More than 13,000 people have crammed into Mexico City's central square to set a world record for the largest number of simultaneous chess games. Read more at BBC News.
Monday, October 30, 2006
Sunday, October 08, 2006
Did You Know?
By early October 1781, British general Charles Cornwallis ordered horses that were behind the lines of siege to be killed so that they would not starve to death.
American commander in chief George Washington refused to accept a salary during the war.
In an attempt to fool British general Henry Clinton, American general George Washington ordered his men to build big camps outside New York City, to make it appear as if the Continental Army were preparing to stay there.
The British did not evacuate New York City, their last position in the United States, until November 25, 1783 -- more than two years after Yorktown.
Sixteen-year-old John Quincy Adams, son of John Adams, Served as his father's secretary and helped prepare paperwork for the Treaty of Paris. Both father and son would later become presidents of the United States.
The loss at Yorktown, Virginia, was such a devastating blow for Great Britain because one-third of all its North American forces were Stationed there.
See more interesting facts
American commander in chief George Washington refused to accept a salary during the war.
In an attempt to fool British general Henry Clinton, American general George Washington ordered his men to build big camps outside New York City, to make it appear as if the Continental Army were preparing to stay there.
The British did not evacuate New York City, their last position in the United States, until November 25, 1783 -- more than two years after Yorktown.
Sixteen-year-old John Quincy Adams, son of John Adams, Served as his father's secretary and helped prepare paperwork for the Treaty of Paris. Both father and son would later become presidents of the United States.
The loss at Yorktown, Virginia, was such a devastating blow for Great Britain because one-third of all its North American forces were Stationed there.
See more interesting facts
Tuesday, October 03, 2006
10 Tips Deer-Hunting Success
GO PUBLIC While it's difficult to gain access to private lands, every state has public wildlife management areas, including federal lands. Many public lands offer excellent hunting opportunities.
TAKE A CHANCE Experiment with new ideas and products. Many hunters still believe that calling and rattling for whitetails won't work in their area. You'll never know if you don't try.
VISUALIZE THE SHOT If you're hunting from a tree stand, practice shooting from every angle. When a deer appears, you'll know better how to move without being detected and which shots are impossible or very difficult because of obstacles.
SWEEP UP If you're in a ground blind, clear leaves and brush from around your feet. If a deer suddenly approaches and you must change positions, rustling noises could alert it to your presence.
IGNORE THE MOON Some hunters won't go out on a day following a full moon because they believe the deer are active all night and don't move in daylight. Wrong. Deer are always someplace, and you should hunt whenever you can.
GET MOBILE Don't spend all your time in one spot, unless you've patterned a buck and want to wait him out. Otherwise, be flexible and try new areas.
BE SURE If you're hunting does and your management plan is to protect young bucks, look long and hard before pulling the trigger. The doe might be a button buck.
DON'T FORGET SAFETY When you hunt with a firearm, wear hunter orange clothing whether the law requires it or not. Likewise, always use a safety harness when in a tree stand or climbing to and from it.
PRACTICE FOR ACCURACY Don't even think of hunting unless you've practiced enough with your firearm or bow to be consistently accurate.
COUNT ON LUCK During an Arkansas hunt a guide showed me a tree stand and said a big buck was once seen from it, though he hadn't been spotted for a few seasons since. Other tree stands with more potential were available but I opted for the first one. The big buck decided it was time to pay a return visit. I shot him and learned that simple luck always plays a hand in a hunter's success.
TAKE A CHANCE Experiment with new ideas and products. Many hunters still believe that calling and rattling for whitetails won't work in their area. You'll never know if you don't try.
VISUALIZE THE SHOT If you're hunting from a tree stand, practice shooting from every angle. When a deer appears, you'll know better how to move without being detected and which shots are impossible or very difficult because of obstacles.
SWEEP UP If you're in a ground blind, clear leaves and brush from around your feet. If a deer suddenly approaches and you must change positions, rustling noises could alert it to your presence.
IGNORE THE MOON Some hunters won't go out on a day following a full moon because they believe the deer are active all night and don't move in daylight. Wrong. Deer are always someplace, and you should hunt whenever you can.
GET MOBILE Don't spend all your time in one spot, unless you've patterned a buck and want to wait him out. Otherwise, be flexible and try new areas.
BE SURE If you're hunting does and your management plan is to protect young bucks, look long and hard before pulling the trigger. The doe might be a button buck.
DON'T FORGET SAFETY When you hunt with a firearm, wear hunter orange clothing whether the law requires it or not. Likewise, always use a safety harness when in a tree stand or climbing to and from it.
PRACTICE FOR ACCURACY Don't even think of hunting unless you've practiced enough with your firearm or bow to be consistently accurate.
COUNT ON LUCK During an Arkansas hunt a guide showed me a tree stand and said a big buck was once seen from it, though he hadn't been spotted for a few seasons since. Other tree stands with more potential were available but I opted for the first one. The big buck decided it was time to pay a return visit. I shot him and learned that simple luck always plays a hand in a hunter's success.
Monday, October 02, 2006
Advice From Master Hunters
TAKE IT Slow Francis Mose, a veteran woodsman in New York's Adirondacks, taught me how to still-hunt the woods for whitetails. On one hunt I walked parallel to him about 10 yards away, copying his movements. At first I found it annoyingly difficult to imitate his snail's pace, but after seeing the effectiveness of his approach, I became a believer.
ROCK OUT Western hunter DeMarr Dudley showed me how to outwit a crafty mule deer buck. On a Utah hunt, he threw rocks into a weedy draw that was barely as wide as a pickup truck. Nothing happened, but Dudley kept it up. After the 15th rock hit, a buck came boiling out as if he had been scalded.
PATTERN THE DEER New York hunter Paul Jeheber directed me to sit on a particular rock in southern New York while he and a pal put on a drive for whitetails. He pointed out two trails coming off a ridge where deer might travel. Sure enough, he was right. A buck ran out. I shot it and learned the importance of patterning deer and knowing their escape routes.
STAY ON STAND Famed Kentucky hunter Harold Knight put me on stand in Tennessee near some fresh scrapes and told me to stay put until noon, even though the weather was hot, because the rut was cranking up. I was skeptical, but when a big 1 O-point buck emerged in the laurel with his nose to the ground and headed to the scrapes, I had a change of attitude. Because anything can happen at any time during the rut, a hunter is better off staying in his stand all day if possible.
ROCK OUT Western hunter DeMarr Dudley showed me how to outwit a crafty mule deer buck. On a Utah hunt, he threw rocks into a weedy draw that was barely as wide as a pickup truck. Nothing happened, but Dudley kept it up. After the 15th rock hit, a buck came boiling out as if he had been scalded.
PATTERN THE DEER New York hunter Paul Jeheber directed me to sit on a particular rock in southern New York while he and a pal put on a drive for whitetails. He pointed out two trails coming off a ridge where deer might travel. Sure enough, he was right. A buck ran out. I shot it and learned the importance of patterning deer and knowing their escape routes.
STAY ON STAND Famed Kentucky hunter Harold Knight put me on stand in Tennessee near some fresh scrapes and told me to stay put until noon, even though the weather was hot, because the rut was cranking up. I was skeptical, but when a big 1 O-point buck emerged in the laurel with his nose to the ground and headed to the scrapes, I had a change of attitude. Because anything can happen at any time during the rut, a hunter is better off staying in his stand all day if possible.
50 States For Deer
A deer-hunting road warrior reminisces about his lifelong odyssey and lessons learned along the way.
Outside it was cold and raw, the kind of day best spent indoors. The gales and blowing snow made hunting almost impossible, but I was on a mission. I was in North Dakota, hunting alone on public land and fulfilling a lifetime quest. I had set out to hunt all 50 states for deer, and North Dakota was the last stop on my itinerary. I didn't get a deer on that trip, but I drove home smiling anyway. The long 50-state odyssey was finally over.
I conceived the idea to hunt deer in every state about 10 years ago One day, out of curiosity, I jotted down all the states in which I had hunted and was surprised when the total came to about two dozen. I resolved then to try to hunt all 50, and the adventure began. Toward the end, I'd drive my pickup truck from my home in Wyoming and hunt a cluster of states in a particular region, spending at least three days in each. During one such journey, I was on the road for 41 days. I put 14,000 miles on my pickup and managed to hunt six states. In some instances I simply drove in, bought a license across a counter, located a state wildlife management area on a map and went hunting. In others I hunted with friends or outfitters. Whether I hunted in a group or alone, I always had a great time.
BORN TO HUNT
I began hunting as a child near my birthplace in New York. I bought my first deer tag when I was 14, the minimum legal age at the time. After high school and a two-year stint at a small forestry college in northern New York, I journeyed to a Western college to work toward a bachelor's degree. One of my first priorities after arriving in Utah to study forestry was to plan a mule deer hunt with some classmates.
So it began; my first Western hunts occurred in the 1960s, when hunting for mule deer was at its best. Big bucks were pushovers, even on public land. Other than Utah, most of my early mule deer hunts were in Colorado. Permission to hunt ranches was easy to come by in those days. Now virtually every private acre in prime deer country-East or West-is leased or closed to hunting altogether.
In the late '60s, I left the West temporarily to work for the U.S. Military Academy at West Point as post forester and game warden. Eight years there taught me a lot about whitetails. At the time the hunting world barely knew what a scrape was and had no clue about the significance of a rubbed tree, except that a buck did it.
During that period I hunted New York extensively, chiefly the Catskill Mountains. If I wasn't hunting with my buddies in the deer camp there, I was probably in the Adirondacks, where my family had a cottage. There were no tree stands in those days, though hunters sometimes nailed planks on branches and perched there. Mostly we sat against trees or stood in spots where we thought we might see deer. Or we conducted drives. Somewhere along the line I realized I missed the West and began to spend my vacations hunting deer and elk in the Rockies.
HOME AGAIN
I heeded the call of open spaces in 1974. For a time I worked in Utah as a wildlife biologist for the federal government. At that point, I began to explore new horizons, hunting deer in various Western states as well as exotic locales outside the Lower 48. I wrote hunting articles part-time and tried to gain as much information as possible about distant and unique places.
Profound changes were occurring in the hunting world. Private lands were being leased in a feverish effort to wrest control of exclusive hunting rights, and mule deer populations were plummeting. Meanwhile, whitetails were multiplying rapidly all over the country and also moving into Western landscapes traditionally inhabited by mule deer.
My life took a dramatic turn in 1978 when I became Western Editor for OUTDOOR LIVE, and later Editor-at-Large. My job required me to travel and learn, and one of the first things I discovered was that the deer-hunting world was in transition. Hunters were talking excitedly about new strategies that involved scrapes, rubs, rattling and calling. Some companies were beginning to manufacture deer grunt calls and cover scents. Others were ramping up the manufacture of light-weight tree stands and climbing aids.
A new world was opening, and I was eager to spend as much time as possible in it. By 1980, I had about as many states on my "Hunted" list as on my "Still to Hunt" list, though at the time I wasn't counting. I shared hunting camps with mentors such as Murry Burnham, owner of Burnham Brothers Calls. Burnham introduced me to rattling. After learning the basics, I used the rattling technique elsewhere. I found it to be effective anywhere there is a fairly even buck-to-doe ratio.
The '80s brought profound changes in deer-hunting strategies. We learned more about deer communication and breeding habits. I was continually amazed at the knowledge that was being amassed and put to good use. Tree-stand hunting became the preferred strategy, and companies such as Trebark, Realtree and Mossy Oak couldn't manufacture camouflage garments fast enough. I added more states to my list, especially those in the Midwest and South, and continued to hunt the West extensively.
As I traveled, I was exposed to regional differences in hunting techniques, governed mainly by habitat and regulations. Everywhere, hunters had begun to learn the importance of supplemental nutrition for deer via specially formulated plantings, as well as the importance of selective harvest.
In the mid-'90s, I got to know Tony Knight, who introduced a popular version of in-line muzzleloader. Intrigued by my quest, Knight became my traveling companion to a number of states.
Considering I have 50 states under my deer-hunting belt, you might assume I'm a happy camper. Well, almost. In a number of them I never squeezed the trigger, by choice or chance; and in a couple I never saw a deer. Sometimes I arrived when the season was well under way, and competition with other hunters was intense. Stormy weather worked against me in some cases. So my "new" crusade is to revisit the 11 states where my tag went unpunched and perhaps ultimately take a deer in each. If I don't, though, I won't be disappointed. Just having the opportunity to hunt all 50 states has been tremendously satisfying.
Outside it was cold and raw, the kind of day best spent indoors. The gales and blowing snow made hunting almost impossible, but I was on a mission. I was in North Dakota, hunting alone on public land and fulfilling a lifetime quest. I had set out to hunt all 50 states for deer, and North Dakota was the last stop on my itinerary. I didn't get a deer on that trip, but I drove home smiling anyway. The long 50-state odyssey was finally over.
I conceived the idea to hunt deer in every state about 10 years ago One day, out of curiosity, I jotted down all the states in which I had hunted and was surprised when the total came to about two dozen. I resolved then to try to hunt all 50, and the adventure began. Toward the end, I'd drive my pickup truck from my home in Wyoming and hunt a cluster of states in a particular region, spending at least three days in each. During one such journey, I was on the road for 41 days. I put 14,000 miles on my pickup and managed to hunt six states. In some instances I simply drove in, bought a license across a counter, located a state wildlife management area on a map and went hunting. In others I hunted with friends or outfitters. Whether I hunted in a group or alone, I always had a great time.
BORN TO HUNT
I began hunting as a child near my birthplace in New York. I bought my first deer tag when I was 14, the minimum legal age at the time. After high school and a two-year stint at a small forestry college in northern New York, I journeyed to a Western college to work toward a bachelor's degree. One of my first priorities after arriving in Utah to study forestry was to plan a mule deer hunt with some classmates.
So it began; my first Western hunts occurred in the 1960s, when hunting for mule deer was at its best. Big bucks were pushovers, even on public land. Other than Utah, most of my early mule deer hunts were in Colorado. Permission to hunt ranches was easy to come by in those days. Now virtually every private acre in prime deer country-East or West-is leased or closed to hunting altogether.
In the late '60s, I left the West temporarily to work for the U.S. Military Academy at West Point as post forester and game warden. Eight years there taught me a lot about whitetails. At the time the hunting world barely knew what a scrape was and had no clue about the significance of a rubbed tree, except that a buck did it.
During that period I hunted New York extensively, chiefly the Catskill Mountains. If I wasn't hunting with my buddies in the deer camp there, I was probably in the Adirondacks, where my family had a cottage. There were no tree stands in those days, though hunters sometimes nailed planks on branches and perched there. Mostly we sat against trees or stood in spots where we thought we might see deer. Or we conducted drives. Somewhere along the line I realized I missed the West and began to spend my vacations hunting deer and elk in the Rockies.
HOME AGAIN
I heeded the call of open spaces in 1974. For a time I worked in Utah as a wildlife biologist for the federal government. At that point, I began to explore new horizons, hunting deer in various Western states as well as exotic locales outside the Lower 48. I wrote hunting articles part-time and tried to gain as much information as possible about distant and unique places.
Profound changes were occurring in the hunting world. Private lands were being leased in a feverish effort to wrest control of exclusive hunting rights, and mule deer populations were plummeting. Meanwhile, whitetails were multiplying rapidly all over the country and also moving into Western landscapes traditionally inhabited by mule deer.
My life took a dramatic turn in 1978 when I became Western Editor for OUTDOOR LIVE, and later Editor-at-Large. My job required me to travel and learn, and one of the first things I discovered was that the deer-hunting world was in transition. Hunters were talking excitedly about new strategies that involved scrapes, rubs, rattling and calling. Some companies were beginning to manufacture deer grunt calls and cover scents. Others were ramping up the manufacture of light-weight tree stands and climbing aids.
A new world was opening, and I was eager to spend as much time as possible in it. By 1980, I had about as many states on my "Hunted" list as on my "Still to Hunt" list, though at the time I wasn't counting. I shared hunting camps with mentors such as Murry Burnham, owner of Burnham Brothers Calls. Burnham introduced me to rattling. After learning the basics, I used the rattling technique elsewhere. I found it to be effective anywhere there is a fairly even buck-to-doe ratio.
The '80s brought profound changes in deer-hunting strategies. We learned more about deer communication and breeding habits. I was continually amazed at the knowledge that was being amassed and put to good use. Tree-stand hunting became the preferred strategy, and companies such as Trebark, Realtree and Mossy Oak couldn't manufacture camouflage garments fast enough. I added more states to my list, especially those in the Midwest and South, and continued to hunt the West extensively.
As I traveled, I was exposed to regional differences in hunting techniques, governed mainly by habitat and regulations. Everywhere, hunters had begun to learn the importance of supplemental nutrition for deer via specially formulated plantings, as well as the importance of selective harvest.
In the mid-'90s, I got to know Tony Knight, who introduced a popular version of in-line muzzleloader. Intrigued by my quest, Knight became my traveling companion to a number of states.
Considering I have 50 states under my deer-hunting belt, you might assume I'm a happy camper. Well, almost. In a number of them I never squeezed the trigger, by choice or chance; and in a couple I never saw a deer. Sometimes I arrived when the season was well under way, and competition with other hunters was intense. Stormy weather worked against me in some cases. So my "new" crusade is to revisit the 11 states where my tag went unpunched and perhaps ultimately take a deer in each. If I don't, though, I won't be disappointed. Just having the opportunity to hunt all 50 states has been tremendously satisfying.
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