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21 Articles

SPRING INTO ACTION

As we nudge this spring 2023 issue off to press, there’s still snow on the ground and in the forecast for the next month. But our juices are flowing, and our minds are wandering to the sights, sounds and smells of the spring turkey woods, trout streams, big bass hotspots and camping adventures with good friends and family members. Ready to blast into spring? You’re in luck, because there’s a heavy “guns and hunting” slant to this issue with two modern turkey shotgun reviews, a big-bore test on Marlin’s newest 1895 Trapper lever gun, a Jill Easton story on hound-dogging bears in the Appalachians, plus Frank Jardim pulled double-time at the annual Shooting, Hunting & Outdoor Trade (SHOT) Show in Vegas to round up the newest muzzleloaders and gear. DIYers,…

SPRING INTO ACTION

SUNRISE SURPRISE

FRONTAL ASSAULT WHAT became known as the first attack on the Kentucky settlement of Boonesborough began at sunrise on Thursday, April 24, 1777. A few days earlier, Daniel Boone, founder of the wilderness settlement, had received word from Simon Kenton that an attack on the fort by a large war party of Shawnee raiders, who had crossed the Ohio River, was imminent. Daniel Goodman and another man had gone about 400 yards from the fort to drive in some horses and noticed that cows at the head of the lane had become quite cautious. At this time, they were fired upon by four or five tribesmen and were pursued to within 60 or 70 yards of the fort. Kenton and two hunters who had been standing at the gate rushed…

SUNRISE SURPRISE

TRACKING the SWAMP FOX

LATE IN 1780, AMERICA’S FIGHT FOR FREEDOM AGAINST THE BRITISH WAS A STRUGGLE ON LIFE SUPPORT. The glory days of 1776 and the Declaration of Independence had evolved into a long war. George Washington’s Continental Army was holding on in the northeastern colonies. But in Georgia and South Carolina, the critical ports of Savannah and Charleston had both fallen. Redcoat forces were pouring into the area to complete a grand plan of attacking to the north and trapping the Continental Army between northern and southern jaws. This was the moment that a Georgetown, South Carolina, farmer named Francis Marion was destined to write a new chapter in the American Revolution. In doing so, he would become the most-feared fighter of his time. After Charleston and Savannah were lost to the…

TRACKING the SWAMP FOX

A PERFECT STORM

IT HAPPENED TO ME It was a fall weekday. I had all my work finished by 9 a.m. and was itching to do something outdoors. The wind was swirling and not ideal for deer hunting, so I resisted the temptation to spoil my bow setup. I considered going squirrel hunting or to the shooting range but came up with reasons why it wasn’t the day for that, either. After pacing the house for 20 minutes, I finally arrived at the decision to hitch up my 14-foot Alumacraft and head to the lake for some solo bass fishing. After a stop at the gas station for ice, Reese’s cups and a hot dog, I pulled into the boat launch. To my surprise, the local fire department had one of…

A
PERFECT
STORM

French Frontiersmen

Today, many confuse the French terms coureur de bois and voyageur. In fact, the two are separate classes of people who were involved in the fur trade during different time periods. Coureur de bois was a French slang term that meant “woods runner.” It was applied with the same disdain that prohibition-era alcohol smugglers were called “bootleggers” and people who lived in the country were called “hillbillies.” This was not a term of endearment, and the men engaged in the fur trade at the time would not have called themselves by that derogatory name. These men would have called themselves commerçants de fourrures (“fur traders”). They were unlicensed, unregulated and penetrated the frontier during the period of about 1649 through 1681, with some accounts recording their presence into the early…

French Frontiersmen

WATER RIDES Kenneth Grahame wrote in The Wind in the Willows, “There is nothing, absolutely nothing, half so much fun as simply messing about in boats.” One of our ancient ancestors undoubtedly pulled themselves atop a floating log and invented one of the earliest watercraft. It still works. While on a raft trip in Costa Rica, I watched local kids with short balsa logs that they had modified by leveling the top side and inserting a stout peg in a hole drilled in the top of the front end. They were bravely going through Class III rapids by lying on the log and holding on to the peg for stability. Boats have long been the mode of travel for adventurers since they greatly multiply the weight that can be carried…

Artist images from James “Jim” Bowie’s September 1827 Vidalia Sandbar Fight wielding a knife that became famous as the bowie knife is the starting point of the Bowie legend—both the man and his weapon. The bowie knife arose from the need for a wearable, convenient close-quarters weapon that wasn’t as conspicuous as a sword. During Bowie’s time, pistols were notorious for misfiring, leaving their users in an awkward position in a close-range melee. The bowie-knife concept can be grasped as a user wanting a heavy, stout “short sword” of smaller length than the popular sabers of the day. Lists are always problematic. With that said, the goal for this article is to focus on multiple production bowie knives that best represent the original Bowie form. Custom bowies will not be…

BAGS OF WONDERS

ACCOUTREMENTS Centuries ago both American frontiersmen and Native Americans carried an outwardly unremarkable pouch on their bodies. This item, which varied in both size and design, served much different purposes for both groups. Often referred to as a medicine pouch or medicine bag for Native Americans and a hunting bag or bullet bag for the frontiersmen, this item was indispensable when it came to providing for very specific and very important needs for an individual. Here we describe the distinct individuals and groups that carried them consistently, exposing the mysterious contents of these versatile pouches of ages ago and exactly how they became such an integral part of their daily lives. For The Frontiersmen HUNTER’S BAG: For the frontiersmen, the hunter’s bag was usually created using heavy cloth, animal skin…

BAGS OF WONDERS

20-GAUGE TOMINATOR

It seems like every couple of seasons I have a gobbler that haunts me. As I write this, I’m preparing to head out the door again to try and kill an almost unkillable tom. This old paranoid limbhanger could be the love child of Pablo Escobar and Osama bin Laden. He seldom roosts in the same tree, won’t gobble at flyup and gobbles less and less every day. He’s in that maddening stage of only gobbling a couple of times a day and never from the same spot. As if the hunting wasn’t hard enough already, I decided to take things up a notch in difficulty by hunting with a 20 gauge. The past season’s turkey surprise was Weatherby’s new Element autoloader 20-gauge turkey gun. By the second week of…

20-GAUGE TOMINATOR

SHOTGUN TEST THE MOSSBERG 930 has been the go-to workhorse for many an outdoorsman and their kin for decades. Although rugged and affordable, it had plenty of room for improvement and made a terrific platform to start a line of purpose-built, semi-automatic shotguns. Mossberg started this work in 2020 with the introduction of the 940 JM Pro, a competition-geared revision that was a major hit to 3-gunners and anybody else who sought a lightning-fast shotgun that could go seemingly forever without a cleaning. This is a tough feat for a gas-operated gun and thus attracted attention from other types of gun owners, namely hunters. The 940 Pro Field was up next and delivered this crowd an all-black variant that was better suited for the rough service that hunting firearms are…

Game Bird Trifecta

Tired of chicken? So am I. I mean, chicken is OK, but it’s so—how to put this nicely—pedestrian. It just doesn’t inspire one to do something special. Now, game birds? That’s another story. There are all kinds of exotic recipes for pheasant, quail and partridge—like pheasant under glass, quail in aspic and partridge ballotine, to name a few. Here we’re going to use those same three upland birds but prepare them using recipes that, though simpler, still result in dishes that are fancy enough for the most special occasions. If you’re a hunter and happen to have any of these birds in your freezer, you’re in luck. If not, depending on where you live, you may be able to find any or all of these birds locally in supermarkets or…

Game Bird Trifecta

Modern Marlin Trapper

The lever-action rifle first appeared in 1855 as a product of Volcanic Repeating Arms. This evolved into the Henry lever gun, then the Model 1866 Winchester and on to the present day. It’s no great stretch to say that the lever-action rifle had a tremendous impact on taming the American Western Frontier. It was a state-of-the-art weapon when introduced for armed settlers, soldiers, hunters, lawmen, outlaws and just about anyone who needed a practical repeating long gun. In 1870, the Marlin Firearms Co. became the chief competitor of Winchester as a producer of lever-action rifles and carbines. Toward the end of the 19th Century, advances in lever-gun actions enabled them to chamber powerful cartridges like the .30-30 Winchester, .30-40 Krag and .45-70 Govt. In 1881, Marlin produced a successful lever-gun…

Modern Marlin Trapper

HOUND DOGGIN’ BEARS

The bear is puffing like a punch-drunk prizefighter. He’s tiring after a long run up a steep West Virginia mountain, looking to either side to find a strong tree. Black bears can run about 30 miles per hour uphill but aren’t meant to go fast for long. Close on his heels, big hounds attempt to nip the bear’s fast-moving haunches and get him to make the climb. Each hound’s hoarse, croupy bay or bark is different. The men listening below recognize individual dogs by their voices, but they also see each dog’s location on the Garmin GPS receiver. To bear hunters, a pack of full-throated hounds baying a bear on a cool, fall afternoon is more heart-shaking and thrilling than any music humans could create. “The dogs have him cornered,”…

HOUND DOGGIN’ BEARS

PRIMITIVE SKILLS The bow drill is an apparatus commonly used in the past by certain indigenous peoples to make fire. It consists of a bow and string (thong) using reciprocal motion to rapidly spin a wooden rod or drill on a hearth (fireboard). A bearing block (socket) is used to apply downward pressure on the drill as it spins in a hole on the hearth. A notch at the edge of the board connects to the hole and serves to gather the hot dust from drilling. Through friction, the resulting pile of dust eventually turns black and ignites, turning it into an ember (coal). This ember is then placed into tinder and blown into flame. Because of its mechanical advantage, the bow drill is especially suited to operating in damp,…

SQUARE LASHING IQ

My buddy Wade and I were trekking and doing some wild brook trout fishing along a rugged trail in the southern Appalachians when we spotted a primitive campsite. We noticed a small primitive table made from saplings and branches, but it wasn’t usable because whoever built it probably couldn’t tie their bootlaces, much less lash together a camp table. It looked as if it had been hastily assembled using several different types of knots and lashings, none of which seemed to keep it together when the weight of a couple of backpacking stoves, fuel containers and water bottles were set on it. Wade suggested that we set up our camp, then we’d see if we could save the table with a square lashing on the corners that would give it…

SQUARE LASHING IQ

BACKYARD FIREPIT

I don’t know if it’s the warmth, crackling sounds or mesmerizing flames, but I could sit around a firepit with friends or family—or even all alone—for hours upon hours. It sets the stage for the best stories to be told, but it also seemingly slows life down just a bit, giving you time to think and reminisce. A cooler stocked with ice-cold drinks and some tasty snacks or grilled food only add to the experience. But not all homes have a backyard firepit, and some that do just aren’t very inviting. That was the case with the last property my wife, Becca, and I lived at, as well as our current home property. Neither had an existing firepit, and that just doesn’t work for us. So, we made plans, then…

BACKYARD FIREPIT

FOREST FURNITURE

You don’t need to buy the latest expensive, super-duper lightweight alloy folding chair and table to have a comfortable camp. Nope—all you have to do is reach for your handy hatchet and some cord, and in no time, you can craft some very comfortable forest furniture for free. THE CAMP CHAIR i This chair is made of two A-configured sections, but the vertical ‘A’ is the main component. Be sure that the sticks and cord you choose are stout, as they need to bear considerable stress and weight. You don’t want the chair falling apart while you’re sitting in it. Find a 2- to 3-inch-diameter tree or two and chop them down. You’ll need four 50-inch pieces and two 42-inch pieces. I sourced the sticks from my woodshed, some green…

FOREST FURNITURE

Technology finds its way into everything that we do and, for the most part, makes it easier and more consistent. Take smoking meat, for example. The first time I’ve ever smoked something was over a smoldering campfire with a literal garbage-can lid to hold the smoke inside. I sat back, lit the biggest cigar I had and figured the food would be ready when I was down to the nub. After about three hours, we pulled that lid back and sank our teeth into what were accidentally some of the best ribs we’ve ever had. Since that day, I was hooked and, as such, have been seeking out ways to more conveniently smoke my favorite foods. At a cast and blast in Seadrift, Texas, I was introduced to the fanciest…

MUZZLE BLASTS MASH-UP

• BILL SMITH Scout Hunting Bag This 18th-century-patterned bag has three pockets and is lined with a separate layer of deer leather for durability. Hand-sewn with waxed linen thread, it has an adjustable 1.5-inch-wide leather strap with a hand-forged buckle attached with iron D-rings. Measuring 10 inches wide by 8 inches tall, the bag is made entirely by hand using processes and American-sourced materials true to the period between 1750 to 1840. The leather parts are cut one piece at a time, hand-punched and hand-stitched with durable welt-reinforced seams. The exterior of the scout bag shown here is made of buffalo leather with a walnut hull-dyed woven hemp fabric face on the body, but yours can be made from any combination of leathers or leather and fabric. The Scout comes…

MUZZLE BLASTS MASH-UP

North Dakota’s Fort Union

FRIDAY, APRIL 26, 1805: THE LEWIS AND CLARK CORPS OF DISCOVERY arrived at the confluence of the Missouri and Yellowstone Rivers near theh border of today’s North Dakota and Montana. Lewis wrote in his journal: “Capt. Clark…had fired on some buffaloe…of which they killed a cow and several calves, the latter are now fine veal…Having arrived at this long wished for spot,…we ordered a dram (of alcohol) to be issue to each person. This soon produced the fiddle.” (from The Journals of Lewis and Clark, edited by Bernard DeVoto, The Franklin Library) Oh to have been at that campfire! The captains later wrote that the confluence would be a good location for a trading fort. Thus, the idea of Fort Union was born. Consequently, the fort was built about three…

North Dakota’s Fort Union

GREAT WEAR FOR FRONTIERSWOMEN Here’s a hot tip for all AF dads to take to the bank… don’t try to pawn off your old hunting clothes on your teenage daughter. The same applies to your loving wife. When my daughter Sam decide d she was finally ready to spend some fro sty mornings in the deer woods last fal l, she did a bit of online recon and discov ered DSG Outerwear. “DSG” stands for Doing Something Great, which prompted her to dig deeper. The Breanna 2.0 Fle ece Pullover in Realtree’s Excape camo wowed her, as did the matching Breanna 2.0 Drop Seat Fleece Bib. “But Da d, I need some gloves, too,” she decried , so we added DSG’s D-Tech 2.0 Liner Glo ves. The gloves and the…

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