Focus on flintlock season

Cabela's has partnered with the National Muzzle Loading Rifle Association to hold "Muzzleloader Weekend" Saturday and Sunday, Dec. 17 and 18, at its Hamburg location.

Hosted by NMLRA Longhunter Society director Dave Ehrig of Topton, the weekend features free seminars designed to help hunters prepare for Pennsylvania's flintlock muzzleloader deer season, which opens Monday, Dec. 26. A nationally known outdoors writer and the author of "Muzzleloader Hunting for Deer and Turkey," he will also have informal question-and-answer sessions.

Ehrig has hunted big game, including bear, caribou and deer, with muzzleloaders for more than 35 years and has taken more than 100 deer with the firearms. His seminars will be comprised of both foundational skills for beginners and new techniques for veteran hunters.

Seminar schedules for both days are as follows: "Flintlock Muzzleloader Basics," 11 a.m.; "Powders, Pellets, Confusion," 1 p.m.; "The Truth about Flints, Caps, 209 Primers and Battery Ignition," 2 p.m.; and "Foul Weather Muzzleloader Hunting," 3 p.m. For more information, access the website at www.cabelas.com/hamburg.

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This year's Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission Photography Contest deadline is Saturday, Dec. 31. Previous winners have had their entries published in PFBC publications, including "Pennsylvania Angler & Boater" magazine, and used as displays at agency exhibits at sportshows.

To obtain an entry form, complete with contest rules and past winning entries, visit the PFBC website at www.fishandboat.com/anglerboater/photocontest/00photo.htm.

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A muzzleloader shoot will be held, Sunday, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., by First Frontier Militia at Bowmanstown Rod and Gun Club, Road and Gun Club Road, Bowmanstown. For information, call Roger Fisher at 610-377-2812.

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This week's edition of "Experience The Outdoors," hosted by award-winning Pennsylvania Outdoor Writers Association member Doyle Dietz, Sunday, at 7 a.m. on 1410 WLSH and 9:30 a.m. on Magic 105.5, will feature Hunters Sharing the Harvest executive director John Plowman.

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A trap shoot will be held, Thursday, Nov. Dec. 15, beginning at 6 p.m., at Orwigsburg Gun Club, Gun Club Road, off Route 443 East, Orwigsburg. For information, e-mail jafone@comcast.net.