HUNTING --For the first time in modern history, Chippewa Indians will be permitted to hunt deer at night in the Ceded Territory of Wisconsin, reports Milwaukee Journal Sentinel outdoor writer Paul A. Smith. The six bands of Lake Superior Chippewa have long had the right…
WINTERSPORTS -- A free snowmobile safety course for youths ages 12-16 will be held at the 35th Annual Snow & ATV Swap Meet sponsored by the Spokane Winter Knights snowmobile club on Nov. 14 at the Spokane County Fair & Expo Center. Preregister youths here....
PUBLIC LANDS -- Giving federal public land to states would promote the eventual theft of public access. Stay on top of this. TRCP CEO says budget cuts part of federal lands transfer push Whit Fosburgh, president and CEO of the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, said…
HUNTING -- Official waterfowl shooting times in Idaho’s 2015 Waterfowl Season and Rules brochure contain errors, state Fish and Game officials say. The agency is alerting hunters to misprints for shooting hours on Nov. 1, Nov. 4 and Feb. 29. November 1 on page 12.…
HUNTING -- Four years after the brutal winter that caused an antelope die-off on a scale that hadn’t been seen in decades in Montana, prairie pronghorn are rebounding, according to state Fish, Wildlife and Parks. “I think people are definitely excited about antelope returning to…
WINTER SPORTS – The Warren Miller film Chasing Shadows, coming to the Bing Crosby Theater Friday has a segment featuring Ingrid Backstrom, who’s been tracking the slopes of Washington’s Crystal Mountain since she was mastering the wedge. Given a stage on ESPN’s Real Women in...
OUTDOOR FILMS -- The World Tour of outdoors flicks -- exciting to poignant -- from the 2015 Banff Mountain Film Festival will make a stop at the Bing Crosby Theater in Spokane on Nov. 20-22. A different selection of climbing, skiing, biking, cultural and aerial...
WILDFIRES -- As fall rains help extinguish the last of the Tower Fire across the Washington-Idaho border between the Pend Oreille and Priest River drainages, the Forest Service is lifting area closures but keeping road and trail closures in place. Keeping roads and trail closed...
TRAPPING -- A lawsuit that could restrict trapping across much of Idaho is being heard in a Boise court today. Arguments are being presented involving inadvertent trapping of federally protected Canada lynx. The Center for Biological Diversity and three other groups say Idaho is violating…
OUTDOOR RETAILERS -- Recreational Equipment, Inc., has announced that its 143 retail stores will be closed on Nov. 27, a.k.a.Black Friday, one of the nation's biggest retail money making days of the year. Instead, REI is telling its employees and customers to take the day...
LANDSCAPES -- Three previously unlabeled geographic features, including a notch on Mount Rainier, were named recently by the Washington State Committee on Geographical Names. At its regular semi-annual meeting Friday, the panel voted to sent three selections to the Board of Natural Resources for a…
HUNTING -- Considering that fewer than 15 percent of hunters fill their elk tags each year, I've always noted that hunters are the ultimate nature watchers considering all the time they put in sitting, looking, listening and appreciating their surroundings. Brett French, outdoor writer for...
FISHING -- It's been a great salmon fishing season on the Hanford Reach of the Columbia River, as anglers have smashed the fall chinook harvest record with a week of fishing remaining in the season. Last week, about 2,465 anglers in the Hanford Reach between…
WILDLIFE -- More than half a century after a group of beavers parachuted into the Idaho backcountry, officials have uncovered footage of the quirky wildlife management moment and digitized the film for YouTube. The Idaho Department of Fish and Game was struggling with an overpopulation...
ENDANGERED SPECIES -- A detailed report on the killing of a collared gray wolf on Eckler Mountain, a Washington portion of the Blue Mountains on Oct. 11 indicates the 9-year-old male in poor condition was approaching a cabin when the owner shot 10 rounds with...
HUNTING -- Washington's first hunter education field skills class designed especially for women and girls is set for Nov. 1 in Black Diamond. The class, the first of its kind offered by the Washington Fish and Wildlife Department specifically for females, is a field skills...
OUTPLAN – Public lands and wilderness experts will gather at the University of Montana this week to present 30 workshops on public lands and wilderness. The seventh-annual National Wilderness Workshop, set in Missoula for the first time, will bring together stakeholders from around the country...
FISHING -- Silver Bow Fly Shop has been filing great reports of fall fishing from the Spokane River and North Idaho trout streams to the steelhead waters of the Clearwater and Grande Ronde. See the reports on the Silver Bow website, along with some useful…
WATERSPORTS -- Continued construction on the Sullivan Road Bridge this week will prevent Spokane River floaters from going under the bridge. The city of Spokane Valley has announced that for this work week, and possibly longer: The Spokane River below the bridge will be closed...
WILDLIFE -- Wolves will be wolves. Their nature is to defend territory and kill for their food. But the reality of that wildness is gut-wrenching if you're a dog owner who takes the 10 minutes to watch the video (below) of a wolf attack on...
GLOBAL WARMING -- The head-in sand approach to our planet's future -- and the existence of critters such as polar bears and cutthroat trout - is alive and well. Publication of President Obama's climate regulations prompt lawsuits The Environmental Protection Agency's regulations that are at...
FISHING -- My Thursday column on fly pattern selection for the annual Jackson Hole One Fly Tournament was published before I could get in contact with a busy Trey Scharp, who won the competition in September for the second consecutive year. Scharp caught 51 fish...
TRAILS – The fourth annual Return of the Zombies hike is set for Oct. 24 on “the scariest half-mile hike ever” in Riverside State Park. Visitors of all ages can hike the half-mile haunted trail between 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. as a fundraiser for...
PUBLIC LANDS -- After reading the political cronyism of how Idaho secretly works to appoint federal judges, the public should be VERY careful in letting any politician give away federal oversight to federal public lands and the wildlife they support. GOP presidential candidate Bush lays...
Rich Landers writes and photographs stories and columns for a wide range of outdoors coverage, including Outdoors feature sections on Sunday and Thursday.