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Moving Beyond Pebble Mine :: Russ Schnitzer

Night’s darkness is elusive during an Alaskan June. Stubborn light clings to the tundra horizon as perpetual dusk, silhouetting stunted spires of black spruce. This is the landscape of the Bristol Bay region. Conscious of it or not, it is the Alaska characterized in the dreams of almost every passionate outdoorsperson. These are fantasies of soaring glacier-laced mountains, massive brown bears, herds of caribou, remote fly-in fishing camps and profound pulses of salmon moving from sea to headwaters each season.

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In the Land of the Czars :: Isaias Miciu Nicolaevici

This remote location is so distant it requires multiple plane trips to Murmansk, and another two-hour flight in a helicopter over desolate Russian tundra to reach the Kola Peninsula. From there it’s a few more days to reach Ponoi—where wonders await.

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The Royal Wood: A few words on Juglans regia :: Terry Wieland

English walnut—the favored wood for gunstocks for centuries—is both a difficult topic and an easy one.

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NSSF Action Alert: The Sportsmen’s Act of 2012 Needs your Help

The Sportsmen’s Act of 2012 Needs Your Help

Call your U.S. Senators to keep it Alive!
202-224-3121

The Sportsmen’s Act of 2012 (S.3525) still can be enacted in this Congress if we keep the pressure on. All hunters, target shooters and firearms owners should call your senators today and urge them to work in a bipartisan manner to resolve budgetary concerns raised on Monday so the Sportsmen’s Act can be brought back to the floor for a vote on final passage. There are ongoing negotiations but time is running short. Tell your senators to compromise and reach a bipartisan agreement now.

The Sportsmen’s Act is the most important package of measures for the benefit of sportsmen in a generation. It took a great deal of work to bring together no less than 46 of the nation’s leading sportsmen and conservation groups including NSSF, NRA, Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation, Ducks Unlimited, American Sportfishing Association, International Game Fish Association, Center for Coastal Conservation, and Boone and Crockett Club to champion S.3525.

Call the U.S. Capitol Switchboard at 202-224-3121 to urge your senators to continue their bipartisan work on The Sportsmen’s Act of 2012. Let’s get the bill passed before the end of the 112th Congress. Find complete contact information for your elected officials here.

Click here to Contact Your Senators

Visit NSSF’s Government Relations site at nssf.org/GovRel

Hunters :: By Chris Dombrowski

Behind three bird dogs, two men walk up the middle of a gravel road, shotguns slung over their shoulders: a hunter and a poet trailing two ticked-up setters and an old grey-faced black Lab.

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These, Among Many: A Gallery of Good Fortune :: By Robert DeMott

In southeastern Ohio, where I have lived since 1969 (transplanted from New England), ruffed grouse, my main hunting obsession for most of my time here, have become so scarce that pursuing them has become at worst utterly futile, and at best an elegiac exercise, like remembering the faintest strains of long-gone music, or the first kiss with Mary Lou what’s-her-name.

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IDP in the Field :: By Jim Stenson

Ask any writer and they will probably tell you that it is substantially easier to write a complete novel than a short story or a component essay. I have recently learned the hard way that this axiom applies to film as well; it appears to be much easier to shoot and edit a full-length film than a short 90-second video.

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Grail Gun: With Parsifal in the North Woods :: by Terry Wieland

In 1995, during a visit to Holland & Holland in London, I experienced what proved to be a life-changing event: I handled, for the first time, a Boss & Co. game gun from 1910.

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James Acord Creates Another Beautiful Reel Case

James Acord recently created a truly unique reel case for a customer in Vancouver,WA. I’m sure you have heard of Bogdan reels, this is a portrait of Stan Bogdan that was in the New York Times obituary after he passed on last winter. This customer has some Bogdan Salmon reels and James Acord has made him other cases in the past. Check out the photos below to see his amazing skill and craftsmanship.

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Avery Island :: By Lindsay Mott



Avery Island, Louisiana, is home to world-famous Tabasco pepper sauce. It’s also home to a beautiful 170-acre lavish garden oasis in the middle of a cypress swamp and an amazing wildlife preserve where thousands of snowy egrets visit year to year. Tabasco, and the factory tour showcasing its history and production, is the backbone of the island’s offerings, but there’s much more to see. To the families that have lived and worked on the island and are continuing to run the operation, grow the commercial business, and maintain the natural aspects, Avery Island is more than a tourist destination. It’s been home for close to 200 years and is a natural haven for them as well.

“We’ve been stewards of the land and taken care of it for a long time,” said Paul McIlhenny, chairman and CEO of the McIlhenny Company, the company that produces Tabasco sauce.



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