Carolina Hunting

Hands of a Sportsman is a non-profit organization based in Salisbury, N.C. that believes everyone should share in the beauty of adventure in our great outdoors. They’ve recognized that some would-be hunters and anglers don’t have it as easy as the rest of us, but they fill the gap, and “put smiles on the faces of those taking on some of life’s toughest challenges.”

Pests challenge farmers and food-plot developers every time seeds hit the dirt. Weeds, grasses and other competing vegetation are the chief pests that will ruin a food plot’s success. 

Jason Snead of Manteo did something few wild turkey hunters have duplicated with odds close to one in a half-million.

For the six weeks or so, we won’t be at breakfast very often. We’ll fall asleep early, while you’re barely finished watching Jeopardy after supper. Our fingers will be chalk-stained, and we’re not even teachers. We’ll have bags under the bags under our eyes. If we’re outside in the backyard during any daylight hours, you might find us looking for a big, thick tree truck to sit down against. Somebody from the office might call home to ask where we are and if we’re coming into work.

It’s always a good idea to carry a knife when hunting or fishing. The potential uses are unlimited, and one thing’s for sure — if you ever go on an outdoors adventure without one, you’ll surely need it. And just in case the unthinkable happens, it’s always good to have a knife with multiple uses.

Hugh McLaurin of Big Lake Outdoor Products has been making game calls out of a variety of woods for years, and he knows that dymond wood, a laminate that isn’t easy to come by, is one of the hardest, most-dense woods around, often used in the handles of custom knives.

Here’s the equation deer hunters need to know. Any kind of physical exertion can lead to bacteria on the skin. Bacteria leads to body odor. Body odor leads to deer turning up their noses at areas where stinky hunters are set up in stands.

I don’t remember the first fish I ever caught. That’s probably true for many of us, especially those who did it when we were very young. One bluegill turns into a dozen, and before you know it, your memory is blurred. It’s not the same with big game though, partly because they don’t happen in the same numbers as fish. If you catch one fish in a day, that’s probably not a great day. But if you kill one big game animal in a week, that’s success!

As I write this, another year’s deer season has come to a close. For many hunters, this is a sad time of year, as thoughts of a long offseason become reality. 

We recently published an article about the 2017-18 North Carolina deer hunting season, which saw an 8-percent increase over the previous season. The article listed the top 10 counties by harvest.