Last week, the Safari Club International Convention was held in Las Vegas.

I’ve had a rather hectic schedule the last couple of weeks. On Monday, I was in Mountain Home. Tuesday through Thursday, I had to fly to Atlanta. I flew home Thursday night and then jumped on a plane to fly to Vegas on Friday morning.

Then on Sunday, I flew to Dallas to take care of a problem, then jumped in a rental car and drove to Amarillo and had some stuff to do. I just got told Tuesday that I have to return to Idaho on Thursday, which is fine with me. Plus, now I get to help out with the Calvary Chapel Wildgame Feed on Friday night.

But despite the hectic schedule, I had two seminars at the SCI Convention on Saturday. My flight Friday morning got canceled and rescheduled for that afternoon, but it was late. Nothing is beyond United Airlines for messing with my travel schedule. They’re the best of the worst.

But back to the convention. I was scheduled to arrive earlier Friday but didn’t end up arriving at the motel until nearly 10 p.m. I was now under the gun. I like to visit as many booths as I can, talk to guides and work deals with the companies, plus do my seminars. My afternoon was pretty much tied up with seminars so I had to hit it hard that morning.

Wow, there were some unbelievable mounts. These guys are artists in their own right. I just stood and stared at some of them. They were awesome. I’ve noticed lately that some of them do a mount of the head and have the hide tanned in folds. It’s like a flat picture. I just don’t have an artistic enough of an eye to think of stuff like that.

That leads into another twist. My buddy Ron Spomer is an unbelievable photographer. You need to know how to take good pictures, but I’ve noticed that Ron has an eye for what is going to be an awesome layout.

So, I guess I’ll never hit his level. First off, I can’t adjust my camera to take as detailed pictures as he does, and secondly I’m not artistic enough to know what makes for a great pose. So I’ve decided to take awesome pics, you have to be artistic and I don’t have an artistic bone in my body. You can check out some of his work on RonSpomerOutdoors.com or follow him on Instagram to check out some of his pics.

As alluded to above, I think that you could spend a good half-day just walking around looking at the mounts. There were two that really stood out to me. One was a rhino flipping a lion in the air. It was breathtaking. Then another display had a pride of lions lounging around with a lioness nursing a passel of kittens. I didn’t see it, but on Ron’s Instagram I saw a cool scene of a herd of wildebeest crossing a river.

Then, of course, there are a ton of booths filled with guides from all over the country. Dove hunts in Argentina on up to lion hunts in Africa and everything in-between. If you want to go on a cool guided hunt, this is the show to attend to find a good guide.

Then on top of that, you have a lot of the popular manufacturers. Leupold, Knives of Alaska/Diamond Blades, Hornady and below are a couple other knife companies that I didn’t know about.

I met Arno Bernard Knives, an outfit out of Africa that makes some really sweet knives. You’ll have to go on their website to check out how cool their handles are: www.knivesshipfree.com/arno-bernard-knives.

Then I met the Charlton boys out of North Carolina that make some cool Damascus Knives. Damascus steel has always amazed me. I’m not a metallurgist, but I recognize beauty when I see it. Check them out at www.damascususa.com

Well, we’re out of room but not out of booths to talk about, but I guess that I’ll have to shut it down. Some day you must attend the Safari Club International if you’ve never done so.

Tom Claycomb lives in Idaho and has outdoors columns in newspapers in Alaska, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, Colorado and Louisiana. He also writes for various outdoors magazines and teaches outdoors seminars at stores like Cabela’s, Sportsman’s Warehouse and Bass Pro Shop.

I love elk hunting. It’s the epitome of Western hunting, isn’t it? Anytime I meet someone from back east, they always ask about elk hunting.

The problem is I had all kinds of hunts lined up this past fall. I put in for a special draw down in the Owyhees and ended up with a cow tag over near Hells Canyon. Not sure how that happened. Maybe they couldn’t read my writing.

I also had a 17-day Alaskan trip planned. My cow tag opened the day I got back. Then I just signed on with a new outfit and got a landowner’s cow tag down south, and I also had the opportunity for a trophy bull hunt in Nevada. Too many options, not enough time.

So, for today let’s talk about the Owyhee cow hunt. My buddy Steve Meyer and I picked up the landowner cow tags and headed down scouting. At first, all that we could find were bulls, of course. Nice bulls. I teach a lot of glassing for big game seminars. In fact, I’ve got two at the Dallas Safari Club Convention and Expo in Dallas and at the Safari Club International Convention in Las Vegas and yet I’m still amazed at how much game I see when I glass.

Late afternoon, we were about to move spots and I told Steve to hold on a second and let me glass. I threw up my Leupold spotting scope and within seconds we saw some elk. A bunch of elk. Like about 200. The problem was, they were 7 miles away across a super deep canyon. We wouldn’t even get to them before dark.

The next weekend I went back and parked close to where I thought the big herd was and headed towards them. I had to cross a knee-deep creek, but finally after a couple of miles I thought I was close. However, could not find hide nor hair. I sat down and started glassing and suddenly saw six.

I crossed a half-mile open spot as they grazed over a knoll, and when I snuck over the knoll, I was within 40 yards of them. It had to have been blowing 30 mph and I’d forgotten my shooting sticks and couldn’t hold steady.

The next week Steve and I went back but never could find any elk. The next week I headed down and met a local rancher that was checking cows and hunting on the side. He said I could run with him, so we unloaded out 4-wheelers and took off.

We covered a lot of ground but couldn’t find anything. After many miles we ran across a whole passel of tracks. Great. We’d found the elk army. We went for a good ways and were almost into Nevada.

The rancher was ready to turn around but told me to glass for a second. Once again, the glassing paid off. Seemingly in clear view not much over a mile away, I spotted about 20-30 elk on the side of a ridge. The rancher told me to go ahead if I thought that I could sneak up on them and he’d stay put and see if I spooked a big bull.

The snow was a little deep in the draws, but I had to sneak up on them for cover. After 30 minutes, I peeked over the edge to orientate where they were. Still a good 800 yards off. I ducked down another draw and in a bit popped up again. Now a good 400 yards off. Nothing to do but try to work closer.

As I was working closer, I got on a good blood trail. I trailed the elk all the way up to the herd but never located the animal. I knew I had to be close and hunched over to crawl out of the draw. I came up behind a small bush and there was some elk grazing not 20-30 yards away. It’s amazing how out in the middle of a million bare plains, and I’d been lucky enough to sneak up on two herds.

I slipped up my rifle and took a shot. They took off. I ran over the ridge and took another shot at the closest one.

Oh my gosh, I’ve never seen this big of a herd in my life. There had to be 400-500 elk. Mine had fallen about 40 yards off. Unbelievable. The first shot had blown half of the elk’s heart off and it still took off like it wasn’t even hit. Wow, elk are tough. And that was with a Federal 250-grain .338 Winchester Magnum.

I took a few pics and then started cleaning the elk. Before long the rancher showed up and we loaded the animal up on his 4-wheeler. Wow, what a great day it’d been. And we now have a freezer full of elk meat.

Tom Claycomb lives in Idaho and has outdoors columns in newspapers in Alaska, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, Colorado and Louisiana. He also writes for various outdoors magazines and teaches outdoors seminars at stores like Cabela’s, Sportsman’s Warehouse and Bass Pro Shop.

For decades at work, church or just walking down the sidewalk, I’ve endured doting old grandparents flashing pictures of their slobbering little grandkids.

I swore I’d never be like that. No one cares about your grandkid. Get over it. He or she is nothing special. At least that’s what I thought.

And then, I just had one. Well, I guess I didn’t actually have one. My daughter played a small part in having him.

My daughters have always been the apples of my eye, but now that a grandkid is here, the oldest and her husband have been demoted. Their only use now is to be modes of transportation to get the grandkid over to see me.

So enough about all of that. Kids nowadays live in a wicked world. There’s all kinds of electronic gizmos to draw them away from hunting, fishing and camping (with Grandpa, of course).

When I was a kid in the winter months, we’d go duck hunting every morning before school. We’d slide into school at the last second with duck feathers stuck on us.

In junior high, they called me “Gloves” because my hands were brown from running trap lines and sticking my hands in freezing cold water. In PE, it looked like I had a pair of gloves on. Now? Gee, all the boys’ hands are as soft as a newborn pig’s hiney because they play on computers all day and their moms rub their hands with Vaseline so they don’t get chapped and cracked.

So I knew I had to formulate a plan fast to overcome all of this negativity. I went to the drawing room. As a kid, mom and dad got us kids a BB gun when we were 6 years old, a pellet gun when we were 9, a shotgun when we were 10 and a .22 when we were 12.

But, drastic times call for drastic measures, so we had to jumpstart his training. I figured at the ripe old age of 5 months he should be ready to get his first gun.

But what should it be? There are literally hundreds of BB guns on the market now. After much research and soul searching, I figured I’d go with my gut feeling and the advice of the famous movie “A Christmas Story” and get him the famous Daisy “Red Ryder.”

I assured his nervous mom and dad that he was old enough. Now all I have to do is figure how he can go ground squirrel hunting with me. He’s not even strong enough yet to hold a baby bottle. Oh well, minor detail.

And not to be one that pushes the limit or anything, but he for sure needed a new hat. All he currently has are the weird stocking hats the kids wear who act like they’re some cross between a yuppie mountain man skier and John Denver. That’ll never cut it on my grandkid, so I ran to my local outdoor store and bought him a Daniel Boone coon skin hat. It may have fake fur but it does have a real coon tail. Pretty neat huh?

Now all I have to do is convince his mom that it’s safe to let me take him to the mountains. She has too many images in her mind as a kid of moose chasing her on the 4-wheeler, slamming into a deadfall while floating the river, camping in blizzards and storms blowing in and nearly swamping us while out fishing. But she’s in trouble. I know my rights. I have grandpa visitation rights.

At the risk of adding a little seriousness to the article I must say something. I believe F&G has done a grave disservice to kids and the hunting community in general by making kids wait until they’re 12 to get a hunting license. By the age of 12, they’re already into way too many other things. I once heard it said that the Catholics said to give them a child until he is 12 and they will have them for life. There’s a lot of truth to that statement.

I started shooting a shotgun at 7 and couldn’t even reach the trigger. I had to hold the stock under my arm and dad would only let me load one shell. I carried a rifle deer hunting at 9 or 10. Do you think this might have something to do with me loving the outdoors or becoming an Outdoor Writer?

Tom Claycomb lives in Idaho and has outdoors columns in newspapers in Alaska, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, Colorado and Louisiana. He also writes for various outdoors magazines and teaches outdoors seminars at stores like Cabela’s, Sportsman’s Warehouse and Bass Pro Shop.

Two weeks ago, we talked about salmon fishing in Alaska. This week let’s talk about how to catch them.

After the salmon enter the fresh water rivers, they quit feeding. Their whole purpose is to go upstream, spawn and then die.

You hear all kinds of theories as to why they hit since they’re no longer feeding. Most people theorize they’re not actually feeding but trying to pick up what they think is an egg sack floating down the river that they try to carry back to the nest. Because of this, a lot of us use pink flies, while some bait fishermen use egg sacks, because that explanation sounds plausible.

In a nutshell, I can’t tell you why they hit, but they do. So I’ll tell you what worked for us. Because we were fishing for silvers, that’s what I’m going to be talking about in this article.

We were using mainly pink flies or egg-sucking leeches. My buddy, Stan Tenza, says he uses a mouse fly now and then strips it across the stream, and it’s a blast catching them on top. He said they just slam it.

Most of the times I’ve gone to Alaska I’ve mainly been ocean fishing while hitting the rivers in the evenings. I’ve always used my 5-weight rod, but salmon will tear you up on a 5-weight. To me, a 10-weight is too unwieldy, but an 8-weight is too light.

So this year I got a Cabela’s 9-weight and it worked great. If you don’t have a big fly rod, you just aren’t going to be able to handle them. They’re going to tear you up and spool you. So my advice, buy a 9-weight.

Next, you’ll want a big reel. I got a Cabela’s Saltwater Prestige reel so I could also use it fishing for Reds in Louisiana. Because the rivers we were fishing weren’t more than 6 to 8 feet deep, I used floating line and a 9-foot leader. For tippet material, I used 15-pound test.

But salmon aren’t leader-shy. So you can tie your fly right onto your leader, but you’ll be tying on new leaders all day. So to me, it’s best to use some heavy tippet material.

Now that we’re set on gear, let’s talk about the fishing itself. Bright sunny bluebird days aren’t the best. The salmon are just a little too jumpy, which is understandable. If it’s bright, it’s easier for the seals, bears, wolves and eagles to jump in and grab them. I guess if I was the main attraction on the menu, I’d be a little nervous on sunny days, too. So we did best on overcast days.

I like to cast upstream a bit and strip my fly as it floats downstream. I don’t strip super-fast, but you don’t want to go too slow either. If it is lazily floating along, they have time to study it and know something is fishy. So you want to strip it slow enough so it doesn’t zip past them fast enough that they don’t see it. But it should be fast enough so it worries them that it’s going to get away if they don’t attack fast.

When they hit, you’ll know it. Not all, but many go airborne and do cartwheels. I had one do four to six cartwheels, so that’s fun. And they have some power. They will haul.

I was raised using my pointer finger and thumb to strip line and fight trout, but on salmon they’ll burn your fingers up. I’ve caught pinks and dogs before, but never silvers on a flyrod. I’d try to palm them, but invariably they’d zip off. And the handle would beat my fingers to a pulp before I was fast enough to move my hand.

One night I walked into the lodge and they were discussing how they fought salmon. There were two Canadians who were super good fly fisherman, and one of them leaned over to me and said, “I never palm my reel, do you? That’ll beat your fingers to death. I just tighten my drag to reel them in.”

I replied, “Oh yeah, only a real idiot would try to palm his reel. That’d whack the heck out of your fingers.” Ever since that conversation, I’ve used my drag to fight big fish.

Of course it goes without saying that you’ll want a big dip net to land your fish, and it’s best if someone is netting for you.

Well hopefully that’s enough advice to help you get jump-started. If you want the silver trip of a lifetime, give Alaska Expedition Co. a call at 800-572-0980. Have fun.

Tom Claycomb lives in Idaho and has outdoors columns in newspapers in Alaska, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, Colorado and Louisiana. He also writes for various outdoors magazines and teaches outdoors seminars at stores like Cabela’s, Sportsman’s Warehouse and Bass Pro Shop.

Last week, I said I’d do Part II of the salmon fishing series, but I’m cold and thought I’d slip in this one on some neat rechargeable hand warmers. Then I’ll wrap up the salmon article next week.

ThermaCELL has to be the most creative company in the world. I love dealing with them. As you know, they make a unique mosquito unit that is super popular with outdoorsmen. Then they came out with a variety of lanterns that incorporated their mosquito unit capabilities and a heated rechargeable insole that fits into your boots and are popular for a variety of applications.

Now they’ve come out with some heat packs. These are fresh on my mind because it’s 7 degrees this morning and has been for a day or two. Weather like this will make you find creative ways to stay warm.

ThermaCELL has come out with some cool heat packs that you can stick in your pockets for hand warmers. They even have bigger packs that can be stuck in your pocket to keep your core warm. I don’t know why all the cool stuff comes out after I’m grown up.

When I was a kid, there weren’t any good hunting clothes for kids. I wore my dad’s old hand-me-down cammies, which hung a foot past the tips of my fingers. To keep my feet warm, I’d wear three pairs of socks and stuff them into an already tight pair of cowboy boots. I don’t know if I ever had a warm hat as a kid.

Now there are all kinds of cool accessories for kids. There were electric socks when I was a kid, but they never worked. Same with the hand warmers that supposedly worked on lighter fluid. They always worked fine in camp until you crawled into your blind. But, back to the handwarmers that actually do work.

ThermaCELL sent me a set of handwarmers to test. They are actually a protocol set. The ones on the market have more features. But regardless, here’s the scoop. They make two sizes. The smaller one is 1 5/8×3 inches and the larger one is 2 7/8×4 inches.

They are water resistant and rechargeable and come with chargers.

To charge:

1. Plug the charger into the wall, about like charging your cellphone.
2. You can also use a USB connector to charge.
3. A red light will indicate that they are charging and it will turn green when they’re fully charged.
4. For those who have a Bushnell Solar Panel, you’re in luck. As stated above, they have a USB connector that sticks into the wall plug. Of course you can also use it to charge off of your solar panel.

To operate:

1. There are three settings that are activated by a button on the end. High (122 F), Medium (113 F) and Low (101 F). The lower the setting, the longer the battery will last. You can stick them in your pockets or in the back of your glove.

Once fully charged, it will give four hours of heat on high, five hours on medium and six hours on the low setting.

These are a great alternative to freezing or using expensive “one-time use” heat packs. I will be using them for hunting, 4-wheeling, ice fishing or when I’ve been hunting too much and Katy locks the door and I’m stuck sleeping on the porch.

Well, take care and have a Merry Christmas!

Tom Claycomb lives in Idaho and has outdoors columns in newspapers in Alaska, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, Colorado and Louisiana. He also writes for various outdoors magazines and teaches outdoors seminars at stores like Cabela’s, Sportsman’s Warehouse and Bass Pro Shop.

I recently started a new job. Caviness Beef out of Texas has joined with Simplot out of Idaho to form a company called C & S Beef.

We’re opening a new beef plant southwest of Boise. That will be a good deal for the ranchers and dairies because there’s no major cow/bull kills between Gibbon, Nebraska, and California.

We’re building the plant as you read this article. While the construction is going on, Simplot was decent enough to let us office in their corporate building. They have a nice cafeteria, so of course I’m eating lunches there.

Do hunters stick out that clearly? Or do we have something that just automatically draws us together like a magnet?

Here’s why I ask this. Within no time at all, I suddenly met a hunter. Then, of course, he introduced me to another one. Then one guy is buddy with another one, and he helps Millit Knives, the company that I did an article on the other day.

Then, suddenly, Holly pops up, and she is a big-time hunter. She shows me her scrapbook of all the mounts in her house and of some pictures from the Safari Club International Convention.

I don’t know, maybe hunters have some inner code that helps us all identify each other subliminally. Or maybe it’s because everything from our cellphone covers to our undies are camo’d. Plus, we all drive four-wheel drive vehicles with off-road vehicles strapped onto them and we all wear Cabela’s caps. Ha, maybe it’s not really that big of a mystery how we all meet each other.

OK, now that we’ve solved that mystery, which ranks right up there with why do geese fly in formation when heading south, let’s now get into the actual meat of the article.

Another guy that I met in the cafeteria is named Randy King. They told me that he was a chef and that he’d written a wild game cookbook. I had to meet him. Us outdoorsmen are always hunting for new wild game recipes, aren’t we?

We sat down at lunch one day and I got to know him. We got talking about his book and I soon had one in my hot little hands. I normally don’t write an article on any products until I’ve tested them. Of course, I can’t thoroughly test or write about a new product until I’d tested it for three years. By then, it’d be an old hat and there’d be approximately 3,879,560 reviews on the internet.

The same goes for a book review. You’re not supposed to write a book review until you’ve finished a book. Any idiot knows that. And, with a cookbook, you’ve got to wait until you’ve tried at least half of the recipes. Well, I’m not any idiot. I’m a special idiot, so I’m going to write a book review on Randy’s book, which is titled “Chef in the Wild” before I’ve finished it.

Before you self-righteous ones out there condemn me, remember this: How many of you bought a condensed book so you could whip out a fast book review for your high school English class? I know you’re out there.

I love Randy’s book. Between recipes, he intersperses cool stories. I love storytelling types of books. I guess I like reading them because it’s like sitting around a campfire telling stories. Just normal stories from normal people.

Randy is an excellent writer. The stories alone would be worth reading the book. On the other hand of the spectrum, just the recipes alone would be worth reading the book. But, as we close, you ought to check out this book. I’m really enjoying it. Even if you’re not a hunter, I think you’ll really like it. Happy eating.

To buy “Chef in the Wild,” visit caxtonpress.com.

Tom Claycomb lives in Idaho and has outdoors columns in newspapers in Alaska, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, Colorado and Louisiana. He also writes for various outdoors magazines and teaches outdoors seminars at stores like Cabela’s, Sportsman’s Warehouse and Bass Pro Shop.

All outdoorsmen use a knife and yet seemingly a very small minority can sharpen one. Houston, that’s a problem.

It seems to be a lost skill of the ancients, but let’s see if we can’t help you out a little. Because of the complexity of the topic, I won’t be able to totally train you in one short article, but I’ve included some links below for further instruction.

To begin, nowadays most knives are constructed of metal that is so hard that you cannot adequately sharpen them on an Arkansas stone. That’s why I recommend using a fine diamond stone. With them, you’ll be able to obtain an edge within minutes. I’ve had good luck with Smith’s Consumer Products.

You see some people grinding their knife in a circular motion, cutting into the stone and cutting away. Which way is the correct method? It doesn’t matter as long as you use the correct angle all the way down the edge.

For simplicity, I cut into the stone three times on each side. You will have a tendency to get a steeper angle as you get into the curvature of the blade. To eliminate this habit, I recommend lifting your elbow when you reach this point of the procedure. Watch the YouTube at the end of the article to comprehend what I mean.

If the edge is really dinged up and mushroomed, I’ll slide the blade backwards the first four revolutions and then start cutting motions into the stone.

To put on a finer edge, you’ll now advance to the Arkansas stone. Add a few drops of honing oil before you start. Use the same procedures as you employed on the diamond stone until the edge feels smooth. When it does, then test it by slicing a piece of paper.

Most boning knives and fish fillet knives are going to be made of softer metal. So to sharpen one of them, you’ll want to start right off on an Arkansas stone. Then, to get a wicked edge, you’ll need to progress to a smooth steel. Doing this will put an unbelievably sharp edge on them.

For smooth steel to perform, it is imperative that you properly prepare it. I use 80-grit emery cloth and rub it up and down to put microscopic lines in the steel. You want these lines running straight from head to tail. If the steel is dinged up, rusted or has pits, it will harm your knife more than it will help it.

To use a smooth steel, I hold it in my left hand against my bottom rib for stability and cut away from me, almost like I’m peeling a carrot. Do this move at the exact same angle that you sharpened it. If you do this every two minutes while filleting fish or boning out your game, it is possible to stay razor sharp all day long.

With some practice, you can become proficient at sharpening. But if you try to learn on a cheap knife from China, you’ll be frustrated and lose faith. Use good knives. I’ve had good luck with Knives of Alaska. They’re well-made and constructed out of good materials. The metal is hard so they will hold an edge but not so hard that they cannot be easily sharpened.

I have an article on Amazon Kindle titled “Knife Sharpening” that goes in greater detail: http://tinyurl.com/jonty2p.

For the knife sharpening video on YouTube, go to Ron Spomer Outdoors: http://tinyurl.com/zztdog5.

Tom Claycomb lives in Idaho and has outdoors columns in newspapers in Alaska, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, Colorado and Louisiana. He also writes for various outdoors magazines and teaches outdoors seminars at stores like Cabela’s, Sportsman’s Warehouse and Bass Pro Shop.