Another deer season is over, and it’s time to clean our rifles and put them away for a few months. The best advice I’ve ever seen comes from an old book entitled “Do-It-Yourself Gun Repair” by Edward Matunas (out of print). I’ve been following Ed’s routine for years, and it’s the best. --You’ll need a cleaning rod, brush, jag, patches and solvent. The best rod is a spring-steel model with a plastic, nylon or similar coating and a swiveling handle. --Choose Shooter’s Choice or Hoppe’s No. 9 solvent. --Always use a cleaning-rod guide to protect a gun’s receiver from the sharp jag, and also to protect the rifle’s throat from damage. --Insert the rod into the bore from the chamber end [...]

Mike: I found this big old shed hanging in a pine tree. A fellow shed hunter south of me found the match 2 years ago and we thought that shed was one year old then. I have walked passed this tree 20 times in the last few years and never spotted it. Amazing how you just miss the simple ones!—Kelly K. from South Dakota Thanks Kelly, I find several things fascinating about your find. Apparently the buck was rubbing on the tree one winter day when this antler popped off. Maybe the abscission layer that hold the antler on like cement was dissolving and getting brittle, causing the deer’s head to itch? Also, that  rub on the pine has been there [...]

A weird thing happened the other day to our favorite outdoor couple, Zach and Ellie: Hey Mike: We went hunting Saturday, January 17th and saw the big boy we have been after, but this time he didn't have any antlers! So we decided to walk out into our wheat field where he usually goes and look what we found. Finding the sheds of the deer you’ve been after all year is the best feeling and the worst feeling at the same time.—Zach and Ellie from Southern Illinois      

Today’s guest blog from Dan L. who has been reading the BIG DEER blog for many years. Love these stories of guys hunting hard till the bitter end: Hey Mike: In the area of western Wisconsin where I hunt there is a metro zone that stays open to bowhunting until the 31st of January to give us cold-weather lovers an extra crack at a good deer. We set up a stand in a cluster of 10 mature pines nestled at the base of a wooded bluff. In the pines we typically have a late-season food source. Deer bed up the ridge a bit and move toward the feed. We had 12 bucks on camera in that stand of pines, and had [...]

While the hunting is over for most of you, it is just getting good in some areas of the Deep South, most notably Alabama where the peak of the rut is due to explode any day. If you’re hunting down there the next couple of weeks, here are some rut tips.  Alabama hunter Logan Bell, 21, got a jump on the rut and rang in 2015 in a big way. He killed this fine old buck on New Year’s Day in Talladega Co. Shot him w/a lever-action .30-30. Cool, old-school, anybody else still shot a .30-30?