February 15, 2018
By: Ted Nugent
My Spirit of the Wild BloodBrother campfires glow bright and hot forever. As I fidget excitedly preparing for my 70th deerseason in 2018, (and my 55th year of killer Rock-N-Roll recording and touring for my 36th album and 6680th concert!!) my overloaded memory bank flashes a tsunami of happy, heartwarming images of the greatest people in my long life aglow in those flickering flames.
These fires and memories go all the way back to the fall of 1949 as the Nugent family created our annual Up North bowhunting expeditions into the Michigan State forests.
Loaded up with blankets, a cast iron skillet, assorted camping supplies, longbows and quivers full of beautiful handmade cedar arrows in our Ford station wagon, even at just 10 months old, such imagery, spirit and powerfully positive family time and attitude surely imprinted on me to identify a path in life that has guided my American Dream to this day.
So many smiling faces and uppity laughter from family and friends fan the flames of those campfires. Every person has been special, every campfire moving. I see my mom and dad, brothers and sister, sons, daughters, wife Shemane, Uncle John and Uncle Dick, all my cousins, Fred Bear, Dick Mauch and so many special people in every flame. I have shared these fires with soldiers, airmen, sailors and marine heroes of the US Military that have sacrificed so much. The indefatigable spirit and attitude of those special needs and terminally ill kids will remain with me forever and make me a better man.
Recent campfires have once again elevated and escalated that spirit and attitude as we welcomed another very special young man from Michigan into our family.
Austin Jones is 21 years old and was stricken with Muscular Dystrophy at the age of six way back in 2003. Born into a gungho Michigan hunting family, the loss of mobility and muscular function didn’t deter or compromise his love of the great outdoors one bit.
February 8, 2018
By: Ted Nugent
I know I’m not alone when I celebrate my hunting as a genuine lifestyle. I know a lot of hardcore, dedicated hunters all across America and around the world, and each and every one of them seriously live for this stuff, and we live it all year long to one degree or another.
Even though I am still pursuing the mighty whitetail deer here at home in Texas through the month of February, for the vast majority of American deerhunters, the season is over and many are already hard at it preparing for next fall.
Immediately following the season is surely the very best time of year to get intimate and updated improved knowledge of our deergrounds.
Shed hunting is getting more and more popular during the post-season winter months, but searching for ground-bone is about much more than just finding those mythical discarded antlers.
Walking our hunting grounds on the open, denuded terrain in the dead of winter gives us the absolute best and clear view of critter activity better than at any other time of year.
Of course any excuse to get out there into the wild is good enough for the joys of just being out there.
Where sheds are found and trails are identified on barren ground gives us a direct contact with where and what the deer were doing at the tail end of the season, and in most habitats, their general habits for most of the fall and winter periods as well.
Way back in the 1960s when I first figured out how educational my winter exploring could be, I discovered more about topography and deer activity than I ever had during the actual deerhunting season.
February 1, 2018
By: Ted Nugent Well Happy February everyone! As winter throttles on across the hinterland and we plow head-first into 2018, I hope everyone who is able to wrangle some time in their busy schedules to attend some of the various...
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January 25, 2018
By: Ted Nugent Just let me just start out here in our deeranddeerhunting.com world by saying “Happy New Year 2018” again! It really is amazing and deeply gratifying to celebrate the beginning of yet another year and it thrills me...
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January 18, 2018
By: Ted Nugent
Swear to God the thermometer read 72’ below zero! Fahrenheit! No, really! My Alaska bowhunting BloodBrother Dave Widby and I were slogging across the frozen arctic tundra in search of the wooly mammoth musk ox, bundled up beyond the Pillsbury dough boy meets the Michelin man against the coldest of freezing cold mother Nature could possible throw our way!
It was wonderful and exciting, but Good Lord almighty was it ever COLD!
We were nonetheless pretty comfortable and snugged up, fully insulated in our state of the art gonzo muy frio attire of multi-layered heavy wool, down filled long-johns and every imaginable Thinsulate/Goretex goodies known to man back in the 1990s.
In these most challenging conditions possible, we did both get lucky and arrowed two dandy record book quality trophy wooly beasts on this phenomenal adventure. Whenever I might get a little chill and move a little closer to the fireplace, my body tingles and my mind reels with memories of this deadly freezing safari in the iced over North country of the Last Frontier.
As a lifelong Michigan bowhunter, I have certainly had my share of incredibly frozen vigils in dangerously below zero conditions in the last 69 deerseasons. I so remember all those years in the 1950s and 60s when all we had was wool, insulated Herman Survivor leather boots and cotton long-johns. Thank God for those old lighter fluid operating pocket handwarmers eh!
Even now as I wrap up my 2017-2018 deerseason at home in Texas, we are experiencing our share of single digit temperatures to adequately test our resolve to keep warm, persevere and stick with it.
When I went to my treestand yesterday afternoon around 3 o’clock here in mid-January, the temperature was a warmer than usual 63’ even for this part of the Hill Country. Wearing my lightweight Savanah ScentLok jacket was more than enough to handle the occasional yet ever increasing cool wind change from east to north.
January 4, 2018
By: Ted Nugent
My beloved son Theodore Tobias Nugent was born November 7, 1976, and like all my kids, he brought great joy and happiness into our lives and immediately made the world a better place.
To say he was born into a full-on Gonzo whirlwind high-energy environment as the son of The MotorCity MadMan WhackMaster would be a gross understatement.
But within that swirling dervish Nugent world, far beyond the fiery glare of over the top flamethrowing rock-n-roll mayhem, was a beautiful, loving, down to earth all-American quality of life family dream based on love, individual accountability, being the absolute best that you can be discipline and all the positive elements that go into a serious bowhunting family lifestyle.
As Toby grew up, he showed all the youthful fascination with bows and arrows and BB guns and slingshots and always enjoyed our regular fun walks in the woods with dad. He would join me on a little hunting here and there, but never really showed a real passion for the outdoor sports. Instead he dedicated himself to basketball and became a serious athletic force to reckon with on the court.
I never pushed him to be a hunter or a guitar player, always hoping that his overall disciplined life would inspire and drive him towards his own personal passions and dreams.
It wasn’t until he was in his late teens that he began to show increased interest in deerhunting and I made it a point to encourage him and push a little harder to fan those flames that brought me such immense, deeply spiritual happiness and fulfillment.
As a very thoughtful, clever, intelligent and focused young man, it didn’t surprise me that after only a few outings, young Toby lucked into a monster Michigan swampbuck of a lifetime, killing a 168” mature beast with his Remington 12-gauge slug gun.
It was a moment in time for this die-hard deerhunting dad and his own deerhunting bug exploded in him from then on.
January 2, 2018
By: Ted Nugent Deer. Those, beautiful, spectacular, always fascinating deer. I have a funny feeling that if you’re reading this here NugeBlog that you and I share this quality of life stimulating relationship and admiration for our brother the deer....
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December 22, 2017
By: Ted Nugent It was kind of dark, another misty dusk, and it came from a tangle down below! That is the opening stanza of the 3rd verse of my magical spirit song Fred Bear, and I cannot tell you...
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December 7, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
Ahhhhh….. December! At last! This wonderful last month that brings a blazing end to another incredible year that may very well be the best hunting month of all.
Say YOWZA like you mean it!
With sheer joy and a Cheshire grin, I recount the many exciting days, sunrises, sunsets, the many earth shattering deer encounters, the effervescent paths of many mystical flights of many arrows, the humbling spiritual moments of critter recoveries, the sizzling of backstraps on an open fire, all the good, the bad and the ugly of always challenging time afield during our precious hunting season so far this year.
When the deerhunting is all said and done, I believe it really boils down to an amazing series of very special and very diverse hunting memories that we can take with us through life.
And of all the moving memories we are lucky enough to pursue and accumulate, for me the best of the best are the times with special people around those special flame glowing deerhunting campfires.
Sure, at the end of each hunting day, after sitting and waiting and tracking and dragging and loading and gutting and hanging our hard-earned prizes, sometimes there is little opportunity for an actual campfire, but the gatherings around the buckpole or woodstove or just sitting down to the dinner table together are slight yet powerful variations on a campfire theme and we cherish them all.
Since I hunt every day and host and guide 50 to 100 hunters each fall and winter, our extended campfire time reminds us all how this timeless primal hunting life coalesces the absolute best aspects of our very existence.
In a world otherwise gone mad and turned upside where the government, media, Hollywood and academia all scramble to make right wrong and good bad, nothing brings truth, logic and commonsense so powerfully back into focus like a bunch of American hunters around a fire.
November 30, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
I hope you are all celebrating every day in the deerwoods with deep, passionate appreciation for this incredible nature lifestyle and calling that we are so blessed to live and embrace. I am here to tell you that I sure am. And yes, it takes serious nerve, energy, spirit, physical and emotional management to get us through some of the frustrations, ups and downs and inescapable hunter fatigue that hits all of us as the season throttles on.
But let it be known by all good hands-on conservationist adventurers across the hinterland, never ever forget that even the most nerve wracking moments on the hunt are still some of the very best moments life has to offer.
I keep telling myself this and force myself to never allow a negative thought or moment to enter or interfere with my sacred sanctuary of pure predatorship.
Ever!
Opening up my 68th deerseason on our sacred homegrounds in Michigan was as thrilling as ever. Good herd rebound after the EHD scourge of a few years ago is proof-positive that Ma Nature can and does take care of her critters in a rather miraculous way.
As usual, way too many carcasses could be seen strewn about the highways and bi-ways, and the corn and bean crops again showed a resurgence of serious depredation.
With dedicated scouting, strategizing and gungho hunting, my backstrap boogie throttled on nicely in the woodlands, swamps, marshes and croplands of southern Michigan and I celebrated many beautiful arrows on numerous stunning beasts.
My Queen of the Forest wife Shemane and son Toby remained skunked after many sojourns afield, but daughter Sasha was able to kill a handsome 8-point buck with her .450 Bushmaster sniper Ruger.
With family scattered across America, we decided to head home to SpiritWild Ranch in Texas for a ThanXgiving holiday feast and the kickoff to our Texas deerseason.
In our absence the deer had no idea that a hunting season was even on. The bucks were rutting hard and the whole ranch was saturated with the lovely nostril flaring stench of black-goo tarsal gland aroma, and I liked it.
November 23, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
I thank God everyday that I’m a deerhunter! Swear to God I do! And you should too. What a powerfully dynamic, extremely lucky aliveness we live!
I have SO much to be thankful for, and of course it begins with health, family, country and freedom!
As I rise and shine all bright-eyed and bushytailed eager to go again on this ThanXgiving Day 2017 for my 58th day of nonstop hunting since late September, I often wonder if non-hunters truly grasp the concept of ThanXgiving as powerfully as we hunters do.
Can a sunrise on a walk in the park or on the beach be as moving as the ones we live from our deerstands, literally smack dab in the middle of its deadringer inner glow as an integral player in nature?
Can that store bought butterball provide anywhere near the deep appreciation that our haunch of hard-earned, hands-on, natural predator venison delivers to a hunting family?
I am convinced that even though hunting isn’t for everyone, I cannot imagine a lifestyle that comes anywhere close to hunting, so deeply intertwined with God’s miraculous creation and sense of individual fulfillment experienced as an independent procurer of one’s natural sustenance according to God’s tooth, fang and claw plan and design.
Let us give sincere thanks that we are Americans, where we the people choose our individual life, liberty and pursuit of backstrap happiness.
Give thanks for the hero warriors of the US Military for their dedication and sacrifice for good over evil.
November 16, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
Dream on! Never stop believing, never stop dreaming! And I’m not talking Tinkerbell or Peter Pan dreams either. I’m talking big buck dreams from the big buck dreamlands in our dreamy little deerhunting heads!
I don’t have a crystal ball or a magical future predictor of any kind. In fact, I am always amazed at so many deerhunters whom I know that consistently predict which buck will show up where and when.
I strategize with all the smarts and experienced hunches I can muster, but it has always been a random roll of the dice for this old backstrapper.
I dream nonetheless and have on more than one occasion made some bold, cocky predictions of my own that unfortunately have never come to fruition.
But on November 2, 2017, the planets aligned, and my radar was on an alltime high and my luck meter pegged.
And it goes like this……
November 9, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
I knew it was a perfect morning. Cold, overcast, dank, dark, solid, gentle west, southwest breeze and I was in a perfect tree at the edge of a perfect cattail marsh that I hadn’t hunted yet this fall. You know the feeling. I could smell it in the air. My predator instinct was at full mast and giddy!
Geese gurgled, splashed and squawked in the nearby pond, along with the occasional mallard quack and wood duck whistle.
Crows sounded off in the distance, a dog barked and a tractor cranked to life way yonder. The American bowhunters soundtrack was right on schedule. I even heard that lovely far away train whistle.
Able bodied SpiritWild VidCamDude in training Ethan Wiskur was at my side, cocked, locked and ready to rock doc! As a serious Michigan bowhunter his bad self, Ethan was in full-on stealth/kill mode and loving every soul cleansing minute of it. We sat there poised like deadly statues, ready to perform our predator duties for God.
Chipmunks, red squirrels and big, fat fox squirrels scurried about heather and yon, and birdlife was abuzz with winter preparations.
It was definitively soothing to say the least.
Sitting in one of my alltime favorite deerhunting ambush sets, I was slightly let down that we had not seen a single deer in the first two hours of our vigil. I know damn well it is all about “right place right time”, but still I was truly expecting more action.
Barely a flicker of nearly invisible white got my predator eye way off around 90 yards to the north, and we had game on!
My Bushnells showed me the rear half of a deer descending the ridge toward the marsh, but it was another fifteen minutes or so before the big doe was visible again below us.
Now there were two big swamp donkeys ever so slowly meandering and browsing our way taking their good old time.
After a nerve wracking long wait, the lead doe turned right to ascend the slope to my left, and when she paused at 12 yards with her head behind a tree, my 50-pound Mathews Halon came back gracefully, pin settling on her crease, and THWACKO! Thar she blows!
This terminally smacked she-deer exploded behind us on a deathrun while the 2nd doe flinched and watched her go.
November 2, 2017
By: Ted Nugent I love life! I mean I really really love life! I love waking up every day! I love spring and summer and fall and winter. I love my wife and family and my dogs and my friends...
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October 27, 2017
The mystical flights of my October arrows have indeed been exciting beyond words this glorious fall bowhunting season 2017! Sure there is that doggone October lull we always hear about, but what might be a lull to some is certainly no lull for me. I’m allergic to lulls. Don’t believe in em.
I’m out there every day, every morning and every afternoon, for good Lord almighty, it is hunting season every day after all and I am not quitting no matter what.
And like every other hunter on earth, I of course get frustrated and somewhat agitated on occasion after many a days skunked, but I will be damned if I am going to sit on a couch when I could be out there in the deerwoods, and I am reminded every season at some point just how persistence and indefatigable dogged due diligence will eventually pay off.
And so it was on October 13, after I made my annual call to my rock-n-roll buddy Sammy Hagar to wish him a happy 70th birthday, that I once again slowly trudged through the muck infested fen onto a high glacier cut Michigan swamp-woods forest ridge to ascend into my deadly Earl’s Ridge ambush ladder.
With numerous fat backstrapper does hanging in the cooler and having passed on many younger bucks, I really wasn’t all that excited about a mid-October sunny afternoon set, but I was nonetheless thrilled to be out here in the lap of God no matter what happened.
A handsome studly bulbous furry nubbined buttonbuck entertained SpiritWild VidCamDude Ethan Wiskur and me for over an hour gobbling up a few bushels of acorns, and the setting sun washed the woodlands with the most beautiful fiery glow a fall color-lover could ever hope to see.
October 19, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
It was thirty years ago this month that I walked with a giant for the very last time. Privileged beyond words to be the invited guest of the great Fred Bear at his beloved annual Grouse Haven deercamp in the big woods of Michigan, there was nothing in this world that could keep me away from spending such earth-moving time with the legendary bowhunter and conservation visionary.
My cherished times with Fred going all the way back to my youth were always incredibly special, but the magical setting of an autumn woodland colorfest during bowseason with The Man was literally off the charts exciting.
Surrounded by old hunting buddies and Bear Archery associates from around the country, the atmosphere verily glowed with the essence of the bowhunting life.
Chats around the campfire and fireplace, dining, sitting back sharing hunting tales and lies, making the rounds spreading corn and sugar beets at all the various deerstands, shooting our bows at the range and just classic deercamp hanging out and camaraderie was all so damn special there are no words to describe the magical aura and pulsations of it all.
Old Doug Walker was there. Bob Munger, Dick Mauch, Erv Wagner, Sheriff Bob Blevins, Sherwood Schock, Hap Fling, Dick Lattimer, Frank Scott, Astronaut Joe Engle, so many good friends and A list players from the original days of bowhunting’s rebirth. Every year was the bowhunting camp to end all bowhunting camps.
On that October day 1987 thirty years ago, Fred and I had the rare moment to have some time alone together as everyone else headed to their deerstands. Doing everything I could to be sure I wasn’t being a pest to Fred, I would always opt to stick around camp with him instead of hunting some mornings and afternoons.
Those that knew Fred were well aware of his great sense of humor and there was never a dull moment with him.
October 12, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
The conditions were just right for our bowhunting dreams. It was a wonderful, dark, dreary, overcast, cold, breezy, grey cloud October afternoon, and inspired by the hunter friendly weather, I headed into the wind for my favorite west woods treestand a couple hours earlier than usual.
Not really expecting to encounter deer on the way in, typically I would just casually stroll through the ½ mile of enchanting deerwoods at a leisurely somewhat alert pace to my stand. I didn’t exactly walk along with my radar turned off like a citykid, but I also didn’t sneak in perfect deadly stealth mode either.
This day felt different, you know, a bowhunter’s sixth sense kind of thing, and with a better tuned in, more focused situational ‘bowhunter’ awareness, I did my very best Fred Bear predator approach and took my time, more like outright stalking than just still hunting.
Staying in the shadows, I only took a few ultra-slow, cautious steps at a time, and never stepped on anything I could step over.
I moved with my eyes 10 times more than with my feet and forced myself to stand still and probe the forest with the utmost of attentiveness. Like Fred and other master bowhunters taught us, I looked for horizontal lines and parts of a deer instead of the whole animal.
I reminded myself to look for a flicker of white or a quiver of an ear or head more than a deer’s body.
Not surprisingly the rewards were instantaneous with nonstop increased sightings of birds, squirrels and always titillating flora a fauna.
More than ounce I was inspired to increase my pace and get the walk to my stand over with, excited to get settled in for what had become over many years my standard operating treestand ambush procedure.
But I resisted the urge and kept my movement slow and easy.
September 26, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
Oh my God, glory glory hallelujah, here it comes! The moment of truth is glowing on the ever-approaching horizon and is nearly upon us, and the bloodbrotherhood of reasoning predators of the mystical flight of the arrow everywhere are dangerously cocked, locked and oh so ready to ROCK doc!
I know! I know! Many bowhunters across America celebrated the mythical season of harvest opener in numerous states many weeks and even months ago, but come on! You must admit that early seasons being as exciting as they are, they surely do not compare with the magic month of October!
We salute the many states that sensibly open their early archery deerseasons in the month of September, some even in July and August for goodness sakes, but with the historical traditional opener kicking off either on the closest Saturday to October or on October 1st itself, we all must admit that good old October fall days feel, smell, stimulate, inspire, motivate, electrify and call our name like the ultimate real McCoy of hunting season excitement just a little more powerfully.
Being so fortunate to be born in Detroit Michigan, the land of Fred Bear, way back in 1948, October 1st will always be the day of days for this old bowhunter. Even though we can still expect plenty of undesirably warm days, October nonetheless is the month when the weather and spirit at least starts to feel like hunting season.
September 12, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
I gotta tell ya, this social media phenomenon is something else, isn’t it! I am anything but a high-tech guy, (crowbars, hatchets, guitars and sharp sticks being my specialty) but I can figure most things out eventually, and once I got this facebook thing down, look out world!
Communicating freely with tens of MILLIONS of people around the world at the touch of a finger everyday certainly has unlimited pluses. And of course, like everything in life, with pluses comes an inescapable flurry of minuses. But in my nonstop communication on facebook the positives surely far outweigh the negatives and the lunatic fringe is always left hanging there by their own noose of stupidity and hate for all the world to see.
It all works out rather nicely in the end.
Now that hunting season 2017 is upon us and building steam, I hear from a lot of fellow hunters out there on a daily basis. I hear from dyed in the wool oldtimers like you and me and also from many newcomers eager to live and learn everything about our amazing sport.
Though everyone readily grasps the inescapable dynamic of the inherent frustrations that are inevitable in the “roll the dice” hunting lifestyle, there certainly still remains a lot of pain in the rear-end frustration out there nonetheless.
It’s called hunting, not shooting afterall.
From what I can tell, most everybody understands and works hard at all the basics like scouting, practicing, picking the best ambush stand sites, scent and sound control and a well-rounded understanding of game, gear, equipment, shooting and how to best use it all in our inexhaustible quest for life, liberty and the pursuit of backstrap happiness.
August 29, 2017
by Ted Nugent
Man does not live by rock-n-roll alone. Well, not completely, but almost! I mean come on! It is the ultimate soundtrack of the American Dream of God, family, country, career, hunting, horsepower, firepower, independence, rugged individualism and deercamp afterall!
August 23, 2017
By Ted Nugent
There is a vast, stunning, towering, soul cleansing forest in the swamplands of southern Michigan that an uppity guitar player planted by hand. With many indigenous coniferous and deciduous species of trees, some now more than 45 years old, this mystical woodland paradise is living proof that real honest to God sweat equity prioritized stewardship can and will make a difference for thriving wildlife and healthy wildground, not to mention a sense of gratifying fulfillment and soul cleansing spiritual fortification that makes a man feel all warm and good inside.
August 4, 2017
by Ted Nugent
I don’t have to look to the heavens to see a meteorite, I am a damn meteorite! Based on sheer velocity and trajectory and that fiery vaportrail flaming up a storm in my review mirror, all scientific indicators are showing very little danger of this fireball burning out in the far-off future of my crazy rock-n-roll atmosphere.
I didn’t invent the American Dream but I did perfect it a long, long time ago.
No, seriously, as I hammer away on my handy dandy little laptop computer writing this here NugeBlog, bucking and weaving at 10,800 feet in my little twin turbo-prop Cessna NugeForce1 rocketship on my way to rockout #6613, I am confident that my readers here will give the old backstrapping WhackMaster guitarplayer the benefit of the doubt and let me enjoy this mind dazzling 60 plus year musical adventure with a little creative metaphoring.
Thank you for that. It is good to respect your elders, or least show a little pity!
So far this amazing summer tour 2017, my killer band and I have unleashed 37 firebreathing torrents of killer American soulmusic, marking just past the half-way point of the greatest tour of my life. And of course that means more than half-way to Opening Day of deer season!
Join me in the gnashing of teeth, the rolling of eyeballs, goosebumps on goosebumps and fully erect hair follicles on the back of our necks and scream HALLELUJAH, won’t you!
And of course 37 concerts so far this year also means 37 wonderful roundtable campfires backstage and at the hotels securing once again that our hunting lifestyle truth, logic and commonsense remains alive and well across the hinterland.
July 25, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
Okay pilgrims, we’re rockin’ fulltime across America like a jetstorm afire! It’s only July 20 for Nuge summer Rockout 2017 and we’ve already imprinted our fiery rock-n-roll vaportrail singe on thousands and thousands of real music lovers in 20 cities in eight states so far in the 1st six weeks and we’re not even warmed up yet.
Can I get a witness!
Performing my 6602nd concert in Montgomery Alabama last Sunday and scorching Nashville yesterday, we will unleash our ferocious animal breeding soundtrack fury on Merrillville, Indiana tonight then blitz onward across the hinterland nonstop to September.
It’s only rock-n-roll but we like it!
Cops, soldiers, teachers, farmers, ranchers, welders, carpenters, truck drivers, entrepreneurs and deerhunters of every imaginable walk of life and just great families hang backstage with their lovable Uncle Ted each and every night to shoot the breeze before and after every concert. No words can describe what an honor and how humbling it is to have such a connection with so many great Americans across the land all these years.
When I saw Montgomery Alabama in the crosshairs, I knew I had to reach out to everybody’s favorite Buckmaster, Jackie Bushman to see if we could get together for the day, and sure enough, old Jackie was home and ready to ROCK!
The Buckmaster picked me up at the airport where we were greeted by the ultimate welcoming committee of US Army warriors. The amazing soldiers sure made me feel welcome and at home and I sincerely thanked them for their service, dedication and sacrifices on behalf of a grateful nation.
I could not have asked for a more relaxing BloodBrother afternoon in preparation for the nightly Iron Man rockout, and Jackie and his beautiful daughter hosted a wonderful steak lunch at their remote hunting cabin in the wilds of Alabama deer country.
July 11, 2017
by Ted Nugent
Too painful and numerous to repeat here, the horror stories are heartbreaking and endless; a parent wanting desperately to introduce their young son and/or daughter to the joys of the shooting sports before they are truly ready.
That is a deadly and dangerous recipe for disaster and the evidence is far too widespread to ignore.
I have personally witnessed how some youngsters are ready, with ultra-structured guidance, for the intense discipline of the very serious business of firearms fun as early as their 5th or 6th birthday. But I have also witnessed the life threatening dangers of pushing a 10 year old before they are physically or psychologically capable of handling or processing all that which goes with safe handling and firing of a gun.
The undeveloped muscle weakness alone of a small boy or girl, not to mention their childish minds, is almost always enough of a concern to force us to wait a few years.
Even with the expert experienced control of a qualified rangemaster, the instantaneous physics of even minimal recoil is a deadly force to reckon with in the wrong hands.
A few proven tips that can be beneficial to a smooth, positive, fun, safe first firearm experience can make all the difference in the world in order to make it something they will not only always cherish, but eagerly wish to repeat often in life.
It’s not just about recruitment into the shooting sports, but more importantly, retention.
June 12, 2017
By: Ted Nugent
How ‘bout our sacred family hunting campfires, huh! It is impossible to put into mere words the power and glory of our pure tooth, fang and claw connection as hunting families with God’s miraculous creation and our natural stewardship lifestyle.
As Fred Bear said and I repeat often, it truly does cleanse the soul!
When we escape the often stressful crazy world of everyday life, nothing soothes and recreates our mind, spirit, body and soul quite like the great outdoors and those we share and celebrate it with.
There is no question that the finest human beings to ever walk the good earth are found in hunting camps and around hunting campfires worldwide.
My mind is aflutter with wonderful happy memories of mom, dad, brothers, sister, sons, daughters, Uncle John and Uncle Dick, cousins, Fred Bear, Dick Mauch, Bob Munger, Ed Bilderback, Doug Walker, George Nicholls, Marv Leslie, extended family and friends and just the greatest most down to earth people a person could ever wish to spend meaningful time with.
With all that immeasurable good we are so blessed with, it is a damn shame we must deal with so much bad and ugly within our hunting community and industry, but in order to maximize all that is good, it is our responsibility to identify and constantly fight to reduce and hopefully eliminate the toxic runaway bad and ugly with all our might wherever and whenever we encounter it.
And you all know exactly what I’m talking about.
Sharing 100s of campfires with 100s of hunting families each year certifies the truth, logic and commonsense that I live by. And though much positive spirit and unlimited fun defines our spirit sessions, there is unfortunately a constant reminder of the pain and heartbreak we all feel ab out the cannibals and inbreeders in our own sport.
