So I got a product test that I want to put out there. Its not a hunting product but its a guy/handyman product. So I got these in the mail a little while ago but with the holidays and such didn’t get a chance to break them out. They are called Gliders and Grabbers.
Here is some photos of them.

So these little triangles are pretty useful things. One one end they have a ridged red piece of Rubber and then on the opposite side a smooth rounded cap that can be removed. OK so the first test was to use them in a bedroom to move a cabinet. So I put them smooth side down on all 4 corners and I was able to slide the cabinet around the room no problem.

On the packaging it showed them being used in a work shot in order to hold a piece of wood in order to sand it. I tried using them to glide a piece of wood through my table saw. They gripped great I was able to move the wood with less fingers and force.

So I have hardwood floors throughout most of my home and in the family room one of the things that bugs the most is when the couches slide on the wood floor. I have tried several products and they will work for a while but eventually the couch slides again. So I got the idea to take the smooth surface off of them when you do this as seen in the photos there is rubber grip on both sides. I put them under the feet of my couch and was amazed the couch will not slide on the floors. I have had them under for almost a week and they are still holding strong.

All in all I would say this is a really great product to have around the home. It works and can be used all sorts of tasks around the home.

Click here to pick up a Gliders and Grabbers 4 Pack today!

I recently got the opportunity to test out a new product from Avid Hunter. Its the Zip Pistol Cleaning Kit.

I was pretty excited to try this out. I decided to start on my .40 XD. The kit had 3 sized brushes .22, .38, .45. I used the .38 brush and was quickly disappointed when I pulled it through the barrel and had a ton of copper brush needles come out of the barrel.

It looks like the twist on the main part of the brush wasn’t strong enough and the bristles fell out.

So I switched and grabbed my .45 and ran a test with the .45 brush and happy to report that it worked fine. Overall I would say that it is a real nice quick clean for a pistol. A couple of things I found disappointing was the kit comes with a handy squeeze bottle for a cleaning solution but it was empty. In reading the instructions it recommends their cleaning solution but it is not included in the kit. I can’t imagine it costing them that much more to fill the squeeze bottle included so it is an all in one. Second I was a little disappointed in the .38 brush falling apart on me. Things I liked about it was the ease of use. The packaging is nice and compact. And once I switched to my .45 and grabbed some cleaning solution from one of my other kits it worked like a gem. Overall the product worked like it should I would give it 3 out of 5 stars.

It is time we all join this woman in her plea to help the deer! Is there anybody that thinks about the deer as they are placing the deer crossing signs, or are they just trying to get them all killed?

Check out this video and please help spread the word below by sharing this on FaceBook, Twitter, Pinterest and anywhere else we can think of to help this fine woman help the deer.

They just want to cross the street safely. Is it too much to ask that we place the deer crossings in a safe place? Come on people!

So far this season has been a crazy one. Opening weekend we went up camping and was able to take all of our kids. It was a good time.

I got up real early and headed down to a new spot that I felt good about. Two years previous I had traversed into this area and had bumped a large group of mature bucks. So I wanted to drop in and see what I was able to see. As I dropped in it was barely light enough for me to see where I was going not much more than that. I got down about mid mountain and heard a stick break. Slowly as my vision adjusted I was able to see a large group of bucks 50 yards down the hill from me. As the sun came up I was able to see them better 14 good size bucks and a couple does. They were all together in a large group of trees and I was unable to get a shot from that position. I sat there for what seemed like forever (probably 20 min) waiting for one of them to come into the open. All of a sudden a large 4 point made the move but I quickly found out that the brush was too high I could only see his head. Then he turned and went back into the trees. Something below spooked the does and then took off running and the bucks followed. Major bummer right? Well I found a better spot more open not to far away and set up. I soon had this doe come in and for 30 min she circled around me no more than 5 yards away.

Shortly after she took off I had two nice 4 points come 40 yards down the hill from me. One stepped into a great shooting lane so I pulled back and took my shot. I didn’t have time to range him and had estimated that he was at 50 yards. My shot was high and my arrow cracked into a tree. The two bucks didn’t spoke they were just looking around trying to figure out what that noise was. The buck I shot at dropped down the hill a little further and out of range. But the other buck was standing much closer at around 35 yards. So I knocked a new arrow and pulled back he turned broadside and I placed the pin right were I needed it and released. I was watching my arrow and it was headed right to the sweet spot when all of a sudden he turned and did this bronc kick towards me and I hear this loud crack sound just like before when I hit the tree. I was in shock did he really just jump my arrow? I watched him as he walked away and he seemed fine in fact the other buck joined up with him and they started walking up the hill. Bummed out I went down to find my arrows. So just a quick shout out to my PSE Evo and Grimm Reaper Broadheads. I found my first arrow and it was stuck in a 4 inch tree right smack in the middle and the tip of my broadhead was sticking out the other side. I was unable to find my second arrow. After a ton of searching I actually found some blood I tracked it up the hill to the ridge and the blood stopped and I was unable to find anymore. My brother and dad came and we searched all afternoon and nothing was found. I think as he jumped that I ended up hitting him in the brisket as the blood we found was not too one side or the other but small drops in the middle of the trail. I was bummed about it but after a good nights sleep and replaying it over and over in my mind I didn’t feel I had fatally hit him.

I ended back up in the same area later that week for an evening hunt. I was actually up scouting for Elk. My wife got the new PSE Stiletto for Christmas and this was going to be her first year hunting. I was hoping to get the lock on some cow elk because we were going up there that weekend to hunt. So I was sitting and cow calling on the hill when all of a sudden I see antlers moving through the trees and this real nice 4 point starts walking 40 yards below me. I was able to get a clear lane as he stopped and fed broadside slightly quartered away. I ranged him and then pulled back put the pin where it needed to be and released. I watched my arrow drive right through him. He took off into these thick pines and I heard a loud crash and started my celebration dance I was sure he was down just in those pines. I sat down and checked the time and decided to give him 45 minutes and eat some dinner. After 45 minutes I went down to were I hit him. He didn’t start bleeding real quick so I followed the trail into the pines and started seeing blood. Unfortunately he wasn’t in the pines like I thought and made his way down the trail blood was spraying out both sides of the trail. I had hit him on the right side and about 20 yards on the trail found the back half of my arrow on the left side of the trail soaked in blood. The blood trail was pretty easy to follow it pretty much traversed the hill. Then it started to traverse uphill more. I ended up in a clearing and looked up and there were two bucks standing in it looking at me. Neither of them were bleeding and they took off running. The crazy part is the blood trail headed straight up to where they were and I found this.

I was sure I was going to find him soon. The blood trail shot straight up the hill towards a clump of thick pines and I was sure he was going to be down in them. I get up to the pines and find large clumps of clotted blood covered in dirt and pine needles and then the blood trail stopped. I was in shock up to this point it was easy to follow plenty of blood and then it just stopped. We searched with out headlamps well into the morning and nothing. I spent the night on the hill and then was back at it in the morning and ended up finding two drops of blood and did several circles in the direction he was headed and could never find him I was so disappointed and confused to what happened. I appeared as if he had laid down and something bumped him into the trees above and then further up the hill. I was beside myself because I really felt it was a solid hit and the blood indicated that as well. Too be honest I’m not sure what we could have done differently. I hate to be the one that fatally injured an animal and not be able to recover it.

Ok I have a couple of shout outs. I was able to try some new products this year that I loved. This year I tried the Core4Element clothing line. This stuff was amazing. They are using the new mothwing camo pattern and it worked perfect for the area I was hunting. The pants and jacket are lightweight but efficient. Everything from the suspenders, removable knee pads, and zipper vents was so well thought out. I highly recommend this product. My family likes to joke about how I go through clothes trying different ones. You name it I have had it. Until this year I though Sitka had the best out there but Core4Element has them beat. Its a far superior product.

OK one more. This year I was asked by Slay products to try their scent elimination products.

As you can see from the pictures of the doe and my experience I had no problem getting close to the game this year. This stuff is amazing. On top of the performance was the design of the spray bottles. The one thing I am tired of with scent spray products is the spray bottle is either spraying too much or not enough. And then they clog all the time. Slay has a spray bottle that actually mists out the product for a real nice consistent even spray I loved it. The kit came with a larger bottle (12 oz) and then a smaller (4 oz) The bigger bottle was great for an initial spray at camp before heading down the hill and the smaller one was perfect for the hunting pack. This year a bunch of us went back packing for Elk in the high Uintahs. I took the Slay kit along with us minus the laundry soap since they I knew we wouldn’t have a washing machine. When backpacking you have to limit the weight of what you take with you. So that means only one set of hunting clothes. We were up there for 6 days. Let me just say that by day 4 my wife and I’s socks were not smelling so great. We sprayed them down the the Slay spray as we went to bed. The next morning I put my nose right up on them and nothing they were ready good to go. On day three of the hunt my brother in law and I grabbed the Body wash and Shampoo and headed to the creek for a bath. It was great I loved the product it washed real well and rinsed without a soapy residue. On top of being clean and smelling clean. Later that night my wife made the comment of how soft my hair felt an added bonus. I highly recommend this product it works and not only does it work they spared no expense on the bottles. And to top it off the whole kit retails for $31.00 so not too bad. I need to mention that before the season started I washed all of my clothes with the laundry detergent and it worked great.

Well happy trails to those of you that are just getting into your seasons. I hope that they are filled with memories that will last a life time. I hope that in the next few months that I will be able to report some better success. Still need to get an Elk in my freezer.

One of the addicts, Scott, had the unthinkable happen. I’ll let Scott tell the in’s and outs of that story however I read another article about teaching our sons and realized that Scott did exactly the right thing. He turned a horrible moment into a great teaching moment while archery deer hunting. I hope I would do the same if faced with that situation.

The short story is he took his son out for his first year archery deer, they found and shot a buck late in the evening, not the best shot so they decided to go home and come back in the morning to track it. They got back up there extremely early, got on the blood trail. As they did they ran into another hunter, they told him the whole story and what they were doing, that they were back up tracking his son’s deer. The guy went with them as they tracked the deer, they found the deer hung up on a fence, too hurt to make it over. As his son prepared to shoot the deer and put it down this other hunter quickly drew back and shot it. Then he claimed the deer, stated that Utah law says the deer goes to the person that kills it not injures it.

As ridiculous as this sounds that’s what happened. A grown man stole a 13 years old’s first archery kill by quickly taking the last shot while being right there with the kid and knowing the full story, he shot it hung up on a fence. I hope that this grown man has a lot of regret, that one day he will realize how embarrassing what he did was and that every time he looks at the deer (he wants to mount it) he remembers what he did. Hopefully Scott will post the full story in more detail as at this point I’ve just heard it second hand. The point I wanted to make was about how he took this unbelievable moment and taught his son a lesson.

When I heard this I was shocked. Truly one of the most amazing stories I’ve heard of a hunter stooping so low, right down there with poachers. As you hear something so insane you think about how you would react. You can never fully guess what you would do but I know I would do anything for my kids and this would put me in a corner where I felt like I had to protect my sons’s buck, I might have called DWR, gone to fists, who knows. Scott handled this with more integrity than most would have. Yes he gave the guy some grief and was in shock but in the end he took a photo with his son and his buck and they walked away, letting this scum of a hunter have the buck. I can only imagine what was going thru his head but he taught his son a lesson, taught him to pick his battles and to be the bigger man. I was reading the following blog as I thought about this and how #11 was taught.

Dan Pearce is the author of Single Dad Laughing, click here to check out his blog and read all of the rules for Fathers raising Sons in his latest blog post. Here is Rule #11:

11. Teach him to choose his battles. Make sure he knows which battles are worth fighting- like for family or his favorite baseball team. Remind him that people can be mean and nasty because of jealousy, or other personal reasons. Help him to understand when to shut his mouth and walk-away. Teach him to be the bigger better person.

I’m sure he had the chance to teach his son other things but Scott did what many of us wouldn’t have and was the bigger man that day, teaching his son what is more important, his son also learned about how selfish people can be and the lows they will stoop to. I hope that this hunter reads this, that he hears about it from his friend that was with him and that the story of his buck that he is having mounted gets to all of his friends and family. Most of all I hope he learns a lesson too, despite his choices I hope he realizes how low he stooped and that he would never do that again.

Family is what hunting is about to us. We love the hunt but more than that we love the time we get with our family, raising the next generation of hunters. There will be many lessons learned over the years as we introduce our son’s to hunting, I just hope that none of them are as extreme as this.

It is finally here, the day we have been waiting for all year long! On Saturday the Archery Elk and Deer hunt opens for us in Utah and we could not be more excited.

I may not have practiced as much as I wanted. I couldn’t afford all of the new equipment I wanted to buy. I didn’t scout my area once. However, I am more excited to hunt this year than I have ever been.

This one picture sums up why I am so excited to get into the woods this year:

This is my son, Hunter. (Yes, I did decide I was going to name my first son Hunter while on an Elk hunt. In fact when I started getting serious with my wife I had to make sure this would not be an issue. Luckily, she has always loved the name as well.) Hunter is so excited to go hunting, it is all he has talked about for the past couple of weeks. Hunter has always been dedicated to hunting, so dedicated that he was actually born on the opener 4 years ago (You can read about that here). In addition to the excitement of the opener of hunting season, we also have the excitement of Hunter’s 4th birthday!

I took Hunter up hunting for the first time last year and we had a blast! It was so much fun walking through the woods with him and sharing in his excitement. My Dad was always so patient with me when I was younger and would always allow me to go hunting with him. Those are some of my first memories and I have always wanted to take Hunter up when he was young as well so he could grow to love hunting as much as I do.

Having a huge buck come in quietly is a thrill, and there is nothing like bugling an Elk in and having the hair on the back of your neck stand up. This may seem crazy, but seeing Deer and Elk is not the most important thing about hunting to me.  For me, having my son next to me while we try to sit quietly on a log is the greatest thing about hunting. There is nothing like watching him try to do an Elk call, or get so excited when he thinks he hears something coming our way. There is nothing like watching his excitement for hunting, knowing that he is the future of hunting and these will be some of his earliest childhood memories as well.

His excitement for hunting is contagious and it has rubbed off on his 5 year old sister as well. She has decided that she wants to go hunting with us and see what it is all about. You won’t be able to miss her if you see us, she will be the one wearing a camo dress with camo bows in her hair.  I am so excited to walk around the woods with my two little hunters this weekend!

I am so grateful for my Father and the example he has set for me. Hunting has never been about what you kill for my Dad, but rather who you go hunting with. I have loved all of the hunts we have enjoyed together and it is so fun to see the next generation grow up with a love for hunting as well.

While we may scare away every squirrel within a mile of us, we are the hunting group that is laughing and having a great time because hunting is so much more than filling the freezer with meat!

Utah hunters have something else to watch out for this fall when the mountain goat hunt begins. Apparently, there is a man dressed up as a Goat living amongst a herd of mountain goats in Northern Utah. He is simply known as the Utah Goat Man.

This may be the strangest story I have ever heard. I have so many questions for this man, I wish I had a couple of minutes just to pick his brain and see how he does it. I want to find out how committed he is to being the Goat Man.

• When and what does he eat?
• How does he go to the bathroom?
• What was it like the first time he approached the goats?
• How did they receive him?
• Is there any interaction taking place between him and the goats?
• How embarrassed is he that his dirty little secret went viral and he is all over the news?

As a Hunter this intrigues me. Maybe I should dress up like an Elk this fall and try to integrate with the herd and then once the hunt begins it would be easy pickings. The possibilities are endless.

He looks so loneley and sad in this picture. He realizes he has been caught by Human and it seems like he is not fitting in with the Goats either. What a lonely world.

Goat Man, please don’t listen to the critics. Go on living your dreams amongst the mountain goats, it is not weird at all.

There are some poachers in San Juan County that the DWR needs some help stopping. They have shot several bulls, a couple of does and a nice buck.

A 31-inch, 4×4 buck mule deer was illegally poached in San Juan County, and the Utah Division of Wildlife Resourcesis seeking the public’s assistance in identifying those responsible.

The buck was found on March 10 by a Blanding resident who contacted DWR officers.

The poaching occurred southeast of the White Mesa Mill near the Black Mesa Butte Road. Although the deer was shot within the last few months, it did not die immediately. Evidence suggests that the deer may have lived two to four weeks before dying from its injuries.

The DWR is offering a reward of $1,500 for any information that leads to the arrest and conviction of those responsible for illegally killing the deer.

Read the full article on KSL.com and help fight the Poachers!

I have worn Danner Hunting Boots for the past two hunting seasons and they are by far the most comfortable hunting boots i have ever put on my feet! They keep your feet warm, help you stalk animals without making noise and feel just like a tennis shoe.

Low-lugged Danner Phantom outsoles offer stealth-focused hunters unmatched ground feel and noise discipline for stalking wary game in warm weather.

Thick EVA inserts offer deeply cushioned comfort for high-mileage hunts. The Mossy Oak Brush boots have rugged full-grain leather uppers and a more traditional Danner look.

The Realtree APG boots have breathable 1,000-denier nylon uppers and are completely camouflaged from collar to outsole.

Both versions offer the lightweight durability and lasting quality that made Danner boots famous.

Waterproof, breathable GORE-TEX Extended Comfort linings for all-weather performance.

• Height: 7″.
• Average weight: 2.875 lbs.
• Men s sizes: 8-14 D width; 8-13 EE width.
• Half sizes to 12.
• Camo patterns: Mossy Oak Brush Realtree APG

Check out the Danner Jackal Ii Hunting Boots today!

I really don’t understand vegetarians. They are missing out on so much this life has to offer.

I can’t imagine eating only vegetables my whole life. Sure, I like a good salad every now and then. But even then, salad is much better with meat!