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Mastering Summer Catfish
Iowa Sportsman July 2025
This Issue Brings You:
- Mastering Summer Catfish
- Fishing Iowa: Iowa Hot Spots
- Do It Yourself – Iowa Kill Plots
- Introducing Youth to Shooting Sports
- Whitetails 365 – Drought, Deer & Looming Threat of EHD
- County Spotlight: Iowa Fishing Destinations
- Blind Buyers Guide: Clear Sight Hunting Blinds
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A Plan on How to Catch your Biggest Fish of the Year
A Plan on How to Catch your Biggest Fish of the Year By Billy Pryor It is that time of year again… fall! It is a beautiful season change. The leaves start to glow with bright hues of yellow and orange, the chilly mornings have a crisp frost on the grass, and the earlier sunset […]
READ MOREPatterning Your Shotgun
Patterning Your Shotgun By Ryan Eder I love to joke with everyone and blame the choke in my gun for a poor shooting performance. “Man, I should have used a mod and not my full” is my signature tag line. The truth is, understanding your gun’s performance with different chokes is obviously important when we […]
READ MOREThinking Small
Thinking Small Hunting in Iowa has changed significantly during my lifetime. Four decades ago wild turkey and deer were scarce or non-existent in much of the state. Most hunters started out shooting squirrels and rabbits before moving on to pheasants and/or waterfowl. Only then did they graduate to larger game, if they had access to […]
READ MOREWhat Would You Do? Bow Hunting Questions Answered
What Would You Do? Bow Hunting Questions Answered It is time for our annual questions and answers article geared around bow hunting here in Iowa. Normally we answer questions from our readers on hot topics in the deer hunting realm. For example a question we always get is “Should I hunt stand “X” before the […]
READ MOREFeatured Story
10 Killer Big Buck Bow Hunting Ambushes
Why do top notch hunters shoot quality mature deer year after year? Sure they scout, don’t shoot young bucks, maintain their land, pay attention to the wind, plant food plots, are in big buck country, ect. Yes all of those and many more reasons can attribute to better chances of shooting bigger bucks consistently. However do you know the most important reason why people shoot big deer year after year? Because they place their stands in locations where big bucks like to frequent…it really is that simple. They are in the right place at the right time. You will never consistently shoot mature deer if you are not putting your tree stands in the proper locations.
Whitetails are creatures of habit and instinct, they do everything for a purpose and that is actually a good thing for us hunters. If we know what they like to do, what they don’t like to do, and how they navigate their day then we can key in on certain geographical locations on our properties and ambush an unsuspecting bruiser.
Created By Iowans, For Iowans
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.