Christmas is a time to buy something special for the outdoors people in your life or for yourself, and this year is fertile for great new items.
Fenix Flashlight
Remember when the Mag Lite was the ultimate flashlight, especially the riot control version that required half a dozen D-cell batteries? If you dropped it from a deer stand, it left a crater. Flashlights have come a long way since then. They are a lot smaller and brighter.
The best I've found to date is the new Fenix PD35 V3.0. It is self billed as a high-performance tactical flashlight, but it is appropriate for any situation.
Only 5.25 inches long and weighing only 3 ounces, it produces an astonishing 1,700 lumens by way of a Lunimus SFT40 light emitting diode (LED). The owner's manual says the maximum beam distance is 357 meters, or 1171 feet. That's a bit less than a quarter of a mile. A rechargeable 18650 battery provides the power. You can also use two CR123 batteries.
The body is anodized black aluminum with an integral clip for a belt or shirt pocket. It also comes with a Cordura belt holster with a Velcro flap, as well as a lanyard. The unit also has a power meter for the battery, a charging cable and a spare O-ring.
You can regulate light intensity through six modes determined by a button near the muzzle. The Turbo setting produces 1,700 lumens and a runtime of 1 hour and 25 minutes. The High setting emits 600 lumens with a runtime of 2:35. The Medium setting emits 150 lumens and a runtime of 8:30 . The Low setting emits 50 lumens for a runtime of 26:25. The Eco setting emits 5 lumens for a runtime of 230 hours. There's also a 1,700-lumen Strobe setting for hunters that have black light posters in their cabins, or for those trying to attract rescuers.
Impact resistance is 1 meter, and the lamp is rated as submersible. All of these features make the Fenix PD35 ideal for spelunking and other activities that require extended light availability.
Fenix also has a selection of other lights, including its Intelligent High Output, Wireless Control Bicycle Light (BC30 V2.0). This dual beam unit emits 2,200 lumens.
For more information, visit fenix-store.com.
Irreverent Bird Guide
There are a lot of great bird field identification guides, but after a day afield with The Field Guide to Dumb Birds of North America, you will never look at birds or birdwatching the same again.
Written and illustrated by Matt Kracht, The Field Guide to Dumb Birds of North America offers an irreverent, adversarial perspective on common birds that fill our worlds with song and color. Be forewarned that this book is Rated R for Language. Kids will love it for all the wrong reasons.
Kracht is not endeared to the vocalizations, habits and lifestyles of birds. Most of his descriptions are unprintable in a family medium, which is what made us laugh loudly while thumbing through its pages at Domestic Domestic on Kavanaugh Boulevard.
"That's the greatest bird book ever!" yelled the manager from the other side of the store. He knew what I was looking at merely by where I stood. "I often hand a copy to people that come in here and tell them to read a page. Any page. It doesn't matter. You can't read a single page without laughing. They almost always buy it."
Kracht identifies each species with an unofficial name, most of which are unprintable. The tamest is the mallard, which he calls The Dullard. The common name is in parentheses in smaller type below. There are no pretentious Latin names, either.
He compares the plumage of the pine siskin to dirty underwear. His description is more detailed, but we'll leave it at that. He weight shames the mallard for its gluttony of white bread at community ponds. He also lampoons the western bluebird for its faithlessness and promiscuity.
Kracht takes offense with the traditional description of the song sparrow's song, which is often compared to the opening of Beethoven's Symphony No. 5. Kracht says it has more in common with the opening of "Ice, Ice Baby!"
"So maybe you sparrow enthusiasts can put away your opera glasses and top hats and take it down a notch, OK?" Kracht exhorts.
It's a different tone for describing birds in lay terms, but between the lines the reader quickly understands that Kracht is an astute and observant birder, a term he loathes. In a section titled, "The Difference Between Birding and Birdwatching," Kracht wrote, "Until recently, there was no debate over the difference between the terms because rational people generally agreed that you can't just turn a noun into a verb because you feel like it, and thus the terms "birding" and "birder" did not exist. Sadly, those days are over."
Frankly, we suspect that Kracht is a pen name. It sounds too much like "Cracked," an appropriate name for a malcontent. We have some experience with this, ourselves having published a couple dozen magazine articles under the name Jacques Strappe.
Regardless, you need this book if you want to lighten up your birdwatching. It is well worth $16, but be careful about leaving it out where the grandkids will find it.
Oh, and don't skip the Introduction. It explains everything.
Apex Snack Sticks
Processed snack sticks are a staple for duck blinds and deer stands. The selection is vast, but Backcountry Meat Sticks by Apex Protein Snacks are a worthy addition to the lineup.
First and foremost, they are delicious. They are not excessively salty, they are lean, and they lack the shiny, oily surface of similar products that surely has a reductionist effect on our lifespans.
Second, they appear to be made of better stuff than most retail snack sticks. The ingredient list is short and devoid of the multi-syllabic chemical compounds that compose many foods in this category. Beef, water, venison, sea salt, dextrose, corn syrup solids, citric acid, spices, garlic, onion and sodium nitrite. That's it.
A stick weighs 1.5 ounces, contains 90 calories, 11 grams of protein and no sugar. Dextrose is technically kind of a stealth sugar, but it's not worth an argument. We only know that Apex meat sticks taste good, and we do not regret eating them as we do so many other products of this genre.
For more information, visit apexproteinsnacks.com.