In the early 1900s, national parks were under constant threat from private industry, which hoped to capitalize on those unique landscapes. Two charismatic members of the Boone and Crockett Club worked the halls of Congress to ensure management of those wonders fell to a new agency that would prioritize their protection.
Conservation
Where Hunting Happens, Conservation Happens™
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Conservation doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Achieving grand conservation milestones takes networking, collaboration, patience, and partnerships. Boone and Crockett Club members know that. For this reason, many Club members have been on the ground floor in the formative days of numerous conservation and environmental organizations that still exist today. While this isn’t an exhaustive list of the groups that the Club has helped to get off the ground, it does provide some insight into the far-reaching influence that past and current members have on the community dedicated to the wildlife and wild places we cherish.
Bison are symbols of the American West, and market hunting nearly wiped them from the planet. The story of their near-extinction and then of their restoration thanks to members of the Boone and Crockett Club is the story of the first animal reintroduction in North America.
Members of the Boone and Crockett Club worked relentlessly not just to save pronghorn from extinction, but also to preserve the land on which they roam where they still flourish to this day.
There were about two million acres of old-growth redwoods in Northern California before Europeans arrived en masse to the area. Today, only about 110,000 acres of old-growth redwood forest remains. If it weren’t for Boone and Crockett Club members, there wouldn’t be any redwoods left at all.
More than a century ago, members of the Boone and Crockett Club spearheaded efforts to set aside areas of land and water where conservation of our fish and wildlife is the number one priority. This is how it all began.
George Bird Grinnell, co-founder of the Boone and Crockett Club, worked for decades to protect a chunk of northwest Montana we now call Glacier National Park.
Members of the Boone and Crockett Club were key players in laying the groundwork for both conservation of game species and generating the funds to pay for it—a system that we still use today.
After establishing the foundation for America's National Wildlife Refuge System, members of the Boone and Crockett Club continued to build upon their successful wildlife restoration efforts that still exist today. Challenges in managing these special places take collaborative solutions—and that’s where the Club excels.
How one member of the Boone and Crockett Club (almost) single-handedly established Denali National Park.
By PJ DelHomme A list of those involved in the early years of the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) reads like a who’s who of the Boone and Crockett Club. Even though the AMNH opened its doors in 1869—18 years before the Club was founded by Theodore Roosevelt and George Bird Grinnell —the...
Sheep, Bears, Caribou, Whitetails—There’s a Giant for Every Hunter Could you pick only one species to hunt for the rest of your life? We can’t either, so we waded through our recent big game entries to give you a big taste of everything. North America is a hunter’s paradise, and the assortment of...
More than anyone, George Bird Grinnell influenced, directed, and solidified the conservation movement during its early years. He also orchestrated the activity of many other conservation leaders, some of whom will be topics of future biographies. His avoidance of self-promotion, and his desire to often work “behind the scenes,” has left him largely unheralded today.
In 2022, both the Boone and Crockett Club’s National Collection of Heads and Horns and one of B&C’s great partners, Federal Premium Ammunition, celebrated their centennial anniversaries. The building that housed the National Collection was dedicated in May 1922 and marked a critical time in turning the tide toward wildlife conservation. Federal Cartridge Company was incorporated in April 1922, and when the Pittman-Robertson Federal Aid in Wildlife Restoration Act passed in 1937, Federal became one of the primary companies paying the excise tax that helped restore our native wildlife populations. Conservation became a success story over the next 100 years, and the Club and our members and partners were at the center of the discussion.
Winter 2022 Edition From the Desert to the Tundra, We’ve Got It All If you need some last-minute motivation to get out in the woods and fill your tag, we’ve got it right here. There’s a record-breaking Pennsylvania black bear, some wild trophies from the muskeg and tundra of the frozen north, and a...
Spring 2022 Edition – What’s better than record-book antlers, horns, and skulls? The stories behind them, of course. This slideshow certainly has plenty of big bone at which to gawk. Dig deeper, though, and you’ll find so much more. There’s the coal miner from Virginia who drove to Newfoundland with two chest freezers to hunt woodland caribou. There is the hunter who killed the world’s record musk ox, and then he packed it out on his back. And did you hear the one about the Rocky Mountain goat in South Dakota? We’ve got them all right here.
Fall 2022 Edition Giant Bison, Bears, Whitetails…and Everything in Between With some hunting seasons underway and others right around the corner, your head should be in the game by now. If not, then let us help with some of the top trophies of the 31st and upcoming 32nd Awards periods. If this...
Summer 2022 Edition With the 31st Big Game Awards right around the corner, the anticipation of seeing so many conservation success stories under one roof is electric. What follows is just a sample of some of the great trophies the Boone and Crockett Club will celebrate in Springfield Missouri, July...
Winter 2021 Edition - Whether your hunts are in the rearview or you’re layering up for one more try, we have a number of new record entries to keep hunting on your mind. Check out a new Montana state record black bear, a behemoth bighorn ram from North Dakota, and an Appalachian sleeper-state producing some incredible whitetails.
In the early 1900s, when America’s conservation movement was in its infancy, Boone and Crockett Club members used media to spread the word about destruction of the country’s wildlife and wild places. In turn, the public pressured lawmakers to support legislation safeguarding those resources.
Lead Ammunition Top of Mind in D.C. — For most hunters, the metallurgical composition of ammunition only comes to mind when buying a box of cartridges or two at the sporting goods store. Most folks find their preferred caliber, peruse the specs, and buy the most cost-effective round for their budget.
Wildlife artist Carl Rungius traveled extensively across Canada and the American West, sketching and painting the big game he encountered. His work showed city folks on the East Coast what they would lose if they didn’t take seriously a new concept called conservation.
Montana 1958 — With a .270 Winchester Model 70, this dairy farm worker cut a big set of elk tracks in October. He followed that bull for at least a dozen miles using his wits and old-school hunting wisdom. At the end of the trail was the second-largest elk in the world.
Relenting to mounting pressure, Club officials allow the elusive chupacabra (Spanish for goat sucker) into the big game records. April 1, 2023 — Since 1995, advocates of a blood-sucking, hairless, reptilian-like animal have worked to recognize the creature as a trophy big game animal. They finally...
By Mike McTee, Researcher, MPG Ranch - Aldo Leopold wrote that “a conservationist is one who is humbly aware that with each stroke [of the axe] he is writing his signature on the face of the land.” As hunters today, we are signing our names with bullets.
Stylish Stalkers — There was a time when hunters would don a tie and tuck in their shirt to chase big game—and they would look darn good doing it. For that reason, we sifted through the archives to find some of the best-dressed hunters from the good old days. If you like this slideshow, more of these timeless photos can be found in our Vintage Hunting Album , which makes a great gift or book to keep up at the cabin.
From Toddlers to Tines—The only thing better than sharing the spoils of the hunt with your kids is having them hunt themselves. Passing down the fun of the hunt is a time-honored tradition for many families—and as you can see from this slideshow, it’s been going on for quite a while.
Smile, You're Hunting — Too many hunting photos show a hunter, for whatever reason, looking downright mad about filling a tag. Why not smile after a successful hunt? You don’t want your great-grandkids thinking you were a complete jerk. As a friendly reminder to have a good time out there this hunting season, we compiled these vintage photos of hunters who look truly happy. We hope you’re glad to be out there, too. Say cheese.
With an estimated 34 million whitetail deer running around the U.S. today, it’s hard to imagine that their numbers were down to around 500,000 in the early 1900s. With proper management, numbers rebounded, and hunting seasons followed. Many hunters were happy to snap a few field photos along the...
March is an action-packed month for college basketball fans, a time for the buzzer-beaters and underdog comebacks. You know it as March Madness, and to get into the spirit of this most exciting time, we’re putting a Boone and Crockett spin on the bracket system with our own big buck bracket action.
By Jon Gassett , B&C Professional Member In 2020, the Boone and Crockett Club, in partnership with the Wildlife Management Institute, initiated a comprehensive study of the illegal take of big game in the United States. The goals of this effort are to better understand the difference between...
The Boone and Crockett Club and Wildlife Management Institute’s Poach & Pay Program recently completed analysis of early data from surveys of landowners, hunters, and conservation officers in an effort to understand the “Dark Figure” of poaching. Initial research under the Poach & Pay project in 2016 examined and reviewed state restitution systems for illegal take of big game species and found that the judicial systems were the primary obstacle for successfully convicting and punishing poachers.
Ladies in the Field—When the Boone and Crockett Club was first created, those two dozen men agreed that the first purpose of the Club would be “to promote manly sport with a rifle.” Today, that dog doesn’t hunt as more women take to the field and forest (with or without their husbands). Today, entries into the Boone and Crockett Records by female hunters are commonplace—and they have been for a while. We sifted through the records and Boone and Crockett publications to bring you some of the highlights from more than a century of ladies getting it done out there.
Colorado hasn’t seen a state-record ram in more than two decades, and the state has never seen a 200-point ram enter the records. Recently, the state has seen two number-one rams in two weeks.
For five months in 2022, a trail camera posted on a fence next to a riparian area caught the intimate travels of both predator and prey. Grizzlies, lions, elk, bobcats, mule deer—everything took a turn walking along, scooting under, hopping over, and plowing through this fence near Dupuyer Creek that runs along Montana’s Rocky Mountain Front.
A raffle ticket earns a young hunter (and his dad) the chance to chase elk in Virginia. A historic hunt ensues, ending with a big bull and bigger memories. By PJ DelHomme Bo Prieskorn was hunting pronghorn with his sons in New Mexico when his phone rang. He didn’t recognize the number but answered...
Winter came early this year to the Rocky Mountain Front. On the Club’s Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Ranch in northwest Montana, the plains slam into the Rocky Mountains in dramatic fashion—and the weather can be intense. Winds in some places on the Front average 18 mph every single day. That doesn’t seem to stop the big game, predators, and other woodland creatures from going about their business as usual.
From apex predators like grizzly bears to feisty striped skunks, the Boone and Crockett Club’s Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Ranch on Montana’s Rocky Mountain Front is a wildlife melting pot. You can see a small sampling of those full-time residents here. The ranch has dozens of wildlife trail cams...
With a mix of apex predators, big game, migratory songbirds, and a wide variety of small woodland creatures, the Boone and Crockett Club’s Theodore Roosevelt Memorial (TRM) Ranch is a true wildlife cornucopia. Located on Montana’s Rocky Mountain Front, the TRM is a place of research and instruction...
It’s been a long winter, and they can be very long on Montana’s Rocky Mountain Front where the Boone and Crockett Club owns and manages the Theodore Roosevelt Memorial (TRM) Ranch . The mission of the ranch is to research, teach, and demonstrate integrated livestock/wildlife conservation, which is...
Much of North America is currently in the depths of winter, but that doesn’t mean you have to dwell on it. After sifting through thousands of trail camera photos and videos from the Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Ranch from last spring and summer, Boone and Crockett Fellow Chris Hansen pulled the very...
Alaska 1956 One man’s quest for a trophy Dall’s sheep takes him on a classic adventure in Alaska’s Chugach Mountains. His determination ends with a wild story and a World’s Record. During World War II, Frank Cook served in the Navy. He was a radio and radar operator on seaplanes and spent about a...
Colorado 1901 Theodore Roosevelt is the only U.S. president with his name in the Boone and Crockett records. And as far as we know, he’s the only hunter to kill a World’s Record with a hunting knife. On November 6, 1900, William McKinley was elected the 25th president of the United States. Theodore...
Congressional action prior to the holidays enacted the Chronic Wasting Disease Research and Management Act as part of the final omnibus spending bill for 2023. The legislation formalizes a 3-year-old program that supports states and tribes in their efforts to control chronic wasting disease (CWD), an always fatal neurological disease affecting cervids like deer, elk, and moose.
Adding packrafting has catapulted MOHAB into the highest category of BSA high adventure programs. Excerpt from Fair Chase Magazine By Luke Coccoli, B&C Conservation Program Manager Photos Courtesy of MOHAB/BSA contributors When I was filling out the application to work for Boone and Crockett,...
MISSOULA, Mont. (May 5, 2022) – In late April, the Judges Panel for the Boone and Crockett Club’s 31st Big Game Awards completed the official scores on 71 of the top trophies in 32 categories from 26 distinct species or subspecies that were taken through fair chase hunting or were picked up and entered into the B&C Record Book over the last three years. The mounts that were panel scored for the 31st Big Game Awards—and those of 25 youth-harvested trophies that were added to the record book—are now on display to the public at Johnny Morris’ Wonders of Wildlife National Museum & Aquarium in Springfield, Missouri.
While Wisconsin has plenty of game to hunt like turkey, upland birds—and even elk and wolves—it’s the whitetail deer and black bears that make the record book. In fact, their black bears are consistently in the top 100, and they have been since 2000. To hunt one of the state’s 24,000 estimated bruins, hunters have to apply for roughly 11,500 permits. More than 129,000 hunters applied in 2021. As for deer, Wisconsin is home to the Jordan buck, the number three typical whitetail of all time. The state has plenty of typical deer entries in the 180-inch range, and there are a number of non-typicals over 220 as well.
In 1887, Theodore Roosevelt returned from his Elkhorn Ranch in the Dakota Territory with an idea. He would assemble a group of like-minded, influential men to turn the tide in favor of conserving our nation’s resources, which, at the time, was vanishing quickly. This is how he did it. Roosevelt...
The .30-06 is not only the .308’s parent case; it is also the cartridge that the .308 is best compared against. Despite its much shorter case, the .308 offers about 96 percent the performance of the ‘06. Shown at left—the .308 Winchester, and right—the .30-06 Springfield. In the background, the...
With 76 entries and counting, Brian Ross has the largest collection of whitetails belonging to any individual in the Boone and Crockett records. By PJ DelHomme Brian Ross started collecting antlers in 1983 when he was 10 years old. He still has his first set, an eight-point whitetail with a broken...
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"The wildlife and its habitat cannot speak. So we must and we will."
-Theodore Roosevelt
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