Top Ten Hunting and Fishing Books
From conservation and historical accounts to fictional adventures, these books make for great reading whenever the season. If you’ve completed this list, make sure you browse our entire selection. Last Stand: George Bird Grinnell, the Battle to Save the Buffalo, and...
Winchester’s Haunted House
Said to be haunted by the ghosts of those killed with Winchester rifles, the home is an interesting site even without the superstitions.
Getting There
I take my time with the old men now. I take my time with the duffers I find on opening day, swapping yarns and a thermos by 9am, or posted alone on a barren ridge no deer has crossed in more than a decade. They will tell me, whether I ask or not, that they don't much...
Hunting is a Marathon
Hunting is a marathon and Mike and anyone hunting afield with me needs to keep up! Hunting is a task that is not to be taken lightly. Once the door is open on the truck and I spring out faster than a jack-n-the-box, it’s like the Kentucky Derby — I’m off to the race!...
The Lady in Green
Everybody had now gathered but Steve. When questioned, the other drivers disclaimed all knowledge of his whereabouts or his peculiar behavior. But they knew perfectly of both. For a very long time we have had on the plantation a black man named Steve. For a generation...
Greg Beecham Wildlife Artist Coming Home
It’s only natural that Greg Beecham should feel as he does. His dad, Tom Beecham...drilled drawing into him before the youngsters years had reached his teens. Greg Beecham’s dusty brown felt hat rides high on his forehead, the way a cowboy sits straight on his horse....
He Wrote On the Heart of the Boy
I had not come here to say good-bye — I already had, and I never would. The Last eleven miles of road were as I remembered. Even these many years later. Each mile — rutted, washed-out and overhung with cypress and oak — had always seemed to be the price we paid to...
Shadows on the Hills
It is at the edge of dark, that pandemonium erupts. One day, I want to shoot a buffalo. With paces between us, facing his dare. I want to know for once before I die, even if on the day I die, the tremble of doubt and the taste of fear. It is only just, before all I...
Hunting Clues
There's your clue! If you remember the odd comment about nearly everything a few years past, everyone was saying: “There’s your clue!” This comment came when folks everywhere would wonder what to do next or which road in life to take when a fork in the road appeared....
2022 Magnolia Speech School Clay Shoot
The 2022 Magnolia Speech School Clay Shoot was held October 20th at the Providence Hill Farm in Jackson, Mississippi — and Sporting Classics was a sponsor. This year, more than 200 shooters enjoyed morning and afternoon shoots leading to an evening party overlooking...
The Baby Toddles
I think a dog’s pleasure in scenting game is certainly as keen as our seeing it. How many birds do you think there are in it?” I asked Jake. “Forty if there’s one,” he said. I believed him; for Jack owed me nothing, and he is not a farmer. To a farmer — at least, to...
Leopard in Our Lap
I felt terrible. I could have prevented the whole thing if only I had killed the leopard when it charged. When our family of five set out on our hunting safari in Africa, we were prepared for a great adventure. Although we knew Africa could be a dangerous place, we...
The Bloody Side of Hunting
For me, this hunting season is becoming the season of cuts. If you think this piece will be about dead animals, read something else. The recent blood in hunting has been mine. From thorns to sharp rocks to barbed-wire fences, there are things in the hunting world that...
Last Buck at Charlie’s Place
My last buck — the last to date at Charlie’s and likely the last, though the unknown has yet to reach its terminus. Distraught. That definitive aptly portrayed the sentiments of both Neal and me. Current news, while not completely unexpected, put us on alert. Near two...
John Schoenherr Bold and Beyond
As both sportsman and art lover, my walls battle for either mounted heads or country scenes. Oddly, though, I own no wildlife art. Before visiting John Schoenherr I wasn't sure why. Now I am. Over the years, most wildlife has seemed partisan to me, as though the...
Why I Taught My Boys to be Hunters
It has always seemed to me that any man is a better man for being a hunter. I have said that my hunting has often been solitary; but that was chiefly in the early days. During the last 25 years, I have rarely taken to the woods and fields in the shooting season...
Stories Told By Doug Turnbull’s 1886
SPONSORED CONTENT: A recent Turnbull Restoration calendar featured a spread of Turnbull’s personal Winchester 1886 from 1888, which he restored and converted to .475 Turnbull in 2007. The spread focuses on all of the “imperfections” his rifle has collected over the...
Night of the Leopard
As night fell, a dense bank of fog from the Indian Ocean pushed inland over the Mozambique coast, blocking the moonlight and cloaking the forest in darkness. Condensation that had formed high in the jungle canopy literally rained down onto the leaf litter below. Just...
Hunting is Like Work
I may need to charge overtime. Treats and a half, Mike! I wrote recently that fishing is like work, and I’m here to tell you that hunting is like real work. I have to climb mountains, trek down valleys, wade or swim across rivers and struggle and muscle my way through...
ETHOS Performance Shop Upland Shotgun
Benelli’s ETHOS Performance Shop Upland 20-gauge semi-auto shotgun with its Inertia-Driven System meets all the requirements. SPONSORED CONTENT Every quality upland shotgun should meet these requirements: be easy to shoulder, swing and point; easy to operate by feel...
The Phantom Setter
Originally published in The Saturday Evening Post in 1961, this story is one of the finest ever written about gundogs and grouse hunting. It is certainly the most chilling.
Cole Johnson in Black and White
"You don't decide on a style...you do the work and a style evolves." Over the years, I have had the luck to interview some very talented wildlife artists. A number actually hunted, others did not. In the work of those that did, I discovered another quality, a...
The Old Man’s Leopard and the Omen
It had to be an evil omen. The first glow of the sun eased out the night and pinked the peaks of the majestic Water Berg Range. Towering mountains, like a series of huge waves about to crash onto the land below and a crumbling old stone house guarded by flat-topped...
Report from the Field
Hunting season is here! Time to find birds! These are the days all hunting dogs live for. Hunting season is underway and once that calendar rolled over and spotted September on the exposed page, I dashed to the truck and dove in. My days now are spent sniffing about...
Into the Mountains
Montana’s landscape is so spellbinding it will make you forget everything that led you there. Even the fishing.
First Season Expectations
SPONSORED CONTENT: You’ve built up to your pup’s first hunting season — but what should you expect from your young dog? The experts weigh in. Every sporting dog owner has high expectations for their dog. Social media is flooded with beautiful images of dogs on point...
Joshua Spies the Wide World
For Joshua Spies, it's about payback. Across the lonesome, windblown prairie of northern mid-America, locals know him simply as "the kid." On this morning, the prodigal artistic son of Watertown, South Dakota, stands in his studio surrounded by six easel paintings,...
Night Sweats
It is important for a man to do a thing well, even if it is killing. The honor of a feat is the measure of how you do it...And what was the truth of me? To hell with Bob Ruark. To blazes with Hemingway, Capstick, Percival, Boddington, the whole and bunch of them. It's...
The Trespasser
"That's a very sad story,” said Austin. "It gets worse," said Ray. Passing through the ranch gate and driving down the tree-lined gravel lane toward the log house seemed like going back in time. The little English setter, asleep in the passenger seat for the past...
The Price Per Pound
The other day I was eating a pheasant breast Mike had grilled when he said, “Cameron, slow down gobbling on that thing, it is very expensive per pound.” Well, how dare him tell me how to eat. I descended from wolves and know about eating meat of all types. Now I was...
At the Edge of Alaska
A sheep-turned-grizzly hunt along the Canadian border.
The Blood Horse
Though Chinese ceramics of 3500 BC depict horses both harnessed and ridden, the archaeological agreement is that the horse was first domesticated in Asiatic Russia around 3,000 BC. The wild horse of Mongolia, or Przewalski's horse, as it was named in 1881 by the...
The Traveling Knight
Sir Henry Seton-Karr dreamed of hunting America, later using a .500 double to take many of its game animals.
A Hunting Song
“Give me a dog that is keen of scent, and a gun that is tried and true . . .”
Island Getaway
Bunny gunning on Nantucket amid the homes of the rich and famous.
Fall at Brays Island
Fall at Brays Island brings with it the much anticipated scene of crisp mornings, rock steady pointers and eager cockers culminating in a burst of bobwhites in every direction. With 3,500 acres of quail courses and woodlands, Brays is every upland bird hunter's dream...
A Bear for the Ages
“George is here with us in spirit, and I have a feeling that everything is going to work out. In truth, I think it’s going to be magical.”
Randall McKissick – Lasting Impressions
To elicit thoughtful reflection ... to trigger an emotional response, these are the things McKissick seeks in his art. Of course you can't always tell a book by its cover — nor a painter by his paintings. Take Randall McKissick, for example. With just a casual glance,...
The Branding Iron
When their production lines weren’t manufacturing firearms, many gun companies turned to making a wide range of household items.
A Man-Killing Bear and Revenge
Almost every trapper past middle age who has spent his life in the wilderness has stories to tell about exceptionally savage bears. One of these stories was told in my ranch house one evening by an old mountain hunter, clad in fur cap, buckskin hunting shirt, and...
Dog Names
Well, there are now lists for everything — including popular dog names. I was surfing the web and looking for more stuff to order when a list popped up — the Most Popular Dog Names. I had to look — and could not find Cameron anywhere. Who made this list? On the list I...
Slamming Cuba
A belief in Avalon helped the author overcome years of fear and heartache.
Michael Sieve – Hunter’s Eyes Artist’s Hands
"I decided awhile back that I wouldn't paint any animal unless I'd seen it first.” It's a dangerous trap to fall into, but I'd formed quite a few impressions about Michael Sieve through his paintings long before I ever met him. You hear public figures complaining...
Belly of the Beast
Hunting elephants in cover so thick they can only be located by the rumbling of their stomachs.
Gear for Birdhunters
Happy opening day of dove season, America. Across the country, millions of bird hunters celebrate this unofficial holiday of sorts by heading to sunflower patches, milo fields and watering holes to test their wingshooting skills on one of the hunting world’s toughest...
Wilhelm Kuhnert – Rediscovering an Artist
The artistic legacy of Wilhelm Kuhnert, abridged by the first Great War and almost devastated by the second, is known to but a few wildlife art enthusiasts. On April 30, 1906, Wilhelm Kuhnert and his expedition of 80 porters were encamped along a wide river, less than...
Fishing is Like Work!
On the offseason I get to fish — a lot. But fishing (not necessarily catching) with Mike sure feels like work! Well, it has been a long hot summer of tagging along as Mike fishes. Now, I did not say he was catching — just fishing, har har! On the downside of these...
Preseason Training Tips from the Pros
Eukanuba Pro Trainers share key preseason training tips to help get your dogs prepped and ready for Opening Day and the autumn trial season. SPONSORED CONTENT Opening Day is coming in low and hot, and so is the autumn trial season. Pro trainers “plan their work and...
To Bite the Bullet
Terror in the tall grass.
We Weims Can Run
Weimaraners can run at speeds up to 35 MPH. I was again surfing the web the other day — hey, I’m down to only 20 boxes of dog treats, time to reorder — and saw a dog speed report. According to the report, Weimaraners can run at speeds up to 35 MPH. We Weims can run!...