Mushrooms
The professional mushroom pickers call this time of year Winter Pick. It's a time of abundance here in Northern California, a time when you can conceivably come home with 20 different kinds of edible mushrooms. It's my favorite time of year.
Essays and Stories
I did something the other day that I rarely ever do: I bought meat. Specifically, I bought a chicken. I view it as an almost political act. Americans have been brainwashed into believing that cheap chicken is a God-given right. It isn't. It's a horrible disservice to the chicken, the farmer and the consumer.
Venison
Deer fat, venison tallow, whatever you call it, this is the stuff of controversy. A great many sources, including some trusted ones, say it's inedible. Others, including me, have long said it can be damn tasty. Here's some science behind both claims.
Featured
There's a saying in fly fishing that catching a fish is the goal, but not the point of that particular obsession. Deer hunting in the West is the same thing. It's been a tough season so far, but it ain't over yet.
Featured
I've fished for tuna, off and on, my whole life. But the more you fish, the more you understand how different the fishing can be from place to place, even for the same species. This latest trip off the Mexican Coast was, well, a learning experience.
Foraging
Morel hunting the way I do it is a lonely affair. Miles walked in a beaten, burned landscape. A morel here, a morel there. It's not the bonanza of a big burn, but I wouldn't give it up for anything.
Featured
For the second time, I journeyed 300 miles south to hunt wild pigs. And for the second time, good karma lead to a good hunt. Crazy how that works out, eh?
Featured
It's a frightening thing, meeting your limitations. Knowing that there are many people better than you even at the things you consider yourself good at is nothing if not humbling. The only way I can cope with such knowledge is to fight it. Limitations are not set in stone. They can be moved.
Wild Game
Last month I hunted tundra swans in Utah, and we ate our bird for Christmas dinner. When I tell people I have hunted and eaten swan I get reactions sunning the gamut from excited interest to full-on horror. Few animals carry the cultural baggage that swans do, and even I am not immune to these mixed feelings.
Featured
Geese are not ducks, nor is goose hunting like duck hunting. Geese are far tougher to fool, far tougher to kill. But when it all works, there is nothing else that thrills me more. I had such a hunt last week.
Fish
Classic Louisiana redfish on the half shell, which can be made with a variety of fish species.
Fish
Live long enough and you will start forgetting about all those fish you've caught over the years. It takes a rare combination of time, place and fish to vault one from that nameless school and into your memory. It all came together recently for me in Nevada with a monster trout.
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