After spending three months adrift on the Pacific Ocean, Australian sailor Timothy Shaddock was rescued by a group of Mexican tuna fisherman on July 12, the Associated Press reports. Stepping on dry land for the first time since April, Shaddock recounted on July 18 how he and his “amazing” dog Bella survived the ordeal by eating raw fish and drinking rainwater.

“I’m feeling all right. I’m feeling a lot better than I was,” Shaddock told reporters during a welcome ceremony in Manzanillo on Tuesday. “To the captain and fishing company that saved my life, I’m just so grateful.”

The 54-year-old sailor added that there were times when he didn’t think he’d survive. But thanks to his perseverance and ingenuity, he’ll be returning to Australia soon to reunite with his family.

“There were many, many, many bad days and many good days,” Shaddock said of his time adrift at sea.

The First Bad Day

Shaddock set sail in April from the Mexican city of La Paz, which is located in Baja on the Sea of Cortez. He was joined on his small catamaran, named the Aloha Toa, by Bella, a stray dog that he’d picked up during his travels in Mexico.

“She’s the spirit of the middle of the country and she wouldn’t let me go,” he said of his newfound companion. “I tried to find a home for her three times, and she just kept following me onto the water. She’s a lot braver than I am, that’s for sure.”

Shaddock originally planned to sail across the Pacific to French Polynesia, but that plan fell apart just weeks into the journey. He ran into bad weather in early May after sailing out of the Sea of Cortez and into the Pacific, and his catamaran was badly damaged in a storm. Without any electronics or the ability to cook, he and Bella found themselves adrift in a crippled vessel.

Survival at Sea

Fortunately, Shaddock had some fishing gear onboard. He spent the following weeks, which soon turned into months, catching fish, eating them raw, and sharing the meat with his dog.

While it’s unknown what kind of fish he was catching, the Sea of Cortez and South Pacific are known as some of the most fertile fishing grounds on the planet. They’re home to large numbers of billfish, dolphin, bonito, tuna, and other saltwater species that can be eaten raw. (Some of these species carry parasites and there is always a risk when eating uncooked fish straight from the ocean.)

As for how they stayed hydrated, Shaddock said he collected rainwater the whole time. He didn’t explain how, but there are a few different ways he could have done this—like using a tarp or one of his sails to catch and funnel the water into a receptacle.

Read Next: 10 Primitive Survival Skills that Will Keep You Alive

Of course, physical needs are only part of the equation when trying to survive in the open ocean. And Shaddock said he was able to stay sane all those months by tinkering with his boat and taking the occasional swim, which allowed him to “just enjoy being in the water.”

Saved by Fish, Rescued by Fishermen     

Shaddock has Grupo Mar, a Manzanillo-based commercial tuna fishing fleet, to thank for his eventual rescue. A helicopter pilot that was scouting for the fleet spotted his small catamaran roughly 1,200 miles from land. The pilot then returned with the María Delia, one of Grupo Mar’s tuna boats.

The crew did what they could to help Shaddock and his dog, who were both in a “precarious” state, according to the company. They gave them food, water, and medical attention before bringing them back to port on July 18. One of the crew members also agreed to adopt Bella and promised Shaddock that he’d take good care of the dog.

Shaddock has since been cleared by doctors and local governments to return to his native country. And when an AP reporter asked him what meal he was looking forward to the most when he got home, he gave an unexpected answer.

“Tuna,” he replied. “Sushi.”

The post Sailor and His Dog Survive 3 Months at Sea by Eating Raw Fish and Drinking Rainwater appeared first on Outdoor Life.

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As if all the biting bugs that are visible to the naked eye weren’t nuisance enough during the summer, the tiny chigger is nearly impossible to spot and produces giant welts that are maddeningly itchy. The good news is that, unlike ticks and mosquitoes, chiggers don’t usually carry diseases in the U.S. and chigger bite treatment can be administered at home with basic first aid supplies.

What chiggers in the U.S. have historically lacked in disease risk, they more than make up for with itch factor. The bites will drive you crazy if you don’t treat them. If you’ve never even heard of chiggers before, then lucky you. If you’re suffering from chigger bites as you read this, then relief is on the way. We’ll cover everything from where chiggers live to what the tiny bugs look like, how they bite, how to differentiate chigger bites from other bug bites, and how to treat them.

What Are Chiggers?

In order to understand proper chigger bite treatment, it’s helpful to first know what chiggers are and where they live. Chiggers are the larval form of a mite species in the Trombiculidae family. They are technically arachnids, like spiders and ticks, although they are much smaller and often aren’t visible without a magnifying glass or microscope. The larvae are less than 1/150th of an inch, while adults are about 1/60th of an inch. If you do manage to get eyes on one, they can be an orange or bright crimson color, hence the other common nickname: berry bugs.

Humans need only worry about these parasites in their newborn larval stage. After hatching, they require a meal to mature into nymphs and adults. They cling to clothing and eventually make their way to skin, where they inject a special digestive enzyme that breaks down skin cells. They actually spend three to four days feeding on the dead, liquified skin cells that result from their saliva. (Contrary to popular belief, chiggers do not feed on human blood as mosquitos do.) This enzyme is what causes the violent itching. Chiggers may stay attached for multiple days to feed on their hosts, assuming the hosts don’t furiously scratch them off. (We don’t recommend doing this, since it won’t make the bites itch any less and could potentially lead to infection.)

Where Do Chiggers Live?

Chiggers lay waiting for their host in wooded areas in tall grasses and shrubs, especially near water and in shade. They exist globally and across the U.S., but are more common in more humid places since they prefer moisture. For that reason, you are more likely to encounter chiggers in the South, Mid-Atlantic, and Great Lakes regions than you are in the Northeast, Northern Midwest, Mountain West or Southwest.

Chiggers are most active during the late spring to early fall months. If the ground temperature is hovering between 77 and 86 degrees Fahrenheit, they’re certainly on the move and looking for a meal. Any ground temperature drop below 42 degrees spells almost certain death for chiggers.

Chigger Bite Symptoms

Telling symptoms of a chigger bite from other bug bites and rashes can be tricky, but knowing what to look for is helpful. Chigger bites are:

• Red
• Itchy
• Small bumps
• Multiple bites in a small area
• Clustered in areas covered by tight-fitting clothing or waistbands
• In areas with thin or wrinkled skin
• Sometimes accompanied by pustules or whiteheads, similar to ingrown hairs

Because chiggers move from clothing onto skin, places where clothing is in close contact with skin are the most vulnerable, second only to places without any clothing cover. Chigger bites are common on the ankles, backs of knees, groin, belt-line, and armpits.

Some people describe chigger bites as a “chigger rash,” since the bites are small and clustered. They can resemble other types of rashes like sun rash or poison ivy. Look for clusters of irritated, little white pustules resembling ingrown hairs rather than liquid-filled blisters or sprawling patches of red skin.

How to Treat a Chigger Bite

If a strange collection of itchy red bites appear after a hike, early-season hunt, or yard work, there are a series of steps you can take to ward off the worst of the symptoms. Steps for chigger bite treatment include:

1. Taking a shower. Wash the area with soap, warm water, and a washcloth or loofah. This step helps ensure that any remaining chiggers wind up down the drain and don’t stay on your skin, drooling skin-melting enzymes onto your ankles or the backs of your knees. Better yet, take a shower or a bath. Scrub a little harder than usual.
2. Doing a load of laundry. Wash any and all clothes, blankets, and other textiles that you brought outdoors in hot water. They might still have chiggers hanging around and waiting for an opportunity to jump to skin.
3. Applying ointment. Treat the bites and rash with over-the-counter anti-itch cream. For some folks, calamine lotion does the best job. Others prefer a hydrocortisone cream, or maybe a swipe of menthol ointment. Keep applying in the days and weeks that follow to stave off the itchiness. 
4. Taking meds. If creams and ointments aren’t getting the job done, take an antihistamine like Benadryl before going to bed. This will treat the itch systemically rather than topically. You can also apply cold compresses to relieve the fiery irritation.
5. Watching the area closely. If you scratch the bites too much and accidentally break the skin, you run the risk of infection, which could require antibiotics to clear up. You could also react to the bites so severely that you require a steroid shot. If anything extreme arises, contact your doctor. Expect the bites to itch for one to two weeks.

Chigger Bite Prevention

Like most other outdoor pests, chigger bites can be prevented with proper care and attention to detail. Insect control is, after all, one of the most important ways to stay safe in the outdoors.

• Wear long, loose-fitting clothing if you’re going to walk through woodlands, tall grass, or brush.
• Before you go outside, douse yourself in an insect repellent of your choosing. Anything you would use as a mosquito repellent for camping should work fine, as long as it has DEET. 
• Consider treating your clothes with permethrin before wearing them outside. Permethrin is considered one of the best tick repellents and can make a big difference in deflecting all types of nasty biting bugs. You can also buy pretreated insect-repellent clothing.
• When you get home, throw your clothes in the wash and take a hot, soapy shower. Scrubbing your skin with lots of soap can help kill chiggers before they get a chance to bite you.

FAQs

Final Thoughts on Chigger Bites

Chiggers can put a damper on an outdoor weekend by leaving you with ferociously itchy skin for the weeks that follow. Having some chigger bite treatment tips memorized can help you avoid the worst of the itchiness, and knowing how to prevent chigger bites in the first place means you probably won’t need to deal with them. As with all bug bites, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.       

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Everything we know about tick bite symptoms seems to have been watered down to a single telltale warning sign: the bullseye rash. If no red rings show up around the site of your tick bite, then you’re fine, right? Not necessarily, according to the experts.

There are plenty of tick bite symptoms that warrant a visit to your doctor’s office. While increasingly common (and now of concern year-round in some parts of the country), tick bites are not something to take lightly. The health consequences can range from an irritated bite mark that lasts a few weeks to a serious illness that lands you in the hospital or with chronic complaints.

We spoke with public health entomology expert Phurchhoki Sherpa, coordinator for the Purdue University Public Health Entomology Program. Medical entomology is a fancy term for the area of medicine concerning insect-borne diseases like Lyme and malaria. Sherpa has spent countless hours in the field collecting ticks for research purposes, and she knows more than her fair share about what can happen when a tick bites you.

What to Do When a Tick Bites You

If you find a tick latched onto your skin, first you should review how to remove a tick and follow that procedure. (Quick refresher: grab your tweezers or tick removal tool, grasp the tick as close to your skin as possible, and pull until it releases.) The best immediate tick bite treatment options involve cleaning the bite with some sort of disinfectant—hydrogen peroxide or rubbing alcohol are good options—and applying an antibiotic ointment of your choosing. Your tick bite may look and feel like a chigger bite or any other bug bite in the days that follow, or you may find that an angry, itchy bump persists for weeks as it heals.

“It can look as benign as a mosquito bite, like a little itchy welt, especially if the tick has fallen off without you realizing you had it,” Sherpa tells Outdoor Life. She notes that such circumstances are common with tiny, immature ticks that are hard to see. “It can also look kind of scary, with a scab on the bite mark. It varies.”

Common Tick Bite Symptoms

Sherpa is referring to the rashes, scabs, and swelling that can accompany a tick bite. Always keep an eye out for a bullseye rash (the traditional symptom that is present in some, though not all, Lyme disease cases). A bullseye rash can appear not just around the bite mark, but anywhere on the body. Small, hard scabs might form around the bite. If they’re dark and crusty, this might be an early sign of a type of tick-borne disease known as spotted fever (more on this in a minute). If the bite mark exhibits other signs of infection, like extreme swelling, pustules, blistering, or anything else abnormal, seek medical treatment immediately. 

Beyond the early, visible symptoms of a tick bite, be on the lookout for these more systemic symptoms that most or all tick-borne illnesses share. These symptoms might pop up anywhere from a day to a few weeks after the bite: 

• Fever
• Chills
• Headache
• Muscle ache
• Fatigue
• Nausea/vomiting
• Joint aches/arthritic pain

Tick-Borne Illnesses You Should Know About

Most tick bites will not cause you any further trauma than a mosquito bite would. After all, half or fewer of all ticks are infected with transmissible diseases. If the tick wasn’t latched deep into your skin or wasn’t engorged with blood yet, it probably didn’t get the chance to transmit anything. For example, it usually takes at least 36 hours for an attached tick to transmit Lyme disease to its human host. 

But if your tick bite does transform into something of concern, it’s good to know about the various tick-borne illnesses you could develop. The risk of each tick-borne illness changes depending on where in North America you picked up the tick, Sherpa says. This is because different types of ticks carry different diseases. 

This is not an exhaustive list of all possible tick-borne illnesses. But here are eight tick-borne diseases that you should absolutely know about.

Tick Bite Prevention

Fortunately, with proper tick bite prevention, there’s no reason to avoid the outdoors—especially not during the most enjoyable months of the year.

Dress, Treat, and Check

Tick bite prevention goes beyond simply drowning yourself in the best tick repellent. It also involves wearing the right clothes, treating your gear with permethrin, and doing multiple tick checks in the field and after the day is over. 

“I tell [hikers] to wear light-colored clothing so they can detect ticks earlier and faster, especially the ones that would go unnoticed if we wore patterns or dark clothing,” Sherpa says. “Tuck your shirt into your pants, tuck your pant legs into your socks, always wear close-toed shoes with long socks when you’re outdoors.” 

Sherpa also acknowledges that hunters have to do things a little differently if they want to avoid tick bites and the scary symptoms that can come with them. We spend more time bushwhacking than we do on trails, we wear dark and patterned clothing (hello camouflage), and we’re outside for a long time.

“When you’re hunting, you’re in the field for a while. You’re waiting, walking around. So do a tick check every few hours. The faster you can find the tick and get rid of it, the better,” she says. “When you get home, check yourself and your camo clothing. If you have a dryer, put your clothes in the dryer on high heat for about 20 minutes. The heat will decimate the ticks. And the sooner you can take a shower, the better.” 

If showers and dryers are unavailable back at camp, or you refuse to put your expensive merino wool or rain gear in a dryer, treating your clothes with permethrin is the best line of defense. Make sure to follow the instructions on the bottle and wear gloves to avoid getting any on your skin.

Parts of the Body Likely to Get Tick Bites

When it comes to tick checks, close attention to detail makes all the difference. Check under your armpits, behind your ears, along your hairline, in your groin area, between your toes, behind your knees, and even in your belly button. Sherpa highlights all these spots as dark, easy-to-overlook hiding holes for ticks of all sizes.

If your legs and arms are bare, not only is there a chance they bite your ankles or inside your elbows, but they could also crawl under your shirt or shorts. By wearing long sleeves and pants and tucking in all your layers, you limit a tick’s chances of accessing any skin, let alone skin in a hard-to-reach place.

Tick Bite FAQs

Final Thoughts

Tick bite symptoms can range from a small, itchy welt to a series of flu-like ailments that could land you in the hospital if left untreated. That’s why it’s crucial to know what types of ticks live in your area and what diseases they might carry. 

Read Next: How to Remove a Tick From a Dog

The good news is that these scary tick-borne diseases with their array of side effects are all avoidable, thanks to the time-tested prevention strategies outdoorswomen and men now swear by. The age-old adage about an ounce of prevention being worth a pound of cure holds true, Sherpa says.

“We as humans are lazy. We don’t like dealing with that extra work. But prevention goes a long way when it comes to tick bites and tick-borne diseases. It is really important to take preventative measures when you go out,” Sherpa says. “If people aren’t sure about the worthiness of prevention measures, they should talk to someone who has had a tick-borne disease before.”

The post Tick Bite Symptoms appeared first on Outdoor Life.

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Captain Alex Rogers will always remember the worst day of his sportfishing career. It was when he watched his 33-foot offshore fishing boat sink to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. Rogers captured footage of the aptly named “disaster at sea” in July 2022 and shared the series of videos to his TikTok page, where they’ve been seen by millions of viewers.

@fishcabo Im gonna Ride her down! #fishprotocol #fishcabo #sinkingboat #liferaft #cabo #surrender #protocolsportfishing #winslowliferaft ♬ Surrender – Natalie Taylor

To get the full story behind the videos, Outdoor Life caught up with Rogers over the phone. From his home base in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, the 52-year-old charter captain shared the story of how his boat went down, and how he and his crew survived 12 hours in a life raft before they were rescued by one of his fishing buddies.

A Sinking Feeling

It all started the morning of July 18 with a 500-pound marlin, says Rogers, a California native who moved south to Cabo several years ago and started running offshore trips from a 33-foot Rampage he named the Protocol.

“The only reason I had a camera running that morning is because we were about 45 to 50 minutes into fighting a 500-pound blue marlin, and I wanted a video of the fight and catch,” Rogers says. “I was backing down hard on the fish, which washes big waves of water over the transom.”

Read Next: Hard-Fighting Marlin Punches Hole in Boat Engine, Strands Anglers in Open Ocean

He says this is something that all bluewater captains do when trying to land a huge fish like a marlin. And he’d backed down on other billfish in the Protocol countless times before. But unknown to Rogers, his first mate Cristian Balderas, and the four paying anglers on board, one of the through-hull fittings for the motor’s exhaust pipe had failed, which opened a giant hole in the boat’s stern.

“I noticed water was still on the stern deck and we hadn’t been backing down on the fish and taking water over the transom for awhile,” he explains. “That didn’t make sense. Then my starboard engine went dead.”

@fishcabo My guys stayed focused! #fishprotocol #fishcabo #cabo #sinkingboat #liferaft #billfish #lostatsea #yousay @Pure Okie ♬ You Say – Lauren Daigle

At that point, around 10 a.m., Rogers climbed down from the tuna tower and opened the engine compartment. It was overflowing with water. His clients were still hooked up with the marlin and trying to land it, but Rogers had to pull them off the rod as the boat kept sinking lower.

“We got a bucket brigade working with the anglers, trying to pitch water out of the cockpit, but to no avail. At that point the scupper holes were underwater, and the boat was filling faster with water,” Rogers says. “I knew something bad was happening.”

Mayday

Now realizing that the Protocol was beyond saving, Rogers climbed back in the tuna tower and used his radio to call in a mayday.

“I was on the radio broadcasting our location when my electronics died,” Rogers says. “I was clueless the boat would sink that fast, [but] when I realized we were going down, I tossed down the life raft box. By that time my boat was really going under, and I just stepped off the bridge and into the warm Pacific.”

@fishcabo Replying to @walnutcafe8 #fishprotocol #sinkingboat #liferaft #cabo #billfish #winslowliferaft #jacksparrow #captainjacksparrow #fishcabo ♬ Addicted – KING COLE

His crew had already grabbed life jackets, and they swam away from the sinking boat to deploy the life raft. Rogers, meanwhile, kept filming as he watched his boat sink down in 10,000 feet of clear blue water.

“That’s when I realized the real challenge was ahead of us.”

12 Hours in a Raft

The Winslow life raft had a roof, along with basic emergency gear like water, flares, and fishing tackle. But it was rated for five people, and they had six adult men on board.

“The guys were distressed,” Rogers recalls. “We were cramped inside the raft with our legs entangled. It was pretty bad for the long hours we spent bobbing on the ocean.”

@fishcabo Sorry! Here is the sound! #fishprotocol #sinkingboat #fishcabo #winslowliferaft #billfish #protocolsportfishing #survival #aftco #jacksparrow #lostatsea ♬ original sound – Alex Rogers

With a hurricane brewing 200 miles away, the waves were rough and most of the men got seasick. Some puked over the side of the raft. Even going to the bathroom was difficult as they had to jump into the ocean to relieve themselves.

“It’s traumatic to be adrift in a raft on the open water. We had a range of emotions. Despair, hope, anger, frustration. I prayed to God. Apologized to God. Made promises to God.”

In between prayers, Rogers tried to stay positive. He says he was confident that one of his friends from Cabo’s close-knit fishing community would come save them.

What he didn’t realize at the time was that his GPS coordinates weren’t accurately received when he called in the mayday. This meant that some of his friends were searching more than 25 miles away from where the Protocol actually sank. High waves and strong currents made it harder to pinpoint their location, and even the Mexican Navy was unable to find them.

Read Next: Hawaiian Angler Missing at Sea After Being Pulled Overboard by a Giant Tuna

“The Navy quit looking for us at 7 p.m., and they closed the harbor down for boats because the hurricane was bearing down on us,” says Rogers, who credits his wife Brandi for coordinating with the U.S. Coast Guard, the American Consulate, and the charter captains they knew in Cabo. “But the offshore fishing community headed out anyways [and looked] for us long after sundown.”

Finally, around 11 p.m., after 12 hours adrift in the Pacific, someone in the raft said they thought they heard a boat engine.

“I could see a boat’s running lights almost a mile away, and I started jumping and signaling to it,” Rogers says. “I watched the boat turn, then spotted its red-and-green navigation lights coming to us.”

Pancho Bojorquez, a local charter captain and one of Rogers’ friends, was at the wheel of the 35-foot Viking. He was joined by eight or 10 others, who were almost as happy to see the anglers as the anglers were to be rescued.  

“I knew then we were going to be saved,” Rogers says. “And all of us just started going nuts in the raft.”

@fishcabo Replying to @gecko.rau #fishcabo #fishprotocol #survival #lostatsea #protocolsportfishing #pro2col #billfish #winslowliferaft ♬ original sound – Alex Rogers

Back on shore, the fishermen reunited with their friends and families. And within two months’ time, Rogers bought a new 38-foot Egg Harbor boat, which he named the Right Rigger. He’s since replaced the roughly $60,000 worth of offshore tackle that sunk along with the Protocol. But he says the most important item on the new boat is a brand-new life raft.

“Those rafts are pricey, some up to about $5,000, but that’s the best money anyone can spend who fishes open water,” Rogers says. “When I bought the Protocol, my friend the late Ted Barta told me to buy a good Winslow raft for the boat because one day it might save my life. “Best advice I ever got from a legend in the offshore fishing world. That raft saved all our lives.”

The post Watch a ‘Disaster at Sea’ Unfold as a Fishing Boat Sinks Off the Coast of Mexico appeared first on Outdoor Life.

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If it seems like ticks are everywhere these days, that’s because they are. There are many different types of ticks that have adapted for a variety of climates, and they continue adapting and expanding their range amid climate change. From New England and the northern reaches of Canada to the American Southwest, everyone needs to be on the lookout for ticks, which can carry serious diseases. Outdoorsmen and women are particularly at risk, but even folks who don’t go outside much can pick up ticks in their yard or from their dogs. That’s why it’s important to be able to identify the types of ticks that live in your area.

The Life-Cycle of a Tick

While it can feel like ticks target us humans far too often, ticks will actually feed on most living animals, including birds, mammals, reptiles, and even a few amphibians.

“A lot of these types of ticks are generalist feeders that are willing to feed on whatever wanders past,” says Griffin Dill, the Tick Lab coordinator for the University of Maine’s Diagnostic and Research Laboratory. “They don’t have any specific affinity for one host versus another.”

These crab-like arthropods have four life stages (egg, larvae, nymph, and adult) and most ticks prefer to find a different host animal at each stage of life. While life cycles are species-specific, ticks tend to grow and find hosts to feed on in the spring and summer before going inactive during the late fall and winter. In the first spring, tick larvae emerge from their eggs and, depending on the species, they may or may not be disease carriers at this early stage. After spending part of their life cycle on small animals, they often acquire pathogens, some of which cause disease in humans and other animals. 

Once the larvae have fed for a few days (usually on the smallest animals, like birds or mice), they drop off and molt into nymphs. While both nymphs and larvae are very small, larvae only have six legs, while nymphs are larger and have eight legs (like the adults). Once the nymphs have fed for a few days, they will drop off to molt again and become adults. Adult females eagerly attack humans and larger animals in order to engorge themselves with blood. Once full, they drop off to lay an egg mass, which can contain as many as 4,000 individual eggs, depending on the tick size and species. Depending on the tick species, this whole process can take two to three years. 

Hard Ticks vs. Soft Ticks

Even the most experienced outdoorsmen might not know that there are two primary categories of ticks out there: hard ticks and soft ticks. Dill says that most of us will only ever interact with hard ticks. In fact, if you were to Google an image of a soft tick, you would encounter a small, mite-looking bug that you’ve likely never seen before.

Hard ticks differ from soft ticks in their basic construction. Hard ticks have a shell-like plate that resembles a backpack or a shield and sits right behind their mouths, giving them the classic pear or teardrop shape. In males, this plate, which is called a scutum, covers their whole back. In females, however, it might only cover the upper half of their back, while the lower half is made of a softer material that’s more flexible for carrying eggs. That soft material also allows female ticks to get much bigger while engorged, Dill says. 

“It’s not to say you can’t encounter soft ticks, because of course people can and do,” Dill tells Outdoor Life. “But certainly not to the extent that we’re encountering these hard ticks like the American dog tick, the black-legged tick, and the Lone Star tick.”

Soft ticks lack the hard plate and look more like tiny, oval-shaped pillows. When you think of the ticks you find crawling on your dog or your ankles, you’re thinking of hard ticks. They’re more generalist feeders that will latch onto humans and pets, while soft ticks are more commonly relegated to wildlife. 

Types of Ticks

Here, we cover the nine most common types of ticks, their scientific names, ranges, habitats and active seasons, identifying features, and the diseases they’re known to transmit. All the types of ticks on this list are hard ticks. The tick species include: 

1. American dog tick
2. Asian longhorned tick
3. Black-legged tick (Eastern and Western)
4. Brown dog tick
5. Cayenne tick
6. Gulf coast tick
7. Lone star tick
8. Pacific coast tick
9. Rocky mountain tick

American Dog Tick

Scientific name: Dermacetor variabilis

Native range: Texas to New England, Alberta to Nova Scotia, including a few spots along the West Coast. 

Habitat and season: Forest edges, areas with little tree cover, grasslands and shrublands, along trails and sidewalks. Active April to August.

Identifying features: Brown legs and mouth. Males have brown bodies with a toffee- to cream-colored pattern covering their backs, while that same pattern covers the female’s scutum. The rest of the female’s body is a reddish-rusty brown.

Diseases transmitted: Tularemia, Rocky Mountain spotted fever

Asian Longhorned Tick

Scientific name: Haemaphysalis longicornis 

Native range: Native to Eastern Asia, arrived to the eastern United States in the 2010s on pets and livestock. Currently expanding through the Mid-Atlantic, from Massachusetts to northern Georgia, including some sightings in Arkansas and Missouri.

Habitat and season: Grassy areas, pastures, meadows, shaded wooded areas, proximity to livestock.  

Identifying features: Both males and females are a solid caramel color with large mouth and long limbs. No major identifying features, unlike other ticks with patterns.

Diseases transmitted: Known to transmit anaplasmosis, babesiosis, ehrlichiosis, and rickettsiosis, although no known cases of transmission in the United States yet.

Black-Legged Tick

There are two distinct species of black-legged ticks—the Eastern and the Western. Here we address both, since their only major distinction is their region.

Scientific name: Eastern: Ixodes scapularis (also known as the deer tick) Western: Ixodes pacificus

Native range: The Eastern black-legged tick occupies the entire eastern half of the United States, while the Western black-legged tick lives along the Pacific coast and in parts of Utah and Nevada.

Habitat and season: Deciduous forests, tall grasses, shrublands on field edges, any good whitetail habitat since whitetails are one of their primary hosts. Active October to May whenever temperatures are above freezing.

Identifying features: Dark-brown to black legs and mouth. Males are entirely a solid dark color, while the females have a more rusty brown body beyond a dark-brown to black scutum.

Diseases transmitted: Lyme disease, babesiosis, anaplasmosis, and potentially CWD

Brown Dog Tick

Scientific name: Rhipicephalus sanguineus

Native range: Worldwide and throughout the lower 48, more concentrated in the South.

Habitat and season: Generally human- and dog-dominated areas; kennels, homes, animal pens, yards. Active year-round, especially indoors where they’re protected from harsher winter climates.

Identifying features: All-brown bodies and with brown legs; females can develop a slightly caramel-to-yellow tinge.

Diseases transmitted: Rocky Mountain spotted fever (to both humans and dogs), canine ehrlichiosis and canine babesiosis to dogs. Luckily, it’s easy to learn how to remove a tick from a dog.

Cayenne Tick

Scientific name: Amblyomma cajennense

Native range: Southern Texas, occasionally along Gulf Coast.

Habitat and season: Active year-round in shrublands and brushy areas, specifically near livestock enclosures and horse pens.

Identifying features: Light-brown to caramel-colored legs. Males have a light-brown whole-body pattern with a solid brown scalloped edge along the bottom half of their bodies. Females have patterned scuta and brown bodies with the same brown scalloped edge.

Diseases transmitted: Rocky Mountain spotted fever, equine piroplasmosis in horses.

Gulf Coast Tick

Scientific name: Amblyomma maculatum

Native range: Coastal areas from southern New England to Texas Gulf Coast, extend inland to Kansas.

Habitat and season: Shaded, wooded field edges, grassy meadows, prairies. Active April to October, peak season in mid-summer.

Identifying features: Caramel-to-brown-colored legs and long mouth. Males have a cream-to-light-brown pattern covering their bodies similar to the American dog tick. Females only have the same pattern on their scuta, while the rest of their bodies are a warm brown color. 

Diseases transmitted: Rickettsiosis, canine hepatozoonosis in dogs  

Lone Star Tick

Scientific name: Amblyomma americanum

Native range: Texas and the South up to the mid-Atlantic, southern Great Lakes, and southern New England.

Habitat and season: Active April to August in dense woodlands, forest undergrowth, areas close to animals, like livestock pens.

Identifying features: Caramel-colored legs, mouths, and bodies. Males have a slight dark-brown patterning covering their scutum. Females have a single creamy yellow dot on the bottom edge of the scutum, giving them the namesake “lone star” look. Both males and females have a scalloped edge around the bottom half of their bodies. 

Diseases transmitted: Ehrlichiosis, ‘Stari’ borreliosis, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, Alpha gal.

Pacific Coast Tick

Scientific name: Dermacentor occidentalis

Native range: Oregon to Mexico. This is the most common tick in California.

Habitat and season: Active year-round but peak in early spring. Predominantly in shrublands, along trails, scrubby chaparral characteristic of southern California.

Identifying features: Dark brown legs and mouth parts. Males have dark brown bodies with a slight mottled pattern, while females have a similar pattern on their scuta but all-brown bodies otherwise.

Diseases transmitted: Rocky Mountain spotted fever, Pacific Coast tick fever, tularemia, tick-bite paralysis and anaplasmosis to animals.

Rocky Mountain Wood Tick

Scientific name: Dermacentor andersoni

Native range: Mountain and Pacific Northwest regions of the U.S. and Canada.

Habitat and season: Can be active January to November but most frequently seen in late spring. Shrublands, open grassy areas, lightly wooded areas, along trails at subalpine elevation.

Identifying features: Very similar appearance to American dog ticks. Brown bodies and legs, males have a cream-colored pattern covering their whole body while a similar pattern is limited to the female’s scutum. The rest of the female’s body is brown. 

Diseases transmitted: Rocky Mountain spotted fever, Colorado tick fever, temporary tick paralysis, Tularemia.

How to Prevent a Tick Bite

This list of tick species is certainly not exhaustive. But these nine types of ticks are the most well-known for posing a threat to humans in North America. That’s why tick bite prevention is critical. Here’s how to do it the right way.

• Cover your skin when hiking through brush, wooded areas, grassy meadows, or anywhere else that might hold ticks. Tuck long pants into tall socks, then tuck your shirt into your pants. Wear long sleeves if you can stand it. Pull long hair into a tight ponytail, braid, or bun, and wear a hat.
• Use bug repellents and be prepared to reapply them throughout the day. DEET can be reapplied twice, while other more natural products might need reapplication every hour. 
• Plan ahead and treat your clothes with permethrin, but use it wisely. Follow the instructions exactly, wear gloves, and don’t get any on your skin. Treat your clothes outdoors in a well-ventilated area. Some outdoors apparel comes pre-treated, so look for products like these jackets and pants.  
• Do multiple tick checks throughout the day. This means give your clothes a thorough once-over, look up your sleeves and down your shirt, feel around your chest and neck, comb through your hairline, and check behind your ears.  
• If you find a tick crawling on you, squash it or trap it in tape to dispose of later. Hopefully all these precautions mean that you won’t find a tick attached to your skin. If you do, don’t panic. Instead, follow a few simple guidelines to remove a tick. With all of these preventative measures, you’re much more likely to make it through a bushwhack during tick season without any issues.

Types of Ticks: FAQs

Q: What is the most common type of tick?

A: Across the United States, the most common types of ticks are the American dog tick and the black-legged tick. Both have wide ranges that cover the Eastern and Western U.S. and much of Canada, as well.

Q: How do ticks bite?

A: A tick’s mouth is comprised of three pieces: two “chelicerae” and one “hypostome.” The chelicerae are essentially barbed teeth that dig into the skin, while the hypostome is the “straw” that ticks use to inject saliva and extract blood. The movement of the chelicerae has been likened to “swimming into the skin,” creating room for the hypostome to enter and wreak havoc. 

Q: What is the most common type of tick disease?

A: While ticks can carry a variety of diseases, the most common type of tick disease is Lyme disease. It comprises the most documented cases of tick-borne illness across the country. Black-legged ticks are the documented culprit in all cases of Lyme disease. 

Q: How do you remove a tick?

A: Removing a tick properly requires precision and the right tools. Use a Tick Key, or grab a pair of tweezers, pinch the tick as close to the skin as possible, and pull straight up. For a more in-depth set of instructions, read up on how to remove a tick. 

Read Next: The Best Tick Repellents

Final Thoughts on Identifying Different Types of Ticks

There are plenty of reasons why knowing how to identify different types of ticks (specifically these nine species) is important. If you travel a lot and like to spend time in the woods in different parts of the country, knowing what types of ticks to look for goes hand-in-hand with other responsible outdoor recreation strategies, like knowing if you’re in grizzly bear country or what fish species are native to the stream you’re fishing. Prepare by arming yourself with knowledge—and lots of permethrin.

The post How to Identify Common Types of Ticks appeared first on Outdoor Life.

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Famed Alaskan bush pilot Jim Tweto, 68, and Idaho hunting and fishing guide Shane Reynolds, 45, died in a plane crash in western Alaska on the morning of June 16. The crash occurred shortly after takeoff, according to the Alaska Department of Public Safety.

At least one witness reported the Cessna 180 had taken off but not gained elevation and crashed as a result, according to the ADPS. An InReach satellite device sent an SOS signal to Alaska State Troopers at 11:48 a.m. Troopers received the signal shortly after the aircraft crashed 35 miles northeast of Shaktoolik, a coastal town on Norton Sound near Nome. AST arrived at the scene and recovered the deceased from the crash site, transferring them to the State Medical Examiner’s Office in Anchorage. The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the crash.

Tweto, of Unalakleet, Alaska, was piloting the aircraft at the time. He is most widely known for his show on the Discovery Channel, “Flying Wild Alaska” which followed his family’s journey running a small regional airline that served rural communities around the western part of the state. The show ran for three seasons starting in 2011 and depicted Jim, his wife, Ferno, and their two daughters, Ariel and Ayla, tackling the day-to-day duties of operating aircraft in remote country with its unpredictable challenges. 

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Reynolds, of Orofino, Idaho, was the only passenger. He was a hunting guide and owner of Northwest Fishing Expeditions, a salmon, steelhead, walleye, and sturgeon outfitter on the Snake and Columbia rivers. He was a good friend of Tweto’s, and the two had flown together in the past. Reynolds leaves behind his wife Gina and daughter Juliette. A GoFundMe is collecting donations to support the Reynolds family.

KUIU took to social media on June 19 to offer its condolences to both families, regarding Reynolds and Tweto as “great friends” of the hunting apparel brand.  

“Shane had been a part of the KUIU family since its beginning, leaving a lasting impression with anyone who was lucky enough to spend time with him in or out of the field,” the Instagram post reads. “He was a well-respected guide and accomplished hunter, but his most treasured titles were husband and father.”

Read Next: Poachers Caught with 71 Fish Stuffed in Their Backpacks

Commenters on the post shared memories of successful hunting trips with Shane. One called him “the best brown bear guide there ever was.” Another called the crash “a tragic loss for us here in Alaska.” 

“We step out onto that ledge in our everyday lives here,” the commenter continues. “Sometimes it breaks away and takes our friends and family.” 

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Ariel Tweto also shared news of her dad’s passing on Instagram through a series of posts, including one post that fell on Father’s Day, June 18. In the carousel of nine photos, Jim is only indoors once. The other photos show him ice fishing, hiking, and flying, and a video clip shows him maneuvering an ATV across a slushy field. In another post, Ariel wrote, “He died doing what he truly loved and is now … up there soaring.”

The post Famous Alaska Bush Pilot and Hunting Guide Die in Plane Crash appeared first on Outdoor Life.

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If you want to learn how to prevent altitude sickness, you need to understand how it can occur. And few people are as familiar with how it can ruin a hunt as Cody Arnold, who worked as a hunting guide near Granby, Colorado, for two decades. He has watched multiple clients struggle with the myriad symptoms that can occur when you ascend to 8,000 feet of elevation too fast. Extreme altitude sickness symptoms, also known as “acute mountain sickness” or AMS, can turn serious quickly.

“One client came from Arkansas, and his hunt got cut short,” Arnold tells Outdoor Life. “The hunters typically arrive on Friday afternoon, and then they would all hang out and we’d all have a few drinks. The next day this guy got sick, and it wasn’t from a hangover. He stayed in bed for a few days and then decided to go home. [This] guy who got sick was a pro baseball player, and he was in shape.”

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It’s tricky to predict who will get altitude sickness. One hunter who is in excellent physical condition might feel poorly at altitude while a less physically fit person feels fine.

“Then we guided a guy from Miami who smoked cigars all day long,” says Arnold. “There was not one minute of the day that he didn’t have a cigar lit up. You would think the [lower] oxygen [at altitude] would have impacted him. But he was fine.”

The good news? Mountain trips don’t have to be miserable for hunters or anglers who live at or near sea level. In this article, we cover:

• What causes altitude sickness
• How to recognize altitude sickness symptoms
• How to prevent altitude sickness
• How to treat altitude sickness if prevention doesn’t work
• What to do if you get altitude sickness in the backcountry
• Altitude sickness best practices

What Causes Altitude Sickness?

Altitude sickness is a mild form of hypoxia, when the tissues of your body don’t receive enough oxygen. When you travel to higher altitudes than you’re accustomed to, your body’s systems need time to catch up to the lower concentration of oxygen in the air. Depending on where you live and how much altitude you gain in a short period, you might experience mild to moderate symptoms.

Different people react to altitude differently. If two hunters who live at sea level head into the mountains, one might experience symptoms after just a few hours of hiking while the other goes the whole trip without a single issue. 

Pre-existing cardiovascular and respiratory conditions can further complicate how well you adjust to higher altitude. Good overall cardiovascular health can help you perform better at higher altitudes, but you won’t avoid altitude sickness symptoms just because you’re fit. In fact, people with asthma tend to feel better at altitude than they might at sea level due to an absence of allergens, humidity, and other factors that can complicate asthma symptoms.  

Mythical causes of altitude sickness include alcohol consumption, dehydration, and poor fitness. While dehydration and a hangover will make you feel pretty rotten and symptoms of both are similar to altitude sickness symptoms, neither will actually trigger or worsen acute mountain sickness. The only thing that can cause altitude sickness is gaining altitude too fast without acclimatization.

Symptoms of Altitude Sickness

Being responsible in the backcountry means being able to recognize when you’re pushing yourself too hard at altitude and putting yourself and your group at risk. Mild altitude sickness can quickly turn serious, so be on the lookout for these symptoms.

Mild Symptoms

These symptoms might show up a day or so after you fly into an airport at higher altitude, or while you’re hiking into camp. They should improve after a few days of acclimatizing to your new surroundings.

• Dizziness
• Fatigue
• Shortness of breath
• Loss of appetite
• Minor headache
• Mild nausea
• Trouble sleeping

Moderate Symptoms

If you continue gaining altitude without acclimatizing to the elevation where your mild symptoms emerged, your symptoms will naturally worsen. They might start impacting your ability to hike, walk, ride, or even function around camp. If you reach some of these more moderate benchmarks, healthcare experts recommend descending to a lower altitude. 

• Worsening of any mild symptoms
• Chest tightness
• Dizziness or fatigue that impedes your ability to walk
• Moderate to severe nausea
• Moderate to severe headache
• Vomiting

Severe Symptoms

Once symptoms reach this point, they should be treated like any other emergency situation that requires knowledge of wilderness medicine. Descend to a lower altitude immediately and, in severe cases, call for medical assistance. If fluid starts pooling in your lungs (known as high-altitude pulmonary edema) or in your brain (high-altitude cerebral edema), get medical attention as soon as possible. 

• Shortness of breath at complete rest
• Confusion and denial of symptoms
• Inability to stand unassisted
• HAPE, or high-altitude pulmonary edema
  • Fluid in the lungs, a feeling of suffocation
• HACE, or high-altitude cerebral edema
  • Fluid in the brain, causing lack of coordination, aggression, and confusion

How to Prevent Altitude Sickness

If you’re a flatlander or a coastal dweller with a nonresident elk or sheep tag in a mountain state, one of the best things you can do to perform better at high altitudes is to simply prepare your body for physical exertion with less available oxygen. This can be difficult to replicate without actually traveling to the altitude where you’ll be hunting, but you could incorporate an altitude mask to your standard cardio workouts. While you might feel a bit like Bane from Batman at first, eventually you will notice a difference in your cardiovascular system’s tolerance for lower oxygen levels. 

But here’s a tricky truth: physical fitness does not prevent altitude sickness. So while it’s best to be in shape, there are other steps you must take to prevent altitude sickness. The first is to ascend altitude slowly and give yourself time to acclimatize. The second might sound unnecessary, but trust the experts here—visit a doctor and get a prescription.

Do Altitude Sickness Medications Work?

For experienced high-altitude hikers and hunters, the debate over whether to use medication for altitude sickness is a hot one. Some people swear by it, while others were turned off by weird side effects. But in general, yes, these medications do work.

The most commonly prescribed medication for altitude sickness is Diamox, a name brand of the generic acetazolamide. It’s a diuretic pill that can reduce swelling and inflammation in glaucoma patients, patients with heart disease, and can even treat seizures. Those same anti-inflammatory capabilities help you acclimatize quicker and can decrease headache, nausea, exhaustion, and fatigue associated with mild to moderate altitude sickness. 

The side effects of Diamox can range from strange to unpleasant. Some users report tingling in the extremities, ringing in the ears, nausea, excessive sweating, lightheadedness, or increased thirst. Some of those side effects might sound similar to the very symptoms of altitude sickness you’re taking the medication to prevent. But the medication reduces the risk of developing severe altitude sickness, or at the very worst, HAPE or HACE.

Some other altitude sickness medications include dexamethasone and nifedipine. While Diamox is preventative, these other medications are more commonly used for treatment of moderate to severe symptoms, as well as HAPE and HACE.

How to Treat Altitude Sickness After Prevention Fails

Since the primary cause of altitude sickness is gaining too much altitude without acclimatizing, the best treatment is to reduce your elevation. Backtrack to spend a day at a lower elevation and wait for your mild or moderate symptoms to subside. You should also evacuate as soon as possible if HAPE or HACE occurs. But with some severe symptoms, like HAPE or HACE, descent will not be enough to alleviate the problem.

That’s where other treatment drugs come into play. Dexamethasone and nifedipine are both used for emergency treatment of moderate to severe symptoms and even HAPE and HACE. They can help alleviate the swelling and fluid buildup in the brain and lungs. 

Best Practices to Prepare for a High-Altitude Trip

Keep these survival tips in mind to prepare for or treat altitude sickness while on a high-country hunt or fishing trip:

• Good physical health will help your hunt, but it won’t prevent altitude sickness.
• Give yourself time to acclimatize to a higher altitude. Do this by arriving at your destination at least a day early so you can adjust to higher altitudes in town before going even higher into the backcountry.
• If you’re concerned about pre-existing conditions or prior bouts of altitude sickness, or just want to get an expert opinion, talk with your health care provider before your trip. Having a prescription of Diamox on hand in the mountains won’t add much weight to your pack.
• Communicate any altitude sickness symptoms with your guides and companions as soon as they appear. Even if they’re mild to start, taking an extra day before gaining altitude can be the difference between a successful trip and a mountainside evacuation.

Altitude Sickness FAQs

Q: Does salt help with altitude sickness?

No, salt doesn’t help with altitude sickness, though it’s important to pay attention to while exercising at altitude. Your salt levels depend on your fluid intake, and salt can either help or harm your body when you’re experiencing altitude sickness symptoms. If you’ve been sweating and drinking a lot of water, you’ve definitely been losing sodium. Try adding an electrolyte mix with sodium to replace lost salt faster. But if you haven’t been sweating, avoid salt intake until you can drink more water. Your sodium levels are probably pretty high already. 

Q: Does drinking water prevent altitude sickness?

No, drinking water will not prevent altitude sickness. While staying hydrated is crucial for all physical activities, and the dryer air at a higher altitude might dehydrate you quicker, but altitude sickness is determined by oxygen levels. If anything, drinking lots of water could dilute your electrolyte levels and make you feel worse.  

Q: At what altitude do you lose oxygen?

The oxygen level in the air remains at a constant 20.9 percent at all altitudes. But as you gain altitude, air is less dense and concentrated, which means oxygen is more spread out. At roughly 18,000 feet, the air is about half as dense as it is at sea level. You could start feeling altitude symptoms at around 8,000 feet, or the altitude of Aspen, Colorado, though this varies from person to person.

Q: What is a good oxygen level at high-altitude?

A: For people without any pulmonary issues, a blood oxygen level of at least 88 percent is considered healthy at any altitude. At around 5,000 feet of elevation, your blood oxygen level might be around 90 percent, while it would be closer to 95 percent at sea level. 

Final Thoughts on Altitude Sickness

A fear of altitude sickness shouldn’t prevent you from going on the trip of a lifetime—especially if you cashed in decades of points and finally drew a once-in-a-blue-moon tag. But just like Smokey the Bear says about forest fires, only you can prevent altitude sickness.

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True prevention starts months in advance with proper education, talking to your doctor, and acclimatization at altitude. But the most key component of addressing altitude sickness is understanding that it could happen to you no matter how healthy you are, and being prepared to handle it.  

The post How to Prevent Altitude Sickness appeared first on Outdoor Life.

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This story, “Bear Attack,” originally ran in the January 1980 issue. Until this attack in September 1979, grizzlies were thought to be extinct in Colorado. Two were killed in 1951, before the bears were declared an endangered species. Both were about 3 years old. One of them was killed just a dozen miles or so from the place where Wiseman was attacked. 

THE BEAR came at me with no warning. Ears flattened, neck hairs stiffly erect, it growled fiercely as it charged, full bore, right at me. I saw its flashing teeth as it came, and I knew in an instant it was a grizzly, although I’d never seen one in the wild before. There was no mistaking the hump on its back, the broad face and the guard hairs. I’ve seen a couple of hundred black bears in the woods, enough to know that this one was entirely different from the rest. 

The grizzly’s attack started about 30 yards away, and I had no time to raise my bow and arrow. For a brief moment I thought the bear would go around me. Maybe its charge was a bluff. I’d had close confrontations with black bears before, and even had them approach me, but they all eventually backed off, giving me nothing more than a good scare. 

This bear kept coming, growling and snapping its teeth with each terrifying bound. When I realized it meant business, I shouted at the top of my lungs, but it was no use. In two more leaps, the bear would be all over me. 

I’m 46, a full-time outfitter, and I make my living taking people hunting and fishing. I was raised in Colorado and live in Crestone, near Alamosa. Fourteen years ago, I decided to go into outfitting and I’ve been at it ever since. The country I hunt is one of the most remote regions in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado. 

I had four elk hunters out that day, the last day of the 1979 bow season. The weather was balmy, with bright blue skies, and the warm temperature made for comfortable hunting, although it got chilly in the evening. 

My hunters were W. C. Niederee and his son, Mike, from Great Bend, Kansas, and Rick Nelson and Jim Latin, both from McPherson, Kansas. On that last day, Ace Calloway guided Rick and Jim, Chuck Gibbs guided Dr. Niederee, and I took Mike. Al Brandenburg, my cook, remained in camp. 

Dr. Niederee decided to hunt on a slope opposite camp that day. The rest of us rode out of camp together and split up about three miles down the trail. Ace, Rick and Jim rode south to hunt the East Fork of the Navajo River; Mike and I headed west for the Main Fork. 

Mike was the only hunter in the party who hadn’t seen elk that week. Everyone had seen plenty of animals, and Rick said he’d looked at about 85. I figured the Main Fork would be a good place to show Mike some elk because I knew of some pockets that were always good. The area was just off the Continental Divide; it was rugged country that few people penetrated. It was about 11 miles by trail from camp to the place I wanted to hunt, about five miles overland. 

About 2 p.m., we tied our horses in the timber and began to hunt on foot. We split up and planned to meet at the other end of the meadows, where I’d intercept Mike. Although I carried my bow, I wasn’t really hunting intently. I figured on looking for elk sign and later meeting Mike. 

I worked my way along and kept my eyes on some open meadows in the timber. I thought I’d see Mike as he traveled through them. He never appeared, so I wandered up toward the horses to see if he’d returned to meet me there. Freckles, my Apaloosa mare, and Buckshot, Mike’s horse, stood quietly in the trees. Mike wasn’t around. 

I headed back down to look for more sign. We were in a small finger off the main ridge, and I knew there was a good chance that Mike and I would meet. About 5 o’clock, while walking across a small flat, I heard an ominous growl a short distance away. 

For a moment, while the grizzly charged straight at me, I thought it might be trying to get around me. But I quickly discounted that possibility as the bear narrowed the distance to just a few yards, still coming full steam. At close range, I could easily see the hump on its back and the yellow guard hairs. The bear growled continuously, and its open mouth exposed a set of huge teeth. My shouts, which might have startled or turned another bear, had no effect. This grizzly was enraged, and I was in bad trouble. 

The charge lasted only a few seconds. I was carrying my compound bow at my side, but there was no time to nock an arrow. My knife was in my day pack, well out of reach for the precious split-second I had. 

The bear was almost on top of me when I raised my bow, trying to fend off the attack. I shoved it in the grizzly’s face, but it bowled me over. The bow clattered to the ground, and arrows scattered everywhere. 

As soon as I hit the ground I curled up into a ball. I brought my knees up under my belly to protect my vitals, stuck my face into my chest as far as I could, and clasped both hands behind my head to cover my neck. My day pack was still on my back, and would offer some protection there. I had read many articles that said playing dead was the thing to do during a bear attack. I knew that no man is a physical match with an enraged bear. 

The grizzly immediately started mauling my right leg with its teeth. I had little sensation of pain, but I vividly remember the sounds of flesh tearing as the bear ripped into me. As I lay there helplessly, my only hope was that the grizzly would tire of me and leave. 

It kept biting and chewing at my leg, and I forced myself to lie as quietly as I could. I still felt that if I didn’t present myself as a threat to the bear, it would quit and lumber off into the woods. Strange as it might seem, I never panicked, even as the grizzly continued to work over that right leg. 

I felt the bear dragging me slightly, but most of the time it would bite into my leg, shake its head and bite into the leg again. It didn’t use its huge claws, just its teeth. 

Then the bear dropped my leg and bit into my right shoulder. It clamped down hard, and penetrated my flesh deeply with its powerful jaws. I didn’t know it then, but the bear had bitten completely through my shoulder, from one side to the other. Later, at the hospital, doctors found puncture wounds all the way through. Clinical tests also showed it bit my shoulder twice, but there was no tearing, just deeply penetrating bites. 

When the bear let go of my shoulder and started on my leg again, I remember telling myself, This could be the end. 

At that point I realized that this was more than a passing attack. Playing dead was getting me nowhere, so I desperately started thinking about fighting back. If the mauling kept up, the grizzly would surely kill me. 

In the blur of the ordeal, I saw an arrow lying close by. I reached for it, and because of good luck or providence, it was pointing toward the bear. 

I’m convinced that my hunting background was a factor that weighed heavily in my survival. I always trained myself to instinctively shoot at one part of an animal rather than the whole thing. I focused all my attention on the grizzly’s frontal portion and brought the arrow up with as powerful a thrust as I could muster, all the while concentrating intently on a small spot that I judged to be vital. I’m right-handed, but the arrow was in my left. I plunged it deeply into the bear. Years ago, I was a meatcutter. I know something about animal anatomy, but lying on the ground with a bear tearing into me, I wasn’t sure I could drive it away before it killed me. Survival was all I could think of then, and I knew I must try. 

The arrow I used, a new Bear razorhead fitted on a magnum aluminum shaft, is one of the strongest made. Somehow, the arrow snapped in half after I drove it into the bear. I remember reading about people who have by some incredible force lifted wrecked cars off their loved ones; the human brain in such cases goes momentarily haywire and the adrenalin flows. Maybe that’s what happened to me. All my senses were fine-tuned to driving off that grizzly. There was no other choice. 

After the shaft broke, I reached for the arrow and yanked it back out of the grizzly. A stream of blood flowed from the wound, and I rammed the broken arrow back in again as hard as I could. I remember thinking that the blood looked like it was coming from the jugular. I was convinced I had struck a pretty good blow. At that point I thought, Maybe I’ve got a chance. 

The grizzly gave no indication of being hurt and kept biting and tearing at my leg. It kept on growling, just as it had done throughout the entire attack. Right after I stabbed it, it started on my left leg for the first time. 

Suddenly, the bear stopped working me over and walked over the top of me. A great gush of blood from the bear’s arrow wounds splashed over me as the animal stepped across. The grizzly loped off and stopped about 25 yards away. I saw it slowly lower itself to the ground. It lay still, and I knew it was dead. 

I was off in a side finger of the drainage, and my only hope was to make it to the main trail where I might be found. I didn’t realize it at the time, but Mike was only a couple of hundred yards away from me throughout the entire ordeal. 

I got up slowly, unsure whether my mangled right leg could hold my weight. I tested it carefully and was relieved to find that I could walk. The main trail wasn’t far, and I started for it standing up. The bleeding was starting to take its toll, though, and I felt myself going into shock. 

I was about 90 yards from the scene of the attack when I heard Mike shout. I was surprised and relieved to hear him. I shouted back, and he appeared in the timber moments later. 

Mike is 25 and a full-time farmer. He is tough and wiry, but when he walked out of the woods toward me, he looked like he’d seen a ghost. My physical appearance didn’t help. I was covered with blood from the top of my head to the soles of my feet. Every square inch of my camouflage clothing was blood-soaked, and my face and hands were crimson. 

Afterward, I learned that Mike had heard the bear growl as it charged me. He also heard my shouts. By the time he got to the scene, the attack was over, and all he could see was a great spot of blood-soaked ground, my bow and scattered arrows. He was convinced the bear had killed me and dragged me off. He moved slowly with a nocked arrow, figuring he’d be facing the bear too. Then he spotted the bear lying dead and realized I might be alive after all. 

We used the limited supplies from a small first aid kit to bandage my leg as well as we could, with strips of Mike’s shirt for wrappings. I made myself as comfortable as possible, and Mike went for help. The sun was setting, and I knew I was in for a long, hard night. 

By the time Mike returned with the horses, I had grown much weaker. He brought them over to where I lay, and they got jittery when they caught a whiff of the bear and the blood. Mike tied Buckshot by the reins, and when he led Freckles toward me, Buckshot reared back and shucked the bridle. The spooked horse took off. 

Mike tried to position Freckles in a way that would be easiest for me to get aboard. But when I stood up, I lost consciousness. Mike eased me to the ground, and it was a while before I came to. 

I tried a second time to get on the horse, with Mike pushing and lifting me. Freckles is a big horse, 17 hands high. That worked against me now. I got my foot into the stirrup, swung my mangled right leg over and grabbed the saddle horn. I talked to Freckles, who was still jittery, and she settled right down. 

We started off, and Freckles got shaky again because of the strange smells. Mike was leading Freckles using only a lead rope and halter, so I told him to put the bridle back on. When he did, we had better control, and she calmed down some. 

As we traveled, Mike led my horse, and he constantly looked back and said, “Ed, talk to me, talk to me.” I was slumped over in the saddle, bent over to the front. That way I wouldn’t pass out. If I tried to sit straight up, I’d feel myself getting dizzy and going under again. Mike tied my raincoat over the saddle horn to keep it from bouncing into my gut, but it was still painful to stay in the saddle. Riding wasn’t helping my leg which was still bleeding freely. 

Mike wasn’t sure of the country, and every once in a while, when my head cleared enough that I could look around, I’d give him directions to get us on the trail. I was having trouble maintaining full consciousness. 

Finally we got to a large meadow, and I decided I could go no further. I knew it would be foolhardy to continue because camp was still some 10 miles away and I’d never make it. The meadow would serve as a good place for a helicopter to land. It was about 7 in the evening, and I knew I had to rest and get my head down to where I could think straight. I was the only one who knew where we were, and I had to get Mike ready for what was in store for him. I had to describe in detail the overland route to base camp. If he took the trail, the way he had come, it would be an extra six miles or more, some of it with no visible trail. So he’d have to go across the mountains. It was the dark of the moon, and he had his work cut out for him. 

Mike built a fire while I lay back and rested. He dragged wood to where I could reach it, but in his haste to get going for help, he didn’t gather as much as I’d need. He piled all the extra clothes on top of me. I told him to follow a nearby stream bed up to a pond and then cross the Continental Divide. The ride downhill would be pretty steep going. But he’d come out about half a mile above camp. 

I knew it was asking a lot of him to find camp during the blackness of the night, but I was confident that with the landmarks I’d described to guide him, along with the trustworthy Freckles, he’d get there. All of my mountain horses are well oriented to the country, and they can find their way around as well as anyone. 

After Mike left, I was as conservative as I could be with the firewood supply. As time wore on, though, I knew I was going to run out. The closest wood was some distance away, so I tried to burn a somewhat green log that Mike had inadvertently dragged over. 

It started to get colder, and I knew I’d have to do something for warmth. I saw the outline of a log up the hill behind me, and it appeared there was some firewood around it. I rested again, did some isometric exercises to stimulate body heat a little, and covered my head with a jacket to retain as much heat as I could. 

There was no way I’d be able to get up the hill and return to the original campfire with wood, so I started dragging myself along the ground, hoping to start another fire at the log. I used both arms and my left leg, and every move was a painful effort. I kept my head as low as possible to avoid passing out. 

It was only 20 feet or so to the log. It seemed 10 times that far, but I kept myself from panicking. I concentrated on little things—like what I should do in the next hour, or two hours. I thought back about the sequence of events so far—I had survived a bear attack, my vital organs were intact, Mike was close by to assist me, I was at a point where I could be rescued, and now Mike was heading for help. I wouldn’t entertain the thought that it wouldn’t work. It would work. Help could be on its way by midnight, just an hour or so away. Dr. Niederee would be there with medical supplies, and I’d have my sleeping bag to warm up in. 

But help didn’t come by midnight. The evening began to pass more slowly, and I wondered if the men might be having trouble finding me. I was in an area where we seldom hunted, and no one in camp was familiar with that part of the country.

A new problem came up. The evening breeze grew stronger, and I began shivering. I had to find protection from the wind, and looked about for some kind of shelter. I saw a small pine tree not far off. Its thick boughs grew to the ground. It was my only hope for a windbreak, so I inched over to it, covered myself with the clothing I had available and tried to get comfortable. I didn’t want to sleep, because if I slowed my body processes, I would only hasten hypothermia. The combination of shock and loss of blood made it dangerous to risk sleep. I had no choice but to stay alert. 

While I lay there, I assessed my plight. I’m a practicing emergency medical technician, and I know something about vital life signs. If I could withstand the loss of blood and shock, hypothermia would be the only thing that could write the final chapter. Curiously enough, I was confident that I’d survive. 

Suddenly, I saw two flashlights above me, coming off the ridge. I yelled and heard Mike shout back. He was alone, carrying a flashlight in each hand. It was about 3 in the morning. I’d been alone eight hours. 

When he reached me, Mike immediately started a fire, but it was difficult because the wood was wet. Finally he got a good blaze going. I was eager for its warmth. He told me that his dad, Dr. Niederee, and Ace were on top of a high ridge. We spotted their flashlights, and they located us when they saw the fire. Mike hollered that he’d found me. 

The position of their flashlights told me that they were too far down the canyon. They needed to go back to a patch of thick timber and then work their way down through it. Mike tried to warn them about a steep hillside near them, but they apparently didn’t understand what he was saying. 

About 5 a.m., Ace and Dr. Niederee appeared on foot, without medical supplies or sleeping bag. I learned that they had tried to work their way across some brush along the steep shale hillside when trouble began. 

Ace’s horse hit the shale, slipped and spun around. The doctor’s horse, Puffer, slipped on the shale and slid about 10 feet down the mountain. Puffer somehow came to a stop, and Dr. Niederee eased out of the stirrups so as not to unbalance the horse. He got off, grabbed for a bush and fought his way up out of the loose shale. Puffer tried to get out but slid down another 100 feet. It was impossible for Ace and the doctor to get to the horse in the dark. 

Later that morning some of my men tried to get Puffer out. They got the saddle, sleeping bag and medical supplies and planned to come back the next day with more help. But it was too late. In his attempt to get out, Puffer went over the edge of the cliff and fell 200 feet to his death. 

Dr. Niederee looked my leg over and saw there was no immediate danger. He was concerned about hypothermia. The men built a fire to warm the length of my body. 

After I was comfortable and somewhat warm, we spent the rest of the night waiting for the helicopter that was to come in at daybreak. Mike built a fire where he wanted the helicopter to land. 

It began to get light, and we strained to hear the helicopter, but it didn’t come. Time began to drag because of the anticipation, and for the first time, I was beginning to look forward to going to the hospital. 

About a half-hour after daybreak the helicopter broke the Continental Divide, and we all heard it at the same time. It was a beautiful sound, and it didn’t come any too soon. I was starting to shiver uncontrollably. 

The Medivac team performed flawlessly and got me to Alamosa Community Hospital without a hitch. The pilot flabbergasted passers-by when he put the ship down smack in front of the emergency room door. 

After the doctors looked me over, they quickly got me under an electric blanket. My temperature was down to 95 degrees, and my blood pressure was low. Dr. Niederee thought I’d lost as much as three pints of blood. My right leg from knee to ankle looked like hamburger. One of the small bones was broken, and there was infection as well as possible nerve damage. I also suffered bites on my left leg, both arms, and my right shoulder. I expect to go back in for surgery to help mend the broken bone in my leg, and some skin graft and nerve repair. 

Now that the ordeal is over, I can’t help but think back on incidents in my hunting territory. Once I guided a hunter who watched over a horse carcass as a bait. During the night, a bear dragged the horse, which weighed about 400 pounds, to an area about 100 yards away to feed on it. I assumed it was a big black, but now I wonder if it could have been a grizzly. 

About seven years ago, while I was away from my base camp, a bear moved in and destroyed it. I found 7-inch wide prints in the dirt. Again, I thought it was a big black bear. 

Three of my clients have insisted that they’ve seen grizzlies. I know there are plenty of blacks in my territory; my hunters saw five during the 1979 elk bow season alone. The blacks are blond, brown, fire-engine red, black, and shades in between. I always figured those “grizzlies” were big blacks, but now I’m not so sure. 

With the grizzly encounter now a matter of history, one of my most sincere hopes is that experiences like mine will not make people fear the outdoors. As always, any bear is to be respected for its potential danger, not feared. I don’t know why the grizzly attacked me, but I have no qualms about going right back into that country as soon as I can. You can be sure of one thing, though. The next time I come across huge bear tracks, I’m going to wonder just what made them. 

About Ed Wiseman, the Bear Attack Survivor

Ed Wiseman didn’t survive the grizzly attack because of luck. He is a powerful man, and he was able to use his strength against the bear. He did not wish to kill the bear and tried to avoid taking an aggressive stand until he realized it was a matter of life or death. Since the incident, Wiseman has repeatedly stated that he does not want people to fear bears, only respect them. 

Since the attack, biologists have learned that the grizzly that attacked Wiseman was an old sow, more than 20 years old and weighing about 400 pounds. 

Until this attack, grizzlies were thought to be extinct in Colorado. Two were killed in 1951, before the bears were declared an endangered species. Both were about 3 years old. One of them was killed just a dozen miles or so from the place where Wiseman was attacked. 

Wiseman owns Toneda Outfitters in Crestone, Colorado, and hunts year-round. He uses hounds for cougars and bears. Wiseman runs a clean camp, and wants only serious hunters. He doesn’t allow alcoholic beverages, because he wants his hunters to be in their best physical shape each day in the mountains. Although he accommodates gun hunters, he is a bowhunter himself and specializes in archery hunts. He is an official measurer for the Pope and Young Club.

Mike Niederee, who was with Wiseman during the attack, says, “Ed is one of the finest outdoorsmen I’ve ever known. There’s a local saying that nobody keeps up with Ed Wiseman in the woods. He’s simply the toughest guy around.”

One of his nephews sums up Wiseman’s abilities this way: “Of course Uncle Ed won the bear fight. He wins every time.” —Jim Zumbo, Jan. 1980

Read more OL+ stories:
• Are Grizzly Attacks Really on the Rise?
• Trying to Stop a Brown Bear Attack with a .38 Special, From the Archives

The post I Killed the Last Grizzly in Colorado, From the Archives appeared first on Outdoor Life.

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This is the first story in our This Happened to Me series, which is based on our long-standing adventure comic first published in 1940. We will be publishing one each week in the coming months.

BY THE TIME we started glassing for moose the morning of Sept. 17, I figured the worst of our troubles was over.

I was with my buddy Cal Stefanko and his dad, Craig, and this was a bucket-list trip: my first fly-in Alaska moose hunt. It was a do-it-yourself hunt, and the only help we had was from the air taxi that had dropped us and our gear at the lake we were camped by.

I was lucky enough to kill a big bull during our first day of hunting on Sept. 13, but I quickly learned how difficult it is to pack such a massive animal across that unforgiving and uneven country. I had shot the moose 2.5 miles away from where we were camped, and it took us the rest of that afternoon and the entire next day to pack everything back to camp.

We spent the next several days hunkered down in our tent as a typhoon lashed the coast, bringing floods, downpours, and brutal winds to most of southwestern Alaska. The storm was actually a blessing, because we were so damn tired that we could hardly get out of bed those couple of days. At 70 years old, Craig was exhausted. My own body was toast, and even Cal, who is only 22, was beat. By the time the storm passed through, we could hear bulls in every direction. With one more tag to fill, Cal and I made a deal: We wouldn’t kill another moose unless we could recover it within a mile of camp.

Read Next: This Happened to Me: I Almost Froze to Death on a Solo Bighorn Hunt

We kept to our word and the next afternoon a huge, 70-plus-inch bull came in slowly and crossed the river. Cal dropped it with one shot at 15 yards—just 350 yards from our tent. After caping out the bull and skinning it, we returned to our tents and passed out.

The next morning, I used my Garmin inReach to message the bush pilot. I let him know that we had tagged both our moose and were still quartering the second one. We would be ready to get picked up later that day. But it was foggy and raining with low visibility, so the pilot told me to touch base with him again that afternoon.

We finished with Cal’s moose by lunchtime, then napped some more. I stepped outside the tent at 4 p.m. and let him know the fog ceiling had lifted. I told him we could see the mountaintops all around us.

“We’re on our way,” he replied. “We’ll be there at 5:30.”

Because of all the added weight from our moose, they sent two Beavers to pick us up. Our lake didn’t have enough runway, so the two pilots puddle-jumped all our gear to a bigger lake nearby. We loaded both planes and distributed the weight evenly, but by this time the weather started getting really bad again—and so did our luck.

I climbed into one plane beside the pilot, and Cal got in the back seat. Behind him was the cargo net holding the giant moose antlers and some of our gear. Craig, the rest of our gear, and the meat were with the other pilot in the second plane.

Our pilot took off first. He pointed the plane to the north—the only direction without the big, steep banks that surrounded us. But as we started to climb up out of the bowl, a huge crosswind slammed into our right wing, turning the plane. The gust shoved the tip of the left wing down and into the water. Now we were careening west—straight toward a 20-foot bank.

The pilot tried his best to get us off the water, but we didn’t make it. The left pontoon rammed into the bank and catapulted us, spinning, into the sky. Then the plane started to slow and tilt, and we rushed toward the earth again, nosediving as the tundra sped up to meet us. The impact was so severe that the plane flipped over.

The first thing I said was, “Cal, you OK?”

But then the pilot started yelling. “We gotta get out!” he shouted.

I unhooked my seatbelt, but I didn’t realize we were upside down. I fell straight onto the roof of the plane, disoriented.

The whole windshield was broken, so I crawled out and hit the SOS button on my Garmin. I turned around and saw Cal staggering out of the side door, and then the pilot came last, crawling out through the windshield. He was bleeding from his head, and he kept yelling, “We gotta get away from the plane!” He thought it was going to catch on fire.

The three of us ran for all we were worth back to the lake. I saw the other Beaver pulling up as we arrived, and they were in shock, too. They had seen the whole horrible crash and couldn’t believe we were still alive. Craig was up front with the other pilot, and we could see his stricken expression even through the windshield. He was as white as a ghost because he thought he’d just lost his son.

Eventually we determined the wrecked plane was safe to approach—there were no visible sparks, and we couldn’t smell gasoline—so we grabbed our gear from the back. Then we loaded our essentials into the other Beaver, and we all flew back to King Salmon.

Meanwhile, my wife was getting calls from the Alaska State Troopers and search-and-rescue personnel. “Your husband has been in a plane crash,” they all told her. She was worried at first, but eventually decided that since I was able to hit the SOS button—and because I’m a nurse—we’d be able to survive for at least a night.

After we landed safely, the authorities took me, Cal, and the pilot to get checked out at the hospital. I had some cuts in my hand that required glue, and the pilot needed 17 stitches in his head. The investigators were already there to ask us questions, and everyone we spoke with said they had no clue how we walked away from the plane crash. With those kinds of G-forces, they explained, we should have died on impact.

The pilot recovered, but that turned out to be his last flight. He was an awesome guy and said he’d been flying up there for 40 years, but he told his boss that day that he was done. He retired on the spot.

Read more OL+ stories.

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Last week a family in the Florida Keys was able to rescue their 22-year-old son after he was whisked away by powerful Gulf Stream currents and left stranded in the open ocean. The miraculous rescue of Dylan Gartenmayer was akin to finding a needle in a haystack, and his discovery made for a powerful and emotional reunion on the water. Priscilla Gartenmayer, Dylan’s cousin, recorded a video of that scene and shared it to TikTok, where it has been viewed thousands of times.

@kwmermaidp So thankful 💙 #lostatsea #rescue #keywest #freedive #drifting #florida ♬ original sound – Priscilla Gartenmayer

Gartenmayer, an experienced free diver and spear fishermen, later told reporters that before he was rescued he was fully prepared to spend his night fighting off sharks as we watched the sun sink down in the sky. After he was carried roughly a mile away from his boat and crew, search-and-rescue crews with the U.S. Coast Guard had spent hours searching for him to no avail. With his remaining energy, Gartenmayer located some buoys and lashed them together to fashion a small raft. Then he watched as bait balls started erupting all around him.

“I had a bunch of bait floating around me,” Gartenmayer told NBC-6 News. “I knew that there were big fish eating those baits and there were sharks that were going to be shortly behind them. I was ready to fight the night out.”

Carried Away in the Gulf Stream

On Jan. 19, Gartenmayer and a couple buddies headed out for a day of freediving and spearfishing at Western Sambo Reef, a well-known coral reef area near Key West.

Gartenmayer had made several deep dives from the boat that day while his friends kept watch from above. With weather conditions starting to deteriorate, the group decided to head back to shore soon. But Gartenmayer wanted to make one final dive, and that’s when things went south (or technically speaking, when things went North).

Gartenmayer dove roughly 35 feet down, where he was immediately carried away by the Gulf Stream, a powerful ocean current that brings warm water from the Gulf of Mexico into the Atlantic Ocean and extends along the eastern coast of North America. Unable to escape the powerful current, he was pulled to depths of 150 feet and whisked far away from his buddies in the boat. No longer able to see him, they notified Gartemayer’s family along with the Coast Guard. The USCG then sent out multiple boats and aircraft in an effort to locate him.

Read Next: Hawaiian Angler Missing at Sea After Being Pulled Overboard by a Giant Tuna

An exhausted Gartenmayer surfaced roughly a mile away and swam to a channel marker, according to NBC. He gathered some buoys and lashed them together into a makeshift raft. He was shivering by this point, and he used the raft to keep as much of his body out of the water as possible. He was also seeing bait balls blowing up around him, and he knew all this activity on the surface would draw predators in. He had already seen one reef shark swim past. He waited there for hours, watching the sun go down as USCG planes flew overhead but failed to spot him.

“I had a small plane fly above but they didn’t see me, and about 30 minutes later they flew back again, still didn’t see me,” Gartenmayer told reporters . “Shortly after that the sun had disappeared past the horizon. As I saw the sun disappear I knew things were starting to get a little more dire.”

Gartenmayers to the Rescue

Around the same time the USCG launched its rescue mission, Dylan’s mother Tabitha was notified of the situation by her ex-husband. The family and several other friends quickly mobilized and launched their boat to join in the search. They headed straight for Dylan’s last known GPS coordinates and began looking for their missing son.

When they reached those coordinates and didn’t find him, they continued looking in the fading light. Eventually one of Dylan’s friends pointed to a group of buoys that appeared to be tied together and looked out of place.

Roughly four hours after he was whisked away and left stranded in the open ocean, Dylan heard his family before he even saw them.  

“I could hear the engines running and I knew from there that was actually my grandfather’s boat,” he said.

The Coast Guard explained that Gartenmayer’s diving skills and survival instincts made all the difference that day, adding that his decision to lash buoys together helped make him more visible and staved off hypothermia. Tabitha agreed that her son’s experience on the water was crucial, but she also gave credit to a higher power.

“It’s a miracle we landed right on my son in a needle in a haystack,” she said. “You’re in the middle of the ocean, and that’s God.”

The post Florida Diver Miraculously Rescued by Family After Being Swept Away in the Gulf Stream appeared first on Outdoor Life.

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