Welcome to the Wednesday edition of the newsletter. If you’re still with us, that means you’ve made it to the middle of yet another week.
With that said, let’s all take a minute to grab a coffee or whiskey and get this mid-week dispatch out the door.
Here's what's worth reading about this morning:
Black Friday deal - Florida group offers $2K for bear tags in last ditch effort to thwart hunt 💸
Successful season - Wisconsin deer hunters dropped over 182,000 deer this season 🦌
Fatal shootings - It was a bloody weekend in the Louisiana woods last weekend 🙏
Poached buck - An illegally killed and dumped buck was found near Bismarck and wardens want answers 🕵️♀️
Hell of a season - Pa. hunter crushes the season with a dandy bull elk and impressive whitetail 👍
Ain’t no joke - Watch as this young buck aims to kill one unsuspecting decoy🥊
ONE LAST KICK AT THE CAN
FLORIDA BEAR ADVOCATES OFFER HUNTERS AN UNBEATABLE ‘BLACK FRIDAY BEAR DEAL’ TO SURRENDER TAGS AHEAD OF CONTROVERSIAL HUNT
Florida’s first statewide black bear hunt in over a decade is still scheduled to open this Saturday, but a new twist has some tag holders weighing a potential payday against a chance at a bruin. After hurling lawsuits, protesting on street corners across the state and even going as far as taking hunter ed courses in order to buy up available tags, the crew at Bear Warriors United is putting their money (read: a financier’s money) where their mouth is and are offering hunters a sizable payout in exchange for valid tags.
The conservation organization announced their Black Friday Bear Sale last week, indicating that they will now pay any Florida resident who draws one of the 172 available bear tags $2,000 to voluntarily surrender it and sit out the season. And much like any Black Friday deal, the offer has naturally been extended through December 31 and has allegedly already drawn commitments from more than 20 winners, according to program organizers…
QUICK HITS // FROM AROUND THE WEB
DNR reports 182,084 deer registered in 2025 Wisconsin gun hunting season, on par with 2024: Hunters registered 182,084 white-tailed deer during the 2025 Wisconsin nine-day gun deer season, according to a preliminary report issued Dec. 2 by the Department of Natural Resources. Read the full story.
Louisiana man killed in hunting accident in bloody weekend across Lafourche Parish, officials say: A Raceland man who was killed in a hunting accident was fatally wounded in one of three unrelated Lafourche Parish shootings that occurred over the course of about 14 hours this weekend, Sheriff Craig Webre said Sunday afternoon. Read the full story.
Deer illegally killed, dumped near Bismarck after hunting season ended: Game wardens found a poached deer dumped southeast of Bismarck, a week after hunting season closed. A landowner discovered the dead buck in a ditch on the morning of Nov. 30 off Lincoln Road near 249th Street Southeast. Read the full story.
Hunter gets bull elk, massive buck in same month in Pennsylvania: Some hunters dream of getting a bull elk or a trophy-sized buck, but one sportsman was able to get both in less than 30 days in Pennsylvania.
Andrew Mazzarese, 35, of Hollsopple, harvested a 7x8 point bull elk on Nov. 4 in Elk County and was able to get a 12-point buck Nov. 29 several miles from his home in Somerset County. Read the full story.
Mazzarese with his trophies
Four men accused of hunting on private property in Charlotte County; Two reported to ICE: The Florida Fish and Wildlife Officers said they arrested four men accused of hunting on private land in Charlotte County without the owner's permission. Several subjects are accused of climbing over a fence and entering the property through a cow field. When they noticed the Charlotte County Sheriff's Office flying a drone over them, they are accused of attempting to hide their guns. However, a K-9 unit found two shotguns and a rifle in extremely dense brush. Read the full story.
Michigan hunters have harvested 126,000 deer as firearm season wraps up: The Michigan regular firearm season has wrapped up, with the 15-day season ending on Sunday, Nov. 30. So far, the state has reported 126,660 total harvests on the season as of 5 p.m. on Monday, Dec. 1 according to the Michigan DNR. Read the full story.
VIDEO // SOME THINGS JUST HAVE TO BE SEEN
🦌 This fella was not messing around. Watch as this young buck establishes his dominance against this would-be rival decoy.
That first shot to the jugular…
QUOTABLES // WORDS TO LIVE BY
“Fair chase is not about giving the animal a sporting chance; it is about refusing to let yourself become something you would despise.”
— David Petersen
HUMPDAY MEME // ME, LAST WEEKEND
WANDERINGS // A SFW GLIMPSE OF OUR BROWSER HISTORY
I’ve lived in three different countries in my life. Two of those places are tropical in nature and void of any semblance of winter. The other was your typical four-season locale. In having now been away from winter for nearly 6 years, I can say that there is a part of me that most certainly misses the comforting sting of winter air. I always tell my kids that ‘the best thing I ever said was nothing’ as I think, generally speaking, it’s pretty good life advice. As it turns out, the art of saying nothing is more about mastering small talk, but it is something we ought to aim for nonetheless. It’s probably my age, but the tow truck chase scene from Terminator 2 is permanently etched in my mind (along with everything else in that flick). The original Bourne movie had a great one as well but didn’t make the cut of this list of the best cinematic car chases in movie history. I’ve been making my own BBQ sauce lately and it’s getting to be pretty good. At least that’s what my kids tell me anyways. Now, the only thing left to do is add a little smoke.
EYE CANDY // PICTURES > WORDS
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