(1)-If you subscribed to a daily newspaper-does not publish on Sunday- what day would you want an outdoor column to run?
(2)- Is there any section in the paper you would want it, i.e. sports, features etc.
(3) What would you want to read? Remember, it is not all hunting, includes fishing and nostalgic fiction. And remember, I am a write, not a reporter. I don't cover tournaments or overly report on who killed what.
2. Features. You'd be surprised at how many people never read the sports section, me included.
3. Stories on kids and other first timers. Education on things affecting our wildlife (feral cats, EHD, deer overpopulations, programs to allow bowhunting in those areas to control excess deer), private locked public land, how our becoming technohunters affects hunting, ethical issues (poachers aren't hunters).
Good luck
I also like to read about "the state of hunting". As hunters what are we doing well, not well, what kinds of things are going on around us that will/can affect us etc.
Everything I read is online anymore but Thursday was always a good day. Here in AZ grocery store adds come out on Wednesday so viewership is a little higher on those days.
The thing about information now is that you can almost find an answer to every single one of your questions with just a little research using internet and YouTube.
Good Luck
I currently have the longest, continuously running outdoor column in the U.S. I am about to start year 42. That column currently runs in seven papers. The daily that just contacted me is published about 60-miles away, therefore a readership that probably has not seen many of my columns. They will take some "conditioning" to my writing style. The publisher was firm about me not changing anything. LOL- His exact comment was, "That stuff you write is exactly why I called you. It is good shxx." I think we are going to get along, just fine.
As to newspaper readership: The dailies are in trouble in the larger towns. In smaller towns, they are doing fine. The weeklies are doing great, simply because they are primarily, gossip sheets-hometown news and sports. My home paper, published on Wed., runs an eight-page sports section and may expand to 10. In recent TN Press Association Judging,it swept every category including outdoors. It is strong. The daily here, not so much. The internet has cut deeply into newspaper circulation. The papers that concentrate on news or sports that is not on the wire, do well. 90% of my columns have never been news or how to. I write to entertain, educate, inform in that order. I do not report news unless it is something exceptional-they can get that on-line. I do no product hype. I write about things everyone can relate to. I guess that is why 42% of my readers are women who neither hunt or fish and I reckon that is what the publisher is looking for. So, my columns are done through February. Thanks all.
2. Sports or Lifestyle
3. "Heart of the hunter" pieces. We are poorly understood.
Here is the best way I know of. The Wilson Post-my hometown paper usually runs about two weeks behind but they do keep an archive. (1) Go to www.wilsonpost.com (2) Click on Sports. (3) Click on columns or outdoors-it varies and the current one will come up.
As for the new paper, have to wait to see how they handle it. I know it will be online, not sure of just how. Have a meeting with the publisher next week and if we still agree, will start January 1.
There is an alternative- If Pat agrees, I will post each week's column on here. I do that on Facebook but I think, to see it, you have to be a friend and I have quit accepting friends. Ask Pat if he is interested. Here is a sample, (in the next post).
Three Guys-One Cold Night.
One of my big regrets is that I didn’t take more pictures. In the days before digital, it cost a lot to get slides and film processed. You had the cost of the film to start with, then developing. So, I was stingy and as a result, I don’t have a lot of pictures, I wish I had taken. As a result, I’ll make do with what I have. We are in the middle of deer, rifle season. As always, now that my hunting is no longer my job, I think back on some hunts from the past. For over 20-years, I was a professional hunter. I got paid to hunt, to hunt trophy animals. It was my job and it became a job. Today, once again, I enjoy hunting. And, I don’t work at it, anymore. That doesn’t mean I don’t kill deer. I am still good at hunting. Mostly, I shoot does. Antlers don’t mean much to me. During the 2016-17 season, last year, I killed nine-deer. It takes two or three for my family. The rest are given to people who need the meat. This year, I think I have killed seven. But this is about one night before I became a “professional” hunter…whatever that is. It is about three men, men who just enjoyed being out in the woods, living as men lived 150-years ago. It is a true story. I am the only one still alive to tell it. Russell Jackson, Mickey Pope and I had the tent up in quick time. We each knew what to do and how to do it. It was good tent, a big one, a Camel 12X10 with an over-fly and a great, waterproof floor. You could live in it if you had to. Cots up, clothes bags stowed, sleeping bags out and carpet strips on the floor. We were at a skidder location where a clearcut met the uncut timber. Lots of firewood. That done, I fired up the chainsaw. Mickey stacked wood. Russ set up the cook box, grill and chairs. That done, lanterns were filled and we were ready to go climb a tree. It was 28-degrees and we were in Hickman County on 5,500 acres of timber company land. Just us, no other hunters. Perfect. I had picked out a tree on a scouting trip much earlier in the year. Mickey and Russ had done the same. We were hunting ridge fingers off a central ridge. Our stands were 300-400 yards apart. I was up my tree just past two on the cold, blustery afternoon. I think, it was 1983. Anyway, it was one of the years we got doe tags for some counties. We each had one or two. My feet were cold in minutes. This was when I still had feeling in my toes and before I got good boots and learned how to avoid cold feet. I had been in the stand less than 30-minutes when I stood to get more circulation in my toes. She was walking up the ridge, about 60-yards behind me. The Savage Model 99, dropped her in her tracks. Fresh backstrap for supper. Then, it started snowing. It use to snow regularly, here. By the time I drug her back to camp, Mickey and Russ had a fire going and we quickly removed the backstrap from one side and Mickey, a professional chef, made a marinade. It was still snowing and the temperature was dropping. While Mickey made some sort of hash brown with onions side dish, I started the steaks over a pile of glowing, hickory coals. Russ mixed us all a tall drink. It was still snowing. We ate until we could hold no more. Then, over post-dinner, drinks, we told stories and watched the snow dance above the fire and melt in midair. Then, an idea came to us. Build the world champion campfire. Russ and I fell to gathering wood-big wood and Mickey began to apply it to our campfire. After a bit, we were throwing wood up to the top of the fire stack. Satisfied, we sat at a distance and admired our work. I recalled the old, Indian saying, “An Indian builds a small fire and sits close to it. White man builds big fire and sits way back.” About 10:30, we called it a night. We all had great sleeping bags. I still use mine. It is rated to -30. That means it will keep you warm down to about zero. We slept as though we had a clear conscience. I awoke about 5:30, my usual time, back then. I rather “needed” to get outside the tent. But could not. The zipper on the tent door, was frozen. We got the lanterns going and that thawed the zipper and I rushed outside. What a surprise. Eight inches of snow and a cool, morning temperature of -4. Coffee and oatmeal, fixed on the Coleman inside the tent, gave us courage. We ventured out. I heard Mickey shoot right at sunup and 10-minutes later, I heard Russ shoot. I climbed down, packed up my stand and started out. He came at a run. Down one side of the ridge and up my side. I braced the Savage on the side of a white oak and when he topped out at 50-yards, I put the crosshairs on the front of his shoulder and shot. Fat four-point. The four deer would have made a nice picture. Wish I had taken one. We spent the rest of that day, snacking on fried tenderloin chunks and gathering fire wood. We just enjoyed being out. It warmed up to about 45 and that night was a comfortable 30. It was a great trip, fun. Just three guys, hunting. I would love to do that again. Wish I had taken more pictures.
Guys-I have tried everything. I cannot get this to format in paragraphs-sorry.
The best newspaper coverage I've read was the writer for the Commercial Appeal/ Memphis , who wrote for eons. Been gone a long time. You may remember him. He always had good hunting and fishing updates and personal interest articles.
There are many more "newbie adventures" of me in the woods, and every time I share an experience it always ends in laughter. I've even used this method to change others opinion of hunting
Cuts-I live in Lebanon, shoulda called. Who are your parents, I may know them.
Thing to keep in mind, I don't write for hunters or anglers...I write for people. My goal is to entertain. Very few how-to columns, no product hype, no, "they are catching them at XYZ on spinnner baits." I write stories, some true, some fiction but all with an outdoor theme.
If you go back and read some of the mishaps that are posted right here on Bowsite, that would give you enough type to last several months. Some things that happen to Bowsiters is just plain funny. Like sticking a knife into a dead horse and getting a mouthfull. OMG The list goes on and on.
No, way east of there. Don't you have Owen Schroeder writing a column for the Leaf Chronicle? And, at one time, Steve McAdams did some writing for them.
Buffalo- were you talking about Henry Reynolds? He was a fine old gentleman but I believe Larry Rea has been OW the Comm. App. for quite some time. Larry is also the editor of Mid-South Hunting and Fishing News-a Bill Dance publication and I am on that staff.
txbowchic-you are dead on with most of your suggestions. I do a lot with female-lady women in the outdoors and always with kids. I do at least six humor things a year. But unless it is a drastic change in regulations, I leave that to the reporters and on-line bloggers. As I said, I am a writer, not a reporter, I don't use canned material. As mentioned, my column has been running 52X a year for almost 42-years. The difference with this one is, it is brand new. The paper has never had an outdoor column. After my conversation yesterday, with the publisher, I will change nothing in the way I have been writing-as per his instructions. What I will add is a second "news" short column with the "canned" material such as regulations, public land and if I can talk him into it, a picture of the week which will be mostly women or kids. What I do not want to do is go back to work. I am retired and I am not going to get back into something that requires me to cover a fishing tournament or some such crap. I'll leave that to the reporters, When we sign a contract, I'll give you TN folks full info. Now I have a serious decide to make. I planned to hunt this morning, it is down to about 19. But when I got out of bed, I fell like I use to when I was drinking. I told my wife-woman, I was insteady. She said, don't you mean unsteady? I replied, no, I am going to do something instead, I just don't know what. I am real insteady. That is your werd for the day.
No mentioning specific tracts of public land or lakes/rivers/creeks for fishing reports. Mortal sin of outdoor writers in my opinion.
And if you could reach non-Hunting females? The outdoor industry would never be the same....
GF-42% of my readers are non-hunting females.
Variety is the spice of life. Sprinkle occasional success of others, do not be a commercial for what most cannot afford, exotic works every now and then, and kids and women always work.
