By Dave Hurteau & Chad Love

Ninety-two-year-old Art Hawkins, who helped lay the foundation for the waterfowl surveys that have been used for 50 years to set annual duck regulations, collapsed and died while on a walk last Thursday. Hawkins helped design the wood duck box that has aided the return of that species. Colleagues remember him as "a legend in waterfowl management."

http://www.startribune.com/466/story/301865.html [ Read Full Post ]

By Dave Hurteau & Chad Love

The White House has long been eager for the Cheney shooting story to die, and indeed the late-night television jokes have largely fizzled. But a minor-league hockey team in Las Vegas, who will give fans orange vests reading "Don't Shoot, I'm Human" at an upcoming game, still considers the incident "just too juicy" not to take full advantage of.

http://www.allheadlinenews.com/articles/7002773139 [ Read Full Post ]

By David E. Petzal and Philip Bourjaily

This blog is supposed to be about sporting firearms, but the responses to my ravings of March 9 were so interesting that I am compelled to follow up.

On the Trapdoor Springfield: As one reader quite correctly pointed out, our soldiers did well with the Model 1873 at the Wagon Box fight. They did well with it on many other occasions as well, including Little Bighorn, where we tend to forget that troopers under the command of Frederick Benteen won their part of the battle.  The truth is that you could have armed Custer’s men with AK-47s and they still would have lost. Two hundred and fifteen against 2,500 (or many more) is bad odds. But still and all, the single-shot rifle was an outmoded tool even during the Civil War.

On the M-14.  During my 6 years in a green suit I was both an armorer and a cadreman, and got to see a lot of trainees shoot the M-14. By and large, they didn’t do very well. Most of them had never shot a rifle before, and it was simply too much gun. But the M-14 is a very good rifle, and tuned up, it can really shoot. That’s why... [ Read Full Post ]

By Dave Hurteau & Chad Love

For folks opposed to drilling in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge--or on any federal lands--here's at least one reason why. The story linked below reports the largest oil spill ever seen on Alaska's North Slope, and now efforts to clean up the crude have stalled because of wind chill factors of 70 below.   

http://www.marketwatch.com/News/Story/Story.aspx?guid=%7BDC3B7830%2DE553%2D40F2%2D94BD%2D288E25A96F81%7D&siteid=google

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/14/AR2006031400157.html [ Read Full Post ]

By David E. Petzal and Philip Bourjaily

One of the things my Navy-officer uncle brought home from World War II was an M-1 carbine (one of the most useless firearms ever issued to the military, but that’s another blog) with a hammer and sickle carved in the stock. The hammer and sickle, you may recall, was the symbol of the now-vanished Communist Party, and I always wondered why an American soldier, sailor, or Marine would cut such a thing into his weapon.

My uncle could shed no light on it; the gun was not issued to him and he never did say whether he found it or traded for it. And that carbine is probably still out there somewhere, its mysterious symbol forever unexplained.

All this was brought up by my trip to the Las Vegas Knife and Gun Show in February, where all sorts of old guns were on sale. Unless you have less imagination than the beasts of the field, you can’t pick up an old gun—especially a military one—and wonder who carried it, and what became of the man, and what trail the gun took to end up on your hands on this day in this place.

Fine guns—there were some gorgeous old Winchesters there—have their own... [ Read Full Post ]

By Dave Hurteau & Chad Love

Seventeen-year-old hunter Spenser Wigsten of Spencer, NY, was up late watching television when he heard his cat screaming outside. He found the feline cornered by a coyote, which suddenly turned on Wigsten, scratching his neck and chest. The intervention save Charlie the cat, and for his trouble, Wigsten will receive a total of 13 rabies shots.

http://www.theithacajournal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060310/NEWS01/603100343/1002 [ Read Full Post ]