sportsman channel Archives

22 04, 2024

Here’s Why You Need to Go Over and Hunt Africa

Clay Hanback2024-04-22T09:23:04-04:00April 22nd, 2024|Big Deer TV, BigDeer, CZ-USA, sportsman channel, trijicon|1 Comment

First read this blog that I wrote and published 20 years ago: I was talking with a colleague the other day and he asked, “So Hanback, when’s your next trip over my man?” “Over where?” “To Africa man!” he roared. I explained that I had never been to Africa, and had never really wanted to go all that much. He looked at me like I was the village idiot. “Ah, there is nothing like it,” he opined, a touch of British high-brow creeping into his Yankee voice. “I was bitten by the bug several years ago and I hardly want to hunt anywhere else.” I was talking with another man who went over and shot his first elephant. With his [...]

1 04, 2024

Pennsylvania Deer Harvest Up 2 % in 2023-24

Clay Hanback2024-04-01T10:32:31-04:00April 1st, 2024|Big Deer TV, BigDeer, Bowhunting, Hunting News, sportsman channel, whitetail deer|0 Comments

The Pennsylvania Game Commission reports that hunters harvested an estimated 430,010 whitetails last season. The statewide buck harvest was estimated at 171,600, while the antlerless harvest was about 258,410. The 20023-24 harvest is 2% greater than that of 2022-23, and 4% higher than the total harvest seen as a three-year average. As for last season’s buck kill, it was by 5% over 2022-23, and up 6% over the three-year average. Overall, 27% of deer hunters shot a buck. That was a slight increase over 2022-23’s 26% success rate, and up significantly from the 15% success rate seen as recently as 2007-08. The majority of bucks harvested are older than in decades past, too. Before antler point restrictions, most of the [...]

27 03, 2024

Deer Hunter Numbers Are Declining Again

Clay Hanback2024-03-27T09:42:23-04:00March 27th, 2024|Big Deer TV, BigDeer, Deer Hunting, Hunting News, sportsman channel, whitetail deer|1 Comment

Numerous studies documented a 4.9% increase in hunting license sales from 2019 to 2020. One of the few bright spots of COVID was that it produced a rekindled interest in deer hunting across the United States as people sought to get outside, and try to harvest their own food. But an extensive study of 46 states in 2022 found that overall hunting license sales decreased by approximately 1.9% in 2021 compared to 2020. Resident license sales were down 4.0% in many states. And yet another new study finds this troubling trend is continuing. The Wisconsin Department of Naturals Resources studied 18 years of detailed license data. Software used in the study allowed the DNR to track and analyze the ages, [...]

25 03, 2024

How to Hang a Tree Stand For Bowhunting

Clay Hanback2024-03-24T09:07:05-04:00March 25th, 2024|Big Deer TV, BigDeer, Bowhunting, Deer Hunting, sportsman channel, whitetail deer|0 Comments

If bowhunting big deer is not a game of inches, then surely it is one of feet. You can do some awesome scouting and find a killer spot ripped with buck sign. But if you move in with a stand and set it a foot too low…or angled on the south side of a tree as a 10-pointer marches in from the west… You get it. If your positioning is off just a bit, you might as well be off a mile, because you are probably not going to shoot that buck. Use this guide to fine-tune your stand placement for better shots. Size matters. A straight tree 15-20 inches in diameter is perfect for any type stand, “lock-on,” ladder [...]

19 03, 2024

Have You Ever Had Buck Fever?

Clay Hanback2024-03-19T07:44:03-04:00March 19th, 2024|Big Deer TV, BigDeer, Deer Hunting, Hunting News, sportsman channel, trijicon|0 Comments

“It’s telltale adrenaline surge is so instant and convulsive that a blood-pressure check at that moment would bust the machine that takes it,” wrote Robert Ruark in his 1953 classic, The Old Man and the Boy. The legendary author was referring to buck fever, a malady which can affect us all in different ways. A mild case of it is good and required--if our heart doesn’t jump and our nerves don’t rattle a bit when we see a heavy 8-pointer sneaking through the woods on a frosty November morning, then why are we out there? But a bad case of the fever, with uncontrollable shaking, heavy sweat and gasping for breath, can not only ruin a hunt, but in the [...]