Volume 14 Number 1 - January 2007

FEATURES:

	Bushytail Time Still hunting for squirrels with a .22 rifle can provide hours of fun, improve a hunter’s skills and provide tasty table treats. More than 20 years ago, when Tim Lemon first went to work as a wildlife enforcement officer for the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission, squirrel hunting was a big deal. ... Dan Kibler

	Deep Blue Winter bottom fishing off the Outer Banks produces unusually large catches of sea bass, tilefish and snowy grouper. Pollack, codfish, monkfish? Winter bottom fishing off the Outer Banks produces huge black sea bass, blueline tilefish, and even snowy grouper. But how to prepare and when to go aren't enough. The few skippers who work deep bottoms off North ... Bob Goldstein

	Hole Lotta Hot Five Tar Heel lakes with steam plants heat the water and make winter fishing sizzle. “Hot holes” they’re called. ... Tim Mead

	It Takes a Bubba To find late-season dove hunting areas, it’s always good to know a local boy who understands how these birds have changed since Labor Day. For many hunters, a Labor Day hunt for mourning doves is the highlight of the season. ... Mike Marsh

	Rabbit Redux The 5 Horsemen Hunt Club doesn’t care for deer, but when the subject is rabbit hunting, they hop to it each weekend. Most hunters in Pender County pursue white-tailed deer in the winter, displaying any newly-acquired buck deer across the tailgates of their pickup trucks for other hunters to admire. ... Mike Marsh

	Rebound Crappie A Lake Tillery angler has winter slab fishing figured out and lands giants while everyone else is inside by a warm fire. Ed Duke is just thrilled few people except local anglers fish Lake Tillery — especially during the winter. ... Dan Kibler

	Secrets of Slabs A Huntersville fishing team reveals some surprising techniques to fill a livewell with cold-weather crappies. EDITOR’S NOTE: Stokes McClellan of Huntersville and his son, Adam, who love to crappie fish recreationally, also are one of the nation’s top professional crappie-fishing teams. They travel across the country, fishing crappie tournaments with great ... John E. Phillips

	Sneaky Fishing Begin the New Year red-eyed and seeing specks with a stone cold sober approach to red drum and speckled trout. The trout moved along the edge of the dropoff just out from the bank, and we sometimes saw a single, pair or small group of fish as they flashed in the current. ... Jerry Dilsaver

	Swan Dive Hitting a flying tundra swan isn’t easy, even for the experts. But practice makes perfect. Most late-night television addicts have seen “The Adventures of Robin Hood,” a 1938 epic that features Errol Flynn using a long bow to split a competitor’s arrow at an impossible distance. ... Craig Holt