Muskoka Outdoors

In a strange case that smacks of a legal fee windfall with a dangerous precedent setting outcome, skeptical hunters from Minnesota have won their ‘case’ against the makers of Scent-Lok, ALS Enterprises Inc.

The Chattanoogan reports this about the the lawsuit,

“Last week, in the United States District Court in Minnesota, Judge Richard Kyle ruled that ALS had falsely claimed that its products were based on ‘odor-eliminating technology’ or were ‘odor-eliminating clothing’.” Entire Article Here

I don’t use the clothing. I can’t afford it. Besides, my hunter orange clothing tends to take on the smell and savor of the most recent meal in our hunt camp. Sometimes, it is fresh ‘bacon and eggs‘ scent or ‘mom’s NEW hot and spicy chili‘ scent. I doubt the carbon clothing could hide those realities of a hunt camp.

I am NOT saying carbon clothing does not work. I don’t know either way.

What troubles me is how could your prove, either way, that the clothing worked or it didn’t work in actual hunting conditions. The experiment would have so many variables like wind direction, wind speed, were any body parts uncovered (ie. neck, wrists, ankles), hunter noise, what the deer saw, deer nose sensitivity, the weather, exterior odors on the clothing, the height of the the treestand, timing of the hunt, the smells on other pieces of equipment, and many more.

A lab won’t take these factors into consideration.

In entering the scent-lok lawsuit into a popular search engine, it was easy to find more details about this case. It seems that the plaintiff’s major ‘issue’ was was not so much that ‘carbon scent filtering systems’ did not work. Test cases found that the odour removing function of the systems DID ACTUALLY work. It was just that, Scent-Lok’s advertising use of the words ‘human scent eliminating…’ and ‘gets hunters close to big game undetected…’ were misleading.

Saying scent removing is ‘good’ but saying ‘scent-eliminating’ is taboo.

It was also claimed that rulings on some of Scent-Lok’s patents were such that Scent-Lok could not claim ‘odour-elimination’ on their ads. Put your ‘brainiac-cap’ on and follow this link to an individual’s site that may have started the advertising fury for Scent-Lok. If credible, it appears to spotlight the issues surrounding the patents.

So now what?

I think most hunters can still sleep well tonight. Lab tests DID show that Scent-Lok’s clothing did remove human odour. Scent-Lok still has my vote as being potentially effective hunting clothing.

Some hunting equipment companies may want to take another look at the wording in their slogans. For those hunters who aren’t sleeping well because you actually believed that because you wear Scent-Lok clothing, when you hunt, you should be able to walk up to wild game undetected. I have some advice:

• If the label says, Realtree, you won’t actually look like a tree, grow roots and develop a thick skin known as bark.
• Despite their website blurb, Winchester ammunition will not actually help you ‘win the west’ or any part of a country
• When Browning clothing says they will protect you from the elements and keep you comfortable, your leg may still fall asleep on a treestand and your are not immune to fire
• When Gorilla Treestands label their safety harness as ‘shock absorbing’ your fall is still going to be uncomfortable and you might be shocked that you actually fell

Just F.Y.I. and common sense of course…

For Scent-Lok’s response to the lawsuit, follow this link to their blog.

For another Canadian’s view of this topic, visit Othmar Vohringer’s blog.

Dear Wife: If you have not purchased my 52 inch plasma TV or a Polaris ATV for Father’s Day yet, you could consider some of these ideas (Don’t worry – I don’t make money from the links unless you happen to by a Cabela’s gift card. These are all items I would want for father’s day):

• Spool of Berkley Vanish 2lb test for fly fishing tippet
• Spot Satellite  Messenger – The concept of these things is cool
• Virtual Gift Cards from Bass Pro Shops or Cabelas (I can shop online)
• Subscription to Hunting or Fishing Magazine like: Outdoor Canada, Fly Fisher Magazine, Northwoods Sporting Journal

If you want some more ideas – Here is a listing of Father’s day gift ideas from some of my contacts on twitter.

• Wildlife Prints – These would look great anywhere! Suggested by: @shustonphotos
• Handmade Hunting Knife – Something to hand down to future generations. Suggested by: @studioelan
• Membership To Quail Forever - There is a Fathers Day Special on right now! Suggested by: @quail4ever
• Florida Fishing Trip With Dad – A contest sponsored by WFN. Register Now! Suggested by: @WFN

The Eureka Assault Outfitter 4 is a high quality tent that is simple to set-up, compact (yet spacious) in design and packs some neat hidden features. Suggested retail $375

The tough part about picking out a tent is knowing exactly it’s dimensions and occupancy details. A visit to Eureka’s camping tent website will list tent dimensions and head space (graphically and textually) with each tent they list. I knew exactly what I was getting before the tent even arrived at my door. That means some piece of mind when you purchase an item online.

Setup

Due to the several feet of snow outside my home, my initial review of this tent occurred in my basement (you can chuckle). I will be doing an actual an overnight ‘field’ test later this spring in Algonquin Park while on the hunt for some spring lake trout. I started my stopwatch after I took the tent from the shipping packaging. It took me just 9 minutes to setup the entire tent by myself (minus not having to use tent pegs). Essentially, there were only 6 items easily rolled into the tent bag.

1. 3 13mm collapsing aluminum poll sections (equal length – no confusion or guessing)
2. tent peg and accessories bag
3. the tent
4. the tent fly

I just had to assemble the folding aluminum polls and slide them through their obvious mesh locations on the outside of the tent. Each pole end was easily ‘clipped’ into circular grommet tabs in the tent’s base to maintain the tent’s structural integrity and shape.

The addition of the fly caused a brief moment of thought as I had to determine its orientation over the top of the tent. This was quickly solved by lining up the orange tabbed fly clip with orange colored tab on one corner of the tent. From there, all the fly’s clips were inserted into the corresponding tab on the tent.

Simple.

Size
The Assault Outfitter 4 is listed as a four person tent. Of course, this rating is directly to the size of people who will be using this tent. It would be tight if I had three of my clones in the tent with me, but numerically it works because of its 8’6″ width. I could lie down in it without having to curl my legs up. The tent is 7’6″ long. There is additional space, with tent protection, on the exterior ends of the tent for some critical gear like boots (they probably should not be kept in an occupied tent). You can’t stand up in the tent ( at 4’8″ high), but you don’t feel like the ‘ceiling’ is just inches from your face when you are sleeping either.

Notable Features

• 75D StormShield® polyester ripstop fly with 1500mm coating (allows tents to ventilate and keep the occupants dry)
• Heavy duty 210D nylon oxford floor (tough and dry)
• 40D No-see-um Meshing (keeps the little guys out)

Summary

I don’t recommend every item I am asked to review. In this particular case, I would gladly suggest to my readers that this tent is worthy of your consideration. It is a great size for an Algonquin Park campsite and could sleep up to four campers (3 adults ideally). When fast set-up is a must (like an incoming rain shower) this tent will not disappoint. If this tent is not what you are looking for, consider other backpacking tents from Eureka

How about something from Field Dressed? If you were to design a slogan or ‘tag line’ for your hunting or fishing clothing what would it be? For those of you who can come up with some catchy phrases and have the artistic capabilities to match – you might have the makings of a new online clothing company.

I recently connected with, Chad, on Twitter who has done just that. His website is: www.fielddressed.com and his design work is fantastic. It is the kind of clothing you could almost wear to a wedding and not second guess the appropriateness of the hunting slogan on your shirt. An example of his work is to the right.

In a direct message from Chad, a portion of his message stood out about his design and slogan ideas. He said,

“(I am) really trying to put out designs that can show a little respect to the sports beside the typical ‘bubba” wear.”

Chad, I agree with you.

Don’t get me wrong. I can appreciate the humour in traditional ‘bubba’ wear designs, but believe it or not, many of us represent our shooting and fishing passions to many different types of people. Many of the shirts I see out there, when taken out of context, mis-represent many of the excellent characteristics found in hunting and fishing. We see these images in the ‘kids’ cartoons anytime a hunter or angler is used as a character. What does your hunting or fishing clothing broadcast to the world around you today?

This matters to Chad when designing his shirts. I also asked Chad if I could suggest to our visitors to comment (see below post) about any tag lines or slogans that he might use for any of his upcoming shirt designs. Although, I told him he did not have to use any of our ideas he did say the following,

“I think that it would be interesting to see what the outdoor community thinks…just as long as it stays relatively classy.”

Without further discussion, here are a couple of my suggestions to start this little brainstorming session:

1. Lord of the Flies (I may have seen this before)
2. Tame the fly. Catch fish.
3. “An angler is a man who spends rainy days sitting around on the muddy banks of rivers doing nothing because his wife won’t let him do it at home.” – Author Unknown
4. Lair of the Swamp King (title of an old blog post I wrote)
5. Follow the Code

This is harder than I thought! Chad and I look forward to your comments.

Ever left your game cam wondering if you left it in the right spot? The people that set-up these camera shots should be teaching courses on game cam set-ups. These photos are submissions from OFAH’s Game Cam Photo Contest. If you have not already submitted photos for this cool contest, follow this link to do so.

Now to the Top 3 Photo Reasons Your Trail Cam Is In The Right Spot:

#3 (Below)

#2 (Below)

#1 Reason (Below)

You can vote for for these photos (and my submission) by following this link. For a good article on setting up your game cam, follow this link.

I have been doing some searching on the web and have come across some interesting hunting items that you may think is worth considering for your 2008 hunting season. They are not in any particular order.

1. Truck Antlers: I am not sure how new these are, but it is the first time I have ever seen these accessory antler add-ons. I can only imagine the reaction from the guys if I were to drive in to camp with these 6 pointers attached. For more information on these antlers follow this link to Taylor’s Gifts.

2. Garmin® Astro DC 30 GPS Dog Tracking System: For those of you who hunt with dogs or enjoy hiking with your dog – this next product could be for you. You can get real time GPS tracking information on your pet’s location in the wild. It will track up to 10 dogs and it will lead you back to you dog for pick-up. It works on fellow hunting buddies as well (Just in case you need to make sure they actually leave the camp while you are sitting out in the cold).

3. Coleman Fyrestorm Ti (Multi-Fuel Stove): I thought this stove was cool because of its ability to use different fuel sources to get your breakfast cooked. You can use white gas, unleaded gas, or threaded isobutane canisters. I don’t think there is a hook-up for the outhouse yet : ).

4. Buck Redpoint Knife: The knife you can open and close with your gloves on, so your fingers can stay warm when you need them.

5. Sportsman 800 EFI: A guy can dream right?! I have always liked the Sportsman Polaris products and when I saw that they had an 800 – I had to add it too my list. A feature that I like on this model is the On-Demand AWD. The unit automatically switches between 2 wheel drive and all wheel drive depending on conditions. It also has 28.6 cm of clearance.

6. 308 Marlin Express: I was fishing up north this spring and an outfitter up there had this gun on display. It was easy to appreciate it’s look and technical specs. With ballistics comparable to the 308 Win., this cartridge is the highest performance round ever made for a traditional lever action rifle! The gun’s unique finish is what really stands out in my mind.

8. Deer Dirt – Yes. You heard right. I was walking down the aisle of my local Canadian Tire and I saw a square foiled package of Deer Dirt. The back of the package says, that it is real dirt from actual deer scrapes. It is supposed to resist freezing and rain. How in the world they actually find enough deer scrapes to market such a product is beyond me. Regardless, this product seems interesting enough to try. I snapped an in-store photo of the package for you.

9. Nosler E-tips: These new bullets are available calibers in .30-06, .300 WSM, .300 Win Mag, and .308. What is the big deal? They are lead free and they are still able to mushroom effectively. If you are looking for new ammunition, consider giving these rounds a try.

That’s it for now – at least until Part 2!