Family-Outdoors

Image via Wikipedia I am not a bowhunter...yet.  Therefore, I am not spending much time out in the woods hunting deer right now, but I have been thinking about it a lot.  One part of this is the time I spent shooting my brother-in-laws bow a couple of weeks ago.  It really got me wishing I had one and I could spend any extra evening time I had out in the woods. I say evening time, because there just has not been one moment of slack time on weekends.  With two kids in college right now, and one an athlete, we have spent a lot of time the past month or two making visits and going to cross-country meets.  It's funny that just a few months ago, I was so worried that I was not going to have enough to do with both sons in college...I almost wish that were true now. Over the next couple of weeks, we will be transitioning to spending some time in the woods scouting and getting ready for Fall firearms deer season in Missouri.  I enjoy the getting ready darn near...

ROLLA, Mo. –Oak trees across a broad swath of Missouri are experiencing an unusual outbreak of a common parasite. Tree experts say the parasite is not fatal to healthy trees, even though the condition can look awful. The Missouri Department of Conservation is receiving numerous reports from St. Louis to Branson of oak trees turning brown. The problem is especially severe in the area around Rolla, Lake of the Ozarks, Springfield and Table Rock Lake. The main cause of the problem is a wasp of the family Cynipidae. These tiny wasps deposit their eggs on emerging leaves in the spring. As the eggs hatch and young wasp larvae begin feeding, leaves develop brown spots that grow into “galls.” Each of these button-like growths, which are about the size of a pinhead, provides food and shelter for one wasp larva. In severe cases, entire leaves turn brown over much of a tree. “It looks worse than it really is,” said Conservation Department Resource Scientist Rob Lawrence. “Some people mistakenly t...

If you think great trout fishing can only be found in the Rocky Mountain West or the East, think again. More specifically, some of the very best trout fishing in the United States has developed in the Ozark Mountain Region of the Midwest. Nestled in an area mostly cont Image by texas_mustang via Flickr ained in Southern Missouri and Northern Arkansas, some outstanding fishing opportunities are out there for rainbow trout and brown trout, even a few spots where brook trout and cutthroat trout can be had. Image via Wikipedia Image via Wikipedia Essentially, these regions can be subdivided into four categories. Thinking of the fishing opportunities in this way can help you zero in on the kind of fishing you are after. There really is, as you will see for yourself, a little bit for every kind of fisherman out there. As a bit of an aside, many of these streams and rivers also offer outstanding smallmouth bass fishing opportunities as well. The first of these types of fisheries is the ...

Deer hunting was a bust this year! We could not hunt the opening weekend of gun season because of a variety of unavoidable circumstances. We got out the second weekend and headed down to one of our favorite, if not most productive spots in the Ozarks. We hunted public land in an area we had hunted several years and always found good deer numbers. We packed in our climber stands and were up in our trees, separated by 150 yards or so, an hour before legal shooting hours. Around 10:00 some bozo comes smack dab through the area we are hunting. He tells my son, "Hey, I have hunted this area for 15 years and never seen another hunter so I guess I'll hunt here today." By the time he got to me, it had only been 10 years and he apologized for messing up our hunt. He then proceeded to a tree close enough to where I could have spit on him (and I should have). Discretion is the part of valor when all three people are heavily armed and one of them is your son. Consequently...

Eleven Point River Near Greer Spring Probably with poor timing and even jumping the gun a bit, we have gotten off the ground a section at Family-Outdoors devoted to Trout Fishing in the Ozarks . The area will be broken into the sections titles Trout Parks , Freestone Rivers , Tailwaters , and Smaller Streams . We believe that this will be one of the few areas on the web where such a comprehensive treatment of these areas of Missouri and Arkansas and the trout fishing opportunities available. Comprehensive descriptions of the waters and the tackle and flies that will be effective will all be a part of this section. We hope it will be a highly used and helpful resource!

Let me be honest about something. I was born in Colorado and raised in Alaska - I should have been an outdoorsman already but I wasn't. Somewhere along the line my boys became enthralled with the idea of hunting and fishing - the outdoors in general. It was constant pressure to go here or there hunting or fishing, and oh heavens the money we have spent on rifles, fishing gear, tents, travel, guides,... I was gradually tiptoed down the path of becoming an outdoorsman because I had to be one. What a fiasco it has been at times. If I knew anything about hunting it sure wasn't anything about how it was done in the Ozarks of Missouri. If I knew anything about fishing, it was salmon, halibut, and trout. Ten years ago I couldn't tell you the difference between a smallmouth and a largemouth bass. Together, my boys and I, we have come quite a ways but I am certain there have been times when they wondered whether their fearless leader was ever going to lead them to harves...