MeatEater's Mark Kenyon discusses Leopold, his land ethic, and legacy with Leopold scholar Stanley Temple and Doug Duren.

Backcountry Hunters and Anglers's Hal Herring discusses the pain of seeing a wild place you love disappear with Leopold biographer Curt Meine.

The Okayest Hunter crew catches up with Doug Duren on his family farm just west of Sand County, WI.

(Dragonfly peers- If you've considered reducing your carbon footprint via subsistence hunting, but don't know how to begin, please contact me. I'd love to help you get started.)

Honeysuckle isn't Indiana's only invasive species. Here's a look at a just a few more to keep an eye out for on this Indiana Native Plant Society page.

There are numerous funding opportunities to enhance your hunting property. Start by making an appointment with your local Natural Resources Conservation Service office.

Additionally, there are untold amounts of native seeds and rhizomes waiting in dormancy for an opportunity to grow- by removing invasive species and giving them that chance, you may find you have everything you need for a healthy deer woods just waiting in the dirt.

This is a tough one to wrap our heads around. Dr. Michael Chamberlain sums it up in this National Deer Association podcast- "Managing predators may be a waste of time...spend as much time as you're thinking about spending trapping, and as much money, on habitat."

The National Deer Association recently reported that a University of Delaware study of fawn mortality in a coyote free area found their survival rate to be similar to those of a population where coyotes are abudant. "Our findings suggest that predators may simply be removing the “doomed surplus” – the individuals that would have died regardless of predator intervention."

So how'd we come to believe these creatures are so awful? In Coyote America, Dan Flores explains how it was a bunch of U.S. Forestry Service bureaucrats trying to keep their jobs after they ran out of wolves to kill.

Manage invasive, plant natives, let coyotes walk, and harvest does because it improves the health of your local deer population, but also know you're fighting a good fight. You're helping to slow these awful assaults on nature.

3 Billion Birds Lost

Insect Decline

20% of Reptiles Face Extinction

The Frogs are in Trouble

Even Einstein knew you had to get out to the woods now and then, but you don't have to be him to check this stuff out- just enter any of these titles into Google Scholar. New to scholarly reading? Just read the abstract and the conclusion and you'll be on your way.

Dion, Justin R., Jacob M. Haus, Joseph E. Rogerson, and Jacob L. Bowman. White‐tailed deer neonate survival in the absence of predators. Ecosphere 11, no. 6 (2020): e03122.

Gorchov, D. L., Blossey, B., Averill, K. M., Dávalos, A., Heberling, J. M., Jenkins, M. A., ... & Waller, D. M. (2021). Differential and interacting impacts of invasive plants and white-tailed deer in eastern US forests. Biological Invasions, 23(9), 2711-2727.

Knight, T. M., Dunn, J. L., Smith, L. A., Davis, J., & Kalisz, S. (2009). Deer facilitate invasive plant success in a Pennsylvania forest understory. Natural Areas Journal, 29(2), 110-116.

McShea, W. J. (2012). Ecology and management of white‐tailed deer in a changing world. Annals of the New york Academy of Sciences, 1249(1), 45-56.

Peebles-Spencer, J. R., Gorchov, D. L., & Crist, T. O. (2017). Effects of an invasive shrub, Lonicera maackii, and a generalist herbivore, white-tailed deer, on forest floor plant community composition. Forest Ecology and Management, 402, 204-212.