whiskey

There is no "public land buffer" along waterways. You can hunt public land, otherwise open to hunting, from a boat, not underway from a motor. So you could hunt LBL from a boat. You could also get cited for shooting squirrel on my land floating down the Red River. Not that I'd care personally, just giving an example.

Looks good. Walmart is selling a couple nylon shelter tarps now. They are cargo pocket size too.

I have a Tacoma 4wd and a couple mountain bikes. I need to rig up a bike trailer cause long term there probably won't be gas. I guess I could float kayaks and canoes down the Red to the Cumberland and into LBL. That's a hellava long paddle though. Bug in or bug out, you'd best have a plan for both.

Maybe on top of that defunct Hemlock plant? There lots of industrial room in Clarksville. The industrial park has tons of space.

Welcome. We've been in Clarksville several years now. Love it up here. I'm also a turkey hunter and grew up in Winchester, TN. I remember going over to Fayetteville to play football.

The only sound advice I can give you is to NEVER use a .300 win mag with 185 grain Bergers. :) just kidding. My step dad and uncle did a few public land hunts out there. I remember them talking about the millions of miles they walked. Hopefully you have good knees and ankles. Good luck.

Had 2 hens and 20ish poults come through the yard at work this morning. Seems like a solid hatch this year.

Any of the kits should work. I used a Zebco 301 pipe clamped to a steel stabilizer when I was a kid. The new spider wire line should work well.

I hunt with a 7mm-08. Great gun. Limited store bought ammo choices compared to many others though. Mine happens to shoot the lighter weight Fusion rounds into a one shot group. I think they are 120gr.

I heard they had a fire. So I thought they may not be open. Thanks.

Compound bows, right? Nothing against crossbows, I just prefer compounds. I am not sure if CK Outfitters is up and running, but I have bought a couple accessories there and enjoyed the service. They treated customers well while I was there. The Sportsman in Dickson seems to be a good place. It's important to find a place you like and spend some time talking with them and other shooters. I had lots of help when I was a new shooter from fellow shooters on the local bow range. Bass Pro is the last place I would go. Not saying all the folks there are bad, but I have heard some serious BS while shopping their archery section. Buy a good used bow from a local bow shop and practice a lot. All of them will kill deer. Focus on quite more than fast. Focus on comfortable more than anything.

If it were my son, I'd buy him the .308. Short action wins first in my book. Second, I believe that the .308 is a more versatile round. Regardless if you load or buy your ammo, there is a wider variety of loads for the .308. There are also lots of choices for other fantastic short action calibers if he ever wanted to rebarrel the gun. .270 has killed lots of deer. Nothing wrong with that caliber for straight up deer killing. I am certain that which ever gun you choose, he will love it and develop a fondness for that caliber. Best of luck.

Awesome!

Funny how I hunted the same woods for years, squirrel in late summer and deer in the fall and never thought about bumping deer. Now, I am careful about doing anything to bump deer preseason. Probably doesn't make any difference, just making sure the big smart deer don't get spookier than needed.

Just a friendly reminder that squirrel season opens in two weeks.   If you have a kid, or know a kid, or are willing to passively kidnap a child, please make an effort to introduce the next generation to the joy of our sport. Just get them out in the woods, away from the electronics, for a few hours. My first hunt was for squirrels. My grandfather took me when I was 8. I still remember that first hunt. I remember how loudly the leave crunched under my feet. I remember seeing the first squirrel I ever killed and all the knowledge that was shared with me that day. I remember my daughter's first hunt. Her first squirrel. How cold it was that day and how proudly she held that squirrel up for pictures. Don't miss the opportunity to make memories that will last a lifetime.     

I enjoy seeing the hippies suffering.

Not it. Most assuredly! LOL

I'd do the show, but only if I got to pick my partner. :)

I had good Q at Central BBQ the one time I was there. Interstate has been good the couple times I was there. Rendezvous was not good.

I hunted with a friend in Alaska that had one if the Springfield M6's and he tried to take all legal game with that gun. Together we killed countless rabbits, squirrels, and grouse. A porcupine also fell victim. Tasted like hell. No amount of BBQ sauce could hide the taste. On one camping excursion, we decided to cut a tree down with the .22. 3 days of plinking at that tree and it finally fell. No point here, just unadulterated youthful behavior. I still kick myself for not picking up one of the M6's when they were reasonably priced. Horrible trigger, but neat little gun.

Got pictures from a buddy that caught a nice stringer full with a couple of hogs this weekend.

Yes you do, and you probably know how hard it is to take anything seriously when he's involved.

Not everyone is a turkey hunter. :)   Speaking of funny turkey hunts...   This past spring I was hunting in KY with a friend. We had a great morning set up that resulted in calling in a pair of longbeards. Unfortunately they hung up too far out. Around lunch, we pack up and moved to another field to do some mid day blind sitting. Well my friend stepped in a creek and got his socks wet on the way to the blind. When we got to the blind he proceeded to pull off his boots and hang his wet socks out of the front window of the blind. It was warm, so I pulled my boots off too. We sat there and played around with several calls, swapping them back and forth, trying different strikers. Then we decided to take a short nap. With my buddy almost asleep, I caught movement across the field. TURKEY! I woke him up and said, "Get your gun, turkeys headed our way." I picked up my call and coaxed the big tom across the field. When he was still 100 yards out, my buddy whispered, "We don't have shoes on. Who's gonna run out and get the bird." It was all I could do to keep from laughing out loud. The bird worked it's way in and my buddy hammered it at 15 yards. We slipped our boots on and walked out to the bird only to find that he had shot a little low and blown the beard clean off.    Then, if that wasn't enough, we were standing around packing up and the turkey was laying on the ground near me. I looked over at it and some something moving on the bird. I inched closer and saw a weird greenish gray foot clawing from it's feathers! It's fair to say I was freaked out! We got a stick and poked around and out crawls a toad! Not sure how long he had been riding on the turkeys back, but it just added to an already funny hunt. 

Habitat is the biggest issue. The lack of good habitat leads to higher predation also. In the early 1900's Americans were small plot farming and there was more timber between fields. Populations grew well and reached new heights in the 1940's. Then mechanized farming and pasture grazing lead to increased areas of cleared land. Fewer fence row, wind rows, and far less burned over pine forests lead to reduced populations. Johnson grass is not good for quail and that stuff has about taken over in the south. I believe that increases in coyotes and turkeys also have led to the declining population, but that's just a hunch. A lot of rabbit hunters and quail hunters believe both turkey and coyotes have reduced their game populations. Not many people trap anymore, so there are probably increased populations of fox, bobcats, raccoons and possums.

Thanks. This law is a perfect example of the room for interpretation that TWRA leaves in their rule writing. For years and years every officer you asked had a different version of how far you had to be from a feeder before it wasn't baiting. It only took them 30 years or so to clear that up...