Brotherhood of the Bow

Believe it or not, peak rut dates across the whitetail’s range stretch all the way from July to February — an incredible span of eight months. But when is the peak of the rut where YOU hunt? Big-game biologists Brian Murphy and Jim Heffelfinger from HuntStand join us to discuss how they compiled breeding data from across North America to map peak whitetail breeding dates across more than 5,000 counties and parishes, along with peak breeding dates for mule deer, blacktail deer and elk.

The EHD virus is ravaging the whitetail herd in Southeast Ohio, where landowners are reporting hundreds of dead and dying deer across multiple counties. We discuss the current situation and the outlook for the upcoming archery season with noted Ohio deer hunter Emily Konkler and Zach Haas, an aquatic biologist and inventor of EHD-fense, a new tool in the fight against the virus.

After decades of effort, Pennsylvania has finally repealed its centuries-old ban on Sunday hunting. Travis Lau of the Pennsylvania Game Commission and Nick Pinozzotto of the National Deer Association join us to discuss this historic change, what it means for bowhunters and the future of deer management in the Keystone State.

Mock scrapes are a fantastic tool — not only for hunting but for taking an inventory of your local deer herd and patterning buck movements in advance of the season. This week, the crew from BuckStik joins us with tips on how to create, monitor and hunt mock scrapes, and how incorporating their innovative products into your scrape setups can attract more deer and keep them coming back to your scrape sites! For more information, visit https://www.litfoutdoors.com https://www.buckstik.com  

 In 1959, legendary bowhunter Harv Ebers used one of his self-made, left-handed, recurve bows to take down the world-record caribou in Alaska. Today, at age 90, Ebers is the last living original Pope and Young Club member — and he’s still inspiring fellow bowhunters such as fellow lefty Tom Vanasche, who last year used the same bow to take a Wyoming whitetail, 65 years after its maiden hunt. Ebers and Vanasche discuss their special friendship and the ways traditional bowhunting transcends time.

Maribeth Kulynycz, the newly elected president of the Maryland Bowhunters Society, may be the first woman ever to lead a statewide bowhunting organization. But that’s just the latest accomplishment for Kulynycz, who has been blazing trails in archery for years and working tirelessly to promote and protect Maryland’s bowhunting heritage.

Public land is getting more crowded all the time, and permission to hunt private land is getting harder to secure every year. Buying hunting land of your own may not be financially feasible, but a long-term hunting lease can provide many of the benefits of land ownership at a fraction of the cost. Aaron Sutton and Mac Christian from National Land Realty join us to discuss the ins and outs of leasing and how a lease can provide you with a high-quality hunting experience.

West Virginia bowhunter David Miller grew up pursuing whitetails in the mountains of Appalachia. Later, he discovered many of the same tactics work for pursuing elk and mule deer in the mountains of the American West. Drawing on years of successful Western adventures, Miller shares his top tips for Eastern bowhunters who want to pursue their Western big-game dreams.

Every year, turkey hunters across America tag some really unusual gobblers with colors that just don't match the local flock. Are these birds mutants, escapees from a the local turkey farm or some kind of hybrid between domestic and wild turkeys? A new project called WildturkeyDNA, spearheaded by the National Wild Turkey Federation and its partners, aims to find out — and turkey hunters get to participate in the science!

Love them or hate them, crossbows are occupying an ever-larger space on the bowhunting landscape. What does that mean for the future of our sport? Brad Fenson, a highly successful hunter and author of our new crossbow column, joins us for a fascinating discussion about the changing bowhunting landscape.