Success At First Ice

Seaguar - Always the best

Throughout the Northland, intrepid anglers are taking their first tentative steps onto the frozen surfaces of pine-studded lakes, welcoming another season of hardwater fishing. After weeks of organizing tackle, sharpening auger blades, charging batteries, and spooling reels, holes are being cut, bites are being triggered, and fish tails are slapping the ice. With most of a tumultuous, uncertainty-filled calendar year now in the rearview mirror, the action-packed first ice period is finally upon us.

“The first weeks of fishable ice represent one of the truly exceptional hardwater opportunities during the winter months,” states Troy Peterson, a.k.a. ‘Mr. Bluegill’ — a full-time guide and hardwater specialist from eastern Wisconsin. “After a fall of scouting new lakes, organizing gear, and watching last year’s videos on YouTube, I’m more ready than ever to get on the ice — and shallow water panfish and walleye are at the top of my agenda.”

Seaguar

Panfish beckon to ice anglers all season long, and the first weeks of walkable ice cover witness some enormous crappies and sumo bluegills being extracted from the depths. You’ll find first ice panfish in two general locations: along the outside edges of remnant green weedbeds and suspended over the main basin of the lake, frequently in 25-35 feet of water. As winter progresses, those weedline fish will trend toward the basin or scatter over deep mudflats, although many lakes host a low-light weedline bite throughout the season.

Peterson notes that, “all of my panfish rods are spooled with 2 lb. test Seaguar IceX™. One of the first things you’ll notice about IceX™ is its extremely low memory — even in freezing temperatures — which means that it comes off the reel nice and straight, without that “slinky effect” that can happen with stiff, coiled line. The abrasion resistance of 100% fluorocarbon IceX™ means that I won’t have to worry about breaking off a giant bluegill as he spirals around beneath the ice and rubs my line against the edge of the hole. And of course, remember that fluorocarbon is a very low-stretch line which enhances its sensitivity, so you’ll feel more bites and catch more fish.”

Seaguar IceX

Captain Troy Peterson talks about Seaguar IceX™ Read more

Fishing

Boone and Crockett Club Launches Poach & Pay Research

MISSOULA, Mont.  – During the annual meeting of the National Assembly of Sportsmen’s Caucuses (NASC), the Boone and Crockett Club announced its plans to lead a long-term Poach & Pay anti-poaching campaign. Through Poach & Pay, the Club will work with state wildlife agencies, legislators, and the judicial system to improve the detection and conviction of poachers and to ensure that the fines being assessed for this illegal killing are in line with the value our society places on wildlife. Poach & Pay, which received initial financial support through the Bass Pro Shops and Cabela’s Outdoor Fund, will include detailed research, a public outreach campaign to actively engage the sportsmen’s community against poaching, and the development of template legislation that could be carried in state houses to help state agencies fight wildlife crime. The Club also announced that it is actively seeking additional sponsorship from the outdoor industry and other organizations to help fund Poach & Pay research and outreach in the coming years.

“Poaching goes against all that we hold sacred as law-abiding sportsmen and women and undermines the entire foundation of the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation. However, the media often uses the terms hunting and poaching interchangeably, dragging all hunters down with the crimes of poachers,” noted Boone and Crockett Club president, Timothy C. Brady. “In addition, with little consistency among states in terms of fines and restitution, poachers often get away with little penalty. This emboldens them and other poachers to steal our public trust resources – and potentially the future of hunting.” Read more

Poachers

Michigan: Arctic Grayling Transferred to Marquette State Fish Hatchery

In 2016, a proposed initiative intended to reintroduce Arctic grayling to select Michigan streams was announced. That idea immediately caught fire, and Michigan’s Arctic Grayling Initiative now counts over 40 member organizations among its supporters.

Before the northern Lower Peninsula was heavily lumbered in the mid- to late 1800s, Arctic grayling were the dominant salmonid (fish of the salmon family) species found in cold-water streams.

They were present in such large numbers that people flocked to northern Michigan towns to target this attractive fish, known best for its prominent dorsal fin. Some anglers were catching them in huge numbers and shipping them on ice back to large metropolitan areas like Detroit and Chicago to be sold in fish markets.

They were extirpated (wiped out) from Michigan due to degrading of habitat associated with the timber harvest practices of the day and overharvest by recreational and market anglers. Competition with and predation by introduced species, like brown trout, also played a role in their disappearing from Michigan waters.

Fast forward more than a century to Sept. 17, 2020 – a big day in the history of fisheries management in Michigan.

That was the day the that the first year-class (fish all produced in the same year) of Arctic grayling future brood fish (those used for breeding purposes) were transferred from an isolated rearing facility at Oden State Fish Hatchery, near Petoskey, to the Marquette State Fish Hatchery in Marquette County.

Approximately 4,000 fish, averaging 6.5 inches in length, made the trip to Marquette.

Check out a video of the fish in their new surroundings. Read more

General

New and Expanded Project ChildSafe Brochure

Digital publication delivers NSSF program’s newest and most popular firearm safety materials.

NEWTOWN, Conn. – Project ChildSafe®, a program of the National Shooting Sports Foundation®, now offers a new digital publication that provides easy access to its key educational resources on firearm safety and suicide prevention. The enhanced digital resource is one of the most comprehensive guides on gun safety available to the public today. Read more

Firearms

Apex Gear MAGNITUDE Bow Sight

For 2021, a new multi-pin bow sight joins the Apex Gear line of performance driven bowhunting accessories. Designed for hunters seeking a high-quality sight at a great price, the new MAGNITUDE™ series combines several popular features with new engineering and design for a modern look and increased ruggedness in the field.

CNC-machined from aircraft-grade aluminum, MAGNITUDE is an ambidextrous 5-pin sight that is available with a detachable dovetail mounting bracket or fixed mounting bracket design. Both attachment systems feature multiple mounting locations and a wide adjustment range. The MAGNITUDE delivers consistent accuracy and easy tuning with an adjustable 2nd and 3rd axis level and micro-adjustable windage and elevation controls. The 2 in. aperture boasts a new glowing shooter’s ring design with vertical and horizontal gaps that improves peep alignment in bright daylight and in low light “dawn and dusk” hunting scenarios. Read more

Archery

Global Ordnance Secures Contract with U.S. Army

SARASOTA, Fla. — Global Ordnance LLC, (GO) has been awarded an Indefinite-Delivery Indefinite-Quantity (IDIQ) contract number W52P1J-21-D-0001, on the U.S. Army’s Bulk Explosives Program for the supply of new production Type 1 Trinitrotoluene (TNT) to the U.S. Army. The Bulk Explosives Program IDIQ contract is for five years and has a ceiling value of $188,170,265.00, considering all IDIQ awards. As part of the initial award, Global Ordnance will deliver 1,000,000 pounds of TNT in 2021 to the U.S Army. Subsequent awards will be competed with two other companies.

Global Ordnance is teamed with TNT manufacturer Research and Production Enterprise “ZARYA” LTD, from Ukraine. Under the strategic agreement, GO regularly imports TNT to the United States (U.S.) for Defense and Commercial applications. John Summers, the head of GO’s Energetics Division, and Marc Morales, President of GO, are excited about the opportunity to deliver ZARYA TNT to the U.S. Army. Read more

Ammunition

Michigan DNR cancels winter Becoming an Outdoors Woman workshop

Given the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and its associated necessary limits on social gatherings, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources has canceled the annual winter Becoming an Outdoors Woman workshop.

The annual weekend event is held in February at the Bay Cliff Health Camp in Big Bay in Marquette County. A similar summer BOW workshop takes place the first weekend in June at Bay Cliff. Read more

Fishing, Hunting

ATF Publishes Proposed Classification Factors for Categorizing Weapons with Stabilizing Braces

Today, the ATF publishes their proposed ‘Objective Factors for Classifying Weapons with Stabilizing Braces’ guidance on https://www.federalregister.gov/d/2020-27857. The proposal will be only be open for comment today (Friday, December 18, 2020) until January 1, 2021.

SB Tactical: Proposed ATF Regulations Nothing More Than Registration Scheme

Bradenton, FL – SB Tactical® learned on December 16 of the ATF’s plan to publish their proposed ‘Objective Factors for Classifying Weapons with Stabilizing Braces’ guidance on https://www.federalregister.gov/d/2020-27857, which will be open for comment on Friday, December 18, 2020 until January 1, 2021.

Our hope was that ATF would finally take transparent action to provide clear criteria for brace equipped pistols, that would give manufacturers and consumers a way to see if products met ATF’s shifting expectations. Instead, the document is a thinly veiled blueprint for the largest firearm registration–and ultimately potentially confiscation– scheme in U.S. history.

The factors identified by the ATF for its possible use in classification include type, caliber, weight and length, how the gun is marketed, length of pull, sights and scopes, peripheral accessories mounted, and rear surface area of the brace, among others. While the factors listed are arbitrary and open-ended, the truly onerous part of the proposal is that no definitions of the factors are provided. Read more

Firearms

Winter Finches Holiday Update

Evening Grosbeaks are already providing surprise visits to many feeding stations and winter water features as far south as Tennessee and Alabama (photo by Stan Vuxinic).
Anyone would be thrilled to see Pine Grosbeaks mobbing their black-oil sunflower feeder.
Red Crossbills are another of the exciting “winter finches” being monitored during this year’s winter finch invasion (male crossbill photo by Neil Paprocki; female photo by Aaron Brees).

Now that you have your feeders stocked and ready for “winter finches” to appear, according to a new article that’s hot off the “electronic presses” of the American Birding Association (ABA), feeding stations in many areas are already experiencing some exciting visits by northern finches, such as Purple Finches, Pine Siskins, Evening Grosbeaks, Pine Grosbeaks, Red Crossbills, White-winged Crossbills, Hoary Redpolls, and Common Redpolls. Perhaps you are already hosting one or more of these species, as this winter’s “invasion” progresses.

Here is an update from the ABA: Birders in the eastern United States and southeastern Canada are reporting a banner year for irruptive boreal birds, including remarkable records and a “super-flight” of finches. Typically, only some of the irruptive finch species found in the East will undergo an irruption, but in super-flight years, the search for food drives representatives of all 8 species south, An enormous movement of northern finches was recorded from in late summer into fall at migration hotspots like the Tadoussac Bird Observatory in Quebec, Cape May in New Jersey, and Hawk Ridge in Duluth, Minnesota. By mid-fall, a Common Redpoll made it to Albuquerque, New Mexico; Evening Grosbeaks were spotted in the Florida Panhandle; Pine Siskins were reported in northern Mexico and into the Atlantic to Bermuda; and Hoary Redpolls visited Cleveland, Ohio.

These birds rely on the seed production (masting) cycles of trees in the core of their ranges. Entire populations of trees will synchronously produce millions seeds some years, but produce no seeds other years. Irruptive “finch” movements follow these seed cycles, but birders in the United States usually don’t see many finches in years when there is food in the boreal forest. Southward movements correspond with years of mast failure, when these birds must search for alternate foods, including seeds of ornamental plants and well-stocked bird feeders. The latter are particularly popular with Pine Siskins, Purple Finches, Evening Grosbeaks, and Common Redpolls. Read more

Wildlife
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