It was a classic encounter of predator and prey.  When a hen turkey was approached by a foraging fox, she immediately moved into the thickest cover available which in this case, wasn't all that much.  At a distance of mere feet, the advancing hunter stopped as the two animals sized each other up; both obviously
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  With the November rut long past, Iowa white-tails have no further need of their magnificent antlers. So what do deer do with something they don’t need anymore?  The same thing we do; they throw it away.  Bucks annually accomplish this task through an involuntary process called shedding.  Sudden spikes in stress levels may hasten the
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  My first encounter with the Gray Faced Buck occurred on November 1st, 2014.  It was during my first bow hunt of the season, and the annual rut was in full swing. Prior to first light, I had set a ground blind along a strip of hay ground bordered on one side by an oak woodlot and
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  At first glance, the blue jay-sized northern shrike looks pretty harmless. But for resident mice, shrews, and juncos this slate colored songbird is anything but harmless.  In reality, the shrike is a complete carnivore -- as brutally predacious as any raptor could hope to be.  The shrike’s list of fair game includes just about anything
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  Overcast skies, chill winter wind, rural landscapes cloaked in nine inches of new snow. Absolute perfect conditions for an end of December goose hunt.  But for hunting companion Curt Stille and I, the anticipated slam dunk outing was rapidly turning into the proverbial wild goose chase. The dilemma wasn’t for a lack of birds. There were
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Today's magnificent snowstorm delivered the kind of weather I wait all year for.  The noisy crusted over snow was quickly buried, the woods became completely silent again, and the landscape soon resembled an upside down Christmas globe on steroids.  Best of all, resident white-tails were on the move.  With three unused deer tags still in
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  It’s rumored that when throwing important dinner parties, some of our local high rollers like to impress their guests by having live lobsters flown in from Maine or gallons of jumbo shrimp delivered fresh from the Gulf.  And although I’m not likely to receive an engraved invitation to any of those social events any time
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  Across Iowa’s northern tier, the signals are clear.  This year’s duck season is rapidly winding down.  Smaller ponds and sloughs – even the larger marshes -- are completely iced over – have been that way for more than a week now.  Winter is at hand and even the largest lakes are on borrowed time. But for
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  Monday morning, the final day of November.  A significant winter storm was brewing and you could feel it in the air.  A light skiff of snow had already fallen during the night and area weather forecasters were all but guaranteeing that more snow and maybe even some ice was headed our way.  With more than
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  Migrators:  Boring into the teeth of a 30 knot NW wind at sunrise; arriving flaps down over the decoys at seven; into the apple wood stoked Weber by 5:30 and onto the table [medium rare] promptly at six.  Long grained rice, mushroom & orange segments, and baked cabbage on the side.  No frills; no fuss
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    Home Wrecker. That’s how my friend Brandon Stark has labeled the monstrous white-tailed buck currently haunting our local woodlands.  The handle stuck, and now it’s the name everyone is using when referring to this nerve shattering, four legged antlered giant. High, wide, and handsome; Home Wrecker is the kind of buck that deer hunters dream of.
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  Migrating Blackbirds Provide Choreographed Air Show   For those who relish the outdoors, the month of November is one of the busiest and most exciting times of the year – so busy and so exciting, in fact, that making a list of all the things to do would fill pages. One of the things I eagerly look
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