Sport Fishing

An end to Roderick L. Haig-Brown’s seasons cycle, Fisherman’s Summer is a book that can be listened to again and again, for both knowledge and pleasure. In this installment, he focuses again on the rivers of his native British Columbia such as the Campbell, the Columbia, and the Nimpkish. Among his vast wealth of knowledge concerning fly fishing, listeners are also exposed to his wise reflections.

Chic and I; or, The practical training of a dog for the gun was published by Leonard Goodwin in 1896 under the pen name of Ben Hur. It is a delightful book with insights into both dog training and bird hunting at the close of the nineteenth century in America. This book is especially unique because it is set in the American West at a time when most of the bird hunting literature was focused on the romantic traditions of ruffed grouse hunting in New England, Appalachia, and the Northwoods.

In No Shortage of Good Days John Gierach takes listeners from the Smokies in Tennessee to his home waters in Colorado, from the Canadian Maritimes to Mexico - saltwater or fresh, it's all fishing and all irresistible. As always he writes perceptively about a wide range of subjects: the charm of familiar waters, the etiquette of working with new fishing guides, night fishing when the trout and the mosquitoes are both biting, and fishing snobbery, a pitfall he seems to have largely avoided.

Sixteen of America's favorite author-anglers spin tales of mystery and fishing in this collection. From the tragic to the comic with many stops in between, these stories reflect the authors' passions for both making stories and catching fish. Michael Connelly, Ridley Pearson, John Lescroart, Don Winslow, Melodie Johnson Howe, Victoria Houston, and others all share a mysterious affection for things piscatorial when not busy writing best-selling books.

The quickest, easiest (if there is an easy way), and safest way to find and take that bull elk of a lifetime will be to hunt with a guide. Chad Schearer, a longtime Montana guide and TV personality, told me, “My hunter is my gun. If I get to the elk, and my hunter isn’t with me, then we don’t take the elk. My job is not only to find the elk but also to help the hunter get to the elk and make the experience as enjoyable as I can for him.” That’s the kind of fella with whom I want to go elk hunting.

Few anglers will skip knowing what a master angler and thinker prefers for his fly box. This title covers a gamut of patterns essential to trout fishing in a variety of circumstances: dry flies, wet flies and nymphs, and streamers. Gierach's legion of fans of his regular magazine column will be highly inclined to buy this title.

Paradise, Gierach shows us, is relative; it can be found in the guilty luxury of fishing private waters or when one is soaked to the skin, in a small canoe on a big lake in a storm a hundred miles from anywhere, exhilarated after a day's fishing. There are also pleasures to be found in unexpected places: solitary fishing trips, fishing for less-appreciated fish like carp, or meeting a guide who at first seems like an inarticulate ax murderer but who proves to be a "Zen master among fishing guides."

If John Gierach is living in a fool's paradise, then it's a paradise that his regular listeners will recognize and new fans will delight in discovering. Laced with the inimitable blend of wit and wisdom that have made him fly-fishing's foremost scribe, Fool's Paradise chronicles the fishing life in all its glory (catching your biggest fish ever) and squalor (being stranded in a tent during a soaking rainstorm). In Gierach's world, both experiences are valuable, and perhaps inevitable.

New England Grouse Shooting is one of the foundations of modern grouse hunting literature. Author and famous artist William Harnden Foster is considered one of the timeless authorities on grouse shooting, and this book stands as a testament to that knowledge. From the days of market hunting and hammer shotguns to the modern era of pointing dogs and the invention of skeet shooting, this book is a must-listen for any serious ruffed grouse hunter.

Zane Grey fished up to 300 days of the year. But, with all that time on the water, there was nothing more exciting or more compelling than the really big fish - the giants of the sea. In Zane Grey's day, blue fin tuna were pursued with harpoons and sometimes are even today. There is the story of a swordfish that was hooked at 10:30 in the morning and played until 11:30 that night - only to...! Tales of Swordfish and Tuna will dazzle and thrill any fishing heart.

From the author of Last Horizons, Peter Hathaway Capstick now presents Death in a Lonely Land, a second volume of his hunting, fishing, and shooting adventures on five continents—stories collected from such magazines as Outdoor Life, NRA’s American Hunter, Guns & Ammo, and Petersen’s Hunting. The stockbroker-turned-outdoorsman recalls his days as an African pro hunter in “The Killer Baboons of Vlackfontein.” “Four Fangs in a Treetop” records a foray into British Honduras for the jaguar, “a gold-dappled teardrop of motion.”

Using a black magic marker and a gray work jumpsuit, Jim Crumley of Buchanan, Virginia, drastically changed the nature and purpose of hunting camouflage when he created the first sportsman’s camouflage - Trebark. Throughout his life, Crumley has been a constant student of how to bowhunt better, and his desire to learn new and better techniques for bowhunting was one of the reasons he created Trebark camouflage. In this hunting guide, he shares the wisdom that he’s learned throughout his lifetime about how to be a hunter, how to find a deer lease, how to scout for deer, and more.

In Casting Forward, naturalist, educator, and writer Steve Ramirez takes the listener on a yearlong journey fly fishing all of the major rivers of the Texas Hill Country.

In Bowhunting Deer: The Secrets of the PSE Pros, these men will tell you how they set up to take them and how they choose a hunting bow and other hunting gear they feel with give them the best opportunities to take those bucks of their lifetimes. You'll also see how a serious deer hunter prepares to take a deer and the different strategies he utilizes to look for a big whitetail and grow a bigger whitetail on the property he hunts.

Izaak Walton's The Compleat Angler, long considered the bible of fishing, is a joyful celebration of the English countryside and the relaxed and reflective lifestyle of the devoted fisherman. Through dialogue between teacher and student, the book sheds a unique light on fishing, baiting, and cooking, including an original recipe for trout. Its music, rhymes, poetry, and humor are all brought to life by a full cast.

Will fly fishing survive the 21st century? Author and angler Paul Guernsey argues that angling and the natural resources it depends upon - clear rivers, unpolluted oceans, and much more - are threatened by a host of increasingly complex social and environmental factors.

No matter what you hunt—upland birds, ducks and geese, doves, deer, or turkeys—Straight Shooting for Hunters will show you how to pick the right gear, develop the right plan, and make the shot when it counts. In this game-changing book, world champion Anthony I. Matarese Jr., the most decorated sporting clays shooter in US history, teams up with Will Primos, a true pioneer of the game-call industry and one of the best-known figures in outdoor media, to offer a no-nonsense guide to everything you need to know to improve your shooting.

In Wild Winter, John D. Burns, best-selling author of The Last Hillwalker and Bothy Tales, sets out to rediscover Scotland’s mountains, remote places and wildlife in the darkest and stormiest months. He traverses the country from the mouth of the River Ness to the Isle of Mull, from remote Sutherland to the Cairngorms, in search of rutting red deer, pupping seals, minke whales, beavers, pine martens, mountain hares, and otters.

The time is ripe to learn the proper way to train the mind, using Bob Palmer’s revolutionary high-performance system that utilizes the state of mind called the Zone. Bob has been teaching world-class shooters to get into the Zone for more than two decades, and now he has written the ultimate book for winning. Bob holds nothing back in his quest to give you a step-by-step approach to winning that is understandable and easy to learn and literally takes your moments of brilliance to your whole game.

Blood Knots is about angling, about great fish caught and lost, but it is also about friendship, honor, and coming of age. As an adult, Jennings has sought out lost and secretive waterways, probing waters at dead of night in search of giant pike. The quest, as always, is for more than the living quarry. For only by searching far beneath the surface, he suggests in this most moving and thought-provoking of memoirs, can you connect with your own deep history. Jennings offers here a striking, elegiac narrative for lovers of unique memoirs and the finest fly-fishing literature.