Eagle Cam should produce another exciting season

February 8, 2018

Pennsylvania Game Commission executive director Bryan Burhans sounds like a proud father, or perhaps grandfather, when he talks about the return of the agency’s Eagle Cam mounted in a nest at Codorus State Park near Hanover in York County. Eagle Cam is the online service that provides worldwide access 24/7 access of the activities in the nest until vacated in the spring. To view Eagle Cam go to the PGC website at www.pgc.pa.gov and click the “Hanover Bald Eagle Live Stream” link. Twitter and Facebook users also can share the Eagle Cam with friends by tweeting ...

Forest lands imperiled as aging owners divide, sell

February 1, 2018

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Many trees in Gary Hague’s Wyoming County forest sprouted before he was born. Others were planted with his own rough hands. A memory seeded in the summer twilight a half-century ago grows there, too. The deed says 99 acres “more or less,” but it felt even bigger when Hague was 14 and his Uncle George said they needed to walk it. They left the clapboard farmhouse at dusk, mostly silent aside from waking insects, and followed the boundary lines in the long shadows. When George Hague died in 1973, an attorney told his nephew the land was his. “I think he ...

Deep freeze draws ice fishermen out in elements

January 25, 2018

CLARK (AP) — A small cluster of ice huts stood alone as the wind swept over the ice covering the Shenango River Lake on a recent afternoon. But spirits inside the huts were warm despite the winds and cold temperatures. Brothers Dan and Billy Inches, of Aliquippa, had individual tents next ...

State hunter has new No. 1 buck

January 18, 2018

HARRISBURG — A trophy whitetail rack shattered the previous record in the Typical Archery category in Pennsylvania’s record book. Ron Shaulis, of West Newton, harvested the trophy buck on Oct. 24, 2017, with a compound bow on public land in Westmoreland County. The rack had a net score ...

Penns Valley group receives fish and wildlife grant funds

January 18, 2018

MILLHEIM — Penns Valley Conservation Association (PVCA) has received a $107,000 grant from the Central Appalachia Habitat Stewardship Program of the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, one of eight 2017 grants in Pennsylvania funded by the Richard King Mellon Foundation. The grant supports a “Young Forest Initiative” launched by PVCA in 2012 to integrate establishment of early successional wildlife habitat for American woodcock, golden winged warbler and many more bird species dependent on shrub habitat with native riparian flora that maintain cold water temperatures and ...

High school rifle teams take aim at scholarships, Olympics

January 18, 2018

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — They’d all skipped caffeine at school and cut back on sugar to keep their heart rates down and their nerves steady. They donned thick canvas uniforms to hold their bodies rigid when they aimed. Some knelt. Some stood. A few lay prone on mats spread out on the cold floor. Just around 3:30 p.m., starting time for the Everett Area High School Rifle Team’s practice, the teens loaded .22-caliber bullets into their rifles, $2,000 to $5,000 worth of hardware each, rested their cheeks on the stocks, and held their breath. In the moment between each heartbeat, they ...