Hunting and gathering has come a long way - maybe too far. The digital age has infiltrated the backwoods, tilting the odds ever more in favor of gadget-packin' bipeds. In response, some states are establishing hunting codes for the 21st century: Washington state has outlawed robotic duck decoys and night-vision goggles and is considering restrictions on digital turkey calls. While the core technology in firearms has remained essentially unchanged for a century, just about everything else in the hunt has been upgraded. Here's a look at what the well-equipped deer stalker is wearing and carrying this fall.
The trees have eyes
TrailTimer's PhotoHunter "hunts while you can't," says the manufacturer. The $240 tree-mounted cam and IR beam combo detects prey and snaps a time-stamped photo. The candid pics help a hunter determine the most likely time that big buck will make his next rounds.
Camo chameleon
Camouflage designer Realtree scoured the countryside to collect thousands of images, including cattails, cornstalks, oak leaves, and cedar limbs. Graphic artists gave their designs to hi-def fabric printers, who produced photorealistic marsh, forest, and field patterns for brands like Bass Pro. Put one on and disappear.
Calling all deer
The $270 Western Rivers Predation, a remote-controlled MP3 player, has a 32-Mbyte hard drive preloaded with proven draws such as "Fawn Distress"; a bit extra gets you bonus tracks like "Buck Social Grunt." An attached speaker projects the calls into the forest and lures the deer.
Now hear this
Acute hearing is one of the last advantages wild animals have over humans. The $490 Walker's Digital Game Ear levels the playing field. Game Ear-equipped hunters can tune in up to seven times better than normal, allowing them to detect the snap of twigs or rustle of leaves from hundreds of yards away.
You can't miss
Enter altitude, barometric pressure, temperature, wind speed, and humidity data into Horus Vision's ballistics system, and it'll help you shoot targets from more than 2 miles away. The $453 system - sold separately from the scope and your GPS and weather metering devices - provides the precise sight adjustments to make when using the scope's patented crosshair grid. The HV promise: "Extreme shooting made easy."
- Joshua Davis
credit: Gabriela Hasbun
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