Breaking News

Outdoors

DCNR announces new rules

HARRISBURG — The Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources recently announced new rules prohibiting rifles and handguns for hunters at four state parks in the southeastern region of the state. Under the new policy, use of all center fire and rim fire rifles and handguns for the purposes of hunting is prohibited at Evansburg, Marsh Creek and Nockamixon state parks, as well as White Clay Creek Preserve. The use of shotguns, muzzleloaders, and bows and arrows are still permitted during established hunting seasons; except for the portion of White Clay Creek Preserve ...

Bald eagle restoration a great success story

By Walt Young sports@altoonamirror.com Wildlife and nature have been a burning fascination for me as long as I can remember. As a youngster, I spent countless hours in the woods, exploring and watching for a glimpse of the many birds and animals that lived there. When I couldn’t be outdoors, I contented myself by reading and learning more about wild creatures, both familiar and far flung. Back then, if someone had told me I would ever see a bald eagle in the wild in Blair, Bedford or Huntingdon counties, I would have dismissed them as being more than a little crazy. But now a ...

Bedford duo go national, wind up in 3rd place

By John Hartsock jhartsock@altoonamirror.com After winning a Pennsylvania state championship this past April, a pair of young bass fishermen from Bedford County have gone on to place third nationally in the Bassmaster Junior National Championship for fishermen ages 13-and-under. Alex Fitzpatrick, who will be a ninth-grade student at Chestnut Ridge High School this fall, and Ander Cowan, who will be an eighth-grader at the Everett Junior High School, teamed up to place third in the national event held July 29-30 on Tennessee’s Carroll County 1,000 Acre Recreational Lake in ...

Guns, hunting earn special place in our language

By Walt Young For the Mirror Recently, while chatting with a longtime friend, he referred to a mutual acquaintance of ours as a “straight shooter.” That reference was intended as a compliment, of course, but not about that fellow’s skill as a marksman but rather his character. Straight shooter has long been an idiom for an honest and forthright person, someone who speaks honestly and plainly. Therefore, being called a “straight shooter” by friends and colleagues can indeed be considered high praise. As a writer, I’ve always had a necessary fascination for the ...

Endangered species get a second chance

The Associated Press GLEN ARBOR, Mich. — In a forest near Lake Michigan, two scientists attached a backpack tracking device to a merlin they’d lured into a net. The mission: help prevent the predatory species from gobbling up piping plovers — highly endangered shorebirds that nest nearby. Merlins themselves were going downhill decades ago but are recovering, thanks to bans on pesticides such as DDT. That’s good for them — but not for plovers in the Great Lakes region, where only 65 to 70 pairs remain. The small falcons are “are a big threat to their recovery,” said ...

Always on the Mark: Skilled hunter trying to recover from auto accident

Archery season will be upon us before you know it, and a lot of us don’t know how to hunt with bow and arrows except to buy a tree stand and sit in it waiting for a deer to come by. That’s one of the ways to go about it, but I know a man who is just about the most successful still-hunter I ...