I just recently switched over to a fixed blade knife for my hunting endeavors and landed on the Benchmade Hidden Canyon Hunter. A phenomenal little knife that you can find my personal review on HERE. Being the gear nerd that I am though, I am always looking to better my system, especially for backcountry hunting. Things need to be lightweight and extremely functional, not to mention dependable. When I saw that Benchmade came out with an ultralight knife, tailor made for the backcountry hunter, I just knew that I would eventually have to get my hands on it. The Benchmade Altitude Knife is one that has not disappointed me in the least bit. Could this be the perfect knife for the backcountry hunter?
Something that I have grown to look forward to every year is the coming of new products from various companies in the hunting industry. I am always so eager to see what these folks have been cooking up and how the new additions might fit into my gear list. Our gear has come a long way in the last 10 years and somehow it just keeps progressing. Look at bows 5 years ago, or technical clothing. We have come leaps and bounds in that time. Just when I think that nothing else can be improved, a company like First Lite crushes my assumptions with their 2017 line of clothing. One of the products that I am especially jacked up on is their new Sawtooth Hybrid Jacket and that is what we will be diving into today.
As I’ve gone down the road of this blog, one of the things that I’ve gotten asked the most is “what are you bringing on your backpack hunts?” In light of that, I have decided to post up my current backcountry gear list for 2017. My gear list is forever growing and shrinking, but hopefully you can get the gist of what is usually in my backpack. This list is going to be for an archery hunt in the early fall. If it were later in the year, I would just be bringing some extra layers along. I am by no means an ounce junkie, so I can’t tell you the EXACT weight of my pack and all of the contents in it. For most hunts, I am sitting in the 35 pound range though, depending on how much water I am packing in. That number will increase with the amount of days I am planning to be out, simply because of food. Each one of my food bags is in the realm of 2 pounds per day containing about 2500-3000 calories in each one. Besides food and water, everything else pretty much stays the same. If you have any questions, feel free to ask below in the comments.
My first year ever really hitting this hunting thing hard was about 4 years ago. Of all things that I could hunt, I chose to chase black bears here in Arizona. One of the primary general seasons here lands right in the middle of August. For people in Arizona, that means 2 things. It’s deathly hot out and it’s monsoon season. Yes, it does in fact rain here, unlike what most people think. We aren’t all sand and cacti. This posed a potential problem for me on my hunt. My problem being, I could get rained out. I know. What a wimp right? I was a noob, what can I say!?
If you asked me a few years ago if I would be investing the money that I do now in high quality hunting clothing, I probably would have laughed at you. I was indeed a skeptic of these higher end purchases and honestly didn’t see the reasoning behind why someone would pay $100 for a shirt or $200 for a pair of pants. That was until I finally tried the stuff out.
“Trust your camo.” I have heard this said many times, but up until recently, it never really resonated with me. This may sound funny, but I don’t think I have ever really TRUSTED my camouflage. Not that I didn’t like it, I loved my camo. I think it was just that though. I wore it because that is what you were suppose to do………and it looked awesome. Who doesn’t love camo? It didn’t change my thoughts on how I stalked animals though. Honestly, even though I have always worn camo, I really have gone about doing things like I wasn’t wearing camo. This caused me to maybe be more careful than need be and might have cost me opportunities in the past.
As most of you have probably guessed it, I am a big fan of the company First Lite and their gear. First Lite is the makers of high quality hunting clothing and the first to successfully print camo on merino wool.
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