february 2012 - the outdoor gazette

February 2012 The Outdoor Gazette


SubmissionsDo you have an interesting story to tell? It could be about a fishing trip with Dad or

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On The CoverMorgan Parrish, age 11 of Grafton, NH with a beauty of a Rainbowcaught thru the ice on Mascoma Lake. - Allan Tschorn playing in our winterwonderland last year, praying for snow this year.

Publisher/Editor: Fred AllardDesign Layout: Dan Millet

Send correspondence to: The Outdoor Gazette

1166 Court Street Haverhill, NH 03765

Tel. (603) 989-3093 • Cell (802) 738-6755Web: www.theoutdoorgazette.com

E-Mail: [email protected]

Graphic Design & Layout: Think Different Design

Berlin, NH 03570603-752-9838

The Outdoor Gazetteis printed monthly by

Seacoast Media GroupPortsmouth, New Hampshire

ISSN Number 1941-9805

Outdoor GazetteNew Hampshire & VermontThe

ARTICLESEditors Back PorchLetter to the Editor8 years in the WildernessTraveling OutdoorsmanTaxidermy TrailsWoes of a Snowless WinterRiverbank TalesLock, Stock and Smoking BarrelFamily TracksLessons fron the OutdoorsSouthern Side UpFrom the Back of the CanoeBirding with BriereThe Modern Pan FishermanBone CollectionsTrail Cam ContestBehind the SightsThoughts on the Out of DoorsSearching for Nature’s TreasuresGuided by the Light, or....Gazette’s Book ReviewPictures Gone Wild

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Table of Contents

Volume 6 Issue 2

Above- Rodney Elmer shot this pic at Upper Valley Grill in Groton VT. During muzzleloader season. “Theowner looked a little shady and I think “Rex” here was readying the getaway!” Right - Taking his buck for awalk, what a good dad. This fellow was caught walking his buck by our booth at the Yankee Sportsman’s Classic.


Foul ups, bleeps and blunders,that sums up my experience asthe head honcho of theOutdoor Gazette thus far. Ihave resisted getting editorialhelp, as I wanted to prove tomyself that I could produce oneissue, by myself, with no majormistakes. Not happening! Justwhen I thought I had it right,there on page 39 of the January2012 issue, in large red lettersthe word “Photography” wasspelled “Photagraphy”…@#$%^. OK, I give, I’ll ask forhelp.

Ken Monte of Arlington,Vermont, one of my huntin’buddies and best friends, isgoing to be doing some proofreading for me, you, us. Yourpain and suffering is over! Kenwas always pointing out mymistakes, so I said put yourmoney where your mouth is,buddy. LOL. Seriously he hasbeen very diplomatic about his

criticism. He is well read, andbeing an outdoorsman heknows hunters and fishersEnglish.

Also on board with editorialhelp is Alaina Smith of Lyme,New Hampshire. Alaina is arecent Journalism graduatefrom Green Mountain Collegeand the daughter of another

huntin’ buddy and good friend,Bruce Smith. His mug was onthe cover of the November2011 issue. Anyway, Alaina hasbeen around Bruce. Ken,myself and others in our groupfor years and has a pretty goodhandle on what the outdoorsports are all about. She will bethe only one on staff with anactual degree related to writing.Who’d a thunk it? Someonewith a Journalism backgroundworking for the gazette!

Brace yourselves we maybecome a “real” publicashun…lol. Just kidding, I meant publi-cation (Thanks Alaina).

Foul Ups, Bleeps and Blunders

By Fred Allard

Editor’s Back

Porch

Fred Allard lives in Haverhill, NHwith his family. He is a BowhunterEducation Instructor, a scorer for theNortheast Big Buck Club, the NewHampshire Antler and Skull TrophyClub and the Vermont Big GameTrophy Club. He is the President of theMontshire Traditional Bowhunters.Fred can be reached by [email protected] is on the way!

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tage of some of the Farm Billprograms to help offset ourcosts. I would be more thanhappy to share our trials, errorsand successes with Alex, your-self or any others that are seri-ous about quality deer manage-ment.

I’ve also attached two photosof a pie-bald whitetail that wasdisbursed from poor habitat toour tree farm in the fall of2010. Although a small deer

genetically, you can see theeffect that one year in goodhabitat, even with one of themore severe winters on record,can have on a deer. We hope hesurvived muzzle loader seasonand makes it through the winter.Then, next fall, we’ll have anexample of what a 3 1/2 yearold deer can be on propertymanaged for QDM.

David MatthewsFairlee, Vermont

Fred,I just finished reading Alex

Cote’s article in the most recentissue of your publication.Attached is an outline of theform we use to estimate the deerdensity and herd structure onour property. Also attached is anexample from 2009. My under-standing is that the method was

developed by James Kroll andexpanded on by Grant Woods(established the multiplier fordeer that were in the area butdidn’t appear at the survey loca-tions). Both individuals have aPhD in wildlife biology.

We’ve been doing habitatwork, seriously, since 2001.Since 2007 we’ve taken advan-

Letters to the Editor

The pie-bald buck at one and a half..... What a difference a year makes. Now at two and a half with better nutrition.


8 Years in the WildernessBy Tom Rideout

Sorry, snowmobilers, this winterdoesn’t look like it will fare wellfor you. Here it is mid-January,and we have very little snow herearound Sturtevant Pond. Ournormal snowfall averages close to190 inches, and we are lucky ifwe have gotten a total of 12 inch-es from the several small squallsthat have passed through thisarea.

I am actually excited about thelack of snowfall as it is the bestthing to happen for our deer herdin years. The land managementcompanies around here areaggressively harvesting the woodfaster than it can grow. We lostabout every major deer yard inthe area, years ago, under theguise of salvaging softwoodwhich was impacted by thespruce budworm epidemic backin the late 70s and early 80s. Ourdeer herd struggles each winter;rebounding after a mild winterbut being devastated after a

severe one. Hopefully this winterwill be one for the record booksand boast our deer population.

I have been out on the pond icefishing pretty much every day

since the first of the year. Theweather has been enjoyable, andthe fishing has been exceptional. Ihave experienced plenty of actionwith yellow perch and pickerelbut manage to catch a salmon ortwo each day I am out. Martha

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and I have enjoyed a meal or twofrom my success.

Most of the time I am out fish-ing by myself, as Martha hastaken a two month positionteaching in Colebrook replacinga teacher out on maternity leave.

Jim Calyer, my neighbor, hasbeen out quite a bit, and we haveshared his bobhouse on dayswhen it is windy or cooler.

It is such a joy experiencing theoutdoors on this pond. Probablythe most enjoyable part aboutfishing here is that you do notknow what you are going tocatch. One flag may produce apickerel, another a yellow perch.The next flag may be a brooktrout or even a salmon. I thinkthe prize fish would be a splake. (Ihaven’t caught one yet but I amtrying.) However, there are somany smallmouth bass in thispond it is a mystery that anglersdon’t catch any during the winter.Martha caught one last winterbut that is the only one I know ofthat has been taken out of thepond during ice fishing. Fish inMay and early June and even themost novice angler can catch 50or 60 a day.

While out on the pond duringboth summer and winter, I findthe scenic beauty never ends, andI end up spending much of mytime staring at the surroundingmountains. The shades of light,or lack thereof, change during theday, and I marvel at how it makeseverything look different.

Few other fishermen have beenaround. Two weeks ago, threeanglers from Berlin were fishingoff one of my favorite points onthe north shore of the pond. Iwas impressed when theyreleased the salmon they caught.They kept most of the perch andsome of the bigger pickerel, and

claimed they would have a fish frysometime during the week ahead.

A couple of days ago, I watchedtwo coyotes bolt across the end ofthe pond. Even if I had had agun, I doubt I could have hitthem, as they were over 300 yardsaway.

I have had visits from a coupleof bald eagles. I toss my deadpickerel on the ice, and the eagleshave come to expect the freelunch. They usually wait until Iget done fishing, and as soon as Istart my snowmachine and takeoff towards the house, they circlethe pond a couple of times, mak-ing sure it is safe. Then they landand chow down. A few ravensand crows also stop by and enjoythe free fish.

I can hear logging equipmentworking off in the distance. Ihaven’t travelled out back thiswinter and am not sure wherethey are logging. It sounds likethere are at least two contractorsworking the area. It is a goodwinter for loggers also as they donot have to plow that often andthe stumps from the harvestersshouldn’t be very high.

I remember years ago, whenmost of the logging was donewith chainsaws, finding stumps astall as I am (over six feet). It wason the back side of WestKennebago Mountain and in anarea where snow usually driftsquite deeply. I always wondered ifthe loggers wore snowshoes.

When I worked in the woodsduring the winter, we never hadtoo much snow and we could getaround fairly well without snow-shoes. I usually used the skidderblade to drag snow away from thetrunks of the tree so we didn’thave to cut too high up the trunk.

If I didn’t live so far off thebeaten path, I would be attendingthe sportsman shows that usuallyhappen at this time of the year.They are the perfect venue to seewhat is new in the sporting worldand rejuvenate one’s excitementabout the upcoming years’ sport-ing activities.

When I owned and operatedBosebuck Camps, I attended sev-eral sportsman show during thewinter months. The HarrisburgPA show was an 11-day show andwould have close to half a millionpeople attend it. Pennsylvania has

Continued on page 7

8 Years in the WildernessBy Tom Rideout

roaming on the ranch and not fedminerals or steroids from foodplots. The guacos (cowboys) whoworked the ranch kept an eye onthe stag, knew where they wereand how many points they had,and hunted accordingly.

The deer up here around thepond have not gone to their win-tering yards yet. Driving around,one can find deer sign just aboutanywhere. I expect another stormor two that might drop a fewinches of snow will force them tothe yards. Maybe even some realcold weather will do it. Eitherway, it looks good for the deereven if we do get snow, as thewinter will be shorter.

I am not counting the winter

over by a longshot, as I havemany more days ahead of icefishing. Probably a few days ofrabbit hunting, as well as visitingsome other areas to try my luckfishing. I will keep you informed!


a dedicated deer hunting group,and I could easily fill the campsup with hunters from that show. Idid offer bear hunts on a limitedbasis but I could have filled mycamps with bear hunters fromthat show as well.

There was a show in SuffernNY that was a pleasure to attend.It had plenty of sportsmen andmore than 400 exhibitors. Showslike these allowed me to makecontacts in the outdoor world,and that networking enhancedmy business. Though I never likegiving presentations or seminars,I usually attended several when atthe shows.

Over the years I have seen it allwhen it comes to experts! I havefound that many of these so-called experts are great self-pro-moters and seldom can walk theirtalk.

Once, at the Hartford CTsportsman show, I watched a flycasting competition. Many of thebig names were there and com-peting for a cash prize. I mustagree that they all could cast a fly.The competition consisted ofseveral venues, but the most diffi-cult was one where they had toget their fly in a small floatingplastic ring about eight inches indiameter. The caster who endedup getting second place (I won’tname his name so as not toembarrass him) booked five days

fishing with me at BosebuckCamps. I took him out for oneday to show him the area and wasflabbergasted to find out he didn’tknow how to fish a nymph orproperly fish a streamer. He cast agreat line but that was about allhe could do.

Now don’t get me wrong; thereare some experts out there whoare due our respect. The Benoitsare a good example. The proof isin the pudding.

What is happening today in thedeer hunting is something thatconfuses me. These so calledranches or outfitters are nowactually growing deer for harvestand one pays for the deer oneshoots. A 10-pointer will cost you$7500, an average 8-pointer$5500. Throw in big scoringpoints, and it is even more expen-sive.

When I was guiding inArgentina, there was somethingsimilar going on there with thered stag hunting. The hosteria(ranch) I worked out of guidingfishing parties also offered redstag hunts. Most of their clientelewere from Europe, and they werecharged by the point. A four byfour would cost $4800, a five byfive $6200, and a six by six ran$7500.

The difference with these huntscompared to the deer hunts nowwere that the stags were free

Tom Rideout is the former editor ofNH Outdoor Gazette and was theowner of Bosebuck Mountain Campson Aszicoos Lake in western Maine for17 years. He has held a Master MaineGuide’s license for more than 35 years(hence the 8 years in the wilderness) Heand his wife Martha operate SturtevantPond Camps in Magalloway, Maineand operates Pakesso Guide Service,which specializes in upland bird wingshooting . You can reach Tom [email protected]

Continued from page 6

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Space remains in the four-weekarchery league that will meet onThursday evenings starting

February 9, 2012, at Owl Brook.Intermediate archery skill level isrecommended, and participantsmust commit to attending all fourweeks. If you have questions orwould like to register, call TomFlynn at the Owl Brook HunterEducation Center at 603-536-3954.

Owl Brook facility managerTom Flynn describes the leagueas a slightly competitive, yet most-ly fun type of league. League par-

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Learn more about this user-pay,user-benefit program, now in its75th year, at www.wildnh.com/SFWR_prog ram/s fwr_pro-gram.htm.

Still Time to Get in on Free Indoor Archery League in Holderness

for ones that are recently shed. I asked Kevin Sweet of W.

Rutland, his take on shed hunting.Kevin, a lifelong Vermont deerhunter, has spent the last decadeas a professional whitetail guide inIllinois and Iowa.

“These big dominant buckshave secretive places where theylike to lay up. Often, you’ll findone side of a big antler right inthe bed where it broke off whilethe old boy snoozed with his headdown.” Kevin also agreed thatyou can often find the matchingside nearby.

“I don’t know if when that deergets up out of his bed with onlyone horn he is so unbalanced thathe goes and actively tries to knockthe other one off or if they bothjust come loose at the same time,but the bigger the beam the morelikely it is that both sides will beshed in the same general area.

We discussed whether buck/doeratios were resulting in bucksbreeding later and thereforedelaying the hormonal changesassociated with the end of the rutcycle and the shedding process,and whether heavier racks weremost likely to be fall off first. Likeeverything else about whitetails, inthe end, the more you think youknow; the more you becomeaware of how much you don’tknow.

But the reality is that for the costof gas money, lodging and somegrub, you have a perfectly legiti-

mate excuse to take a week off inMarch to hunt antlers. Sincehunters seldom consider a springpilgrimage back to the outfitunless they have already huntedthere a season or two, you are notonly returning to woods you arealready familiar with but friendsand farmers you would ordinarilyonly see once a year.

Now granted, you may have ahard time selling this idea, if youhave already promised the familya trip to Disney World but consid-er the advantages; its relativelyinexpensive, you get to do a tripwith your hunting buddies in theoff-season, there isn’t the pressureof when your hunting horns inthe fall (deer attached) and you’llimprove your chances for futuresuccess by becoming that muchmore familiar with the area.

Do you really stumble across anantler or two? You’re more thanapt to. It’s not guaranteed, butoutfitters generally have a prettygood idea of what they have leftfor deer after their clients have allgone home. Riding the back roadsaround their farms glassing thefields for bucks that survived thehunting season is a pretty reliableindicator of areas where shedsmight be found.

Furthermore, like anything elsethe more you do it the better youare going to get at spotting thecurve of an ivory colored beampartially covered by leaves. So, ifyour obsession with whitetailslures you back to the Midwest fora spring shed hunt, don’t be sur-prised; because it just mightbecome a seasonal event.


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Traveling OutdoorsmanTraveling OutdoorsmanBy Glenn DunningBy Glenn Dunning

The Phenomenon of Shed Hunting - Needles in a haystack?

Glenn Dunning lives in Brookfield,Vermont and owns TUNDRATOURConsultants, a travel agency specializ-ing in North American hunting andfishing adventures. He is also a memberof the New England Outdoor WritersAssoc. Glenn can be reached by phone at802-276-3317 or via his web site at:www.tundratour.com

To the average Yankee thewhole concept of searching forshed antlers seems ridiculous.After all, if you spend half the fallroaming the woods trying to finda deer with horns on its head withonly intermittent success, how canit possibly make sense that youcould hunt the same woods in thespring of the year and find just thehorns without the buck attached?While horns without the deer areless mobile, they are also a lotsmaller package. Not to mentionhow much antlers and sticks lookalike lying on the forest floor.

I personally have never foundshed antlers in the hills ofVermont. My nephew once founda set in the Adirondacks and Iknow of moose sheds that havebeen picked up but the occasionsare rare and it’s not rocket scienceto understand why. Most bucksdrop their horns from lateDecember through January innorthern climates and that’s snowseason. Antlers become buriedand by spring they’ve been whit-tled down to nothing by squirrelsand mice or covered by the debrisof winter until they rot back intothe soil.

Conclusion: New England is nota go-to destination for shed hunt-ing.

However there are places youcan go, most notably the Midwest,where an afternoon walk in thewoods could yield multipleantlers, usually found a side at atime but sometimes in close prox-imity to one another. For thehardcore whitetail hunter, espe-cially one that has sampled the

bounty of the Corn Belt’s incred-ible genetics, heading back totheir favorite outfit in the earlyspring can become a bit of a ritu-alistic migration.

The practice is so popular thatmost outfitters in that region price

shed hunts in their brochures.Depending on a lot of factors,including your personal relation-ship with the outfitter and/orfarmer, you can pay $500 or morefor 4-5 days including meals andguides or next to nothing exceptmaybe buying lunch at the localBob Evans.

Obviously, if your search is con-centrated on leased farms that theoutfitter has been managing toproduce big bucks and it’s reason-able to assume that big antlers areeasier to find then little antlers,you get part of the picture. Butthe real difference is that the deerin this part of the country don’ttypically start to drop their headgear until early spring just prior tothe new season’s growth cycle.You’re not looking for horns thathave been decaying under thesnow all winter; you are searching

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voices faded as the volume wentdown and my gun readied. I could-n’t help not bending down slightlyas I moved toward the on comingdeer. Rounding a corner and layingeyes on him is the rush I love mostand he didn’t disappoint. As hisdogtrot brought him right down the

trail to me, the beauty of themoment needed pause.

The ice on his forehead, hisbrown, smooth hair, the antler’sbobbing as he moves silently. Theview in the scope is why I work sohard at this. Then time stops. Thehead moves clear, the finger tightens

to the edge of no return, and leapsoff. It’s done, “Strike 3”, your out.Jeff walks up, looks at him and says“Yup. DEAD!”… We named himThree Strikes.

Buck #2 is scouted in the remain-ing daylight and determined to beWide! Jeff names him after jumpinghim with no shot, “ You could ridehim like a Harley!” “HandbarHenry!” Then promptly declareshim dead tomorrow!

The check station attendantlaughs as we call it a night andpromise to see him the next daywith the grand daddy!

“Well boy’s... where’s old what’shis name?”

“Out in the truck, He won’t fitthrough the door.” Jeff said matterof factly.

“That’s a corker boy’s.” Thingswere never the same again. Butthat’s a story for another day!

It was our first hunt together.“You’ve got to meet this guy, he’sjust like you.” Jimmy said. The longhours of story telling, shared pas-sions and experiences had led to thislate season Muzzleloader hunt inMaine and the deer track at ourfeet.

He sat in the driver’s seat, 40 milesnorth of the golden road, looking atme, reading me.

“It’s a buck, no big deal... a buck75... seen better, to perfect a day... “

“Naaa, let’s go!” I said hoppingback into the truck and cutting himoff midsentence. “Oookay” He saidwith the tone I would learn to listentoo. The kind that says we’d be backin 3 hours. This was the only onearound, the type of tone provencorrect to the hour! As we rolled toa stop back at the track, he said“Now you know...we came here tohunt... let’s just Kill it.”

His words seemed all to appropri-ately blunt, but the last part, “Killit”, changed me as a hunter. I oftenlook for defining moments in myhunting career and the first tensteps on this buck’s track would be.I would no longer “wonder inhopes” if the deer would presenthimself. I would just go kill him.Make it happen, like a wolf, noshame.

I would tell him, I was coming,and he would understand andmake his choices. Show me his steel,his will to live, and play out the chal-lenge’s where he decided. It’s stillthe fairest way I could expect toearn the deer’s gifts. No holdsbarred, “wolf ” him down.

“The road out ahead is close, 3/8of a mile, and if he crosses it, helpyourself, I’ll be coming, shaking myhead, at the fate of the day.

The buck was still reading me.Eager to walk, I gave it some effort.Breaking out onto the Road a shotrang out ahead. Sure enoughanother had taken over the track,jumped the deer, used the tippercan for the first time and wasshocked as our buck came back athim, presenting only a head shot,full alert! “Take the shots you’regiven” philosophy kicked in and hefired, later stating... “He wasscared... I’ve never seen thatbefore”! The hole is still in the leftear of the mount, a perfect pierc-ing! “STRIKE ONE”!

After some radio chatter and gpsbutton pushing, Jimmy swung thetruck around picked me up and wecircled ahead on to the next deadend road 2 miles ahead of him andthe buck. Jim told me that the road

was about 2 miles long and I should“trust my guts and hop out wherev-er.”

“I’ll go out about a mile furtherthan you.”

We each picked a good lookingspot, loaded up and hopped intothe woods. After ten minutes myspot felt worthless, and my gut said“the deer’s gone northeast, back tothe road, head east, hurry!” As Imarched up the logging trail fullsteam, a shot rang out up ahead.Jimmy’s 60- yard neck shot missedclean and the prompt 180-degreeturn sent him back in on his tracks.“Strike two”

It’s rare they will go any distanceback tracking and when tracking inrelay the story develops at a walkingpace by three people, all old news,but valuable! My 4th mile of theday, march up the road was with asmile as Jimmy shot and took overthe tracking duties from Jeff.

The landing at the dead endshowed no fresh crossings, but expe-rience told me that deer in Mainedon’t like crossing roads, and hookaround dead ends.

Passing Jimmy’s spot by anothermile, I dove in. Sure enough, theyhad quiet a runway of old tracksand my guts turned me towardwhere the deer would come from.“Right At me, right down thesetracks!” I said to myself. The radiowent wild; Jeff had seen other somesign of another bigger buck, thatthis buck wanted nothing to dowith! They both spoke of this deer’ssize as “a good one” and neededscouting out.

My hair was standing up. Their

By Rodney ElmerBy Rodney Elmer

Taxidermy TrailsTaxidermy Trails

Rodney Elmer and his wife Theresaown and operate Mountain deer taxi-dermy in Northfield,Vermont.

We came here to hunt!


dren / other dogs, ease of train-ability, major health concernsand a brief history of the breedwere all covered topics. We settledon the Siberian Husky, primarilybecause the breed met out sizecriteria, but also because there isno AKC standard for color coator eye color. They are a uniquebreed with about 7 different rec-

ognized coat colors, ranging fromall black to all white.

Once we had decided on thebreed, the task at hand was tofind a (reputable) breeder whohad puppies available. We foundsuch a breeder outside ofConcord, New Hampshire, andventured over one early summerafternoon. What we found was akennel in a rather suburbanneighborhood with way moredogs than we expected. Cute littlepuppies scurried around the backyard, and sleds adorned the topof dog trucks. We were amazed ata couple of things – first, thatthere were so many dogs in sucha neighborly back yard; and sec-ond, that these folks idea of agreat weekend was loading thedogs (and kids) in the truck andheading out to run the team 20,30 or more miles. We hadabsolutely NO IDEA that mush-ers even existed in the Northeast.And, as all responsible and rep-utable breeders of Siberians willdo, we were screened thoroughlyon our expectations of the breed,

our work schedules, the dynamicsof our home life, our ability tosocialize and exercise the dog, aswell as our ability to safely andsecurely confine the dog. It wassuggested that we consider takingtwo of the puppies. “They arevery social, you know. Two willultimately be easier than one” thebreeder informed us.

“No. We have done ourresearch. They can be very headstrong, difficult to train. Wewould rather ruin one than takethat risk with two. One will befine for now” was our reply.

“What do you plan to do forexercise” was the next questionfrom the breeder. Not havingthought this through, I quipped“I am an avid skier. Think shewill go skiing with me.” Withoutmissing a beat, their reply was“Oh, skijoring. How fun.” Theglances my wife and I exchangedsaid something like “I am adownhill skier and was only(tongue-in-cheek) joking aboutthe skiing” . . . By the way “WhatIS skijoring?”

So we departed that day with apet. We had in our possession aSiberian puppy that launched ourfocus on the household dog frompet to passion; from passion toaddiction; from addiction tolifestyle. We did as much researchas we could on this newly foundactivity of skijoring, but didn’tknow where to start. We didn’tknow how to train, where to trainor even what to train. The bookswe read were informative, but Iam the kind of learner that canread something over and overand not really get it – but if Icombine that with seeing it done,I am much better off. Perhapssome of the reading we weredoing was over our head, and wasmore aligned to managing a teamor kennel, identifying lead dogqualities and characteristics andassumed that the reader hadexperience on the runnersalready. I can honestly say, I donot ever recall reading “If you’regoing to train your dog, a properharness and tug lines are thebasic essential equipment.”

by Alan Tschorn

I’m an addict. (This is whereyou all say “hi, Al” and make mefeel welcome to the group.)

Not your usual addict, though,and I know of no support net-work for a cure; only a supportnetwork of friends and fellowmushers to support a desire to donothing but run your dogs. I referto myself as an addict becausenothing in my life previously hasgripped me the way my dogshave, and truly the time, moneyand resources we devote to ourpassion is ridiculous. There is nopromise of financial return,(though we have begun a trans-formation of this passion into asmall business venture) – only thereward of an unwavering loveand reward of companionship I(we) get from our dogs. I tell peo-ple our dogs are more than pets,they are a hobby; our dogs aremore than a hobby – this passionis a commitment to a life style.There are many a day that mywife and I feel that we eat, breathand sleep dogs. Most days thefirst thing we do when we get upis tend to the dogs, and the lastthing we do at night before retir-ing to bed is tend to the dogs. Amajority of the dogs are in thehouse with us each night; we loveit and wouldn’t change it for theworld. Let me attempt to shareour journey with you.

I will refer to this as “our” jour-ney as my wife is an equal partnerin this venture. We complementeach other’s strengths and weak-nesses perfectly – her desire togrow too quickly was balancedwith my (previously held) rationalmind. She is the nutritionist andmedical records keeper. She sews,makes and repairs collars, leash-es, and harnesses. I am more ofthe laborer of the kennel – build-

ing kennel areas, digging postholes, burying cinderblocks andrailroad ties to keep the critterssafely secured, and building doghouses, hauling bedding, sacks ofdog food and the like. We bothlove to run our dogs, and whenwe load them all into thetruck,and head out for the trail, itnot unlike loading the family into

the car and heading to the beachor out for a family picnic, or hav-ing six, eight or ten of your bestfriends ready to gather and partyat anytime. They are part of ourfamily, and we are part of theirpack. It is a social time; time outof the house; time out of the ken-nel. It is a time for bonding, work-ing together, and having fun.

It began as a search for a familypet. Our only requirement was adog in the thirty to fifty poundrange. We referenced the AKCEncyclopedia of Dog Breeds – awonderful reference book thatcovers the 156 or 157 recognizeddog breeds, and covers all the pri-mary points of interest in a givenbreed. Size, weight, need forexercise, friendliness with chil-

Continued next page

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Woes of a snowless winter . . . . . .

Alan and Suzanne Tschorn, and the rest of the Tschorns, at the top of theworld...Vermont’s Mount Mansfield


from previous pageness, and “scootering” is using aspecially designed scooter fortraining or running your dogs.

The Northeast does not have ashortage of folks with distaste forthe winter season. My commentto those complaining about thesnow or cold is simply – “Youneed a team of sled dogs”. Theirpuzzled look is then followed by –“if you have a team of sled dogs,winter goes by so fast, and it’s ablast, and summers seemingly lastforever”.

Last year we didn’t get our dogson snow until the first of January.Though we had snow on theground by mid-December, it wasa light fluffy snow that didn’t packreal well. The call of the musherthis time of year throughout theregion is “Hookable snow, anyone– Hookable snow anywhere?”Having enough snow to run on isone thing, but being able to set asnow hook (a metal apparatus ofhooked shape style, with a spadetype blade that digs itself in thesnow deeper as the dogs pullharder) is paramount to a saferun.

And once we did get the dogson snow last year, the season wasa short eleven or twelve weekslong. That leaves a remainingforty or forty-one weeks of caninenutritional and health require-ments to be met, and kennelmanagement and maintenance tobe tended to. Mushers will gener-ally look for temperatures to dropinto the lower to mid fifty degreerange before entertaining thethought of beginning fall trainingruns, so my 11 to 12 weeks of dogpowered activity may be a littleshort, but there really is no substi-tute for standing on sled runnersquietly gliding over the snow.

Fall training is most usually exe-cuted with the assistance of anATV of some sort, especially forlarger teams. Remember, beingable to safely stop and secureyour team is a top priority forboth the safety of the musher andthe team. Most mushers are soready and willing to begin falltraining that the bothersomenoise of the ATV is a minorinconvenience for the thrill ofrunning the dogs once again.

By November, we begin towatch the short range and longrange weather forecasts, and theATV has taken on unfavorablenames as you become moreannoyed with the sound of themotor, and your dogs beginresponding better to the rpm’s ofthe ATV than they do to yourvoice commands. We need to get

these dogs on some snow.As I sit and pen this article, it is

late January and raining outside.Ski areas have the (expensive) lux-ury of making snow, though thereis no guarantee of proper tem-perature to keep the white goldon the trail. My friends and com-rades who operate dog sled tour-ing businesses have, for the sec-ond year in a row, lost the week ofbusiness between Christmas andNew Year. And racing kennels arehaving to rethink their trainingstrategy and whether or not therace season will even come tofruition this year. Racing is awhole new level to the sport ofmushing. It is a heightened com-mitment in training and finances.

It is expensive to run dogs. It’seven more expensive to add entryfees, travel and lodging to themix. And if the Northeast doesn’tget some snow cover soon, we willbegin to see race cancelation andpostponements similar to thosethat have begun in the Midwestdue to lack of snow.

I have maintained that oureconomy revolves around thewhite stuff falling from the sky forthose few short months of winter.As a musher, our world is basedupon a thick blanket of the stuff,if only for a few short weeks oncea year.

I started skijoring with my firstSiberian, Nina, by looping herleash through my belt and lettingher run to pull me. It was theworst set up for training a dog topull imaginable, and I am some-what chagrin to admit publicallythat is how I got started. But inmy defense, I only did it 3 timesuntil my belt broke and my Ninaran off. Fortunately, my wife waswith me and Nina ran right toher. But it was a lesson learned.After that we sought out properequipment. And it was in a cata-log, either online or in print thatwe read for the first time theimportance of a proper fittingharness (not a collar. No dogshould ever have to pull from thecollar), and a proper skijoringlead with a bungee section toabsorb some of the initial startenergy, and a proper skijor belt.

A skijor belt is somewhat like aweight lifting belt, some have legstraps to keep the belt from ridingup the waist, and two points ofconnection at each hip. Thesetwo points of connection areoften a d-ring or round ring thatyou connect to the bungee sectionvia a quick connect. One thingyou don’t ever want to do is loseyour dog (or dogs), but in theevent of an emergency, being

able to quickly disconnect your-self from the dog will be impor-tant. Recommendations are tonot use skis with edges, unless youuse a longer tug line and havedeveloped proficiency with thesport. Dogs arteries are very closeto the surface in the leg region,and an unfortunate crash into thedog with edged skis could resultin a serious bleed or worse for thedog.

Skijoring equipment is also verysuitable for other activities. Whenwe were at only five dogs, wehiked Mount Mansfield with thedogs in harness. It was a wonder-ful experience to have the assis-

tance of the dogs pulling on theway up, but we grossly underesti-mated the stamina and desire ofthe dogs to continue pulling all

the way back down. You don’tneed to have “sled dogs” toexperiment and dabble with dogpowered sports, nor do you needa whole team. I have loanedequipment to a friend who hasone golden retriever and borrowsa neighbors golden retriever, andthey have a blast. Golden’s do nothave the drive and forward orien-

tation that Siberians do, but themain point is that he was out hav-ing fun, exercising himself andhis dogs, and most of all, buildinga relationship with the pooches.

If you’re interested in learningmore, a quick internet search forskijoring equipment should yieldresults. As well, most suppliers ofdog sledding and mushing sup-plies will also have available ski-joring equipment. Bikejoring isthe sport of cycling with your dogor dogs in harness, and there arespecific safe ways to attach yourcanine friend to a bike. Canicrossis generally recognized as joggingor running with your dog in har-

Alan and Nina enjoying some winter exercise, skijoring.

Allan & his wife Suzanne have arecreational oriented kennel of SiberianHuskies. This will be their fourth sea-son dog sledding. Currently they havenine working dogs, with two puppiesthat will begin harness training laterthis winter. Additionally, they whelpedtheir first litter of puppies in September,of which they will be keeping five out ofthe nine.

Allan TschornTsan Tsulan Siberians

Sandgate, Vermont


The old adage: “The time to gofishing is when you have thetime” came into play one day lastfall. I had made arrangements tofish with my long time friend,Rick Davidson unfortunately theday before Rick had called to sayhe couldn’t make it. No matter, Ithought, I will just go by myself.The morning of the planned triprolled around and I woke to a rot-ten cold rainy morning. My firstinclination was to stay in bed andforget the whole thing, but thanthe end of the fishing season wasdrawing close and a little rainnever hurt the fishing, so in theend I headed north to fish theAndroscoggin.

Despite a late start I arrived atthe Errol Dam around 10:30 inthe morning. I rigged up tworods; one with a new sinking headand the other with a floating line.The sink tip is a new prototypefrom Airflo and I was eager to tryit out. I am not much of a fan of

sinking lines and in fact this isonly the second one I have everowned; I guess I am too much of

a purist. The line does shootextremely well and as advertisedthe tip section sinks like a rock.

Nate Hill and I had fished thedam two days before Irene madeher visit to New England. Withapologies to Winston Groom andhis character Forest Grump:“The Androscoggin is like a box

of Chocolates. You never knowwhat you’re gonna get”. On theday that Nate and I fished wecaught lots of salmon and rain-bows and a couple of browns

thrown in for good measure. Onthis day it was all bass.

I have nothing against bass,however on the whole I prefer tofish for trout and salmon. I doadmit that bass are a noble gamefish and can give a good accountfor themselves. The bass I caughtgave me every bit as good a fightas any trout I caught that day.The first bass was caught usingthe sinking line in the fast waterbelow the raceway of the dam. Ithought I had hooked a monsterbrown and at first was disappoint-ed that it was only a 15 inch bass.However, after thinking it over Ihad to admit that he was a prettynice fish and I was lucky to havelanded him.

After taking a quick snapshot ofthe bass and releasing him I start-ed casting again. On my third orforth cast I managed to snag myfly on a chain-link fence behindme. The fly was wrapped arounda strand of barbwire several feet

over the water below the dam. Itwas to far out to reach and I triedto break off the fly, in doing so Imanaged to break the leader off afew inches below the line. A newleader would have fixed the prob-lem, but for some reason oranother I had forgotten to bring aspare. I would have liked to con-tinue fishing the sink tip, butinstead congratulated myself onhaving the forethought to haverigged up the second rod with thefloating line.

The prospects for fishing dryflies didn’t look all that good. Itwas raining quite hard and thereseemed to be a definite lack ofinsects on the water or rising fishfor that matter. I tied on aStimulator and began casting upto the dam. On the second orthird cast I missed a fish. This wasa good sign I thought and contin-

ued casting. I was rewarded witha vicious strike. Again I thought Ihad caught a good salmon ortrout. The fish tore off across the

Riverbank TalesRiverbank Talesby Bill Thompsonby Bill Thompson

Continued next page

A Rainy Day Trip Report

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from previous pagefront of the dam and than racedright back at me. In the struggleto get line in the fish managed towrap itself around a large rock.

In a predicament like this thebest thing to do is back off andgive the fish line; I did just that. Ilet line off the reel and backed upto get my net which I had left

lying on the bank behind me.After retrieving the net I slowlyreeled in the line. By the time Igot back into position the fish hadunwrapped himself and washeaded back to his lie. I’m sure hewas surprised to find that he wasstill hooked. I was now in a muchbetter position to fight the fish

and soon had him in the net. Likebefore my fish turned out to be abass.

My third fish of the morningturned out to be another bass ofabout the same size. He readilygulped down the Stimulator andlike his brother headed for thesame rock. This time I was pre-pared and put the wood to himand netted him with little delay.All three of these bass were just ahair over 15 inches, but foughtlike fish twice their size.

The fishing slowed down a bitand it was now well past lunchtime so I headed in to town andpicked up a sub at the local coun-try store. I drove back up to the“gauging station” to eat my sand-

wich and watch the river. Afterlunch I rigged up and waded in.The fishing proved to be slow andI had only caught one smallsalmon before I decided to moveon down river.

I stopped in town to take a pic-ture of an unusual woodenmoose that caught my attention.

Further down river I stopped tofill my water bottle at the springat Seven Island Bridge andarrived at Pontook Dam ataround 3:30 in the afternoon. Itwas still raining and in fact rain-ing hard. The one thing aboutfishing on rainy days is you rarelyfind any competition. This was

quite oblivious this day as I neversaw another fisherman the entiretime I was on the river. In retro-spect, I guess, I was the only onefoolish enough not to come out ofthe rain. I sat there for a whilecontemplating whether or not toget out and fish or get out of mydamp waders and head home. Itcame down to “fish or cut bait”and at last I decided to fish. Icouldn’t have made a betterchoice.

They had just started to closedown the gates of the dam as Iwaded in. A few moments latter Icaught my first fish; a small bassnothing like those I had caught inErrol. I was questioning the wis-dom of my decision when I

caught my first trout of the day. Alovely rainbow of about 16 inch-es came to net. I was still fishingthe Stimulator only now I hadadded a dropper fly. The rainbowhad taken the dropper and so Icontinued to fish the rig. The nextrainbow I caught took the dry fly.And so it went for the next houror so; first I would catch a trouton the dropper and than the nexton the dry. After catching a smallsalmon on the nymph I managedto bend the hook when removingit from the fish’s mouth. I tied ona new nymph, but for some rea-son the fish wanted nothing to dowith it. I caught a couple morerainbows before I cut off thedropper fly and continued to fishonly the dry.

I caught several more rainbowsand a very nice brown troutbefore I decided enough wasenough. There were fish still ris-ing in the run just in front of meand I knew that if I waded outanother twenty feet I could catchthem. I reeled in and called it aday. Every dog has his day andthis dog had just had a spectacu-lar one and well…. enough isenough.

By now I was pretty muchsoaked to the bone. When I got

back to the truck and started to

shuck off my rain jacket andwaders I discovered that both hadfailed miserably. I started thetruck and turned up the heaterand by the time I got home I wasfairly dry.

So the old adage still holds true:“The time to go fishing is whenyou have the time and the weath-er be dammed”.

Originally from Maine, BillThompson, with his wife Janet, lives inFreedom and owns North CountryAngler fly shop in North Conway. Hehas been fly fishing for more than 30years and is a licensed NH FishingGuide. He has fished all over NewEngland, in Canada and out West, butclaims the Saco as his “home river.” Healso writes a column for a local paperas well as articles in national fly fishingmagazines. Bill’s email is [email protected].

himself from my view. I knewthis tense situation would haveto be defused before my wifeconfronted the mouse, a situa-tion that could have resulted in

mutually assured destruction.So there I was, completelyunarmed, with an intruder inmy home … a nightmare homeinvasion scenario.

Quickly reviewing NewHampshire’s self protection lawsin my head, I was sure I coulduse lethal force as long as I couldprove that I was in fear of mylife. Well, if not my life, certain-ly my wife’s life. Also, not hav-ing a current hunting license, Iwasn’t completely sure if therewas an open season on mouse ornot. Did I need a mouse tag?Didn’t New Hampshire have alottery for mouse hunters? Ithought I had read that mousehunters had a 70% success ratethis year, so a license surely musthave been needed. Regardless, Idecided that the safety of myfamily was paramount, so Iwould do whatever I had to doto hunt down and kill this vile lit-tle creature. If I had to take it inand have it weighed and regis-tered, I would do it and risk thefines later.

I quickly grabbed my trusty oldRuger Number One 45/70 rifleand began the hunt. A 405grain bullet should have been

enough to handle this little guyand, coupled with a 2.5 to 8power Leupold scope, he didn’tstand a chance. I nestled into aconcealed position in my diningroom, just behind a chair, andwaited for him to cross my fieldof fire. I was not disappointed.In just a few minutes, the soundof scurrying little feet reverber-ated through the room. Keepingmy scope at its lowest magnifica-tion to increase my field of view,I lined up on the rapidly movingtarget and touched one off.

Okay, so maybe a single shotrifle wasn’t the best of choices Icould have made. I either shothigh or he saw the bullet comingand ducked; but I missed. Ournew laminate flooring buckledfrom the impact, throwing upclouds of shredded fake wood.Pictures fell from the walls,chairs toppled, and the resound-ing boom deafened me instantly.As my ears slowly cleared, Icould hear a faint call from anupstairs room. “Did somethingfall?” “No dear, everything isfine here.”

My hunting plan was flawed.Given the speed of the mouse, Inever should have gone with asingle shot rifle. Time for PlanB. The Ruger went back in thecabinet and I came back with aColt AR-15 .223 with a 30round magazine and an EoTechred dot holographic sight. Thismouse was toast!

Having now found a hidingplace in our kitchen, I reposi-tioned myself and set up asniper’s nest behind a kitchencounter. I pulled down myHarris bipod, loaded up 30rounds of Hornady varmintrounds, and waited for him tomake his last fatal mistake. Iknew where he was holed up,having followed a trail of spooracross the vast plains of myhouse. Soon I heard a faintrustling sound as he prepared fora breakout.


Lock, Stock and Smoking BarrelLock, Stock and Smoking BarrelBy Stan HolzBy Stan Holz

Northern New Hampshire’s Guns-Only Gun Shop

Northern New Hampshire’sGuns-Only Gun Shop

4 King's Square, Whitefield, NH 03598

Phone 603-837-2345Visit our webiste www.villagegun.com

The Village Gun Store is an "old fashioned" gun shopproviding personalized serv-ice, great prices, and a wealthof gun expertise. We arelocated on the common" inthe Northern New HampshireVillage of Whitefield.

Hours of operation: Tuesday to Saturday - 10am to 5pmFriday - 10am to 6:30pmStan & Sandy

Continued next page

Being the well known hunterthat I am, best known for myexploits in the hair raisingBackyard Squirrel andWoodchuck Hunt of 2011, itwas with some surprise that Iwitnessed an aggressive, andobviously none too bright,mouse casually trotting acrossmy living room floor. Pausingonly to grace me with the slight-est of side wards glances, the lit-tle beastie seemed to think thathe was taking a leisurely strollthrough his own domicile.

There I was, relaxing on myrecliner, watching my favoriteshow on my nice flat screen TV,the remote control in one handand a snack in the other. Then,with no warning, my acuteperipheral vision picked upanomalous motion off to oneside. Snapping to full attention,I immediately identified theintruder as a dangerous, andoften venomous, brown field

mouse. My wife, whose love ofmice is only exceeded by herlove of snakes, was luckily not in

the room when this blatantincursion was first noticed.

Having successfully traversedthe carpeting in the living room,the mouse quickly darted undera piece of furniture, concealing

The great mouse hunt of 2012


from previous page

ing dimension requirements andan entry form, can be down-loaded from www.wildnh.com/Education/Junior_Duck_Contest.htm, or contact N.H. Junior

Duck Stamp Art ContestCoordinator Ellen Macneil at theN.H. Fish and GameDepartment, 11 Hazen Drive,Concord, NH 03301; [email protected] or call603-271-2461.

The N.H. Junior Duck StampArt Contest will award first, sec-ond, third and honorable men-tion ribbons in four groups:grades K-3; 4-6; 7-9; and 10-12.The State Best-of-Show is select-

ed from among the first-placewinning designs.

The Best-of-Show NewHampshire winner advances tothe National Junior Duck Stamp

Design Contest, inwhich the three topwinners receive acash award and atrip to the adultFederal DuckStamp Contest.

Winning artworkin all categories willbe displayed atN.H Fish andGame headquar-ters in Concord,N.H., in April2012.

The FederalJunior Duck Stamp Conservationand Design Program is an inte-grated art and science activitydeveloped to teach environmen-tal science and habitat conserva-tion.

Teachers who want to integratethese lessons into their course-work can find a curriculum guidefor teaching conservationthrough the arts athttp://www.fws.gov/junior-duck/E

CONCORD, N.H - Hey kids!Here’s a chance to express yourcreativity, learn about wildlifeand win cash prizes. Create yourown original artwork of a NorthAmerican duck or goose andenter it in the 2012 NewHampshire Junior Duck StampArt Contest.

Entries must be postmarked byMarch 15, 2012. The contest isopen to New Hampshire youthfrom kindergarten through grade12. Entries are judged on artisticmerit and scientific accuracy inportraying the waterfowl. Thecompetition is open to public,private and home-schooled NewHampshire students.

This year’s winners will takehome some great prizes, made

possible by a grant from the U.S.Fish and Wildlife Service. Theartist selected as Best-of-Showwill receive a $500 scholarshipand the first place winners ineach age group will be awardedcash prizes of up to $75.

The New Hampshire Fish andGame Department runs thestatewide competition, which ispart of the U.S. Fish and WildlifeService’s Federal Junior DuckStamp Conservation and DesignContest. The contest serves adual purpose, giving students achance to use their artistic talentsat the same time they learn aboutwildlife and conservation.

Don’t forget — entries must bepostmarked by March 15, 2012.Competition guidelines, includ-

There was movement, and thenI spotted him making a run forit. The Colt is only semi-auto-matic, but it’s capable of somevery rapid fire. With the red cir-cle of the holographic sightplanted right on him, it onlytook what seemed like secondsfor me to empty the magazine.Goodbye Mr. Mouse!

“Honey, did you just dropsomething?” “No dear, it musthave been from outside.”

Carefully revealing myselffrom my expertly concealed hid-ing spot, I went out to recoverthe body … or what was left ofit. With a plastic body bag inone hand, and a scoop in theother, I was ready to search for,recover, and dispose of the bodybefore my wife ever knew whatwas happening. Slowly siftingthrough the pulverized remainsof what used to be kitchen cabi-nets, I was shocked to find noteven a trace of blood. Then, outof the corner of my eye, I spot-ted it. There, not five feet fromwhere I stood, was anothermouse turd, and a fresh one atthat. I missed! How could thisbe?

I was beside myself, and nearpanic, when I remembered anold trick taught to me by anancient Abenaki chief manyyears ago. Searching my memo-ry, I was able to recreate thetechnique which worked for somany through the ages. First Ihad to scrounge for the neces-sary materials. Luckily, every-thing I needed was in the house.

I quickly assembled the wood,metal, and food ingredientsneeded to execute Plan C.Using a flat piece of wood, I fab-

ricated a spring loaded lever andtrigger assembly. Then, careful-ly extracting the oil of freshpeanuts, I smeared this concoc-tion on to a small bait pad. Itwas now complete and ready foraction. Cocking and locking thespring, I cautiously placed thedevice in an area near the mostrecent spoor site. Putting myweapons aside, I now sat backand waited. Minutes, thenhours, went by with no activity.Had I mortally wounded themouse with my last barrage? Ihad just about given up on thewhole concept when I spied aquick movement off to asoutherly direction. I barely hadtime to turn my head when Iheard a loud SNAP echo off thewalls. It was over. I had wonthis battle, ensuring the safety ofwhat was left of my house. Icarefully recovered the carcassand will soon be on my waydown to the local registrationstation to have it weighed.

Meanwhile, my wife has comedownstairs. I’ll have to explainhow quickly we have to get anexterminator in here. The ter-mites have just shredded ourhouse, chewing through floors,carpets, and cabinets. On theother hand, I wonder which gunwould be best on termites?

Stan Holz lives in Whitefield, NHand, with his wife Sandy, has ownedand operated Village Gun Store theresince 1974. He invites everyone to stopand visit. Aside from his interest infirearms and shooting, Stan is alsoinvolved in amateur astronomy, photog-raphy, ham radio and scuba diving. Hecan be contacted by emailing him [email protected].

Reminder — Junior Duck Stamp Contest Deadline Is March 15

2011 Winner- Artist, Michalla Wiss

of equipment that would proba-bly get a parent arrested now forchild endangerment, but it gotme skiing and I survived.

The auto road that climbs themountain is a nice paved surface

that crisscrosses through thehardwoods on the east side of themountain and costs only a fewdollars. At the bottom was a signthat said there would be hangglider activity this day. Ascutneyis popular with hang gliders andthey have a special launch plat-form built at one of the peaks. It’svery cool to watch them launchbut you have to be there on justthe right day with good weather. Ihoped we may get to see some.

Many people were riding theirbikes up the auto road. Thesefolks must really like a challengebecause it looks incredibly gruel-ing and I get tired just looking atthem. The riders just starting outat the bottom have energy andare happy; they smile and wave to

you. When you pass the ones whoare approaching the top, they arebarely moving at a crawl andhave a permanent grimace ontheir face. They look like theywant to die, to just throw them-selves right under your car as youcruise by with your air condition-ing on. I’m sure it’s quite anaccomplishment in the bikingworld, and what a nice ridedown.

Hiking the trails was nice. It wasstill pretty early and there washardly anyone there. We took thelong route and got to the summitin about 30 minutes. Unlike someearlier hikes, the kids now runway ahead, and we have a hardtime keeping up with them. Justbefore the summit there is a look-out tower to climb. It’s prettyhigh, with just narrow, steep stairsspiraling around the steel framewith just a waist high rail andsome chain link fence at the top.Too scary for Michelle, whostayed at the bottom with the dog,but I took the kids up, carefullyand a little nervously. They lis-tened to instructions well and wegot a great 360 degree view,including right where our houseis.

The actual summit of Ascutneyis not quite as thrilling as some ofthe other lookout spots. It is thehome of the radio towers andelectronics building. The anten-nas are impressive though, andthe giant microwave antennaslook like giant drums strapped onthe side of the tower. We madeour way to the highest rock andfound the marker in the stoneshowing the summit, andexplained that this was the high-


It was a stellar summer day,clear and warm. First thing in themorning, everybody is happy andrested, and this was a good morn-ing for a little stroll in the woods.Not a whole day affair, but somefresh air before lunch. We decid-ed to stay close to home, anddrive the couple of miles to somerecreational trails around thebase of Mt. Ascutney, our homemountain. As we approached theparking area at the end of a deadend road, there is a nice close upview of the summit and the kidsyelled “let’s go to the top!” fromthe back seat. A full climb to thesummit would be just a bit muchfor them, we thought, but theymade me pause, and I had theidea to drive up the auto roadthen hike the trails around thesummit.

I have always lived in the shad-ow of Mt. Ascutney. My wife andI got married there, and I learnedto ski there when I was very

young. My first ski’s were wood-en, with cable bindings thatstrapped around your regularwinter boots leaving your heels

free, and a big metal clamp thatfolded over toward the front hold-ing it all together. It was the type

Family TracksFamily TracksBy Brian LangBy Brian Lang

Dragonflies and Giant Butterflies


for hunting hares, dogs and theirneeds and training, safety consid-

erations, hare and rabbit hunting

resources, and how to find clubsin New Hampshire that focus ondogs and hare hunting.

Participants should bring warmoutdoor clothing and be preparedto spend some time outside. Thefirst portion of the workshoptakes place in the classroom, andthen the class moves outdoors,where the dogs will show theirstuff ! Please note that this work-shop does not include lunch.

Activities at Fish and Game’sOwl Brook Hunter EducationCenter are funded by the federalWildlife Restoration Program,now in its 75th year, supported bypurchases of firearms, ammuni-tion and archery supplies.

For more information aboutOwl Brook, visit www.HuntNH.com /Hunting/ hunter_ed_cen-ter.htm.The New HampshireFish and Game Department isthe guardian of the state’s fish,wildlife and marine resources andtheir habitats. Visit www.huntnh.com.

HOLDERNESS, N.H. —Learn about the exciting sport ofsnowshoe hare hunting at a freeworkshop being offered at theNew Hampshire Fish and GameDepartment’s Owl Brook HunterEducation Center in Holderness,N.H., on Saturday, March 3,2012, from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.Space is limited and pre-registra-tion is required. To register, callthe Owl Brook Hunter EducationCenter at 603-536-3954.

Workshop presenters includeEdward Vien President of theNH Beagle Club and a volunteerHunter Education instructor;Bob Drozdowski, a past presidentof the NH Beagle Club; andAdam Gauthier.

These instructors have manyyears of experience and a truepassion for their sport, so bring allyour questions.

Workshop participants will beintroduced to one of NewHampshire’s finest small-gamehunting experiences — hare

hunting with beagles. You’ll learnabout snowshoe hares and where

to find them, equipment needed

est spot on the whole mountain.They sat next to it and I tried toget a picture looking down at themarker by their legs, but they justwould not look up and smiletogether.

As we hung out at the top, thereseemed to be dragonflies all over,hundreds of them. There was ahuge swarm spiraling in thesunny clearing in and around theradio equipment. It almostseemed like you could imaginethey were little robots flyingaround and the loud hum of theradio equipment was giving thempower as they guarded the tower.

We got back to the car and itwas only about 10 am, and I real-ly wanted to try and see thehangliders. It was too early, asthey usually show up in the earlyafternoon when the sun warms

the air more creating the thermalcurrents that they seek out to flyin. We thought we could gohome, have lunch, and make itback to see the gliders.

We made it back for the gliders,but missed them actually launch-ing. As we reached the top of theauto road we could see thehangliders circling just above usnear the summit. We made theshort hike to West Peak, wherethe launch site is. It looks like aboat dock anchored onto theedge of a great cliff, and it had asmall crowd of, people on it whenwe arrived. It’s pretty impressiveto see the pilot holding his glider,poised right at the edge, jump offwhen the time is just right. We gotup there with the rest of them,but careful to stay near the back,well away from the edge.

The gliders were just above us,soaring just like birds, riding theinvisible columns of rising air.They say they actually watch forbirds and try to follow them,because they show where thethermal currents are, bringingthem higher and giving them alonger ride. We craned our neckslooking straight up, holding ourhands against the sun.

The bright , multi coloredwings looked like giant butterflywings, and the pilot, who sits in asort of sling-like sleeping baglooked like an insect body hang-ing below. One of them cruisedby real close in front of us at eyelevel and waved at us. The kidscould actually make out that itwas a person flying and excitedlywaved back.

We hung out for a little while,

until they all flew too far away toappreciate. We could actually seethem start to land in the fields farbelow. As we drove back home,some of them were still alongsidethe road, packing up the gliderson their vehicles. It was a greatday to explore the summit of“our” mountain, and we did ittwice.

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Brian Lang lives with his wife,Michelle and two children Megan andBen in Reading, VT. Brian grew up inVT and started enjoying his outdoorpursuits at a very young age. He is anavid hunter, fisherman, camper, andhiker and hopes to give his kids the samewholesome up bringing he enjoyed in theNew England outdoors. When he's notoutside, he works as an MRITechnologist. He can be reached [email protected].

from previous page

Snowshoe Hare Hunting Workshop: March 3, 2012, in Holderness, N.H.


KID’S KORNERJoey Upton holds up a Brookie he caughtafter school ice fishung with dad, Shawn,somewhere in central New Hampshire.


The days are getting notice-ably longer. That’s one of thereasons that I love February.February allows me to reallyrelax and enjoy winter. InOctober and November, I amusually all worried aboutpreparing for winter. InDecember and January, I amstill worrying about all thethings that can go wrong in thewinter that are that much hard-er to deal with because of allthe snow and cold.

But in February, I can relaxinto winter and just enjoy. Thedays are getting longer and thesun just a little stronger. Yes, wewill still have tons of snow—Iam old enough to remembersome doozies, like February of1969, when we got 10 feet ofsnow in less than a week andthe ski areas had to shut downbecause they couldn’t dig thechairlifts out. And we will stillget plenty of cold temperatures,

even cold snaps with wholeweeks when it doesn’t go abovezero.

But the reason I can relax isthat the end is in sight.Groundhog Day is the day: halfthe wood and half the hay.Groundhog Day is halfway

through the winter, not just bythe calendar; in all my manyyears, I have never seen a yearwhen it wasn’t just about exact-ly that. I usually measure in

terms of wood, and it usuallyworks out just about right.

There was a time in my lifewhen my vacations always fellin the winter. I liked to gosomeplace warm in lateFebruary because, when youleave, it is winter, but when youget back, it is almost spring. Bythe beginning of March, it’sbeginning to feel like sugaringtime. The sun has some heat,the birds are beginning to singmating songs, the pileatedwoodpeckers are out bangingloudly on hollow trees.

February is when I love mostto ice fish. Ice fishing is like sug-aring in that it involves shortburst of activity and then a lotof sitting, watching and wait-ing. You can sit in a sugar shackor bobhouse if you want, but inFebruary, I want to be out in

the sun. I want to soak up asmuch Vitamin D and heat andlight as I can to make up for thelack of it for the last threemonths.

When I was a baby, my fatherwas a naval officer stationed inpost-World War II GreatBritain. Unemployment wasvery high in postwar Europe,especially for young women(men returning from fightingthe war could find employmentrebuilding from the war dam-age). Young, single womenwould go the Americanembassy looking for work, andAmerican military and diplo-matic officers, like my father,often hired them as nannies orother household help. So, wehad a Norwegian nanny.

Norwegians are sun worship-pers. No wonder; if you thinkwinter days are short here, youain’t seen nothin’ ‘til you’vegone to Scandinavia. It’s notthat much colder than here; infact, it might even be a littlewarmer on average, but thesame ocean currents that keepit warmer also make it cloudyand raw in the winter, while thelatitude makes the days almostincomprehensibly short. Thesun barely comes up before it isbusy setting again.

The converse of that, ofcourse, is that in the summer,the sun barely sets. Like inAlaska, one can be runningaround outside in shorts at mid-night in June looking for all theworld like it was 3 o’clock in theafternoon. When you get usedto having that much sun for halfthe year, it’s hard to then have

Continued next page

Lessons from the Great OutdoorsLessons from the Great OutdoorsBy Martha VanderWolk By Martha VanderWolk

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to live without any for the otherhalf. No wonder the Norsemen“went a-Viking” and conqueredmost of northern Europe, theNorth Atlantic and even partsof North America; it was justtoo depressing to stay home.

Even nature knows thatScandinavians needed moresun that other people; that’swhy the people of the northhave fairer skin and lighter hairthan those who evolved in moresouthern climes. Dark skin andhair protects you from theharmful rays of the sun andfrom Vitamin A overdoses, butin the north, at least untilhumans destroyed the ozonelayer, those were not the dan-ger; a shortage of Vitamin Dwas. So peoples who evolved inthe north lost their protectivedarkness and became lightskinned and fair haired.

Anyway, Uni started me onNorwegian sun-worshippingalmost as soon as I was born,since my birthday is in July. Ihad my first sunburn at the ageof 2 weeks. Yes, I know allabout the dangers of ultravioletrays and skin cancer, but I amgoing to get my sunshine, thank

you very much. (And we now allhave Vitamin D deficienciesbecause we are all so busy hid-ing from the sun.) I know aboutthe real dangers of the sun,even in February, reflecting offall that white snow and ice aswell as shining directly on me.But it feels sooo good, and it isso nice to be able to be out-doors all day, enjoying thisamazing place that we live,after having been cooped up forthe first half of the winter.

This year, I am teachingschool every day from the firstof January until February vaca-tion. I will be forced to spendmost of my time indoors. Butyou can bet that as soon asFebruary vacation arrives, youwill find me out on the pondreading or doing puzzles as Iwait for flags to fly!


Guns • Ammo • Accessories

Box 3028 • RT 25AOrford, NH 03777

Harry OsmerOwner 603-353-9217

from previous page

Martha VanderWolk owns and oper-ates Sturtevant Pond Camps inMagalloway, Maine with her husband,Tom Rideout. A lifelong educator, shecurrently teaches in the SustainableBusiness and Communities Program atGoddard College. She can be reached [email protected].

porating multiple learningstyles and optional activitiessuch as music and movement,snacks ideas, home connec-

tions, and more. These interdis-ciplinary methods are necessaryfor successful early childhoodlearning. The curriculum guideand online supplementarymaterials are easy to use andfun to do. Whether you’re a for-mal teacher in a school or anon-formal educator at anature center, this guide is aneffective teaching resource inany setting.”

Growing Up WILD wasdeveloped by a national non-

profit organization, the Councilfor Environmental Education(CEE). Funds to create the pro-gram came from a grant award-ed to CEE by theEnvironmental ProtectionAgency with the goal ofstrengthening a national effortto connect young children tonature, particularly with diverseaudiences.

Developed with the vision ofchanging the culture of earlychildhood education toembrace learning in the out-doors, Growing Up WILD isthe first nationally distributedprofessional development pro-gram and activity guide thatintegrates environmental edu-cation into the early childhoodcurriculum.For more information, visit:www.projectwild.org/growingupwild.htm. To schedule aworkshop, contact:

Ali ThomasVT Fish and Wildlife [email protected]

BARRE, VT — A new, nation-al environmental educationresource is now available foreducators through workshopsgiven by the Vermont Fish andWildlife Department. GrowingUp WILD: Exploring Naturewith Young Children is an earlychildhood education curricu-lum guide focusing on wildlifeeducation.

The Vermont Fish andWildlife Department has beenoffering Project WILD andAquatic WILD training work-shops to Kindergarten throughgrade 12 teachers, environmen-tal educators, and college stu-dents for many years. Now, AliThomas, the EducationCoordinator for the depart-ment is adding Growing UpWILD to the list of training

options. “Growing Up WILD is an

incredible resource, as the cre-ators of the curriculum clearly

understand the needs of earlychildhood educators,” saysThomas. “All of the lessons cre-atively address concepts inmath, science, physical educa-tion, and literature while incor-

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TO HELP CONNECT CHILDREN TO NATURE


to me asking for a dog for myyoungest son, how could I reallysay no? Even though I knew bet-ter, Alex was bringing home a 9week old beagle puppy he appro-priately named Buddy. His regis-tered name is “Alex Cote II’s lit-

tle Buddy”. The problem withBuddy, unlike my dog Billy, heloves to run and every time youlook the other way, he’s headedfor the hills. In true beagle form,he comes back, but when he isdarn good and ready. He is a

well marked little cuss with bigbrown eyes that everyone in theCote house has fallen in lovewith.

He is truly Alex’s best friendand his buddy. He eats, andsleeps with Alex and even takesshowers with him. Alex’s grand-father would be proud if he washere to share it. The big chal-lenge is getting Alex to let metake the dog hunting! Alex isafraid that his dog won’t comeback. Not only is he cute but heis an extremely smart dog.Anyway, with the lack of bunniesand the lack of time to hunt him,I guess it is just as well.

So, where oh where have therabbits gone, oh where oh wherecan they be? No one seems to besure but there is a good part ofsouthern New Hampshire closedto snowshoe rabbit hunting.

Back in the 60’s, all it wasprime hunting cover. Someblame the coyote, some say dis-ease, and some say the decline isdirectly related to habitat loss.One thing for sure it is a loss.Rabbit hunting is certainly oneof the best ways to spend a freeday that you could ask for. It iswhat it is, there is still a goodpopulation of the smaller“coonie” rabbits in the southerntier to hunt.

One of my favorites as ayoungster is still good even today.Spruce Swamp in Fremont andBrentwood is still excellent hunt-ing and is easily accessed fromRt 125 in Brentwood and fromthe old railroad bed in Fremontoff Rt 107. Also on the otherside of Rt 107 off the

During the summer of 1965,my parent’s house was busy justlike any other in urban America.My parents like many other peo-ple in the small town that I grewup in became almost obsessedwith the current events thatflashed across the nightly news.Current events in those daysconsisted of a new president,Lyndon B. Johnson and theVietnam War.

Without getting into the rightsand wrongs and the when’s andwhys, the country was in totalturmoil. And with a brother inthe army, things weren’t muchbetter in our house. Mother wasa complete basket case and myfather became a workaholic. Mysaving grace in those days wasmy beagle, Billy.

There seemed to be a questionas to who was actually Billy’sfather was, he was almost allwhite with a patch of black run-ning up his back giving him theresemblance of a backwardsskunk. In those days, we didn’thave to go far to find a hare ortwo.

Fact is, we only needed to crossthe railroad tracks behind thehouse to get a good run. Fromthe end of November to March,free time was spent here in whatI called the big woods. That is,me and Billy. The woods weren’treally all that big, maybe 200acres or so. When I was outalone with him he wouldn’t leavemy side.

Therefore, he didn’t run tomany rabbits without anotherdog to prod him along. Usually

he ran with one the other dogsthat my father had. Bottom line,he was truly my best friend. Billywasn’t afraid that he was goingto get lost without one of the

other dogs, I’m completely con-vinced that he was afraid of MEGETTING LOST!

Some of my earliest and bestchildhood memories werearound a dog of one kind oranother. So, when my wife came

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Dean Vanier • PO Box 1327 • Lebanon, NH 03766 • 603 523-9206 Continued next page

A Boy's Best Friend

Continued next page

Would you like to promote the North Country and theOutdoor Gazette? Are you a go getter or like being on the road?

The Outdoor Gazette is seek-ing distributers to contact anddistribute to Vermont andNew Hampshire businesses.These are part-time posi-tions with good incomepotential.

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Southern Side UpBy Alex Cote

Southern Side UpBy Alex Cote


from previous page

Rockingham Recreation Trailsome good cover can be found.It is all easily accessible to thepublic with ample parking at thetrail head.

Other areas of interest in thesouthern third of the GraniteState include the Stevens FamilyForest in Nottingham, theSandown Town Forest inSandown, the eastern part ofthe Madbury Reservoir inMadbury, Manchester WaterWorks property located inAuburn, Candia andManchester, Pawtuckaway StatePark located in Nottingham,Deerfield, and Raymond andthe Doust-Cate Town Forest inDeerfield.

These are not the only avail-able areas but are easily foundon maps to plan a weekendhunt. In the towns of Auburn,Candia, Raymond, Chester,Danville, Deerfield, Northwood,Epsom, Epping, Lee andNottingham, all one needs toreally do is acquire a copy of theNew Hampshire Atlas andGazetteer and do a little

research. There is ample, unbro-ken large tracts of prime bunnycountry open to hunters.

As of late the ice fishing haspicked up considerably. TowerHill Pond in Candia, PleasantLake in Deerfield, Bow Lake inStrafford, Beaver Lake in Derry,and Massabic Lake in Auburnand Manchester all sport a troutfishery. I factor the latter holdssome tagged Rainbow trout giv-ing up a major prize winner dur-ing the annual Great Rotary IceFishing Derby a few years back.I was told of an unconfirmedreport that three fishermancaught and released over 25trout from Pleasant Lake inDeerfield the second week ofJanuary.

As for a warm water fishery, allof the above support bass, pick-erel, perch and some even holdblack crappie. Lakes that supporta brook trout fishery, includingbrowns and rainbows are notrestricted to lake trout regula-tions! But, check all the rules andregulations before you go.Designated brook trout ponds

for the most part are ALLCLOSED TO ICE FISHING.

With the lack of snow coverand unseasonably warm weath-er, ice conditions have been slowto improve. A recent cold snaphas brought improvement butextreme caution must still beused. There are still “Thin Ice”signs posted on many of thesouthern lakes. These signs arethere for a reason and are put inplace by local folks who knowthe area.

To feed or not to feed?Supplemental deer feeding hasbecome more and more popularannually. New Hampshire Fishand Game has created a specialpublication that explains the rea-sons why feeding is not a goodthing for the deer. We need tokeep in mind that the folks at fishand game are the experts.Regardless of what is written onthe back of the feed bag, the staffat fish and game are animal spe-cific professional biologists.

The feed makers are trying tosell feed. The state biologists aretrying to grow and manage the

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deer herd. In talking with a closebiologist friend of mine, he rec-ommends that the best supple-mental feeding is to create aback yard food plot. No matterwhat the size, it will attract dif-ferent species of wildlife.

There are products on themarket today from a throw andgrow annual product thatrequires only a quick raking tosome perennial blends that willlast up to 5 years and requiretillers and tractors to put in theplots.

Alex Cote resides in Deerfield NewHampshire. He is on the Pro Staff forNorthwood's Common Scents! He isalso a scorer for the NHASTC. Alexand his son spend as much time out-doors as possible and he only workswhen he has to.


There’s a saying “Time waitsfor no man and dammed fewwomen”. As the year rolls bysportsmen look forward to thebeginning of a season; mourn theend and then repeat the cycleagain the following year. Yearsseem to blend together andremembering exactly what hap-pened on any given trip or seasonbecomes a little blurred; andsometimes slightly exaggeratedwhen extracted from the memorybank. Mile markers along theway like birthdays are remindersbut don’t seem to really registerbecause the incremental increaseis only a year at a time and theolder you get the smaller percent-age of your life it represents. Acomparison I often make is to a10 year old a year is 10% of theirlife but to a 50 year old it’s only2%,

Time rolls by and inevitablybesides getting older a time checkcomes along that makes you stopand think about it. The 10thannual Fly Fish New Hampshireshow will be March 3rd & 4th;somewhat of a milestone. In theearly 90’s I was President of theMerrimack River Valley TUchapter and coordinated a oneday show for three years. Eachshow was in a different locationand parking, space and hallrentals were problems. At thattime there was a fairly successfulfly fishing show in southern NHthat had good attendance. Thatshow ended sometime in the 90’s.

In the early 2000’s the chapterdecided to look into sponsoring afly fishing show. There were sev-eral members on the committeeincluding Jim Riccardi who hadworked the other show. Weteamed up with the Pelham Fish

& Game Club which had a largeclub house and ample parking.Pelham has a large kitchen facili-ty; Bob Greenwood has coordi-nated and cooked food andrefreshments and a dinnerSaturday night and breakfastSunday morning for vendors andclub staff working the show. Ofthe original team Mitch Kopacz

Sr and Bob from Pelham, and Iare the only ones left. Volunteersprovide all of the set up andstaffing for the show.

We’ve been fortunate to have flyshops like Cote’s and NorthCountry Angler that helpedanchor the show. Unfortunatelyseveral shops have gone out ofbusiness. Over the years we’vebeen able to add shops includingthe Evening Sun, OpecheeTrading Post, Dan’s Fly Shop,Paul’s Bait Rigs & Tackle,Shadcreek Flies, Six Sisters FlyBox, and Fly Fishing Products

and for antique tackle andappraisals Jim Philbrook .

Guides and outfitters with theshow include BroadsidesInternational. Osprey FishingAdventures, Fish Story GuideService, Northwind Outfitters &Guide Service, North Star GuideService and NH Rivers GuideService. Non profits includeCostal Conservation Associationof NH, United Fly Tyers and the

New Hampshire GuidesAssociation. Tom Jutras a guideand former owner of MountainRoad Fly Shop has been doingthe casting demonstrations at theshow for years.

Presentations at the show for2012 include: Dick Peterson -FlyFishing 101 – What you need toget started, Bill Thompson – FlyFishing in the White Mountains,Alan Erdossy – Stripers on theDry Fly, and Patrick Ard FlyFishing the Upper ConnecticutRiver. There’s also a rod buildingclass; pre registration is required.

Call Cote’s 508-892-3765 to reg-ister. Information and directionsfor the show are on the TU &Pelham web sites:www.merri-macktu.org or www.pelhamfis-handgame.org.

I seldom make New Year reso-lutions but this year I did, moreor less. For those familiar withSpecial Agent Oso one of hisquotes is “It’s all part of the plan,more or less”. At the end of theyear we send out a card andnewsletter and include a fly forour current year customers.That’s about 14 or 15 dozen flies.I usually try to get most of themtied in the winter and finish up inNovember. Patterns used to bemore complex like Gray Ghostsbut as the number of customersincreased tying simpler patternsprevailed. Winter is the time toresupply the fly boxes so that’swhat I like to spend my tying timedoing. There are a lot of tips forfly tying; one is to tie a fly a dayso my resolution was to tie a fly aday for the mailing; so far I’vestuck with it.

Tying is a lot easier if you havea tying bench or desk and canleave tools and materials out. Fortying large quantities of the samefly it’s easier and quicker to usean assembly line process. Anexample would be saddle hacklefor streamers; select and prep allof the feathers. Try to handlematerial once; if it’s pinchingbarbs on hooks do a pack verseseach one separately; you onlyhave to handle the pliers once. Ifapplying head cement; tie a batchand go back and put the cementon. Put the number of hooks youneed on a magnetic holder so youdon’t have to open a pack or con-tainer for each hook. I keep thematerials for the pattern I’m

By Jim Norton By Jim Norton

From the back of a canoe

From the back of a canoe

Can’t Seem to find us?Can’t Seem to find us?

Not a problem, we’re on Facebook!Search for us under

The New Hampshire Vermont Outdoor Gazette

Continued next page

Fly Fish New Hampshire

Janet & Bill Thompson at the Fly Fish New Hampshire Show with entries forthe Pink Fly Contest.


We’ve had a few ski and tie trips;over the last ten years the moun-tains have been winning. One ofthe group had two concussionsresulting in surgery; unwillinglyhe gave his skis away. At the endof last years ski season a fallresulted in rotator cuff surgery;this year the same trooper wentdown and broke the cartilagefrom a rib.

He still plans on skiing becausehe can’t have surgery on the othershoulder until the rib heals.There have been numerous other

sidelining injuries. Mine was slip-ping in the lodge and fracturing afew ribs on the corner of a picnictable bench a few years ago; tech-nically that doesn’t count; it’s inthe same category as a foulhooked fish

tying in a plastic container (notrequired if you don’t have cats,dogs or kids around). It’s also eas-ier to transport stuff.

If you can tie a particular flypattern in 5 minutes don’t expectto be able to do 12 in an hour; itusually doesn’t work that way.Repetition is the key to improvingtying quality and productivity.Try to tie a minimum of six ofthe same pattern and size.

The more you get used torepeating the process the betterthe flies will be. If your tying flies

in different sizes like a parachuteAdams start with the largest hooksize you need a 10 or 12 then tie14’s and 16’s. Getting used toworking with the material willmake it easier to tie smaller pat-terns.

Winters can go by pretty quickand this one’s off to a late start;we were fishing in late Decemberand quite a few of the guys havebeen out in January. I probablyspend more time skiing than any-thing else in the winter. There’s 4to 8 of us who ski, fish and tie.

from previous page

Jim a native of New Hampshire enjoysfly-fishing & tying, bird hunting and avariety of other outdoor activities and isa registered NH fishing Guidewww.nhriversguide.com and author ofthe book Granite Lines.

Essex, Vt — Lt. GovernorPhil Scott and Fish andWildlife Commissioner PatrickBerry recognized the winnersof Vermont’s 2011 YouthHunting Memories Contest onSaturday, January 21 at theYankee Classic Sportsman’sShow in Essex Junction.

“The Youth HuntingMemories Contest showcasesthe achievements ofVermont’s youth hunters,”said Commissioner Berry. “Inaddition to the three youngpeople who received awards,we had 70 youths who submit-ted wonderful essays captur-ing their thoughts, passionsand experiences about hunt-

ing in Vermont. Perhaps moststriking is the importance ourkids placed on family, friendsand having fun outdoors.”

Each winner received aBeagle Outdoor Wear fannypack, binoculars, a compassand several Fish and WildlifeDepartment publications,including the 2012 Calendar.All contest winners and theirfamily members also receivedcomplimentary passes to theshow, courtesy of the YankeeSportsman’s Classic.

The Youth HuntingMemories Essay Contest is ajoint partnership between theVermont Fish and WildlifeDepartment and the

University of VermontExtension System. All of theessays can be read on theVermont Fish and WildlifeDepartment’s youth page. Goto www.vtfishandwildlife.com,then to Youth Hunting underHunting & Trapping, andclick on the Youth MemoriesScrapbook link.Congratulations to all whoentered.

2011 Youth Hunting Memories

Contest Winners

Colby Fox, age 9, WallingfordJacob Crawford, age 11, JerichoTrevor Houle, age 14, Brattleboro.

Lt. Governor Phil Scott and Fish &Wildlife Commissioner Patrick Berrycongratulated the young hunters in thephoto who entered Vermont’s YouthHunting Memories Contest and attend-ed the awards ceremony Saturday,January 21, at the Yankee ClassicSportsman’s Show in Essex Junction.

Lt. Governor and Fish and Wildlife Commissioner Recognize Youth Hunting Memories Contest Winners

Unless you camp out near awindow watching bird feeders,finding winter birds can be diffi-cult. It’s always enjoyable towatch birds close to the house.You get many opportunities towitness and learn about birdbehavior. The pecking order

becomes well established and it’seasy to determine which birds arethe most dominant. Their prob-lem is that the most dominantbird can spend so much timearguing over feeder rights that itactually does little feeding. Thedominant bird is just too busy

chasing off subdominant birds.We put out our seed later thisyear than normal in an effort tokeep feeder damage by bears to aminimum. It was fairly mild earlyin the season with a couple ofeight inch snowstorms that quick-ly disappeared to warm tempera-tures. This left a lot of naturalfood available to birds andallowed the bears to avoid goinginto hibernation until later thanusual.

When we did put out our seedthis season, we attempted to savemoney by only hanging one feed-er of black-oil sunflower and oneof thistle seed. The tight econo-my and rising expenses makesyou select your priorities. Sorrybirds! It did take two weeks forthe birds to find the feeders oncewe erected them, but we still havea good variety in manageablenumbers. Goldfinches and red-polls, chickadees of course, jays,

and tufted titmouse as well asdowny and hairy woodpeckers allvisit the feeders. There are fourvery healthy gray squirrels visit-ing today. At this point they seem

to be well behaved and are nottoo reckless around the feeders.

If you too are choosing to be abit thrifty with your bird feedingbudget, there is another greatway to add to your wealth of wildbird knowledge and behaviors.Whether you have open groundor snow cover in your local area,there are stories to be found inthe form of tracks.

Birds in search of food spend a

lot of time on the ground and theaerial predators, the hawks, owlsand shrikes strike from above andleave sign of their attack in thesnow cover. Not every attemptresults in a meal however and youmay find multiple punch marks inthe snow where the hawk hits and

jumps in an effort to chase themouse scurrying under the snow.Your search for tracks may eventurn up grouse tracks on a muddytrail.

Make a note of this location asa good place to check out whenthe upland bird hunting seasonsopen next fall. February intoMarch is a time of transition andrebirth. The barred owls andgray squirrels are beginning thesearch for mates and suitableplaces to raise the years’ young.The chickadees and tufted tit-mouse will be singing their terri-torial tunes on the next days thatfeel even slightly like spring.

I’ve always found how resource-ful the birds can be in obtaininggrit for their digestion. They needsome grit in their stomach to helpthem fully process the food theyeat. I generally park my truckoutside the garage, since cleaningout my parking bay means find-ing room for the generator, thesnow thrower, the table saw, etc . .. The birds find that since theground under my truck is gener-ally bare, it is a great access pointto obtain grit. They will alsocome into the other bay of thegarage to gather grit that falls offCheryl’s car. Recently I cleanedout the ash from the fireplace andplaced it in a coal scuttle. I set thecontainer outside to cool and nowthat it is cool the birds hop over toit collect small tidbits to serve thedigestive process. I think it’s safeto say that the birds find manyways to adapt to close proximityto humans. Enjoy the beauty,strength and idiosyncrasies of ourNew England birds.


With over 20 years of experience in taxidermy,we pride ourselves in our ability to preserveyour trophy to look as it did in its natural habi-tat.

We work annually on about 300 mount-ings and presentations of many varietiesof wildlife; deer, bears, moose, coyotes,fox, fisher, turkeys and more. We alsowork on animals from other parts of theglobe including Africa.

In addition to being entertaining, the stories of the hunters who are our cus-tomers provide information allowing us to suggest possibleways to present and mount the trophiesthat they have bagged.

Our high quality work can be seen by ourmany repeat customers that seek out ourservices. The presentation of your trophy

can be head wall mounts or full body depictions.

We are also the State of Vermont Dept.of Fish & Wildlife Big Game ReportingStation. A specially designed outdoorscale system with tall vertical clearanceis also provided for easy weigh-in of allspecies.

MOUNTAIN DEER TAXIDERMY

at 802-485-7184at 802-485-71841308 Loop Road - Northfield, VT 05663

Call Rodney or Theresa Elmer

WWW.MOUNTAINDEERTAXIDERMY.COM

Birding with BriereBirding with Briere

By Alan BriereBy Alan BriereThe Search for Winter Birds

Alan Briere is an award winning photog-rapher and outdoor writer and the out-door photography instructor for the NHBecoming an Outdoors Woman program.Alan lives in Acworth, NH with fourlovely ladies: his wife, Cheryl, and theirBrittanys, Gypsy, Penny and Millie. Hisemail is [email protected].


The Coolest Gift IdeaYour Picture on The Outdoor Gazette! No, not the real cover but an 8x10full color mock-up of our cover. You can put your favorite hunting, fish-ing, snowmobiling or anything you can think of, right on The NewHampshire and Vermont Outdoor Gazette cover and it will look like thereal thing. It’s the perfect gift for any outdoor enthusiast. Cover will befull color on heavy stock photo paper and will fit an 8x10 picture frame.

What do we need from you? A digital photo with at least200dpi resolution at 8x10 size or original photo mailed to

us for scanning. 4 headlines of 30 characters or lessand the month and year you would like on the cover

Want to buy one? send email to [email protected]

The Coolest Gift IdeaThe Coolest Gift Idea

Price is only $20.00 including postage

Price is only $20.00 including postage


By Robert Booth

The first jig rod I ever caughta fish on was hand-made, noth-ing more than a crafted piece ofwood. Today, 15 years later myrods are custom built from thefinest graphite blanks anddesigned to catch specific fishand detect the lightest of bites.Ice fishing has gone through amajor revolution in recentyears. By all means, what you’vegot will work, but if you arewilling to adapt to these newmethods and tools then you willsee more success on the ice.

The modern age of IceFishing has created the finesseIce Fishermen. It has becomecommon practice to put downthe large wooden jigs sticks with10lb test and pick up a lightergraphite jig stick spooled with2-4lb test, have boxes full ofjigs, and carrying a Vexilar fromhole to hole. All of these thingsare essential tools for me whilechasing Pan fish in the lakes andrivers of the Northeast.

I have three rods that I use.The first is a True Blue made byClam, the second is a custombuilt “Meatstick” by Jason

Mitchell, and the last (which Iuse the most) is a Riversider.Each rod has it’s own produc-tive qualities that help me detectbites in different situations. Allof these rods are in my rod casebecause they are durable andthey get the job done. Theserods are also very affordable forthe average “weekend warrior”,they are all pretty much underforty dollars.

More important than the rod,is the jig. I mostly fish for BlueGills, Perch and Crappie, hav-ing a variety of jigs is a hugeadvantage for me in catchingfish. Believe it or not, I havefound that smaller is usuallybetter. There are two types ofice jigs on the market today, ver-tical and horizontal. Verticaljigs are soldered jigs and are formost fishermen their “go tojigs”. My favorite vertical jig isan Orange and ChartreuseTeardrop Katy jig tipped with3-4 spikes. These jigs are small,but the teardrop shaped bladegives it a deadly downward flut-ter, often times triggering thefish to bite. This action allowsthe fishermen to fish the entirewater column, targeting the

most active and aggressive fish.The second type of ice jig is ahorizontal jig. These are some-what new to the market andthese jigs consist of moldedmetals in all shapes and sizes,

and now metals, including tung-sten which is heavier than lead.These jigs offer the fish a differ-ent presentation. Unlike thevertical jig, these jigs swim.They have a sudden side to sideup and down movement thatmimics small bait fish or a smallinsect. Teamed with a microplastic, this bait can be veryproductive. My go to horizontaljigs are Custom Jigs and Spins

Diamond Jigs, and their GillPill. One of these jigs tippedwith a micro plastic, say byMaki Plastics, (makiplactics.com) will surely put more fishon the ice.

Out with the old and in withthe new, well only if you wantto. The old techniques willalways work to a certain extent,but I encourage you to finessemore fish on the ice this seasonand try some of the tactics ofthe Modern Ice-Fishermen.

Tools Of The Trade - The Modern Pan-Fishermen

Dylan Smith with his Vexilar and Two Jumbo Perch caught using ModernTechniques.

Robert Booth lives in Barre Vermontand can be reached at [email protected]


The Green Family, 148 Studio Rd., Warren NH, 03279

Hound Hunting for Bear in NH

and Mountain Lion in Montana

Video’s$20.00

$100.00 Winner? Maybe….Ed Earle of Bridgewater, Vermont rearranged his “Bone Collection” and sent it in for us to admire, andnow he has a 1 in 10 chance of winning a $100.00 gift certificate from one of our advertisers this December. Do you have a bone collectionin your home, on your garage or shed or in your man space? Take a picture of it and send it in…Your “Bone Collection” could be a winner!

Rancher's Rave Barbecue

A ranch style barbecue recipe, cooked in the crockpot.

1 1/2 lbs. stew venison/bear/moose cubes 1 1/2 lbs. pork cubes 2 cups chopped onions 3 small green bell peppers, seeded and chopped 1 can (6 oz.) tomato paste 1/2 cup packed brown sugar 1/4 cup cider vinegar 1 tsp chili powder 2 teaspoons salt 1 teaspoon dry mustard 2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce

Combine ingredients in slow cooker. Cover and cookon high for 6 to 8 hours, or until very tender. Shredmeat with a potato masher or forks; serve over buns,potatoes, rice, or any pasta.

Pop’s KitchenPop’s Kitchen

Bill "Pop" Burke, resides in Claremont, NewHampshire. If you would like to contact Popsend an email to: pop'[email protected]

Bill "Pop" Burke, resides in Claremont, NewHampshire. If you would like to contact Popsend an email to: pop'[email protected]

Baked French Toast8 slices day-old bread 2 eggs, lightly beaten Sliced strawberries or blueberries, or a mix. 2 tablespoons sugar 1/2 cup milk 2 to 3 drops vanilla extract 8 tablespoons melted butter

Remove crusts from bread slices; discard or reserve foranother use. Set bread aside.In a small bowl, beat the eggs with sugar, milk, and vanil-la. Pour into flat bottomed glass dish. Put bread slices intothe dish to soak, a few at a time. Turn with a spatula andallow to soak on the other side, but not too long, or theywill be difficult to turn. Lightly butter a baking sheet; gen-tly remove the soaked bread slices to the baking sheet,cover with strawberries, blueberries, or mix, and continuewith the remaining bread slices. Spoon any remaining eggmixture over the slices. Place the baking sheet in a preheated 400 degree oven;bake for 30 minutes, turning after the first 15 minutes tobrown on both sides.

Baked French Toast8 slices day-old bread 2 eggs, lightly beaten Sliced strawberries or blueberries, or a mix. 2 tablespoons sugar 1/2 cup milk 2 to 3 drops vanilla extract 8 tablespoons melted butter

Remove crusts from bread slices; discard or reserve foranother use. Set bread aside. In a small bowl, beat the eggs with sugar, milk, and vanil-la. Pour into flat bottomed glass dish. Put bread slices intothe dish to soak, a few at a time. Turn with a spatula andallow to soak on the other side, but not too long, or theywill be difficult to turn. Lightly butter a baking sheet; gen-tly remove the soaked bread slices to the baking sheet,cover with strawberries, blueberries, or mix, and continuewith the remaining bread slices. Spoon any remaining eggmixture over the slices. Place the baking sheet in a preheated 400 degree oven;bake for 30 minutes, turning after the first 15 minutes tobrown on both sides.


Trail Camera Photo Contest

Dan Green - Lyme, New Hampshire

Fran Nichols - Lempster, New Hampshire

Dan Green - Lyme, New Hampshire

Central New Hampshire

Central New HampshireCentral New Hampshire

Fran Nichols - Lempster, New Hampshire


2012 Trail Camera Photo Contest

2011 Trail Camera Photo Contest ,

and the Winners are ;

2-Winners will be drawn Randomly andannounced in the Jan. 2013 issue. Plus 1-Winner, Owner of “The Trail CamPic of the Year”, will be chosen by theOutdoor Gazette staff and folks on ourFacebook page. The “Pic of the Year” willbe on the cover of the Jan. 2013 issue!

Send photos to:[email protected] with the subject line “TC Photo Contest 2011”

Send in your trail camera pics, and for every picturethat is published in The Outdoor Gazette you will get

one chance to win one of three Trail Cameras.

2010 Contest Winners - Paul Nault of Gorham, New Hampshire for the Trail Camera Pictureof the Year. Random winners - Kevin Skinner of Newport, New HampshireBob George of Newport, Vermont......It’s a “Newport” Sweep

New for 2012’s contest---Do you have a picture of atrophy buck or huge bull moose you want to share,but are afraid to give up it’s location. We will post

your pics anonymously, with as little info as you like.Your secret is safe with us!... HaHa!.... Really it is!

New for 2012’s contest---Do you have a picture of atrophy buck or huge bull moose you want to share,but are afraid to give up it’s location. We will post

your pics anonymously, with as little info as you like.Your secret is safe with us!... HaHa!.... Really it is!

2011 Trail Camera Picture of the Year is Dan Green from Lyme, New Hampshire

Random Winners - Thomas Flynn from Holderness, New Hampshireand Mary Emery from Enfield, New Hampshire

It’s a Granite State Sweep!

2011 Trail Camera Picture of the Year is Dan Green from Lyme, New Hampshire

Random Winners - Thomas Flynn from Holderness, New Hampshireand Mary Emery from Enfield, New Hampshire

It’s a Granite State Sweep!


pouches have survived withany positive indications oftheir exact date of manufac-ture. Leather wore out fromdaily, constant use. Backwoodsreplacements were made asneeded and nobody dated the

manufacture. Therefore, Mr.Grant is left with some subjec-tive dating on many pieces inthe book.

He also has some good infor-mation on constructiondetails. This information givespointers on the best style for aparticular application. This isa good point to begin our con-struction of your pouch.

Choose one of two basicstyles to begin. The "D"shape, which is a deepenedsemicircle made of two piecesof leather. The back piece islonger and is folded over tomake a flap cover. You couldalso choose a simple squarepouch. This is built from onepiece of leather in a rectangu-lar design. Once you get adesign laid out on paper (gro-cery bags are a good choice)get some good leather. I sug-gest vegetable or oil tannedleather; 5 oz. in weight.Vegetable tan will requiredying to the color of yourchoice. Scars on the surfacewill add to the effect of creat-ing an aged pouch.

Just a few simple tools are

needed. A good knife, severalharness needles (blunt point)and a stitching awl. This awlhas triangular sides and willpush through the leather bet-ter than a round awl. Finally,you will need some 6-ply linencord. No synthetic materials,because they will not take adye.

All stitching will be done bya harness stitch. This involvespunching the awl through theleather and then by having along piece of cord with nee-dles on both ends. Pass oneneedle through the hole oneway and other, back through,the other way. Try to keepstitches even and about aneighth inch long. Sew thepouch inside out and turn toplace the stitches inside forthe best look.

Straps were attached to theback of most original pouch-es. Sew them with the samestitch about one inch downfrom the flap fold. Make surethey are secure. If you haveany place that is critical, thiswould be the spot.

Now that you have thebasics, let's begin the artificialaging process. I suggest look-ing at museum pieces andGrant's book as referencesources. After you view a few,you will notice certain repairsthat are common. You willalso see that most had brassbuckles on the straps. Tobegin, try and find an old har-ness buckle at a flea market.The D shape with an irontongue would be perfect. Theyalready exhibit age and fitright in.

Notice the wear points of apouch. The flap often showsbroken threads or fieldrepairs. Consider making arough knife cut in the flap andclosing the cut with the linencord. Make the stitches

By Charlie ChalkBy Charlie Chalk

Behind the SightsBehind the Sights

"He wore buckskin legginsand beaded moccasins; a shirtof red cloth, carried a knifeand tomahawk in his belt, anda shot pouch and powder hornof a white man slung over hisleft shoulder and under hisright arm, and was armedwith a long rifle, which he car-ried muzzle forward on hisshoulder". Mrs. Jenny Wiley,1787, eastern Kentucky.

Call the shot pouch, riflebag, or hunting pouch; it isthe same item. A small bag,usually leather; that is theaccessory pouch for the muz-zleloading rifle. It carries thebullets, tools and cleaningaccessories for the gun. It willvary in size but it usually isonly large enough for thebasic supplies. The completecollection of goods placedinside made the gun a usefultool. Reaching for one meantreaching for the other.

Before we begin constructionof a pouch I would like toshare a few things fromMadison Grant's book, "TheKentucky Hunting Pouch".

Mr. Grant wrote a well-illus-trated work. His discussions oforigin, development and dat-ing are short but educational.For instance, he makes thestatement that few original

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Building a Rifle Pouch

Continued next page


from previous page

October 28, 2011 in Bradford.The location is a half mile fromany road or dwelling.

It was the long tail that caughtmy attention. To the left is afour foot diameter fence thatprotects an apple tree. Itappears the cat is about thesame length from head to tail.

The last two photos were takenin Groton on Christmas Day2011.

Groton residents RyanAshford and Jon Hill were rabbithunting Christmas Day whenthey bagged what appears to be

a completely black rabbit orhare. The friends were huntingin Groton mid afternoon withtheir dogs William and Rugerwhen the unusual bunnyappeared.

It is headed to the taxidermistfor mounting and will likely betalked about for some time.

You never know what you willencounter as these photos show.

I heard from Don and ShirleyNelson of Albany who sent methe above photo taken with agame camera on May 19, 2009.

They wrote, “We had just satdown on our porch and saw theanimal running along the edgeof the woods toward our game

camera.It stopped there just long

enough for this picture , thenheaded into the woods. Wecould tell from that distance thatit didn't have a tail and waiteduntil it had gone before I went tothe camera to see if we had apicture.

We have gone back and forthsince then about whether it is a

bobcat or lynx. We did see alynx on our lawn a couple ofyears before that but he wasmore of a grey color. We hadwatched him for a few minutesbut didn't get a picture.

We would be interested inhearing your comments on whatthis animal is.”

The next photo was taken byone of my game cameras on

uneven, like a hurried repair.Even consider breaking thethread in the middle, adding aknot and finishing the cut withanother piece.

The bottom of the pouchoften wore through and waspatched. This can be simulat-ed by adding a mismatchedpiece of leather on the outsideand stitching it in place.Other indicators of age aretorn, rough edges on a portionof the flap, worn button holesin the flap, where the closureused to be or stitching holeswhere straps or accessoriesused to be but are now miss-ing. Even old brass buttons asflap closures look good if agedwith a solution of wet blackpowder.

With the leather work out ofthe way, it is time to stain theleather. Oil tanned in alreadydyed, a basic color. You willwant to add black dye to edges

and a few other spots to simu-late wear points where oilyhands touch leather. Vegetabletanned will be dyed a darkbrown/black and then spottedwith the black. Let all dyes drywell before proceeding to fin-ish.

Your finish will consist of100% neetsfoot oil appliedheavily. It will dry in a fewdays and then you will need toapply a beeswax boot dressing.This will give you an oily, darkfinish with a wax gloss; similarto many surviving originalpouches.

These are the basics of afine looking pouch similar toan original, but still havingstrength in the leather. Manyother tricks exist such as usingold boot tops for leather orfinding old leather bags oritems and cutting them up forpouches. You are limited onlyby imagination and resources.

Study the styles of old piecesand try to copy their work.

Finally, be ethical and leavea date somewhere inside. Youwould not want your copy tobe mistaken 50 years fromnow; for an original. Asalways, contact me [email protected], if

you need any help.

Charlie Chalk is an outdoor writer andhas a background as a professionalFirefighter and is a member of theAmerican Mountain Men, an organi-zation that emulates the life of the furtrappers of the 1800's and their sur-vival on the land.

Unusual Occurrences Do Happen

by Gary W. Mooreby Gary W. Moore

Thoughts on the out-of-doorsThoughts on the out-of-doors

Syndicated columnist Gary W. Mooreis a life long resident of Vermont and aformer Commissioner of Fish andGame. He may be reached by e-mail [email protected] or atBox 454, Bradford, VT 05033.


Go up on top of any moun-tain, when you get to an openarea where you can see hilland dale, stop, be still and lis-ten. You will soon hear the cryof the moose calling out forhelp, help from the unrelent-ing blood sucking tick, whichis sucking the lifeblood out ofthe moose population.

Listen closely and you willhear them say, if you wantvisual evidence, walk the hillsand lowlands and see the deadbodies, some still intact hav-ing just died, some rotting andputrid, and some picked cleanwith snow white bones. I haveseen the bodies, as have manyothers. Not just a few, not inone certain area, but all overour woodlands. Dozens anddozens, and all reports addedup will go into the hundreds.There are too many sightingsof dead moose to ignore thenany longer. These giants of

our woods, dropping one byone to the forest floor, is asorry sight. You who have

blinders and ear muffs on,who look the other way, had

better listen up. The moosepopulation cannot and willnot survive the tick epidemic.

I have seen my share of deadmoose in the woods, as have

all the other woodsmen. TomRideout met a man comingout of the woods to the roadwith four skulls on his pack-board. When asked where hegot them, he said he had notrouble finding them, as thebodies were laying in thewoods. Mike, who ownsBosebuck Camps, found six-teen dead moose while settingout baits in Bosebuck country.

The latest and most disturb-ing news comes from theRangeley Lakes region andonup to Jackman. Oneantlerer from Jackman, alongwith other antlerers, foundfifty dead moose! Oneantlerer, Jerrold Mason ofWest Paris, found eleven deadmoose around the Rangeleyarea and south of it. Theantlerers in Maine gave areport to Governor PaulLePage and to the legislature’sInland Fish and GameCouncil. I know of three deadmoose not far from my homehere and know of four morein Grafton Notch and East BHill country.

I feel, with all the reports ofdead moose, that all the dotsare now connected to forecasta fast-dying moose populationfrom Pittsburg to Rangeley toMoosehead lake and mostnorthern areas. It will be a

sad day when we antlerersstart bringing out more mooseskulls than antlers.

Dick Sprague and SteveHarris of Minot, ME are meatprocessors, and they wearTyvek suits so they can seewhat’s crawling on them.Harris sprays himself withinsect repellent before pro-cessing deer and moose, andstated that other processorsare requiring you to skin yourown deer and moose beforeyou bring it to them.

Dave Parent of Mt. DustanStore and Butcher Shop toldme that around ninety-fivepercent of the moose heprocessed had some kind ofegg sac parasite all throughthe meat. Yes, the meat.Choice cuts, all the cutsinfested with egg sacs. Now,who would eat that meat? Itseems the moose are implod-ing from within.

The moose population can-not sustain this mortality longbefore it hits a brick wall.Does anybody really knowhow many young moose thebear and coyote kill? Youcan’t stop vehicle accidents,which take a heavy toll. But Ifeel that number will go downbig time if the moose keepdying from the tick. Thatleaves only one more big pieceof the pie that kills hundredsof moose: the moose hunt.That can be stopped. With allthe reports of dead moose, Ihope it’s being taken into con-sideration.

So all these reports bring upsome questions. Who is listen-ing? Will anything be done?Can anything be done? Howlong a time span before thesereports hit home? Will Maine,New Hampshire or Vermontever stop the moose hunt?

The deer also are hostingticks. In early January, aknock at the door broughtRoger Erwin to visit. Roger isa nature photographer whohas his pictures on displayaround Coos and CarrollCountries.

This visit, he brought alongLarry Metcalf, who used towork at Emerson’s SportingGoods store. Both men know

Antlers for Sale!Antlers for Sale!

By David JohnBy David John

Searching for Natures TreasuresSearching for Natures Treasures

You sell what?

Call David John 603-381-000 or 207-486-9352

Call David John 603-381-000 or 207-486-9352

Continued next page

257 Wilson’s Mills Rd.Errol NH 03579

257 Wilson’s Mills Rd.Errol NH 03579

Moose Troubles

Moose rub against tree’s and rocks or whatever, to rid their bodies of the “life”sucking ticks. Are our moose in trouble? The folks that live with them say they are.

our woodlands. Our talk even-tually turned to the PhillipsBrook country, a place we allloved. I have antlered PhillipsBrook area for twenty years, Iknow the land as well as any-one and have hauled a lot ofmoose antlers from this place.Now, when I talk about it, Icall the topic the ruination ofPhillips Brook country andPhillips Valley. I neverbelieved an area could be sodrastically changed in such ashort time. Roads, powerlines,and many ugly-looking windtowers with many more in theworks. I won’t be walkingthose hills anymore. I drive infrom the Colebrook side, offof the Bungy Road via KelseyNotch Road to a gate. Then ahike up to the top of MooseMountain. When on top, youare instantly hit with a close-up view of wind towers whenlooking east into PhillipsBrook.

Back to my house with thevisitors. Roger is easy to talkto, and so is Larry. We talkedof goings-on in our wood-lands. When they left, I toldthem the coffee is always on.

While talking on the phoneone morning, I was watchingthree deer standing only twen-ty feet from the house whileacross the road in a field was aflock of a dozen or so turkeys.

There is a couple of inchesof snow on the ground, andevery morning, there are deertracks all around the house. Iwalked across the brook, andthere were around thirty deerstanding all over the woodswaiting to feed at a favoritedeer feeding spot up the road.While antlering this season, Ihave seen in good numbersthe rabbit and partridge. Alsoa lot of coyote tracks, and thisyear, I have run across a bob-

cat track every time I wentout.

On my antlering trips, Ihave been seeing a lot ofwildlife even while riding tomy spots. The otter is easy topick out now, with his shinyblack body running along theice shelf. And I have seenmany mink running along theice also. In the woods, eachwalk I view the rabbit andpartridge along with wood-peckers, chickadees, Canadajays and the pileated wood-pecker. Also, every so often, Iwatch the coyote and fisher,along with deer and moose. IfI don’t bring home the antler,the day is not lost. I record inmy mind the beautiful land-scape and wildlife, and enjoylunch on a log.

And as I walk away, I won-der how long before thesounds of my footsteps fadeaway and some one else haslunch on that log. After all,there will be quite a feast onthat log. Cookie crumbs,breadcrumbs, and bits ofapple along with the core.The mouse, mole, chickadeeand jay will snack out. Howmany creatures have I fed insixty years of lunches in thewoods?

I also feed the birds. Here inWilson’s Mills, life on andunder the bird feeders is veryactive day and night. I havefour suet feeders, a large trayset on a pipe with sunflowerseed and corn. A nail drivenup through the tray holds adry ear of corn, which willfeed the blue jay and crow.And one large tube feederwith sunflower seeds.Regulars who come to dineare the nuthatch, chickadee,hairy and downy woodpeck-ers, two crows and a couple ofdoves.

Off and on, come theturkeys, sometimes one andother times many. On January12th, we got our first snow-storm of this year, and therewere eighteen turkeys at thefeeders cleaning up thedropped feed. Sometimes myrooster and hens are pickingthe ground, and there twocrows are there and someturkeys, all looking at eachother trying to claim the turf.

Deer are regulars here at thehouse, even in broad daylight.One morning, while talking tomy daughter on the phone,along came three deer not tenfeet from the window. Atnight, the fox, coyote and deerall check out the feeders andhenhouse. I will end up put-ting out a trail camera torecord such happenings. I cansee now my apple trees, blue-berries and veggie garden willall need protection. The deerand moose population seem tobe downsizing here in theNorth Country, but the smallanimal populations along withthe varmints are in goodshape. And so is the bearholding its own.

February’s full moon will be

the Snow Moon. February is ashort month but has a lotgoing on. Groundhog Daystarts off the month, and thenValentine’s Day. AlsoFebruary ushers in the bignor’easters that can dump twofeet of snow, followed by sub-zero weather. It is now timefor the mating season for thefox and the great horned owl.Toward the end of the month,dusk will come much laterwith spring on our minds.Now the snowpack growsdeep with ice fishermen snugin their shacks. And the bearsare snug in their dens, dream-ing of corn patches, beehivesand dumpsters. February, onemore solid month of winter.

While pulling into my drive-way in the middle of January,there was a lone partridge. Assoon as he saw my truck, hefanned out his tail and did aslow waltz around the truckbefore standing by the garagedoor still fanned out. One ofnature’s surprises.


David John roams the hills year-round,bringing home the moose antler andother nature’s treasures. You can emailhim at DavidJohn1943@gmail .com.

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from previous page


resulted in a floating contraption.There was no concern aboutshooting the line because it wassimply tied to the end of the rod.The “main line” was often dyedusing various dyes but the part

that attached to the fly was left aunaturel.

Expert fly fishers, like me andyou, would use a leader taperedto three or four hairs. Guides,and others prone to deviatingfrom the truth, clamed to use asingle hair.

During my research I learnedthat horse hair is rot proof andcould last so long that lines andleaders were passed from fatherto son. I have no comment, hav-ing only been left a rotting horseby my father.

At some point, leaders werefurled. Several strands of materi-al were twisted and counter twist-ed together to form a knotlesstapered leader. They were firstmade from horse hair and later,from silk. Furled leaders disap-peared when monofilamentbecame available.

The first mono leaders had“compound tapers” achieved bytying pieces of ever decreasingdiameter mono to make a leaderof the desired length. Some ofthose “formulas” are still avail-able and are claimed, by theirusers, to turn over very well.

Somewhere along the linesomeone discovered that runninga level piece of monofilamentthrough a set of graduated cut-ting dies would yield a leader thatis tapered from thick to thin with-out the necessity of knots.Moreover, all kinds of taperscould be created by selecting dif-ferent dies. Eureka – the modern

leader was born! If you thinkabout it, you can see that as soonas we tie on a length of tippet,we’ve created a compound leaderso all this business about knotlessleaders only matters for the firstfew minutes we’re using theleader. Once we tie on a new tip-pet section, we’re back to a com-pound leader.

These days, furled leaders aremaking a comeback. I don’tknow why – I was perfectlyhappy with the previously avail-able selection. You’ll have to tryone yourself to decide if they areworth the expense.

Not wanting to leave you in thelurch, without some usefuladvice, I’ll let you in on a leaderformula that I’ve found good forspecial trout fishing situations. Ioften use a cast of multiple flies.The problem is that each timeyou tie a fly on a dropper fly, thedropper gets shorter. Pretty soon,the dropper is too short to tie onanother fly. The solution is tobuild a dropper leader that’s onlyused for this situation. At 18 inchintervals, along the leader, tie ona dropper. I make mine by leav-ing one leg of the barrel knotabout the width of my hand.Next I tie on one of those smallspring steel clips. The fly getsattached via the clip and thedropper never gets shorter. WhenI’m through fishing droppers, Iremove the leader and save it fornext time I need it.

How many droppers can youfish? The correct answer is “asmany as the law allows.” Thereal answer depends on whetheror not the statue of limitations isup. I believe it’s up in this case.One evening I used a cast oftwenty wet flies and I had a strikeon each drift. I ended the nightwith more releases than I couldcount. Back at the truck, by flash-light, I discovered the leaderappeared as if a small kitten hadtaken vented its frustrations. Ihaven’t had the patience to tieanother dropper rig with thatmany flies. Let me know howyours works out.

I stopped by the fly shop to geta few leaders because the expira-tion dates on all mine were fromthe last millennium. Imagine mysurprise when I learned there aretoo many choices. Given man’spropensity to screw up a goodthing whenever possible, I won-dered how all this confusion gotstarted.

Technically, the leader doesseveral things. It transmits thecasting energy from the line tothe fly so the fly turns over prop-erly. It should also dissipate thiscasting energy so the fly landssoftly and not with the sound of apig falling off a bridge. Finally,it’s supposed to fool the fish intothinking the fly is not attached toany nefarious machines. Also, itmust appear invisible and mustnot create drag that hinders thefloat. That’s a tall order if it’s tobe executed correctly.

The early English fly fishersused horse tail hairs for both

their lines and leaders. Commonwisdom held that the hair shouldcome from a white horse. Cripes,everyone knows a black horse has

stronger hair – right?By braiding or twisting the hair,

they could reduce some fibersand produce a tapered leader.Soaking the whole thing in oil

Guided by the Light or is That a Train Coming?Guided by the Light or is That a Train Coming? By Tony LolliBy Tony Lolli

Tony Lolli is from Cabot, VT. Hisbook, Go-To Flies: 101 Pattern thePros Use When All Else Fails is avail-able online from Amazon andBarnes&Noble.

Take Me To Your Leader

By Roscoe Blaisdell

The 2009 NH muzzle loaderseason for my wife Kathy and Iwas successful and eventful butcould have easily turned into agreat disappointment if not forpersistence in following up theshots.

Kathy was in one of myfavorite tree stands in a greatbottle neck when I heard hershoot just before dark. Iapproached minutes later andheard her describe the events.Two doe had walked by her at 15yards and she took a shot at thelarger one which ran off in anortherly direction. She directedme to where she had last seen thedeer and I found a few specks ofblood and bile, not a good sign.It was starting to get dark so Ifollowed the best I could but ranout of sign quickly. I didn’t wantto push the wounded deer so wedecided to come back in themorning to follow her up but weunfortunately jumped it on theway back to the truck.

We were back early the nextday and I proceeded to startwhere I had left off finding just alittle more sign going in thedirection where we had jumpedthe deer the previous evening.There were tracks everywhereand I was finding no blood so Iset up a grid pattern placing sur-veyors flagging every 50’ so asnot to miss any spot. After 5hours of searching a large areawe had not found any more signso I began to think the deerwould not be recovered.

I went back to the last spot ofblood which was only 50 yardsfrom Kathy’s stand and startedcrawling on my hands and kneesand found a speck of brown bileabout 20 yards farther. I contin-ued and found a speck another10 yards farther showing itturned 90 degrees to the left,away from where we had suppos-edly jumped it the previousevening. All morning we hadbeen following the wrong deer inthe wrong direction!

I continued crawling, occasion-ally finding specks of sign andeventually found the dead deerafter around 300 yards. We wentfrom the very lows of hunting tothe very highs immediately.Don’t give up!

We got the deer dressed,hauled it to the checking station,and then headed home. I hadplanned an evening stand hunt

on my other woodlot 5 milesfrom my house but there was noneed to get there until around3:30. At 2:00, as I sat reading thepaper after only 20 minutes ofrest from the mornings events, I

decided you can’t get a deer sit-ting in the living room so I head-ed out early to try some stillhunting before the eveningwatch.

I had been in the woods lessthan 10 minutes when a doe ranby in front of me. From the wayit was running I expected to see abuck following and was not dis-appointed. I soon saw a largeframed rack low to the ground ashe ran after the doe. Neither ofthem had seen me. I took a quickshot in the only opening avail-able and waited for the smoke toclear as he crashed off in the dis-tance.

I was relieved to find someblood after a short search andfollowed it to where it started topeter out after around 150 yards.I did my usual grid pattern withsurveyors flagging after an initialsearch of the area and found lit-tle more sign before eveningcame. I had covered a large areaand he was nowhere to be found.Had I only grazed him?

I returned early the next morn-ing and went to the last bloodsign. Since there were deertracks and trails everywhere itwas hard to figure where he hadgone. I crawled on my hands andknees and after 50 yards I foundone little speck of blood. I even-tually found another speck show-ing that he had headed a sharpleft towards a beaver pond I hadalready searched the shore of. As

I again walked along the shoreand using my binoculars Inoticed a brown rock out in thepond that had an unusual fistsized pinkish white snowball onit. Could it be him? I ran around

the pond and found him 20’from shore floating barely abovethe water surface. The snowball Ihad seen was foam coming out ofthe entry hole in his shoulder. Ihad taken out one lung and hehad gone over 300 yards. Don’tgive up!

Again it went from the lowestof lows to the highest of highsbut the excitement was not overyet. I had to disrobe and swimout to get him (no boats on thissmall pond). I dragged him toshore, admired him, cleaned himout, then went home for helpsince he was over 200 lbs and ina nasty area. I returned an hourlater with my neighbor and my4-wheeler. After a few photos, wegot him loaded and off I wentwith the neighbor followingbehind. Things started out good

but as I drove around a ledge onthe edge of the pond the topheavy 4-wheeler tipped over withthe buck, rig, and I rolling 30’over the cliff into the pond. I wasin 6’ of water and the buck andmy rig started to float away.

We tied the rig and buck to atree at the base of the cliff butthere was no way we were goingto get them out the normal way.I figured our only chance to getthe rig out was to get my bulldoz-er and haul it up over the cliff. Ireturned with the dozer an hourlater after bushwacking throughthe woods.

I dragged the 4-wheeler up andover the cliff, almost ripping itapart when it got lodged againsta tree. The 4-wheeler was not inworking condition ($500 repairbill) and we were out in the mid-dle of the boonies so my neigh-bor called Kathy to come rescueus using my other truck. My$400 cell phone was toast afterits meeting with the water.

She arrived an hour later andwe finally started to make moreprogress. I was in a hurry to getthe deer reported and get homeso I drove a little faster on thewoods road than I should have. Iwent over an unnoticed rock thatnormally isn’t a problem andsmashed the transmission. I gotout and saw oil leaking out ofthe bottom of the truck. S***happens!

We finally got the buckweighed, registered and hungout in the barn. When I gotinside the house Kathy presentedme with my 200 lb. patch. I coor-dinate the NH Trophy DeerProgram for deer over 200 lbs soit felt nice to receive one of thesepatches that I’m giving out toeveryone else. That was one veryexpensive patch but an unforget-table experience.


Just don’t give up! ••••

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Persistence pays off for Roscoe. His reward a Granite State big buck and a longawaited 200 lb club patch.

together 26 beautiful essaysinto a whole the way fly-linestrings through the eyelets ofa fine trout rod. His gracefulprose and obvious reverencefor the natural world drawsthe reader and holds on fromthe first page to the last.Proper is one of those giftedwriters who can spellbind areader with the sights, sounds,smells and poetry of woods,water and open air.

Proper’s admiration for hisquarry ref lects the finestmotivations of any outdoors-man. As he contemplates thecourse of his life he finds,“Once I had dreamt of catch-ing big trout, read booksabout how to do it, andchased them from Patagoniato Donegal. When I catch onenow, I am still pleased. It is agift, but it is not a triumph.”A gift…not a triumph perhapsin terms of fishes he caught,but his writing is a gift tothose of us who find it and atriumph for he who set it onthe page.

Running Waters is no how-to book. It contains no tips forfinding or catching fish. Itoffers no instructions on cast-ing or tying flies. It providesno recommendations forequipment or even places tofish. Rather, Running Watersis about the poetry of fly-fish-ing and spiritual adventurefound along streams the worldover; as the author says,“Magic is part of fishing.”

Sadly, Running Waters hasno sequel. The talented voiceof Datus Proper has beenstilled. Yet, as with all great

art, the body of workbecomes more valuable, moretreasured by the passing ofthe artist. Knowing theauthor died barely two yearsafter compiling RunningWaters sharpens the reader’sattention and sharpens thewisdom in Proper’s words.

Foremost within RunningWaters’ pages, woven amidthe stories of fishes, water-courses, friends and mereencounters, lays inspiration.The author weaves togetherwords to inspire anyone to getoutside and know the sublimepleasures of feeling the pres-sure of water against waders,and watching the seams wheresunlight meets shadow andhungry trout hover.

February is a perfect time tosit somewhere snug, with acopy of Running Waters,marveling at the f low ofwords so like the flow of thewater. February is a perfecttime to dream of every streamever fished in the wayHemingway did in his shortstory Now I Lay Me, anappreciation of trout fishingvery much akin to RunningWaters. February is also theperfect time to dream ofwaters unlocked from the iceand the reawakening of aslumbering world. Thedreaming is better with a copyof Running Waters at hand.


AttentionNew HampshireHunters

•••••••••••••••••• ORDER FORM ••••••••••••••••••Big Game Record Book1st Edition, up to 89 - $25.00

Under 40 books in stock

Name:Address:City: State: Zip:Telephone Number:

2nd Edition, 89 to 92 - $15.00

Edition Qty.

3rd Edition, 92 to 94 - $15.004th Edition, 94 to 96 - $15.005th Edition, 96 to 98 - $15.956th Edition, 98 to 04 - $19.957th Edition, 04 to 09 - $19.95Please add $3.50 per book for S&H

Enclosed please find my check for $

Please allow 2 - 4 weeks for delivery.Mail or photocopy this form and send to:

NHASTC Record BookRoscoe Blaisdell, President

22 Schribner RoadRaymond, NH 03077

The NewHampshire Antler &Skull Trophy Club

7th Edition NH Big GameRecord Book

is now available!• New State Records • Boone & Crockett Trophies

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Don’t wait till they’re gone, order yours today!

AttentionNew HampshireHunters

The Gazette’s Book ReviewThe Gazette’s Book ReviewRUNNING WATERSBy Datus ProperThe Lyons Press, 2001162 pages, $24.95ISBN: 1-58574-280-5

February usually holds ontight with the iron grip ofdeep winter and the heaviestsnowfalls of the season.Rivers and streams lie hushedunder a roof of ice, still weeksaway from the freedom ofspring. For an angler, troutfishing seems a distant frag-ment of the past or a vaguedream of an unseen future.

Those devoted to the pursuitof salmonids use February toinspect rods, dress lines, tie anew batch of flies, patch tornwaders, or devour books ontheir favorite subject. A goodbook and a warm fire on adark winter night can stir thesouls, almost as much as find-ing a favored pool filled withrising trout and hatchingmayflies.

Though more than ten yearsold now, Running Waters bythe late Datus Proper stirs thesoul of a fisherman in justthat way. Proper, a careerForeign Service Officerretired to an outdoorsman’sparadise in the GallatinValley of Montana publishedthree fine books before themasterful Running Waters.He passed away in 2003.

This fourth book strings

Col. J.C. Allard lives in Pittsfield, NHabout 20 miles north by east ofConcord. “We're in the shadow of theBelknap mountains here, but we can seeMt. Washington on a clear day”.


Pictures Gone WildPictures Gone WildOur reader submitted photosOur reader submitted photos

Larry Green – 7 point, 204 lbs Ryan Lewis – 10lb tom Lee Eastman- 4 point, 178 lbs

Robert Tuttle – 5 point, 145 lbs

Dan Valdez Doug York – 8 point, 215 lbs Jaycee Murray – 123lbs Corey Young – 7 Point, 228 lbs

Richard Way Jim- 5 point, 115 lbs

Michael Hatfield – 6 point, 161 lbs

Frederick Sullivan

Deer season at "The Old Corner Store" in Jefferson, NH"

february 2012 - the outdoor gazette

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