Shed hunter guns down grizzly in season's self-defense opener 🐻

The weekend might not be here yet, but your favorite dispatch from the great outdoors is. 

So grab your coffee or whiskey (no judgement) and let's get caught up on the outdoor news and views from the past few days. 

Here's what caught our eye this week...

• Attack thwarted - The season’s first self-defense case is under investigation 🐻

• Hell of a bull - California elk smashes the record books 🏆

• Japan cares not - About your feelings when it comes to expanding their whaling operations 🐋

• Stashing fish in traffic cones - NY officials drop the hammer on striped bass poachers 🐠

• STAMPEDE! - A herd of caribou nearly tramples truck in the middle of Alaskan highway 🛻

TOO CLOSE FOR COMFORT
SHED HUNTER GUNS DOWN GRIZZLY IN SEASON’S FIRST CASE OF SELF-DEFENSE

A Montana man in search of shed antlers put a grizzly bear on the ground in the name of self-defense after a tense encounter on private property late last month. 

Working the side of a snow-covered ridge, the hunter first spotted the bear’s tracks in the snow before catching a glimpse of the animal about 20 yards away. With his two dogs in tow, “the bear dropped to all four legs and charged the man, who drew his handgun and fired five shots from a distance about 30 feet to 10 feet, grazing the bear with one shot and hitting and killing it with another,” a release from MFWP states…

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🏆 Officially official - A massive Roosevelt elk that was entered to those keeping score at the ol’ Boone and Crockett Club has come back as an official world record. The newly certified 455-inch bull was shot by an elk guide and wildlife biologist by the name of Tim Carpenter in northern California last fall. If you recognize the name, it’s because this isn’t Tim’s first trip into the record books. He was credited with the world record archery elk back in 2011 and also successfully guided another hunter to a 324-inch Roosevelt’s bull that Pope and Young Club certified as a velvet world record.

🐍 Another 17-footer - There’s plenty of nighttime activities that I am perfectly fine with missing out on, and capturing 17-foot pythons by hand is one of them. While the old adage that nothing good happens after 10pm remains mostly true, I can say that I am thankful that there are those that trudge into the ‘Glades under the cover of night and emerge with handfuls of large serpents in the name of conservation. Towards the end of March of this year, Kurt Cox caught a snake while it was crossing the road in the Francis S. Taylor Wildlife Management Area just west of Miami. The serpent weighed in at 176.6 pounds and measured nearly 17 feet in length. 

The python is the 4th heaviest and the 22nd longest invasive Burmese python ever recognized by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC). The recent catch is about two feet short of eclipsing the largest python ever recorded which measured at 19 feet in length.

🐋 Japan set to p*ss everyone off - In a bold move Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi announced this week that the island nation would be adding to its commercial whaling list. Looking to not be outdone by the Norwegians, who are among the few other nations still chasing whales, Japan officials are setting their sights on the fin whale. Second only to the blue whale in terms of size, fin whales are among the giants of the sea and their meat is sought after since becoming a mainstay of the Japanese diet in the 1960s. The proposal to add the giant whale to the country’s commercial whaling was approved this week after the public comment period came back with rosier than expected results.

🐠 There’s fish in the pylons - A band of NY poachers have been brought to justice after officials went scorched Earth after getting wind of some out-of-season striped bass fishing happening on Long Island. Following up on a few leads, officers with the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) busted two separate groups who went to great lengths to conceal their crimes. With the use of trusted K9 officers, DEC police uncovered multiple illegally taken striped bass buried in the sand, hidden in brush piles, under logs and even inside traffic cones set up in the street.

“This action was taken in response to the large increase in the coastal recreational harvest of striped bass in 2022 and repeated years of poor reproductive success in the Chesapeake Bay,” explains the DEC.

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🛻 Take cover!: Watch as a massive herd of caribou nearly trample a pickup truck in the middle of an Alaskan road.

🐿️ You’ve got a friend in me: Watch as a squirrel fights off a snake to save his buddy.

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How a pigeon saved a crew of WWII bombers. What human meat tastes like according to cannibals. And while we’re on the subject of meat, here’s how to best tenderize it. Just don’t eat the most venomous fish in the world. And now that you are totally questioning your next meal, why not take up drinking in museums?

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HANG ‘EM.
@budfisher