and a strong cup of coffee

I will admit it.  The nostalgia got to us and we threw our money at Disney+.  Hubs and I were excited to show our kids the cartoons and movies that we grew up with.  It never dawned on me that I would be faced with defending my love of hunting and trapping to those kids as we watched the movies. The Fox and the Hound Are those the traps you use? Why would Copper hunt Tod if that’s his friend? Amos Slade is the antagonist.   An “evil” trapper who wants to hurt poor, cute Tod the fox. He raises hounds, sets jaw-toothed traps (the illegal kind) and continues to threaten the Widow Tweed about Tod getting into his chickens and needing to return to the wild. The story is more about the conflict around the friendship between the dog and fox but the underlying issue is about hunting and trapping. Beauty and the Beast Another antagonist, Gaston is described as an "arrogant hunter" who sings about how no one can shoot like him and that he uses antlers in his decoratin

George Smith always talks about going to school with a gun in your vehicle because you were coming out of the woods after a morning of hunting, to go to school and were headed back when the day was done.  We are in a very different world now, but that passion for the outdoors is beginning to come back. Waterville Maine’s Mid-Maine Technical Center is home to one of four Outdoor Leadership programs in the State.   With almost 30 high school juniors and seniors, instructor Jason Cyr is excited to see where the brand new program will lead.   “This program is four months old, “Jason said, “but the kids are so excited about not only what we are doing but what they will be able to do as they go through the class.”   Each student will leave the class with hunter’s safety in rifle and archery as well as ATV, snowmobile and boating safety. “I have two students who are avid trappers so they want to help bring an instructor in and get the rest of the class trained” said Jason, “we really w

“We found new public land to hunt,” explained Becky Sucy, “So, we set up a stand and started hunting from it this season.”  What Becky didn’t realize at the time, was that the spot that she picked was in prime swamp buck territory. Becky laughed when I asked if she knew how many deer were in the area, “We didn’t put any trail cameras out because we didn’t want to get focused on chasing one certain deer.” Instead, she put in the time and effort to be in the woods, in the right place and at the right time.  She and her husband, Aaron went out one afternoon as the rut was just beginning.  Aaron had tagged out earlier in the season so he sat at the bottom of the tree and called while Becky climbed into the tree stand.  Aaron used a combination of a buck grunt and doe bleat and after about 90 minutes, Becky could hear the deer coming. “It sounded like a horse trotting.   I had to stand up and peer around the tree to try and see the deer.”   Her first glimpse of the buck was just