billrquimby

Sorry to hear about this. I hope your father had a rider on his homeowner's policy that will cover his loss. Insurance companies have ridiculous limits on what they will pay for firearms and optics, and some don't cover firearms at all without a rider. Hunters need to do an inventory of their toys and sit down with their insurance agents to see what's covered and what is not. They also need to review their coverage frequently. I had a rider on my firearms for more than 20 years that I never got around to updating. I forgot that guns appreciate in value over time, or that I had acquired more of them. When we were hit by burglars, insurance covered less than half of the replacement cost of the 35 rifles and shotguns that were stolen. Bill Quimby

Strange way to remove antlers. I wonder why he didn't saw off the skull plate and leave them attached? That green thing in the ear needs explaining, too. Bill Quimby

Yes, I've eaten the oysters from beef as well as my deer, elk, caribou, moose, eland, kudu and sable antelope. All were good. Just wish I hadn't blown the testicles off my desert sheep. I'm sure they would have tasted better than that ram's "regular" meat. Evan's recipe is as good as any. Don't knock mountain oysters until you've tried it. The menu at The Rocky Mountain Oyster Club in Tucson offers beef oysters. If you ever eat there, order them. You will not be sorry. Bill Quimby

Congratulations!

    I have to agree with Lark when it comes to a choice between the two calibers, but not about rice grinders. IMO, they don't deserve to be listed on the same line with a Dodge, Ford or Chevy. It's safe to say that many, many more elk have been killed with the .270 Winchester than the 7mm Weatherby Magnum over the past 30 years. However, whenever I draw tags for deer or elk, I carry my 7mm Remington Magnum. I shot a lot of game with a .270 until I built my 7RM and discovered its superiority. I retired my .270 after that. Bill Quimby

You might want to consider using light loads in a larger caliber with heavier bullets designed for penetration (and not expansion). I shot a few foxes and lots of coyotes with a .303 Savage lever rifle with light loads and 180-grain .30 caliber bullets from the old Arizona Bullet Company in Tucson during the 1950s. As I remember, there usually was minimum damage. Bill Quimby

The question was 7mm or .308, and strictly speaking that could mean a whole bunch of different chamberings, from 7x57 to .30 Weatherby Magnum. Apparently what was meant was the 7mm Remington Magnum, and the .308 Winchester, so my vote goes to my favorite caliber for most game, the 7RM. The .308 Winchester actually is a mild .30-06, and I'll take the 7RM over any .30-06 for anything up to moose and eland. Above that, the .30-06 with 220 grain solid bullets MIGHT be suitable for African buffalo and elephant under the right conditions. No African country I know of allows its use on these animals,though. Bill Quimby

The best beef I have ever eaten was on my only trip to South America. The posts on this thread that talk about it being served on "skewers" Brazil-style made me remember all the meals we had in Rio de Janeiro and Buenos Aires where waiters kept plopping onto our plates thick slabs of beef that they carried around on genuine swords. I was told the reason the beef tasted so good was because the cattle ate only pampas grass. Could be. The beef I was served at the ranch we hunted was just as good as the best I've eaten anywhere up here, and I was told it wasn't aged. As for El Corral, it has been a Tucson landmark on River Road just east of Campbell Avenue for at least sixty years that I know of, and maybe a lot more than that. Its specialty is prime rib, and I agree with the post that suggested prime rib is a roast and not a steak. I also agree with those who pick rib eye as their number one choice. Bill Quimby

Lark: Welcome back, my young friend. Your wisecracks that include much wisdom have been sorely missed. I look forward to resuming our debate about the "eastern" whitetail. Bill Quimby

Don't know if it can eaten, or why you would want to eat it, but if it is devil's claw it is what Arizona's native Americans use for dark colors in the baskets they weave.......... My wife and I took basket-weaving classes from a Papago woman in the late 1970s, and the first thing we did was collect the devil's claw and other materials for our baskets. I can tell you that whatever price they ask for a basket, it is worth it! My wife and I each spent more that 100 hours on the baskets we made............. I decorated my basket with silhouettes of bighorns around the sides and was flattered when our teacher offered to buy mine. I was the first man to take her class, she said. ....... Bill

Your photo and text makes me want to order a barrel and lock and build another rifle. .......Bill Quimby

I have found the only way to post on this site (no matter the "skin" I choose) is to type my post in the (not so) quick reply at the bottom of the thread, then click on "other options." This prints what I typed on a new window and I can click on "post now." {I cannot make corrections or additions on this window.) Sometimes it posts, but it usually does not and I give up............. Editing what does post is impossible. I've found the only way to change something is to delete the post, make the corrections and go through the whole works again. More often than not, I go away. ............. If you've noticed, I have to insert .......... to separate different thoughts. No matter what I do, my posts (when they do make it to the site) appear in one long paragraph. ,,,,,,,,,,, All of this is frustrating, to say the least, and I'm starting to wonder if it is worth it............. My machine is a five-year-old, large screen IMac that write and design books with. I use Safari as server and encounter no problems on any of the other sites I post on..........

"Apple user forever never an issue. Currently use Safari. (mac as in macintosh... is an old no longer used name)"..............I have used Macintosh computers since 1984. and my five-year=old machine is an IMac, Apple's flagship desktop computer. As long as IMacs are being manufactured and sold, I will continue to call them Macs............. I've made my living on Macs for three decades now, and I'm too old to change............I can't understand why I have such problems with this site when other members who also use Macs and Safari do not. It may have something to do with my using a dial=up modem instead of a high-speed connection, but I visit and post on other sites regularly and have never had a problem. ........ Bill Quimby

I like your rifle. Tell us more about it. Bill Quimby

It would be interesting to see at least twenty years of data comparing mistaken-for-game shootings per 1,000 hunters in states with and without blaze orange laws. I'll stick my neck out and predict that little difference would be found. A couple of generations of hunters have grown up buying blaze orange products, just because of a manufacturer's sales campaign..... Bill Quimby

Happy birthday, Peg. Be sure to make TJ bring you around next summer. Jean was asking about you just the other day......... Bill Quimby

"I never have,but what kind of effective range do you get with a flintlock?",,,,,,,,,,,, The easy answer to your question is the same effective range as a percussion rifle with the same barrel and load. I never hunted an Arizona whitetail with a flintlock, but I did shoot several Texas Hill Country deer with the first muzzleloader I built from parts from Dixie Gun Works and a piece of walnut from a tree we cut on the ranch we hunted. This flintlock was as close as I could make it to one of the guns shown in a book on "Golden Age" "Kentucky" long rifles. I haven't kept up with what's available in contemporary muzzleloading rifles. When they made them look like modern rifles, put scopes on them, and increased their range way past the 75-range that limited nineteenth century hunters, I lost interest and went back to using centerfires. Bill Quimby

Deer get used to all types of things. Years ago, the guy who lived in the last house in Brown Canyon below Baboquivari Peak used to set off dynamite every hour or so on opening weekend, apparently hoping to scare deer away from hunters. It didn't work. A friend and I were watching deer when he did this and they didn't flinch. They simply kept on feeding. I've also watched deer totally ignore gunfire. Bill Quimby

Eric Sparks, one of he four applicants selected on Wednesday (see the AZGFDpress release below) is a long-time friend. I first met him in 1981 at the One Shot Antelope Club's Hunt in Wyoming where we both were inducted into the club. I followed him as president of the Past Shooter's Club a couple of years later. In 1983 or 1984, I think, he left Texas and moved his law practice to Tucson. I have hunted with him in Wyoming, New Mexico, and all over Arizona, as well as on the property he owns on the Limpopo River in Botswana. He hunts with both rifle and bow, and has taken elk, black bear, deer, javelinas and, just this year, an House Rock Valley bison with his bow. His African bowhunting trophies include crocodile, lion and various antelope. He fishes for everything that swims when the opportunity presents itself. Beyond his hunting and fishing, Eric easily meets all the requirements for the position and will make a good commissioner. Bill Quimby PHOENIX -- The Arizona Game and Fish Commission Appointment Recommendation Board will interview four candidates for the governor’s appointment to fill the 2015 vacancy on the Arizona Game and Fish Commission. The interviews will take place at the board’s public meeting on Monday, Nov. 10, beginning at 9 a.m. at the Arizona Game and Fish Department headquarters at 5000 W. Carefree Highway in Phoenix. View the meeting agenda. The following candidates will be interviewed: John “Doyel” Shamley; Eric Slocum Sparks; Chad T. Villamor; and James S. Zieler. They were chosen from a list of 16 applicants considered by the board at its Oct. 22 public meeting. After the interviews, the board will select finalists to forward to the governor for consideration. Per Arizona State Statute 17-202, the Arizona Game and Fish Commission Appointment Recommendation Board shall assist the governor by interviewing, evaluating and recommending candidates for appointment to the Arizona Game and Fish Commission. The Commission Appointment Recommendation Board shall recommend at least two, but no more than five, candidates to the governor. The governor must select and appoint a commissioner from the list submitted by the board. For additional information about the Commission Appointment Recommendation Board, contact the Governor’s Office of Boards and Commissions at (602) 542-2449 or toll free at 1-800-253-0883 or on the web at www.azgovernor.gov. For more information on the Arizona Game and Fish Commission, visitwww.azgfd.gov/commission.

"If you have been hunting elk in Az for the last 30 years, you've got a great idea of how full-of-crap the G&Flakes are with their stats!" I shot my first bull in what now is unit 27 in 1955. That will be sixty years ago next September (to save you the math) and I can say that our state's elk have significantly increased in quantity and trophy quality over those six decades BECAUSE of the Arizona Game and Fish Department. Bill Quimby

I've not used a .30-30 on deer or elk, but my father shot dozens of deer and four or five elk with his. My first rifle was a .303 Savage, and I shot everything from coyotes, javelinas, mule deer and whitetails with it and never felt I needed something better until I drew my first elk tag and bought a .270. This was in the mid-1950s, and it was rare to see a scope on a rifle. Use your Marlin and enjoy it. Bill Quimby

Many years ago, when blaze orange first came out, manufacturers hired lobbyists and sent them across the country to push for laws requiring hunters to wear it. I was at a meeting when a manufacturer's rep gave a presentation and urged our Game and Fish Commission members to adopt such a rule. When a commissioner asked the department to return with hard data on hunting accident fatalities in Arizona, it was found that all of the fewer than a dozen accidental shooting deaths over the previous ten years occurred because of improper gun handling at the victim's vehicle, and not because someone mistook someone for a deer or other game. It was quite a few years after that before Arizona had its first "mistaken-for-game" shooting. This was when deer tags still were sold at hardware stores and 90,000 to 100,000 of us hunted in just one season ("stratified" seasons such as we now have drastically cut the number of hunters in the field at the same time). I would not be surprised that the rate of accidental shootings has dropped significantly since then, thanks to hunter safety training for beginning hunters. Personally, I wear camo and have never felt threatened by seeing other hunters near me. I wear blaze orange in states where it is required, but knowing how such rules came about irks me no end to be forced to wear those silly vests and caps. Bill Quimby

I found thie following when I searched for the origin and proper pronunciation of the name Coues. To me, it says "Cooz" is more correct than "Cows." The corruption the author mentions easily could have gone the other way. (The quote below is from a very early 20th century review of one of Elliott Coues' papers on birds.) Bill Quimby "It's too easy to make fun of Coues's theosophical besottedness, but the Check List is full of wonderful insights and facts available nowhere else, and I highly recommend it to anyone interested in birds, words, and birdwords. It is also, now that no living soul has had the advantage of actually speaking with him, the authoritative source for the pronunciation of its author's name. In 1880, Robert Ridgway described a specimen of Rock Sandpiper as Arquetella couesi, and the human possessor of the patronym tells us in a footnote that: "The name of this person is Norman-French, and is still not infrequently found in the north of France, pronounced in two syllables, with the grave accent on the last : Cou-ès — Coo-ayz. On the removal of his ancestors to the Isle of Wight, the pronunciation naturally became corrupted into Cowz. ... The meaning of the word is unknown to us."

"His name was pronounced Cows just like the actual pronunciation of Prescott is Prescott not preskit but the guy both are named after means nothing if no one chooses to say it correctly. I personally think it's hilarious. if you go somewhere and someone pronounces your name incorrectly you always correct them the but when we pronounce someone else's name incorrectly its okay " Maverick: Is there something written somewhere that says how Elliott Coues pronounced his name?" Bill Quimby

"His name was pronounced Cows just like the actual pronunciation of Prescott is Prescott not preskit but the guy both are named after means nothing if no one chooses to say it correctly. I personally think it's hilarious. if you go somewhere and someone pronounces your name incorrectly you always correct them the but when we pronounce someone else's name incorrectly its okay " Maverick: Is there something written somewhere that says how Elliott Coues pronounced his name?" Bill Quimby