Check Out Our Current Issue!
In the April 2026 Issue of the Iowa Sportsman
- Best Places for Early Season Open Water
- Building a Foundation for the Field
- Range Safety Tips
- Building a Farm Pond to Hold More Wildlife
- Shed Antlers: Do they really tell us anything?
- What Makes a Great Food Plot
- Keeping Kids Engaged in Turkey Hunting
- Pre-Spawn Bass
- Springtime Panfish-Perch, Crappie, and Bluegill
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Voyageurs National Park Is A Winter Wonderland
Voyageurs National Park Is a Winter Wonderland Voyageurs National Park cloaked in its winter array is a beautiful, dramatic landscape of glistening snow, frozen lakes and frost-glazed pines. There are few places to experience a winter vista largely free of roads and buildings, and it’s worth a trip to Voyageurs, along Minnesota’s northern border, to […]
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Whitetails 365 – Aim Small/Miss Small
Whitetails 365 – Aim Small/Miss Small If you’ve never been there, you’re lucky! But most archery hunters have experienced that deep guttural feeling when you release an arrow only to see it drive into a deer way off mark. That sick feeling knowing you didn’t make a good shot. Will you find the deer? Will […]
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Doe Harvest Timing
Doe Harvest Timing I would argue that having a doe population strategy is as important as any other tactic if you are managing a farm for whitetail deer. High population farms are not good for the herd, for native plants, and surely not good for local farming. They can be exciting to hunt for young […]
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5 Tips for Season Opener
5 Tips for Season Opener #5 Tree Stand Inspections – Every year in late August, around the time I put my fall plots in, I do a complete inspection of every tree stand and ground blind set that I have. I make sure all the climbing sticks and the stands are tight and secure. While […]
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Featured Story
Springtime Panfish-Perch, Crappie, and Bluegill
Spring is in full swing here in Iowa, and what can be more pleasant a reminder than the sound of birds, the sight of flowers blooming, and the feel of a warm afternoon? I can think of at least one more thing…Panfish!
I can remember it like yesterday, our family would all meet up at the lake house. There was work to do. The yard was to be picked up, the cabin cleaned, and the dock had to be put in. But then, after the work was finished, it was time for all of us cousins to fish! We would all go out to the garage to pick out a few old rods and tie on a hook and sinker as best we could.
The next order of business was to hunt for worms. Flipping anything that we could find stuck in the ground in hopes of just finding a few crawlers. Once the bait was secured, we were ready to fish. We would go out on the dock and cast, vertical jig, and even troll along the side of the dock. We usually did pretty well use those tactics, but my all-time favorite was walking along the rocks on shore and dropping the bait down every little crevice, not knowing what was going to come up next.
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The Iowa Sportsman website and magazine are Iowa’s only privately owned media sources catering to hunters, anglers, and outdoor enthusiasts here in Iowa. Simply put, we are unlike other Iowa outdoor media sources: All our staff is from Iowa, from our publisher to our writers. We actually follow through on what we advertise; we provide knowledgeable content from people who know the industry or sport discussed.
