‘Deerly’ beloved
The coming of October means the real fall classic is upon us. That’s right — hunting season! With much of New York state now allowing deer hunting in one form or another, it’s time to get out and bag one of the 230,000 or so deer that are expected to be killed this season. These mags will tell you how best to hunt them down.
Bowhunter is full of heartfelt readable personal essays, making it seem like a community gathering where hunters share their stories. There is a story, for example, on the pride of being a Dad turkey hunting with his son. One writer says the way to convince nonhunters that hunting is fine is to offer them some freshkilled game. Of course, that is unless it is brown bear or caribou, since that meat will make you sick. That may make it a little harder to persuade nonhunters the feature essay on killing brown bears on Alaska’s Kodiak Island is moral. Still, nonhunters are not the target audience. We liked the essay on hunting — that is if you’re more than 50 years old.
Field & Stream, instead, is full of professional tips, especially on deer hunting. Guides tell you their favorite gun models and knives. And what state has the best hunters? Pennsylvania. The worst hunters? New York and New Jersey (tied). Well, we don’t know about that but we do know that because of the harsh winter last year in New York, the state expects the number of deer taken this year will fall about 3 percent from last year — while the number of hunting permits has been soaring. So you’ll need some practical hunting advice. In this magazine, that includes pictorials on how a single camera placed the right way can locate your buck, and how, when you stumble upon good hunting ground, to use your cell phone to determine who owns the land.
Outdoor Life has a nice cover picture of a deer and leads you to believe it will be all about the animals. An editorial gets you going: “October is glorious — all bright and crisp, summer fat and ripe for harvest.” Instead, you may have a hard time finding deer in its pages. What you will catch instead is lots of fishing, including the hardtoland pike. There is a piece on salmon conservation in Idaho. What? It’s hunting season, remember? Then, too, there are pages devoted to calling a turkey, and the pheasant hunt. At least these are American hunts. Remember, the turkeyhunting season in most of New York doesn’t start until Oct. 17. The very thin Petersen’s
Hunting focuses on the East African kudu (It looks like an antelope.) This is despite mentioning that the kudu is becoming endangered. If you cannot make it to Africa, you can turn your eyes to a feature on hunting in Scotland. Rifle ratings provide a little practical advice for most American hunters.
The New Yorker seems a bit behind the news curve. First, there is the cover story on the Univision star Jorge Ramos, who stood up to Donald Trump. Didn’t this happen in late August? And since, Carly Fiorina also has stood toetotoe with The Donald. The 10page feature does effectively bring Ramos to life and gives us the real story on this longtime journalist. But, at the end of the day, is it really important enough for the cover? A Talk of the Town item about Fiorina, meanwhile, is biting and provides enough insightful information to have been expanded. There is a Talk of the Town item on Brooklyn’s first National Hockey League team, the Brooklyn Americans, that made me think I had read it before. Oh, yes, that was by Stephen Cohen Sept. 20 in The Post. A saving grace is an investigative story on how an Iraqi woman goes under cover to root out traffickers and expose Iraq’s female pimps. Also, a story worth reading is on a West Harlem girl basketball star named Chicken who was killed by gunfire, only weeks before she was expecting a college scholarship.
Time stays somewhat current, but has little real substance. The cover story, “Pope Francis Meets America,” is almost all pictures, four fullpage shots, and tells us precious little about the overall theme of the visit beyond the obvious he’shumbleandcares aboutpeople message. Missing an opportunity to investigate, Time largely glorifies Planned Parenthood spy David Daleiden. That’s a good topic considering that some Republicans have threatened to shut down the government — and forced Speaker John Boehner from office — if it continues to fund Planned Parenthood, which makes it more frustrating this feature did not include much real insight. Rounding out coverage is a piece that notes the twist in Volkswagen’s “Truth in Engineering” slogan in the diesel weasel scandal and a Yogi Berra obituary that consists mostly of Yogi’s quotes as it barely covered the bases on the passing of an American icon.