Specifically, consider purchasing the MyNature Animal Tracks App and/or the MyNature Tree Guide App. Both applications make it easier for the user to identify tree or animal tracks by prompting for general characteristics and getting more specific after each response. Think of them as ‘techy’ field guides for teachers, outdoor ed instructors, anglers and hunters and outdoor fanatics.

What you might not know is that Kari Murray and I conspired together to pitch the next potential app for the MyNature programmers. Developed with permission from MyNature apps, we hope you get a laugh from the video and consider purchasing their ‘real’ applications. (The Quicktime file is 4 mb)

The Outdoor Canada Show is one of four jaw-dropping outdoor shows that are colliding under one roof to bring a myriad of technologies, seminars, and multi-media presentations to all aspects of the outdoors. That means you do not have to hunt and fish to get excellent value for your admission dollars. The other 3 shows include the Fall Cottage Life Show, the Explore Adventure & Travel Show, and the Canadian Home Workshop Show.

Admission is currently set to be $15 at the door or $13 dollars online.

On the Saturday of the Outdoor Canada Show, be sure to check out the Fishin’ for Answers Quiz Show that will feature angling greats like Bob Izumi, Angelo Viola, Pete Bowman, Mike Miller, Leo Stakos, Dave Mercer, Ron James, and U.S. legends Roland Martin and Jimmy Houston.

The show’s hub will be the Outdoor Canada Lodge and will be providing filleting demos, sampling of wild game, shore-lunch tips, fly-tying lessons and antique decoy appraisals with expert Steven Lloyd.

Visit The Great Outdoors and DIY Weekend website for all the exciting details

SHOW DAYS
Friday, Nov. 26: 11 am–8 pm
Saturday, Nov. 27: 9 am–6 pm
Sunday, Nov. 28: 10 am–5 pm

November 26 - 28, 2010

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.

• 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 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

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.