This is my final post on this blog for two reasons:
1. All Daily Journal blogs have moved to the new Web site — nems360.com.
2. I am no longer a Daily Journal employee. Economics forced the newspaper to eliminate my position.
I hope to return in some form, but as of this time, I don’t know what it is.
Thank you for your support.
Buster
From the Associated Press:
RUSSELLVILLE, Ark. – Mark Menendez won the Bassmasters Elite Series event on Lake Dardanelle, holding off a Sunday charge by four-time angler of the year Kevin VanDam.
Menendez, from Paducah, Ky., simplified his approach by using an aluminum boat-rig with minimal trappings to accumulate 55 pounds, 7 ounces. It was the first time since Roland Martin in 1994 that an angler won a top-level BASS event in an aluminum rig.
“This is the purest form of fishing, absolutely old school,” he said. “But at the end of the day, it’s just a method of transportation and you have to catch the fish to win.”
Menendez earned $100,000 for his third win of the season. VanDam trailed by more than 5 pounds heading into the final day and simply ran out of time trying to catch up, finishing with 53 pounds, 4 ounces. Chris Lane of Winter Haven, Fla. was third at 48-1.
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The Tombigbee River Valley chapter of Ducks Unlimited will hold its annual fundraising banquet beginning at 6 p.m. Thursday at the BancorpSouth Conference Center.
Tickets for the event are $25 for Greenwings, $45 single, $65 couple and $350 sponsor. The conference center is located at 363 E. Main St., Tupelo.
For information, contact John Curlee at 372-0782 or jcurlee@renasant.com, at Michael Addison at 871-2233.
Ducks Unlimited conserves, restores and manages wetlands and associated habitats for North America’s waterfowl. These habitats also benefit other wildlife and people.
DU is backed by more than 1 million supporters. During the past fiscal year, 87 percent of DU’s expenditures went directly to conservation work.
SPRINGFIELD, Mo. — One of country music’s new stars to watch in 2009, Luke Bryan, has a hot debut album, a second album coming later this year, Top 10 hits in “All My Friends Say” and “Country Man,” and a new role as honorary chairman of National Hunting and Fishing Day.
The annual celebration is set for Sept. 26.
Congress established National Hunting and Fishing Day to recognize hunters and anglers for their leadership in 
fish and wildlife conservation. Since launching in 1972, the day has been formally proclaimed by every U.S. president and countless governors and mayors.
Bryan joins an elite fraternity of country stars who helped build National Hunting and Fishing Day, including Hank Williams Jr., Travis Tritt, Tracy Byrd and Jeff Foxworthy.
Other honorary chairs have included actors, entertainers and sports stars like Wade Boggs, Jay Novacek, Robert Urich, Ward Burton, Tom Seaver, George Brett, John Havlicek, Arnold Palmer, Terry Bradshaw and many others.
“I feel very proud to be a part of this,” said Bryan. “I’m looking forward to the coming year. I hope to help grow awareness of what hunters and anglers do for conservation, and just promote hunting and fishing overall. It’s so important for young people to get involved in the outdoors. I couldn’t imagine my life and career without the time that I’ve spent hunting and fishing.”
A native of Leesburg, Ga., Bryan grew up farming, hunting and fishing with his family.
He said, “I don’t remember learning how to hunt and fish — just like I don’t remember learning how to talk. It was just a natural thing in our family. Part of our lifestyle. I had a dad who wanted to take me hunting and fishing, and we went two or three times a week.”
Haas Outdoors of West Point, doing business as Mossy Oak, has established an integrated media and technology company — Hatch Entertainment — focused on generating and distributing 
original outdoor-related content across multiple media platforms. Based on current market dynamics, Mossy Oak believes a tremendous opportunity exists for a cross-platform media and technology company, such as HE, within the outdoor lifestyle industry.
HE was established through the merger of three assets of Haas Outdoors: Hatch, a production group located in Denver with such credits as the NHL, and Tour de France, and well known for delivering highly regarded content to such networks as ABC, CBS, ESPN, Versus, Spike and the Outdoor Channel; Mossy Oak Interactive, located in Austin and a leader in terms of features and functionality within outdoor-focused media delivery; and Mossy Oak Classics, a content library with over 700 finished shows and over 4,000 hours of unedited footage.
HE’s management team brings a strong collective knowledge base and 50-plus years of experience in the fields of media production, Internet technology and development, and sales and marketing. HE’s management team helped grow OLN (now Versus) to 65 million households through content production, advertising sales and sponsorship marketing. Additionally, HE’s team also brings experience in design, development and delivery of Internet technology as well as experience building outdoor-focused print, video and online businesses.
“We’re excited about the market opportunity facing Hatch Entertainment and look forward to growing HE to its true potential,” said Randy Russell, CFO/COO Haas Outdoors and CEO of HE. “As technology advances, media continues to blur the lines of traditional distribution…which offers consumers numerous opportunities to interact with their niche. As we work to expand HE, it’s our intent to create an integrated point of interaction, taking full advantage of multiple mediums for our consumers to experience … making our product not only sticky, but spreadable as well.”
HE has developed a true multi-platform network for the outdoor lifestyle. Content delivery utilizes broadcast and cable television, broadband video, Internet, video on demand, Internet Protocol Television, print, and radio. Because of HE’s coding technology, its content easily can be distributed across any of these platforms. HE now focuses on three specific outdoor verticals – Hunting, Fishing and Shooting Sports – and their communities of 88 million participants in the US.
VONORE, Tenn. – MasterCraft Boat Co. laid off eight employees last week, leaving the company with 450 to 460 total employees.
It reported that the boat builder’s production peaked at 19 boats per day, but is sitting at about 10 boats per day. MasterCraft cited not only the credit crisis and low consumer confidence, but trouble with floorplan financing for its production declines.
“Dealers are having problems getting credit. We have dealers that want boats but they can’t get commercial credit,” said MasterCraft public information officer Jason Boertje.
The company has been working to minimize layoffs through cost cutting in other areas and aggressive marketing efforts, Boertje said. Since early this past fall, MasterCraft has laid off more than 100 employees.,
After two close calls, Kathi Hurst of Ripley found the charm in her third attempt to qualify for the Women’s Bassmaster Tour championship.
She and 19 of the world’s top female anglers will compete in the WBT championship Oct. 23-25 on Lake Hamilton, Ark., near Hot Springs. Hurst fished the lake for the first time Tuesday and like what she saw.
“I was finding some fish in the back of creeks,” said Hurst, who finished 18th to qualify in the top 20 field. “The water was muddy.”
She said she had expected a typical clear Arkansas lake, but a storm front moved through Monday night and dropped bucketfuls on the central Arkansas lake.
“I did catch some,” Hurst said. “They were about 2 pounds each. If you can catch five fish that make 10 pounds, you’ll be doing pretty good.”
With the WBT event still two weeks away, the climate could shift, however.
“It all depends on the weather,” said Hurst, who has fished all three years of the Women’s Bassmaster Tour. “I think they’ll be in the same general place. They may move a little if it gets cooler. But the water temperature is 73 degrees. and I don’t see it changing too much before the tournament.
“If I can just get around them, I think I can catch them,” she said.
A long road
Hurst’s journey to the WBT’s premier event has taken twists and turns the past two years.
Last year, she only missed qualifying by two points. Just two places better in one tournament. About half a thumb on the weigh-in scales.
Ounces.
In 2006 – after waiting so long for the WBT to be formed – she missed half the tour after a tumor was discovered at the base of her brain, on her pituitary gland. Thankfully, it was benign, but it shattered her concentration for that year.
Entering the fourth and final WBT event this year, Hurst thought she was in pretty good shape.
“I was actually in 11th going into the last tournament” on Clarks Hill Lake in Evans, Ga., she said. “And I thought that hopefully this won’t be my drop. But it was.”
After Thursday’s first day of competition, Hurst’s husband, Mike, gave her daunting news.
“I had talked to Mike Thursday evening,” Hurst said. “And he said, ‘Well, you’ve got to come in in the top 20 to make it.’
“And I’m thinking, ‘Why are you telling me this now? You’ve been telling me all year that now I’ve got it made.” I actually got mad after he told me that,” she said.
After Friday’s fishing, the field was trimmed to the top 20, the ones who would get a paycheck. Hurst finished 30th and could only watch her 11th-place status fade.
“So Friday after I weighed in, he said, ‘I refigured today; do you want me to tell you where you are on the list?’” Hurst said. “And I said, ‘No, I’ll just wait.’ But he had me figured at 17th. I felt pretty comfortable about making it, but then there was that drop. You don’t know.”
She could not improve her standing because she didn’t make the final-day cut for Saturday’s competition.
“Actually, I came home Saturday morning,” she said. “I got up early. I kept waking up. I said, ‘Well, heck, I’m going to start packing my stuff up.’”
Then she was more worried about getting gas for the drive from Georgia.
“I left there about 5:15 (a.m.) and I got down there to the interstate and I didn’t think to stop at that station,” Hurst said. “I don’t know if it had gas or not. But I went down the interstate about three miles and got off; every station there, the pumps were covered. And I had less than half a tank of gas, so I knew I couldn’t get to Atlanta.
“I was thinking that I had stopped down there and there was a Walmart; they were just coming in and opening up about 5:30 and they had gas. So I filled up and got out of Georgia anyway.”
Stayed in contention
Because she was in such good shape when she entered the fourth WBT event, she was able to slip into the qualifying ranks after what was arguably the tour’s toughest lake.
“It was kinda a relief going into the last tournament in 11th place,” Hurst said. “Like I said, I was hoping I wouldn’t use that for the drop, and I might move up instead of down. But at least I stayed in the top 20.”
The WBT championship is different from the Bassmasters Classic because the women also have co-anglers competing. The women also keep their Angler of the Year points.
“I’m pretty sure I’m out of that race for the top spot,” Hurst said. “That was my initial goal; that didn’t work out. I’m in the championship, so maybe I can make a good showing there.”
She said she hopes to contend for one of the top two spots, where boats will be awarded.
She also gave a lot of credit to her sponsors for their support in helping her advance to the WBT championship. Her sponsors include Carlock Toyota of Tupelo, Skeeter Boats, Yamaha Outboards, Performance Plus Marine of Tuscumbia, Ala.; Wave Fishing Products, Izorline, The Peoples Bank of Ripley and Kirkwood National Golf Course of Holly Springs, where she plays golf.
Contact outdoors writer Buster Wolfe (buster.wolfe@djournal.com) at 678-1576. His blog is djoutdoors.wordpress.com.
The Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks will make what has been called an important announcement Friday, and insiders say the news will affect the status of deer baiting in the state.
In last year’s Legislature, the Commission on Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks was given the authority over the deer baiting issue when Gov. Haley Barbour signed the bill to give the decision over to the biologists and professionals, not politicians.
This is a different year.
The House has already passed H.B. 1089, which allows hunting over bait that is protected from the elements and is specifically on private land. The bill is awaiting the decision on a Senate committee amendment, which gives the Wildlife Commission the authority to control the baiting in emergency situations. Those would include the introduction of disease, the spread of disease, etc.
I haven’t hunted deer for a long time, but I have hunted. And I hunted what I thought was pretty hard. But I still haven’t killed a deer.
I won’t put out a feeder just to take home a deer. Using bait feeders to kill a deer is not hunting.
Some hunters argue that other people are baiting, stealing the deer from the lawful hunters. That logic doesn’t play well.
The solution is not to allow everyone to bait for deer, but to provide enough enforcement so that everyone plays by the same rules.
FROM THE NRA:
Annapolis, MD – Maryland ’s sportsmen and gun owners are heartened by back-to-back victories in the Maryland Legislature. A House of Representatives bill that would have required all handgun and several calibers of rifle ammunition sold in Maryland to be microscopically engraved with serial numbers by the manufacturers has failed.
The Maryland Legislative Sportsmen’s Caucus backed by the Maryland Legislative Sportsmen’s Foundation strongly represented the
rights of hunters and shooters as it made its case to the House Judiciary Committee considering the bill. A representative from the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), its state affiliate – the Maryland Association of Firearms Retailers – and sportsmen’s and pro-firearms organizations testified at the Tuesday hearing of the bill. This comes on the heels of the failed ‘Minimum Age Hunting License’ bill withdrawn only one week earlier.
HB517: The ‘Encoded Ammunition’ Bill received ‘Unfavorable’ status from the House Judiciary Committee on Friday, February 29, and was withdrawn Monday. Since there is no accompanying bill from the Senate, the issue is dead for this session.
The details of the bill briefly stated; By January 1, 2009, all ammunition sold in Maryland required by handguns and a list of ‘assault-type’ firearms included in the bill would have to be ‘encoded’. This means each bullet and each casing would have been required to be laser engraved with matching serial numbers and each box of ammunition would have the same serial number as the ammunition – no two boxes of ammunition could have the same serial numbers. The owner of any regulated firearm that required
encoded ammunition and owned un-encoded ammunition would have to dispose of it by January 1, 2011.
The bill also called for a 5-cent tax to be added the price of each round. The tax-per-round would have gone into a special fund to maintain a database of all the encoded ammunition purchased in the state. Also, when an individual purchased a box of encoded ammunition, they were required to present their identification. Their personal information and how much ammo they purchased would have then been entered into the State Police database.
The bi-partisan Maryland Legislative Sportsmen’s Caucus is an affiliate of the National Assembly of Sportsmen’s Caucuses (NASC), which icomprises 34 state caucuses nationwide.
