When it comes to bird hunting I have always been partial to double barreled shotguns. The first ducks that I ever shot where killed with my Grandpa’s old 12 gauge side by side. Since then I have owned many pumps, auto loaders, double barrels and single shots in 12, 16, and 20 gauges. At the end of the day though it seems that I always find my hands wrapped around a double barreled gun. For the last 5 or six years I have shot nothing but a Beretta 20 gauge over under. I have shot Quail, Chukar, Huns, Sharp Tails, Ruffs and Blue Grouse, Pheasant, Ducks, Canadian and Snow Geese, and even a Himalayan Snow Cock with that 20 gauge over under. This year however I finally started to feel tempted to break down and shoot an autoloader. It was kind of a tuff season for upland birds here in Nevada, making it two years straight now. Some days would produce more opportunities for birds than you needed and others only produced one or two. It is those days of only one or two opportunities that made me contemplate putting down the two barreled bang stick and switch over to the dark side of the autoloader. Now that the season is over and some of the pain of those tuff days has been forgotten I am starting to feel good about my trusty friend again. I just hope that she has it in her to forgive me for my thoughts of betrayal.

There has been a lot of literature lately regarding the benefits of the use of gloves while fishing catch and release. Gloves allow you to grip the fish without having to tightly squeeze it, avoiding damage to its vital organs. Anyone who has every tried to hold a thrashing fish or even a still fish with bare hands understands that this can be difficult to do, and physically it is very hard on the fish. Always wet your glove before handling your catch to avoid removing the fish's protective coat of slime. Fish scales are covered by a mucous layer which helps prevent infections. Rough handling, especially with dry hands, damages the mucous layer and reduces the chances of the fish surviving after release.
We make fishing gloves for both warm weather and cold weather conditions that not only protect your hands from the elements, but also help make the process of release easier and safer for the fish.
We have donated gloves to biologists in Florida who are running specific tests on various fish species regarding the impact of handling fish with bare hands compared to handling them with gloves. We will be getting results later this year.

For years Glacier Glove has been selling our gloves to cyclists. We even have a picture hanging in our office of Lance Armstrong cycling with a pair of our gloves on. The design and materials of our gloves creates a very good product for winter cycling. Our 802BK is completely wind proof, water proof, features 2mm of fleece lined neoprene, and has pre-curved knuckles for a natural feeling grip. We are now proud to support cycling team Garmin Slipstream with our gloves to help support their cold weather training.

The Nevada Chukar season is over. Part of me feels relieved that it is finished so that I can take a few weekends and just relax, but another part of me knows that I am not going to just relax on the weekend anyway, and I would much rather be bird hunting than doing anything else. At any rate it is over. All in all it was a good year. On a scale of 1 - 10 I would rate the hunting in Nevada this year as a 5. I finished up with 103 chukar, a handful of quail, and 48 birds from Montana. That basically gives me 151 birds for the year. I shot a good number of grouse in September but they where not over my dogs, so I do not count them. I did find a new great spot to hunt grouse over my dogs so I will definitely being doing that this September.

For me there are two days this year that stick out in my mind; One of the days in Montana with my buddy Paul was just awesome. We both shot limits of Sharp Tails and we both basically had our limits of huns as well. We had one flush that day over Cash’s point where we shot 6 huns out of that one covey, and it was not a staggered flush. The other day is definitely the one hunting chukar with my wife Lisa. It was a nice sunny day, we had an easy cool breeze, an easy hunt along a ridge line, lots of birds, great dog work, a limit in about an hour, and she got to experience a chukar hunt that was as good as they get. Very cool.

This last weekend I hunted Saturday and Sunday. I shot 6 birds total, but certainly had the opportunities to get limits both days. The dogs held up on their end of the deal, I just didn’t get it done on my end when I had the chance. Not exactly how you want to finish up the season, but it is what it is. It’s not like this is that last time until next September that I will be able to shot birds over the dogs. I do a lot of “training” in the off season, which at this point isn’t really training, but regardless it means that I shoot a bunch of pen raised birds over the dogs. The dogs do not learn anything from this, but I know that they have a lot of fun anyhow, and so do I, so that is the simple motivation behind it. If I had to guess I probably shoot 50 – 80 pen raised birds every year during the off season.

Now it is time to start thinking about going fishing!