OutdoorHub
“Pride” of Mountain Lions Sighted in California Community
The term "pride" is generally reserved for African lions, yet a California couple says that they have captured footage of a pride of mountain lions prowling through their backyard. Since cougars are generally solitary animals, the picture of four large mountain lions together has drawn some interest from both neighbors and wildlife officials.
"People would very rarely ever get a photo of four lions at one time, so this is kind of a unique photo," Capt. Patrick Foy of the California Department of Fish and Wildlife told Read more »
Captive Russian Bears Suffer from Alcohol Addiction, Junk Food Diet
Bears may not be picky eaters, but is hard to imagine one of the critters consuming enough junk food and alcohol to land itself in rehab. But a Russian court in February ordered the confiscation of two captive male bears living in Sochi after it was discovered that they were addicted to alcohol and had been living on a diet of junk food for years. According to the BBC, a wildlife refuge in Romania has offered to take the bears in and wean them off their destructive habits.
The bears' owner and caretaker, Dzhenkis...
Michigan’s 2014 Hunting Seasons Go Down as Safest on Record
Last month the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (DNR) announced that 2014 marked the safest year ever for hunters. For the first time in the state's history, there were no fatal incidents and only 10 injuries recorded across all of 2014's hunting seasons. Accidents in the field have become remarkably rare in the past few years, and officials are crediting the decrease of injuries to state-wide hunter education programs.
"What makes 2014 the safest on record is that for the first time we had no...
4 Must-have Items for Ice Fishing
A long winter is bad news for some, but great news for ice fishing! Ice fishing has been one of the most popular winter pastimes for anglers in the Northern United States and Canada for generations. In states like Wisconsin, winter ice fishing accounts for as much as one fourth of the state’s annual catch.
When you hit the ice, you’ve got to make sure you have the right gear. Here are a few suggestions that will make any ice fishing adventure a convenient and enjoyable experience.
1. Frabill I-Series Ice Fishing...
Video: Ice Fisherman Pulls Duck Out of Fishing Hole
We've seen a lot of strange things pulled out of the ice in our time, but this video of an angler pulling some kind of waterfowl out of a fishing hole in Pennsylvania might be one of the strangest. Don't worry, the anglers were good practitioners of catch and release ethics and quickly released the bird.
The bird appears to be a red-breasted merganser. What's the weirdest thing you ever pulled out of the ice?
http://youtu.be/9u8fgqnIB5w
...
Photos: This is Why You Don’t Feed “Park Deer”
These pictures were taken in Nara, Japan, home to a world-famous "deer park." There are over 1,200 sika deer in the park that roam freely. Visitors can even purchase deer-crackers to feed the cervids. This guy was feeding the deer, but he quickly realized that he made a mistake after an entire herd started chasing after him.
Bonus video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSxzTNcVezU...
Obama Administration Defends Proposed Ban on 5.56 “Green Tip” Ammo
In a briefing with reporters on Monday, White House press secretary Josh Earnest defended the Obama administration's support of a proposal to ban a common type of rifle ammunition. Last month the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATFE) announced that it will be considering a ban on 5.56x45mm M855 ball ammunition, commonly called "green tips." The ammunition is popular among recreational shooters and some hunters, and the ATF is seeking to reclassify M855 as "armor piercing"...
How to Buy a Silencer Without Really Trying
Sshhhh! I’ve gone all silent recently. Yes, I’ve been bitten by the suppressor bug. You know what they say, once you go suppressed, you never go back.
Anytime I bring a pile of suppressors to the range, I get a lot of questions.
"Are those legal?"
"Are you law enforcement?"
"Can anyone buy one of those?"
The short answers are yes, no, and yes, for the most part.
As I write this, 39 of the 50 states allow us regular civilian citizens to purchase and use suppressors. The confusion stems from the fact that silencers are restricted under the National Firearms Act...
Florida Anglers Catch 10-foot Great White Shark
For angler Derek Keeny, pulling in a great white shark from shore in the Gulf of Mexico was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. For biologists, it was an oddity. Great whites are rarely found in that region, and even more rarely caught by anglers from shore. Yet on Sunday Keeny and other members of his fishing club Dark Side Sharkers---Kyle Register and Gabriel Smeby---brought in this 10-foot great white near Panama City.
"It just kind of looked like a big dusky (shark) at first," Smeby told Read more »
Video: This is What It’s Like to Get Charged by a Bison
Have you ever wondered what it's like to get charged by a bison, but never had the willpower to face one of the land beasts down yourself? Well today's your lucky day, because a man driving through Yellowstone National Park's Lamar Valley managed to record just such an event so you don't have to.
According to comments by the video's uploader, Tom Carter, "tourists in [the] car behind the buffalo chase them into our parked car. Never harass wild animals."
We couldn't agree more.
http://youtu.be/srLjIZK2y_8
The damage to the charged car can be seen in the video...
Georgia Bill Aims for Open Season on Wild Hogs
Like most states with a feral hog population, Georgia has relatively lax regulations on hunting invasive swine. Yet that does not mean that there are no restrictions at all---especially on public land. Currently, sportsmen are restricted to certain weapons depending on the season, prohibited from night hunting, and cannot shoot pigs from a vehicle. A new bill in the Georgia house would do away with these restrictions, vastly expanding the options available to Georgia hunters.
“This [bill] would make the feral hogs not ‘wildlife.’ They’re a nuisance is what they are," the bill's...
Photo: Bald Eagle Fights Coyote over Deer Carcass, Raven Wins
What is the most epic picture you've ever pulled from a trail cam? Did it involve four different species, a life or death battle, and perhaps the most stunningly clear case of opportunism caught in the wild? There's a lot going on in this picture, but we can all agree that the raven is the real winner here.
The above image was uploaded by Reddit user Blutausbeherit, who claims that they recovered the image from a wooded...
Photographer Nabs Picture of Baby Weasel Riding Woodpecker
Martin Le-May, an amateur photographer from England, captured an incredible photograph of a weasel "riding" on the back of a green woodpecker as it flew through the air. Weasels are usually a ground-feeding animal that preys on rabbits, so this attack on a woodpecker is extremely rare.
ABSOLUTLEY INCREDIBLE photo by Martin Le-May. Green Woodpecker and Weasel. Apparently the Woodpecker escaped. pic.twitter.com/PUt1b2Mbhs
— Jason Ward (@Jayward7) March 2, 2015
Martin Le-May...
Video: Amazing Archery Shots in Slow Motion
Byron Ferguson is a world-famous exhibition archer and bowhunte. In the video below, Destin of SmarterEveryDay takes a scientific approach to how Ferguson does what he does. Whether it's shooting targets, big game, or something as small as a piece of lifesaver candy, Byron is always deadly accurate. How impressive is that in mathematical terms? Destin explains below.
Want to see another amazing archer in action? Check out our article on Danish speed archer Lars Andersen...
America’s 5 Greatest Hunting Presidents
It should come as little surprise that a great many of our presidents are and were avid sportsmen, even though only about six percent of the American public hunts. In fact, by some reports more than half of the men in the Oval Office over the past 50 years were hunters---but the history of great hunting presidents stretches far beyond that. From the days of the original 13 colonies to the modern era, America has always carried the spirit of a frontier nation and it is an ideal embraced by many of our presidents. Here is our list of the five US presidents who were most likely to be found in the...
Video: Grouper Devours Invasive Lionfish
Lionfish may be pretty, but they are a destructive invasive species that threatens to destabilize marine ecosystems in the Caribbean and American East Coast. That's why when conservationists took this recent video of a grouper eating one of the fish in the wild, it's exciting news. It's believed that lionfish have thrived in the Atlantic Ocean because of a lack of native predators, but more and more evidence is showing that grouper and sharks are developing a taste for the spiny lionfish. Though increased predation may not stop the lionfish invasion entirely, it could help.
"This video...
The New Canik TP9SA Lives Up to the Hype
Ask anyone on the street to name which country makes the finest machines on the planet, they’ll reply, “Germany” or “Switzerland”---and for good reason. Industry legends like SIG Sauer and Heckler and Koch hail from these European titans of industry. Very few people, including myself, would reply, “Turkey.” At least until they had the chance to shoot the pistol of choice for Turkey’s law enforcement officers, the Canik TP9SA imported and sold by Century Arms.
The Turkish TP9SA is a striker-fired, semiautomatic, polymer-framed handgun chambered in the ubiquitous 9x19mm...
Video: Marksman Pulls Off Unbelievable Two-mile-long Shot with .375 CheyTac Rifle
In the video below, a shooter from Hill Country Rifles attempts to pull off a 3,600-yard shot with a .375 CheyTac rifle on a three-foot steel gong at FTW Ranch. It takes some serious skill and equpiment to be able to make a shot like this. To put things in perspective, the flight time for this shot was over 7.2 seconds! Watch the incredible video below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Z1rktqTvVQ...
Are Hunters the Solution to the Grand Canyon’s “Beefalo” Problem?
They look like buffalo, act like buffalo, and certainly smell like buffalo, yet the hybrids known today as "beefalo" still have domestic cattle DNA in their genetic makeup. These large, lumbering creatures are left over from an ambitious project more than a century ago to raise buffalo for beef production, but now the creatures are causing headaches for wildlife officials.
Beefalo, or bison mixed with cow DNA, have proven to be a serious setback for wild bison conservation. Perhaps even more pressing, the animals are now rampaging through Grand Canyon National Park, pushing out native...
Florida Officials Revive Bear Hunt in Wake of Increased Encounters
After more than 20 years, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) is bringing back bear hunting to the Sunshine State. The decision to plan a limited weeklong season was first announced early last month, and although it has yet to be finalized, officials now say that hunting could take place as early as this fall. It will be the first season in the state since officials banned bear hunting in 1994 due to population declines. Yet, a rash of bear attacks in 2014 and a general increase in black bear numbers has convinced the agency to take a "more aggressive...