillies version of my ride. He’d lashed a sky-blue boat cushion into the donut hole of a used inner tube from an 18-wheeler.
“Really, dude?” I said. “I got up at three o’clock in the morning for this hunt, and you show up with a yard-sale boat?”
He just grinned and easily bore it. Davis was used to being chided for leaning on gumption rather than gear. “Man, you don’t need all that new stuff,” he’d say. “Just tough it out.”
Just tough it out. That was his refrain, year after year. Long after the rest of the world had shifted to polypropylene thermal underwear, Davis sported 100 percent cotton waffle weave, despite the fact they stank like a goat’s belly after a few hours of hunting. He looked like the lumberjack on those paper towel rolls. I had to have every new flashlight on the market, while Davis was happy with his Rayovac that ate D batteries like jerky snacks. His decoys were anchored with a mishmash of U-bolts and railroad spikes. I swear I remember him once tying a decoy line to a can of beanie weenies. I spent a lot of time with Davis, standing in the dark, shaking my head.
GEAR HACK
Denne historien er fra February - March 2018-utgaven av Field & Stream.
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Denne historien er fra February - March 2018-utgaven av Field & Stream.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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LIVING THE DREAM
After the author arrives in Maine’s fabled North Woods with a moose tag in his pocket, an adventure he’s been wanting to take his entire hunting life, reality sets in, and he learns a valuable lesson: Be careful what you wish for
Get the Drift
How to make an accurate windage call under pressure
First Sit
An icebreaker outing in a pristine spot produces the rut hunt of a lifetime
A Local Haunt
The author finds a sense of place in an overlooked creek, close to home
A Hop and a Pump
Jump-shooting rabbits with classic upland guns is about as good a time as you can have in the outdoors
Welcome TO camp
Is there any place better than a good hunting camp? It has everything: great food, games and pranks, and of course, hunting. Shoot, we don’t even mind going to camp for grueling work days in the summer. Here, our contributors share their favorite stories, traditions, and lessons learned from camps they’ve shared. So come on in and join us. The door’s open.
THE DEERSLAYERS
Before you even claim a bunk, you need to eyeball the hardware your buddies have brought. In the process, you’ll see that the guns at deer camp are changing. What was walnut and blued steel may now be Kevlar and carbon fiber. The 10 rifles featured here aren’t your father’s deer guns. They’re today’s new camp classics
THE JOURNEY TO PIKE'S PEAK
Last summer, the author and three friends ventured off the grid to a remote fish camp in Canada. They hoped for great fishing, but what they experienced was truly something else
Stage Directions
When early-season whitetails vanish from open feeding areas, follow this woods-edge ambush plan
Rookie Season
A pup’s first year, from preseason training to fall’s big show