Every year we meet here to try and find that special something for that favorite outdoors-loving someone. These folks are hard to buy for. They have definite preferences for any number of things and those preferences are based on one simple fact — they work. So many outdoors gifts and products are made to lure the purchaser into buying something rather than actually helping in the outdoors. Not the ones featured here. These are all bona fide tools to make the most of your outdoor adventures, or those of that special someone on your list.
Keeping The Tool Clean: Your shotgun is a tool. Tools work best when you keep them clean. So, if A equals B, then it only makes sense that you keep your shotgun as clean as possible. The barrel deserves special attention what with lead, steel, copper, bismuth, and plastic all rocketing down its length when the trigger is squeezed, some of that stuff scrapes up against the barrel and starts to cause fouling.
Birchwood Casey’s new Barrel Boss 12 gauge Shotgun Cleaning Rod Combo Kit comes to the rescue with a nifty set that not only stands up to years of use, but is very portable. Complete with a 36-inch fuzzy cleaning rod, a heavy-duty 36-inch one piece aluminum rod, and a tough brass bristle brush these are all the tools you’ll need to keep ol’ Bessy showcase clean and is packaged in a durable plastic tube for easy storage and portability.
The fuzzy rod is threaded on both ends so you can switch the handle to the other end when the rod gets dirty. You can also thread the brass brush onto the end of the rod for extra cleaning power. Use the brass brush and aluminum rod with a quality solvent like Bore Scrubber 2-in-1 Cleaner to remove tough powder and plastic wad residue. Finish off by wiping the bore with the fuzzy rod for a sparkling clean barrel. The fuzzy rod is solvent resistant and washable for longer wear and service. Suggested retail price is $16.
This type of tool has long been used by shotgun sports enthusiasts. Trap and skeet and sporting clays shooters discovered them more than 20 years ago. These are the new improved versions. They are significantly more durable, better at their job, and cheaper. That’s three checkmarks in the “pro” column. I can’t find any checkmarks in the “con” column when it comes to this kit.
Stay Warm: HotHands warmers from Heatmax offer hours of safe, dependable heat for anyone who is exposed to the cold. I’ve been using these things for well over a decade and nothing I know makes a better stocking stuffer than a set, or a few sets of these. I use them on the deer stand, I use them while ice fishing, I use them when I’m out after predators. These hand warmers, as well as toe warmers, head warmers, and one that actually warms the majority of your back, are lightweight, odorless, and just plain slick. Better yet, they are very inexpensive.
Their strict quality control measures ensure consistent performance from batch to batch. HotHands also have the longest shelf life in the industry. Each package of warmers comes with an expiration date to let consumers check for the latest and freshest products. HotHands are safe and biodegradable and can be disposed of with standard household trash. Using them is as simple as opening the package, shaking the pouch briefly, and then placing the hand warmer in your pocket. That’s it. When your hands get chilled, and where I live and play they will, simply wrap your hands around the warmer and you will get instant relief.
It’s not just cold weather sporting folks who have found out how good these things are. Soon after U.S. troops were deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan, Heatmax began receiving letters from families of soldiers stationed in those areas requesting warmers for their sons and daughters. Most people were unaware that temperatures during the cold season there can fall well below zero. When Heatmax discovered the military didn’t supply such items, they stepped in and started sending HotHands Warmers to supply entire units in the field. Some of Heatmax’s customers, upon hearing of their humanitarian efforts, offered to pay the freight costs on overseas shipments to help show their support. To this day Heatmax continues to supply HotHands to our troops to help them fight the cold and stay combat ready. They receive e-mails and letters from grateful parents and soldiers on an almost daily basis.
In a prior life, during Desert Storm, I was one of those soldiers whose family sent him sets of the warmers. They were a big boost and I became an instant fan.
Stay Clean: Staying clean is a never ending problem when out camping, hunting or fishing, no matter the season. Sure, those big RVs may make things a bit easier, but then there’s the grey water you need to get rid of and the fresh water you need to resupply, when you can. Camp Casey Sanitizing Hand Towels and Spray are the perfect take- along items for campers, hunters, travelers, or anyone who spends time in the outdoors where soap and water may not be readily available. The convenient 8-inch by 5-inch hand towels come sealed in individual packets so they never dry out. The sanitizer kills 99.99% of all germs and bacteria.
The two-ounce spray contains the same formula as the towels. The sanitizer dries quickly and leaves no sticky residue or odor. The towels and spray work great for removing dirt, lead, grease, and bacteria. Camp Casey Sanitizing products are a must for anyone who needs a quick and easy clean up. The 25 pack of the hand towels has a suggested retail price of $7.10 and the spray bottle $5.30.
Now, the big question, do you actually get clean? On a recent trip on board a live-aboard hunting boat based off Kodiak, Alaska, a boat with eight others on it, and one where showers were on a rotational basis every four days, they stood up to the task. While our clothes may have jumped up and crawled away on their own, we all stayed clean, mostly odor-free except for that one fella who didn’t use them regularly. Whether it’s deer or duck camp, a camping trip with the family, there are just so many uses for these things that plunking down the cash for them is easy.
Stay Invisible (Almost): Blaze, or “hunters” orange is required while hunting in most states. In the Midwest, during deer season, wearing a lot of blaze orange is not only a very wise idea, but the law in many states as well. That’s where the problem lies. Blaze orange is highly visible to you and me, a good thing, and the debate has raged for years about just what the deer sees when it sees something adorned in blaze orange.
Ophthalmology researchers have developed and patented a process for treating safety orange material to make it less visible to deer. This is particularly significant for deer hunters. Hunting products featuring this technology became available in the fall of 2006. These products include safety vests and hats and are marketed under the trade name Covert Orange.
Research ophthalmologists collaborated with wildlife biologists to determine how deer and elk perceive safety orange. According to ophthalmology researcher Dr. Lincoln Johnson, “Color vision in animals, including humans, depends upon the number and type of color- sensitive cells in the eye. Humans have three types of color- sensitive cells in their eyes and are therefore termed ‘trichromatic.’ The three types of color-sensitive cells in the human eye are most sensitive to blue, green, or red light. The colors that we see are the result of the combined effects of blue, green, and red colored light that the eye receives from the environment. For example, a plum, which humans see as purple, is really a combination of blue and red light that is sensed and mixed by the cells in the eye and sent to the brain as purple. Remember mixing finger paints to make new colors? It’s the same concept.”
When asked about the vision of deer and elk, Dr. Greg Hageman said, “Deer and other game animals differ from humans in that their eyes are sensitive to only two colors, blue and yellow, and they are therefore called dichromatic.” As a result, a human and a deer perceive the color of the same object differently. For example, regular safety orange material stimulates two of our three color- sensitive cells and, as a result, appears as a bright, vivid orange.
In deer, however, the safety orange color stimulates only the yellow- sensitive cells and thus is perceived as yellow. This is the first of two important reasons why Covert Orange works. The second reason is due to the fact that under certain conditions, when all of the color sensitive cells of the eye are equally stimulated, the color perceived by the brain is a neutral point gray-beige.
Researcher Dr. Don Anderson said, “This is true for humans as well as deer, however, because humans have three color-sensitive cells in their eyes, as opposed to two for deer, the color combination producing this neutral point effect in deer is still perceived as a bright orange by human observers.”
Covert Orange products utilize a patented combination of high intensity UV chemical in combination with legally approved daylight fluorescent safety orange to equally stimulate the blue-sensitive and yellow-sensitive cells of the deer eye. The net effect is a color correction of its perceived color by deer from a bright yellow to a neutral gray. As a result, Covert Orange is far less detectable when viewed by deer against foliage and terrain than is typical safety orange material. In spite of this tremendous advantage to the hunter, Covert Orange is still highly visible to fellow hunters and legal to wear in states that require hunters to wear unbroken blaze orange.
Shoot Straight: Shooters will debate what makes a gun shoot straight. Some will swear by a floating barrel; some by guns that cost more than 75 percent of the population makes in a year. Others point to the sights or the scope. It’s true that all these matter, but, using my gun guru’s words, “It’s the bullet, stupid.” And he’s right. It is the bullet that determines the final accuracy. You can have the fanciest gun made, with the most perfectly floated barrel, you can spend thousands on a scope, and countless hours on the range, yet if the bullets you use are not up to snuff, then that gun just won’t get the bullet on target consistently. Hand loaders are some of the most exacting folks in the shooting world. They tailor-make their bullets to their specific gun. The trouble with this is that hand loading takes time, and a lot of trial and error until you get the right combination or recipe. Enter Winchester, the makers of, in my opinion, the best over-the-counter ammunition on the market in the world. While all their ammunition is good, some is better. Spend the extra couple of dollars a box and get their supreme lines, whether it be for shotgun shells or rifle bullets. You don’t have to take my word for it, either. This year Field and Stream magazine presented not one, but two “Best of the Best” Awards to Winchester Ammunition for its development of the XP 3 bullet and Xtended Range Hi-Density Waterfowl loads. Both received accolades as the best in its category in the magazine’s 2006 September issue.
“Earning this recognition from Field & Stream is a testament to the quality and innovation of our products,” said Dick Hammett, president of Winchester Ammunition. “We develop and produce what sportsmen want, and that’s the best in ammunition.” Each year, Field & Stream picks what they consider the very best outdoor products from across the industry. They are tested and evaluated for a variety of performance qualities.
The Supreme Elite XP3 simply delivers. The bullet provides ultimate knockdown power on thin-skinned game like deer. On thick-skinned game like moose, bear and elk the two-stage expansion along with a bonded core ensure the bullet plows through and stays intact resulting in heavy knockdown power. As for accuracy the polymer tip delivers superior accuracy not found in other bullets.
In the shotgun ammo world, the Supreme Elite Xtended Range Hi- Density Waterfowl loads has a 55 percent higher density than steel and is completely non-toxic. The shot is also extremely consistent in shape, making for a much better shot pattern. And, yes, it hits the birds extremely hard, cutting down on the number of crippled bird follow-ups.
Don’t go taking my word for it, nor the words from the manufacturer. The USA Shooting Team chooses Winchester ammunition for its matches. “We’re proud of the hard work and dedication shown by the Olympic hopefuls on the USA Shooting Shotgun Team,” said Brett Flaugher, Winchester vice president of marketing and sales. “Winchester is honored to be the official ammunition sponsor of the team and continue our support as they work toward the goal of winning gold in 2008.”
— Dan Donarski is editor of Michigan Hunting and Fishing magazine, co- host of The Northern Experience, a PBS and Outdoor Channel travel show, and co-host of PAX cable network’s Angler’s Diary.
