Outdoor Life

Hunting wild hogs is great fun, and it’s a popular pursuit in many places around the country. But wild pigs themselves are a real problem for native flora and fauna. This is precisely why hogs have become a nationwide concern as they reproduce in astounding numbers and find ways to thrive in new environments.

The Department of Interior announced yesterday that it has withdrawn approximately 225,504 acres of public lands in Minnesota’s Superior National Forest from federal mine leasing programs. This move by the Biden Administration effectively halts the proposed copper-nickel mine that Twin Metals has been trying to develop there, and it places a moratorium on all mining activity in the area for the next 20 years. Taken together, these moves represent the most significant protections to date for the Boundary Waters Canoe Wilderness Area and the surrounding watershed.

Colorado Parks and Wildlife put their miter saw to work in order to make an example of the lawless criminals who illegally kill wildlife. On Jan. 26, the Southeast Region office hacked apart an estimated $10,000 worth of rifles, shotguns, handguns, bows, and arrows. All were formerly used by poachers and confiscated. The agency filmed the destruction and posted it to Twitter with a message: poachers beware.

We may earn revenue from the products available on this page and participate in affiliate programs. Anyone who spends time in the outdoors is familiar with the layering dance: throw layers on, then take them off, unzip the pit vent, cinch the hood, repeat. It’s such a fact of life that hikers and backpackers don’t even pretend that they can get away with just one hiking jacket—we’re always talking about “layering systems.”

About a decade ago I was riding in a truck with an out-of-work Tlingit logger along a stretch of Chichagof Island’s hundreds of miles of logging roads. We were both contracted under a grant to help develop a potential bear-viewing area. While we drove, he reminisced about the days of the logging boom. He looked out on the walls of spindly, dead-looking, second-growth forest bordering the road.

We may earn revenue from the products available on this page and participate in affiliate programs. Red dots come with a lot of advantages and they’re being used more frequently on carry guns. This rise in popularity means that you have a lot of options when it comes to pistol red dots and they’re getting better each year. One new red dot on the market is the Holosun EPS Carry. It’s designed for compact and subcompact handguns, but it’s also at home on a shotgun or carbine—especially in an offset mount.

The New Mexico Department of Game and Fish captured a female Mexican wolf that strayed out of the recovery zone and traveled north of Interstate 40, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reported on Jan. 23. The Mexican Wolf Experimental Population Recovery Area (MWEPA) spans southern New Mexico and Arizona. The east-west interstate marks the northern boundary.

The National Deer Association released its annual report on the state of deer hunting in America this week, and one of the most interesting data points the NDA revealed is that 88 percent of whitetails killed in the Midwest, South, and Northeast are taken on private land. That means that...

It’s a rare case of hunter harassment when another hunter is doing the harassing. But in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, a public-land treestand dispute ended with one hunter falling 20 feet from his stand after another hunter cut the stand’s straps. Now, Thomas Steele III will spend 60 days in county jail after pleading guilty to misdemeanor hunter harassment and aggravated assault charges, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources reports.

We may earn revenue from the products available on this page and participate in affiliate programs. If your hard water gear needs an upgrade, we found great deals on some of the best ice fishing gear like Garmin LiveScope and the Eskimo Outbreak 650XD Ice Shelter. The best part is we also have reviews on many of the items on sale so you can read more about them before you make your decision.

We may earn revenue from the products available on this page and participate in affiliate programs. Thermal scopes aren’t cheap, but they are getting more affordable. To help them be a little more affordable, we found great deals on thermal scopes and monoculars. Sightmark SM18041 Wraith 4K Mini 2-16×32...

Last week a family in the Florida Keys was able to rescue their 22-year-old son after he was whisked away by powerful Gulf Stream currents and left stranded in the open ocean. The miraculous rescue of Dylan Gartenmayer was akin to finding a needle in a haystack, and his discovery made for a powerful and emotional reunion on the water. Priscilla Gartenmayer, Dylan’s cousin, recorded a video of that scene and shared it to TikTok, where it has been viewed thousands of times.

Although Canadian lynx are considered threatened or endangered in parts of the Lower 48, they have healthy populations in Canada and Alaska. These medium-sized wild felines are similar to bobcats, but with longer legs, larger feet, silvery fur, and unique ear tufts. The lynx is an icon of the North, and a super predator for its weight class. The lynx is built for killing, and it will take down game as large as caribou at times; something a trapper I know witnessed firsthand.

Cynthia Wiford struggles to get in a tree stand these days. She does it anyway, because deer hunting is her one true love (behind her family, of course). But when the 22-year-old Ohio hunter starts climbing the ladder, her stomach spins and she cries a little bit. Still, she pushes on.

“IT’S ALL BURNED UP,” Chad Hewitt shouts over the Beaver’s roar, briefly lifting one hand off the flight controls to wave across a blackened expanse. “Everything’s gone.”. I try yelling a question from the second-row seat, but my voice is lost in the drone of...

AS THE FINAL HOLDOUT state to maintain a flintlock-specific muzzleloader season, Pennsylvania’s big woods are full of tradition and smoke from the day after Christmas until the middle of January. It’s a season where modern tech like synthetic stocks and sabots clash with century-old rifles that rely on real flint and loose powder.

Utahns rejoice as snowfall continues to stack up across the Beehive State. Skiers and snowboarders celebrate the best conditions in 20 years. Those concerned about historic drought in the region look forward to some reprieve this spring and summer. But as the snow water equivalent (or depth of water that would cover the ground if the snow were melted) climbs 50 percent above the 30-year average, conditions in the northeastern part of the state could spell disaster for some of Utah’s grazing wildlife.

The Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources certified a massive alligator gar as a new state record last week. The huge gar was caught on Thanksgiving Day by Alabama angler Keith Dees, who was fishing with his 15-year-old son, Huntley, as part of their annual holiday outing on the water.

We may earn revenue from the products available on this page and participate in affiliate programs. The rise of satellite messengers might be one of the biggest changes in outdoor gear over the last decade. As the cost and weight of these devices came down, they’ve taken over as a must-have piece of safety gear for both serious adventurers and weekend warriors.

Across deer and elk country, almost all bucks and bulls will have dropped their antlers by mid- to late-March. So when the weather starts warming and the snows start melting, it’s time to get into the woods and start shed hunting. Put simply, shed hunting is about scouring the...