In past conversations with non-hunting friends, when I’ve mentioned eating wild game, the reaction has often been a sour look and a sneer. “How can you eat that stuff,” they would ask. “It’s so tough, dry and gamy.” Such a…
Ruffed grouse (colloquially called partridge) are the premier upland game bird of northern New England and are both delicious and incredibly difficult to hunt. They often dwell in the kind of thick, previously logged, new-growth forest habitat that is nearly…
I made my first trip of the 2013 hunting season today and had a fair amount of success. The area I was hunting is a large tract of state-owned land in Downeast Maine that is dotted with numerous lakes and…
In an earlier article, I wrote about how hunters who, like me, are on a painfully limited budget, can make do with the gear they have on hand and still have a good season afield. In that article, I mentioned…
The start of the Maine ruffed grouse season is rapidly approaching and, as is typical of most years, I find myself in possession of largely aging gear and barely a fistful of loose change to spend on guns, ammo, and…
As I’ve mentioned in previous articles, in recent years my weapon of choice for all game large and small has been a smooth bore shotgun of one type or another. Admittedly, one of the reasons for this is financial in…
In a recent article I wrote about the capabilities of a short barreled, home defense or utility shotgun as a close range bird gun. In addition to yielding useful patterns out to about 25 yards at the range, my own…
During a recent stint as an employee at a local gun shop, one of the discussions that began amongst my coworkers during a rare slow day was how well a home defense optimized shotgun would work as an upland game…
