By Drew YoungeDyke (Originally published in the April 2021 issue of Woods-N-Water News)
The swish of waves on the beach, the crackle of a campfire, and the zip of a tent door; I started imagining the sounds of a Fresh Coast summer as soon as the snow began melting in March. Camping on the Great Lakes is one of my favorite things about living in Michigan, opening access to a diverse range of outdoor recreation opportunities like trail running, hiking, surfing, kayaking, fishing, or just enjoying the sun on a beach towel. The twin abilities to plan well while remaining flexible enough to change your plans will help make the most of your Great Lakes camping trip. Planning ahead is a must for camping on the Great Lakes in Michigan, both due to the pandemic and the resulting surge of interest in outdoor recreation. Last summer, even weekdays saw campgrounds as full as most weekends. This year, competition for state park campground reservations online is already in full swing. Planning ahead goes beyond booking a campground reservation online, though. Thinking through your gear and what you want out of your Great Lakes camping vacation can help you avoid crowds and get the most out of your trip. At the same time, being adaptable to changing conditions can help you salvage your trip when things don’t go according to plan. Last summer, for instance, I road-tripped along northern Michigan’s Lake Michigan coast from my home in Ann Arbor up to Empire, Frankfort, Traverse City, Eastport, Central Lake, and Northport, camping out at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore and Antrim County’s Barnes Park. I was shooting scenes for a film about the threat of invasive carp - “Against the Current” - with Jordan Browne of Michigan Out-of-Doors TV for the National Wildlife Federation, where I work. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, our staff travel was restricted without an approved travel plan meeting strict social distancing requirements. My detailed plan included camping out instead of staying in hotels (which I’d rather do anyway), eating only takeout, outside, or what I brought in a cooler, wearing a mask at all times I had to be indoors at all or couldn’t keep six feet of distance from others, and keeping and using hand sanitizer from Mammoth Distilling in the car at all times. To have the best chance of booking campground reservations, I also planned to film all the scenes during the weekday so that I was avoiding weekend crowds. Even so, there were few campsites available. I accidentally booked my first campsite at the D.H. Day Campground at Sleeping Bear National Lakeshore for the wrong day, which I didn’t realize until I’d made the four-hour drive from Ann Arbor to find the campsite occupied. Time for Plan B. I used my iPhone and the wifi signal from the ranger’s office parking area to check availability and book a walk-in site at the Platte River Campground – about twelve miles away - where my wife and I had camped a few years ago. I drove to the new campground, stuffed my camping gear in a backpack and hiked the short trail to my campsite in the dark by the light of my headlamp. The gentle sound of waves from the beach down the hill through woods in the night calmed all my frayed nerves from finding a place to pitch my tent. The next morning, I drove to the beach in Empire to meet Ella Skrocki from Sleeping Bear Surf & Kayak, whom I was interviewing about the potential impact of invasive carp to outdoor recreation businesses like hers if they were to invade the Great Lakes. The predawn waves and were beautiful but not big enough to surf. With a rainstorm on the horizon, though, Ella suggested we try the beach at Frankfort, so I drove there through the rainstorm and met her, her sister Annabel, and Jordan Browne. The rain passed and the waves were perfect. Jordan captured great footage of Ella and Annabel riding waves and me wiping out, along with my interview of Ella for the film. Both of these changes of plan highlighted the importance of being adaptable for a Great Lakes camping excursion. While we can plan the vacation time we take off, we can’t plan the weather for the days we took. Planning to catch some sun on the beach? What if it’s cloudy and windy? Might be a perfect day to take a surfing lesson from Sleeping Bear Surf & Kayak or a distillery tour at Mammoth Distilling. Planning to surf? What if it’s sunny, calm, and waveless? Might be a perfect day to rent a stand-up paddleboard, go for a trail run, or just take a nap in a hammock. And while you might not make my mistake of booking a campsite on the wrong day, what if the campsite double-booked it, or it got flooded, or the generator and giant RV on the campsite next to yours is too loud? Knowing about some of the other campgrounds in the area can save you from a night sleeping in your car, calling motels, or feeling like you’re camping in a shopping center parking lot instead of a Great Lakes campground. The gear you pack is just as important as your pre-trip planning. I had fairly limited space last summer in my office’s hybrid Toyota Camry, but having packed a backpack, headlamp, and raingear – even though I’d planned to car camp – I was able to carry my gear into the alternative hike-in campsite at Sleeping Bear. Don’t just pack for the conditions you expect; pack for the full range of possible conditions. After last summer’s adventure, and plenty before it, I’m planning some Fresh Coast camping for this summer for the family. As my gear list takes shape, it will include the surfboard I bought from Sleeping Bear after the interview, but also trail running shoes and a float tube and fishing rods for calm conditions (and a recently-purchased used Toyota Tacoma pickup to haul it all). I’ll be ready for calm days and windy ones, sunny afternoons or rainy mornings, so that Michigan’s famously fickle weather doesn’t ruin my plans. Rather, I’ll be prepared to let the adventure take shape. Living in Michigan, we’re never more than a couple hours from a Great Lake and a campground nearby. After the year we’ve had and a typically inconsistent winter, there’s nothing I’m looking forward to more than Lake Michigan beaches, waves, and campfires. With a little planning and the flexibility to change those plans, a Fresh Coast camping adventure awaits. By Drew YoungeDyke (Originally published in the March 2021 issue of Woods-N-Water News)
If you’ve tried to buy new outdoor gear in the past year, you’ve likely experienced frustration at the lack of stock. As the pandemic has required people to keep social distance, a boom in outdoor recreation participation has occurred packing trails and campgrounds and emptying inventories of everything from kayaks to cross-country skis. You don’t need the newest gear to have fun outside, though. As I’ve seen the “out of stock” notifications on the websites for my favorite manufacturers, though, I’ve also realized how much of my outdoor recreation is reliant on old gear that still works. For those who are looking to use their socially distant time to try new outdoor sports, this also means that you don’t have to let a lack of new inventory hold you back. Gear found at second-hand stores, garage sales, or internet resale marketplaces can get you outdoors enjoying Michigan’s woods, waters, and wildlife, if it’s still in working condition. Some of my favorite gear to still use was either handed down, found at a garage sale, or purchased decades ago. For instance, I’ve spent all winter cross-country skiing almost every weekend and most lunch breaks (when there was enough snow) on Karhu Classic Touring skis that I’ve had since college and that my dad first purchased in the 1980’s. As waxless skis, they require little upkeep – until this winter I had last waxed them at least a decade ago – but they still give me a good glide and decent traction uphill. I even use them to get my two-year-old son out in the snow by either towing his sled or carrying him in a backpack carrier while I ski. I’ve been looking at upgrading to new skis but the ones I want are out of stock, even online. Thankfully my old Karhu’s continue to work well even after three decades. Garage sales can be great places to find working outdoor gear. My parents enjoy shopping at garage and estate sales in the summer, so I have them keep an eye out for outdoor gear for me. A few years ago, my dad found a pair of Yukon Charlie Backcountry snowshoes with a broken decking, but with a little duct tape they’ve carried me on multiple winter backpacking trips over the years. My only current hunting bow also came from a garage sale. Shortly after I bought my first compound bow a decade ago (at a Wyoming pawn shop) I expressed an interest to learn to shoot a traditional bow. My dad called me from a garage sale a few years ago and said that there was a recurve bow for sale for $10. I asked if there was any apparent limb twist or cracking, and he said he didn’t think so. I figured for that price, though, it was worth the shot. It turned out to be a Shakespeare Super Necadah, made in Kalamazoo in the late 60’s or early 70’s, and it shoots great. My most prized outdoor gear was handed down from my grandpa, who instilled my passion for fishing and conservation, and mentored me along with my dad in hunting. One of these items is a Marlin Model 1892 lever-action .22 rifle. This century-old rifle is my favorite squirrel gun, loaded with copper .22LR ammunition. When he was still alive and I was in college, we fished together often on summer weekends in his boat on Lake Skegamog, Elk Lake, Torch Lake, and other inland lakes in the northwest Lower Peninsula for northern pike and smallmouth bass. Along with sage advice and lifetime memories, he gave me his Fenwick Voyageur 4-piece fiberglass spinning rod. To this day, even 16 years after he died, it’s the only spinning rod I use. I mostly fly fish now, and while I’ve bought some newer Orvis rods for bass and pike, the Cortland rod and reel package I got for Christmas in college is still what I use for trout and panfish. This past year, with more time to fish and less opportunity to do much else, I caught more panfish than ever mostly on my 17-year-old 5-wt Cortland starter package (with newer Scientific Anglers line and mostly flies I tied myself). And no fish have ever meant more to me than the bluegills and pumpkinseeds I caught on that rod with my son in a backpack on Father’s Day last summer. And while new kayaks were flying off of outdoor retailer shelves last summer, there’s no watercraft I’d rather fish out of than the aluminum rowboat at my family’s Upper Peninsula lake cottage. It’s older than me (and I just turned 41!) but it floats and catches fish. I repainted the oars last summer and my dad and brother replaced the rotten transom a few years ago. Replacing the cracked wood bench seats is next on my list. Watching the MeatEater series “Das Boat” on YouTube – much of it filmed in Michigan last summer – has given me an endless list of future ideas for it, as well. And as the tagline for that series says, “Whatever floats.” I’m as much of a gear junkie as anyone, and I appreciate the technological advances in materials and construction that outdoor gear and clothing manufacturers are continually putting into their products. And I certainly buy my fair share of new outdoor gear when my budget allows, but I also rely on gear that has withstood decades of use and still gets me outdoors. Some of it has sentimental value, but some of it was just a good deal. Whether you’re looking to learn a new outdoor sport or whether finances are just tough, as they are for many right now, don’t let a lack of funds keep you from enjoying outdoor recreation. A new fishing rod may be nice, but an old one can still cast a lure. New skis may go faster, but old ones will still glide. New snowshoes may not require duct tape, but old ones will still keep you from post-holing. And while every fly angler may dream of new drift boats or every bass angler may dream of new sparkle boats, the only real requirement for catching fish is that it floats and you do the rest. And no matter what gear you see others using out in the woods, on the water, or on Instagram, the only gear you need is the gear that gets you out there. Whether you’re using old gear to learn a new skill, because it’s the gear you could afford, because it’s the gear you trust, or because it’s the gear your grandpa used, you belong out there. Get whatever gear you can get your hands on, get outside, and have some fun. Whatever floats. By Drew YoungeDyke (Originally published in the January 2021 issue of Woods-N-Water News)
Throughout 2020, outdoor recreation has provided a welcome outlet for cooped-up Michiganders as a safe, healthy, and fun way to maintain social distancing. The arrival of snow and cold weather doesn’t have to stop that trend. Cross-country skiing is a fun way to enjoy the snow while staying in shape and breaking cabin fever. Cross-country skiing is the simplest form of Nordic skiing, which also includes backcountry touring and skate-skiing like you might see in the Winter Olympics. In classic cross-country skiing, you ski in tracks on relatively flat terrain. Many metroparks, state parks and forests, and even golf courses in Michigan offer tracked cross-country ski trails, and in light conditions it doesn’t take much to create new tracks on nature area trails throughout Michigan. I started cross-country skiing when I was four years old as my parents took me for short trips in the woods behind the school and baseball field in my northern Michigan hometown of Central Lake. In high school I spent more time downhill skiing than cross-country, but I picked it back up on winter breaks home from college. That had as much to do with college finances as anything: I didn’t need a lift ticket to cross-country ski, just a trail and a hill. Now you can find trails on the Michigan Department of Natural Resources website under “Things To Do/Winter Sports/Cross-Country Skiing”. You can really cross-country ski anywhere there’s enough snow; I even ski into work when there’s fresh snow on unplowed side streets, un-shoveled sidewalks, and through nature area trails between my house and our National Wildlife Federation office in Ann Arbor (at least I did before we started remote working due to COVID-19 last March). What I love about cross-country skiing is finding the rhythm that makes the stride smooth and comfortable. The basics of sliding on skis in a straight line are pretty simple, but when I can kick up and find a good rhythm I feel like I’m gliding across the snow like my Iron Age Finnish ancestors might have done – skis and petroglyphs depicting skiers have been found in Finland dating back at least 5,000 years! My skis aren’t quite that old (though at 25 years they sometimes seem like it) but they were made in Finland. Beyond the fun feeling of gliding across the snow, cross-country skiing has some serious health benefits. There’s a reason Nordic Track made a lot of money in the 1980’s selling a home workout apparatus that tries to mimic cross-country skiing. The real thing is a total body workout burning 544 to 816 calories per hour for people with body weights of 150 to 225 lbs., respectively, according to LiveStrong.com. In the winter I’ll often substitute my 5K trail runs for a 5K ski. This winter I may also add resistance to the workout by towing my toddler son behind me in a sled. To get started, you might begin with classic skis, which are more forgiving and used for gliding in a relatively straight line, as simple as walking or running. Performance, metal-edged, and skate skis are more advanced options for speed, off-trail touring, and skate-skiing, respectively. Several state and local parks, as well as ski and outdoor shops offer ski rentals. If you’re new to cross-country skiing, you might want to rent skis a few times before buying. REI has an excellent buyer’s guide to cross country skis on www.rei.com. Used skis are another option; as I wrote earlier, I’ve had my waxless Karhu skis for 25 years (they’re not for sale, though). Selecting the right clothing for active winter sports can be tricky. You want to protect against the cold and snow, but you’re going to work up a sweat. I like to use a merino wool base layer paired with a waterproof or water-resistant shell and mid-layer insulation matched to the conditions. On warmer days, that might mean a light merino wool base layer, Prana Zion pants with gaiters over my ski boots, a fleece pullover, a merino wool hat, and gloves. On colder days, I might add snowboard pants and a light packable down jacket, stored in a light backpack with extra gloves. If you’re new to cross-country skiing, you may fall down more often and want something that repels snow better. To ski, think of it just like walking. Stick to open, flat trails at first – if you lose control going downhill in the woods, those trees can be dangerous. Wedge your skies to walk up steeper ascents. It might be awkward at first, but like every athletic activity, it helps to keep some bend in your knee and work from your core outward to your extremities. By the time you’re done, you’ll feel it throughout. To make a day of it, especially with the family, prepare to have some hot chocolate when you return. Sitting by a fireplace to warm up while you dry out feels great, and it would be even better to have a hot sauna ready to go if you have the means. We’ve all been more cooped up than normal over the past year, and our collective cabin fever will only get worse this winter unless we deliberately seek and find ways to break it. Cross-country skiing can do that while also providing a great workout and a lifetime of relatively inexpensive winter weekend fun. By Drew YoungeDyke (Originally published in the Fall 2020 issue of Michigan Out-of-Doors)
Fall fly-fishing for northern pike is about chasing a moment. All of it – the equipment, the strategy, the effort – comes down to a glimpse of a pike underwater stalking the streamer, a brief pause, and the sudden, violent strike. Within that brief moment is all the adrenaline of the strip-set and the anticipation of wondering if the fish is on the line, followed by the elation of a heavy tug or the disappointment in a slack retrieve. Last fall I invited some friends from different conservation organizations in Michigan and Wisconsin up to my family’s Upper Peninsula lake cottage for a long weekend to chase that moment, along with Jordan Browne of Michigan Out-of-Doors TV to film it for a National Wildlife Federation film, Northwoods Unleaded. We spent three fun-filled days reeling in northern pike with nontoxic gear for both spinning and fly rods while the September leaves changed color overhead. Michigan anglers have long traveled to Canada for trophy northerns but there are ample opportunities to catch northern pike throughout Michigan. My grandpa and I used to catch them trolling with spoons on Lake Skegamog in the northern Lower Peninsula when I was younger, and my family has been catching northern pike at our cottage on Chaney Lake since my great-grandpa bought it in the late 1950’s. In fact, a postscript to the first entry in the cottage log notes that “Grandpa Bill caught a beautiful 24 1/2-in. northern.” Chaney Lake is a small 530-acre lake near the Ottawa National Forest in Gogebic County. Our dock points to the deepest depression in the lake, reaching about 20 feet deep, while the edges boast shallow weeds perfect for pike to ambush prey and a large shallow weed complex at one end for spawning. Chaney Lake is under special pike regulations allowing the take of up to five pike under 24 inches and one over, designed to increase the size of the fish in the lake and reduce the abundance of “hammer handles.” Similar regulations are being considered for additional lakes throughout Michigan by the DNR Fisheries Division. George Lindquist, past Michigan United Conservation Clubs president, caught a hammer handle off the dock as the first evening approached, as did Craig Challenor, president of the Wisconsin Wildlife Federation. With the bite on, we split up into two groups with the gear anglers on George’s 17-foot boat and the fly anglers with me in our little aluminum rowboat. George’s crew cast into the drop-off. We heard the shouts from George’s boat as Sarah Topp and Ryan Cavanaugh caught beautiful pike. Sarah is the former On The Ground coordinator for Michigan United Conservation Clubs and Ryan is the co-chair of the Michigan Chapter of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers. Sarah caught one over 24 inches and kept it to pair with the next day’s lunch of pasties from Randall’s Bakery in Wakefield. Marcia Brownlee, director of Artemis Sportswomen, and Aaron Kindle, director of sporting campaigns for the National Wildlife Federation, joined me in the rowboat with fly rods. We worked the weed edges extending out from shore. As Aaron rowed, I cast an articulated streamer with nonlead dumbbell eyes to the weed edge and stripped it back on my 8-wt rod. I watched a northern pike follow it a few feet below the surface and strike suddenly when I paused the retrieve. With a strip set, I had my first northern pike on the fly. It fought violently into Aaron’s net just as the sun was setting across the lake. It was only about 18-20 inches but I released it. Later in the weekend, l caught another small northern just off the shallow weeds on a Lefty’s Deceiver fly weighted with tungsten putty. Everyone on the trip ended up catching pike, but I was the only one to do so on a fly rod. As a novice pike fly angler, though, I wanted to know if this was just luck or if I was actually fishing the right spots with the right equipment and the right tactics for fall northern pike. “For lakes, I like to search on the edges of shallow flats where pike will ambush baitfish,” advised Kole Luetke, a fly-fishing guide for Superior Outfitters out of Marquette. “I also continue to fish the typically key structure that I fish thought the year, such as weed beds and deadfalls on the shore line. The key is to locate the baitfish, and in the later season warmer water temps. On rivers, I fish typical structures like deadfalls and slow backwater and sloughs.” Kole guides clients for multiple species across the Upper Peninsula, including northern pike and muskies. He uses somewhat similar tactics for both, though he uses relatively smaller flies for northern pike. “Oftentimes during the fall when I'm hunting bigger fish I will utilize the ‘L-turn’ or ‘figure 8’ like in musky fishing,” he said. “My retrieve speeds slow down when the water temps drop, and I like to utilize long pauses throughout the retrieve.” As with the ones I caught, northern pike will follow the fly – often all the way back to the boat – and strike during the pause. Rather than lifting the line for another cast, drawing a figure-8 with the fly with the rod tip down gives the pike more opportunity to strike. Kole uses larger flies than the smaller streamers I fished, though. “In the fall I like to increase the size of fly I use. Typically, I fish articulated flies anywhere from 8 to 12 inches. I don't often exceed the 12-inch mark for pike, but I will occasionally throw triple-articulated flies over 12 inches,” Kole said. “My preferred fly colors are fire tiger, brown and yellow, and white is killer in the tannic waters of the UP. In order to turn over large flies I use a shortened leader, 18 inches of 40-50lb Fluorocarbon connected to 18" of 40lb bite wire. This is similar to the leader I use for fall musky fishing.” With Kole’s advice, I’m looking forward to another trip up to the cottage this fall for pike fly fishing, but probably solo. I’ve tied larger articulated flies in the colors he suggested, bought a 9-wt Orvis Clearwater rod and a sinking line to better cast them, and rigged up some wire tippet leaders along with premade ones from Scientific Angler. I’ll target the same weed edges, structure and drop-offs, but I know it won’t be quite as fun without the whole crew there this time. That moment of anticipation between seeing the pike follow the streamer, pausing the retrieve, and the sudden burst of underwater violence will make it all worth it, though. Travelling to the far end of the Upper Peninsula isn’t necessary to find it, either. Wherever you are in Michigan, there’s a lake or a river nearby holding northern pike and endless opportunities to chase that moment. By Drew YoungeDyke (Originally published in the November 2020 issue of Woods-N-Water News)
Many Michiganders, especially Yoopers, have heard of “sisu.” Sisu is a Finnish word with no direct translation into other languages which is roughly like combining grit, resilience, fortitude, and stubborn determination in the face of hardship over the long term. Though I grew up in the northern Lower Peninsula, I learned the term from the Finnish side of my family at our cottage in the western Upper Peninsula. I’ve often thought about what that term means to me and have often found it tested in the outdoors. The Finns had to have sisu to survive the harsh, cold climate of their country. Northern Michigan and the Upper Peninsula mirror that climate, which is part of what drew so many Finns to the Upper Peninsula, northern Wisconsin, and Minnesota to work in lumber camps and mines in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, as it did for my family. The northern Michigan outdoors can test sisu in large and small ways. In 2014, when I was running the On the Ground (OTG) wildlife habitat program for Michigan United Conservation Clubs, we had a musky spawning structure project planned for March 1 on Chicagoan Lake in the Upper Peninsula. Seventeen volunteers signed up, but on the morning of the project the temperature was -16 F, not counting the wind chill on a frozen lake with no trees to block it. I was sure that most would be no-shows, and I would have understood. But then George Lindquist arrived, followed by all the others, and we spent hours on that ice assembling telephone poles like a tic-tac-toe board, securing steel mesh to the middle square, and filling them with fieldstones to sink them to the bottom of the lake when the ice melted. Every one of those volunteers showed sisu. I’ve also had it tested in physical endurance events. Yvon Chouinard, founder of Patagonia, has been quoted saying, “It’s not an adventure until something goes wrong,” and I kind of consider that to be when sisu kicks in, too. Cramping up in mile 12 of a 31-mile (50K) ultramarathon was when something went wrong; sisu was finishing the remaining 19 miles limping, cramping, slow, but not giving up and finishing anyway. In deer hunting, there are endless ways sisu gets tested in Michigan. Our weather conditions in late November – and our ethics as hunters - often require it. From where we set up our deer camp in the Pigeon River Country, I often still hunt routes that take me in a two or three-mile circular route through hilly wooded terrain, and at many points along it I can be up to a mile or more from camp. In 2015, I was fortunate to shoot a 3 ½ -year-old eight-point buck shortly before the close of shooting light. I was up on a ridge I’d still hunted to where I’d sat against a tree watching a trail. The buck was cruising the valley below and I shot him at a distance of about 70 yards. He ran up the opposite hill, back down, and collapsed less than 50 yards from where I shot him. I waited about 20 minutes, and it was dark by the time I found him. I was looking at close to a mile-long drag of a heavy-bodied deer in the dark after I field-dressed him. I could have marked my spot, gone back to camp, and returned in the morning with help. With coyotes around, though, I didn’t want to leave him so I grabbed an antler and started dragging him uphill. Luckily a pair of flashlights belonging to my dad and cousin shone from the top of the hill before I got too far, so my cousin and I each grabbed an antler and dragged him up the hill. I thought we could cut across a valley as a shortcut, but as it turned out it took us out of the way and we had to drag it back up a hill to get back on course, across a stump-and-slash covered clear-cut plateau, and down through the woods to our camp. There’s nothing particularly unique about this deer drag, but we had to show some sisu to complete it. When something went wrong (we went the wrong way) we had to gut through it with stubborn determination despite adding an extra hill and probably an extra quarter-mile to our drag. In Michigan, I suspect sisu gets shown by hundreds of thousands of deer drags in cold weather across rough terrain every year. Similarly, I think it’s sisu to gut out the discomfort and stay on stand when the weather is cold, when the seat is uncomfortable, and when every urge is to head back to camp for a hot meal. And maybe the most important way it shows in Michigan’s deer season is when a hunter loses a blood trail but doesn’t give up. Losing the blood trail is just the part that goes wrong; sisu is persisting in spite of that and making the small and widening circles to cut for tracks, to search for broken branches, and to find the deer no matter how long it takes. Part of sisu is being prepared. For instance, you can’t drag a deer out if you don’t have the physical conditioning to do it without a heart attack. You can’t stay on the stand when you’re cold and uncomfortable if you don’t have the cold-weather clothing to prevent frostbite and hypothermia. And you might not find your deer after losing a blood trail if you didn’t bring extra batteries for your headlamp. I train with trail-running and CrossFit to be in condition to drag deer and I camp out in the snow in the winter to know my limits and how to keep warm in the cold. Don’t try to drag out a deer if you have a heart condition or are just not in condition to do so or risk frostbite or hypothermia because you didn’t layer up. Sisu isn’t being reckless in the short term; it’s being determined in the long-term. Sisu is a special quality but it doesn’t have to be unique. Any person can show it; Michigan’s hunters just get more opportunities than most. When something goes wrong or gets hard this deer season – you shoot a heavy deer in a valley a mile from camp, you get cold and uncomfortable on stand, you lose your blood trail, or the million other things that can go wrong in deer hunting – don’t give up. Just look at it as a chance to show your sisu. Make the drag, stay on stand, find your deer. That’s sisu. |
AUTHORDrew YoungeDyke is an award-winning freelance outdoor writer and a Director of Conservation Partnerships for the National Wildlife Federation, a board member of the Outdoor Writers Association of America, and a member of the Association of Great Lakes Outdoor Writers and the Michigan Outdoor Writers Association.
All posts at Michigan Outside are independent and do not necessarily reflect the views of NWF, Surfrider, OWAA, AGLOW, MOWA, the or any other entity. ARCHIVES
June 2022
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