While not all these things have led to success. They have led to me enjoying myself more, and accomplishing things easier when hunting.
Clothing
Wool clothing is king. It makes almost no noise when moving or rubbing on things a massive plus when hunting. It repels water really well unless you soak it in puddle or body of water. It keeps you a lot warmer then most of the other fabrics. Overall it's made sitting in the woods in nasty weather, rain, or snow an easy thing to do. This last hunting season I spent most of the week at the hunting camp in just the wool's and my blaze orange.
Also a good pair of rubber boots. I have hunting boots, they are useless to me. Every time I've used them I've soaked them or got them covered in mud. So now all I use is rubber boots when hunting.
What I use for hunting clothing:
- Rubber boots
- Marino wool thermal under layers. Or if it's a warmer day, I use synthetic ones to wick moister off me better.
- Surplus Canadian military knee high wool socks (From site sponsor Army Issue Surplus)
- Big Bill Marino wool pants
- Suspenders (Far superior to using belts)
- Surplus Canadian military wool shirt. (From site sponsor Army Issue Surplus)
- Yukon wear hunting jacket from Canadian Tire(Only when extra cold or raining. Often I'm not even wearing it if in a blind and I plan to swap this out for a big bill wool jacket)
Equipment
For cleaning deer In the field, I have found the Buttout tool to be a massive help. Makes cutting and dealing with it's ass area much easier and cleaner. Just push it in, twist a couple times and pull out. Tie it off and continue cleaning the deer. Worked great this year.
For knives I have really liked my outdoor edge ones. They were affordable, and sharp. I've now cleaned 5 deer with the gamepro boxed set and I have no complaints. But the one I like the most from them is their original swing blade knife. The main blade is a dream to cut with, but it's swing out gutting blade makes cutting the hide fast and clean. They advertise it opens big game like a zipper, and I can attest to it doing just that.
Having good lights is important. No matter the brand, having a reliable headlamp and flashlight as well as back ups is necessary. Personally I'm using Olights. A Warrior 3 with up to 2300 lumens. As well as their Array 2s headlamp with up too 1000 Lumens. The Array 2s has got a few different light modes. Flood + spotlight, floodlight, spotlight, red light. All have different intensity levels that can be changed by simply waving your hand in front of it. It was the sole light we used when hanging the deer this year after bringing them in and it lit up the entire yard as if a truck was throwing high beams. And using it in the morning on red mode doesn't screw with your eyes the same when needing to adjust to darkness like the blue/white light does.
Having AA, or AAA backup ones is also useful. I carry one extra head lamp, with a set of extra batteries in the jacket just in case I'm stuck out there for hours after dark or the lithium based lights run out (This has happened when tracking late after dark). Though the backups I have are considerably worse, more like 100lm's, which is like the lowest setting of the Array 2s but as a backup they work just fine.
A good range finder is also important. Having one you can use in low light conditions is key. Any brand or model that illuminates the readings works. If it isn't waterproof it isn't worth owning, and that also goes for your lights, as well as scopes and boots.
