The New American Outdoor Dream

If you follow us closely here on the MPTV Blog, you will likely hear us refer to the outdoor lifestyle quite a bit. We believe that hunting, fishing, and firearms go beyond sport.

We believe that those sports are just pillars of the outdoor lifestyle. A true 365-day way of living. Something that we can engage in and live out from youth to old age, pass down from generation to generation, and use as a guide in our daily lives. The outdoor lifestyle is alive and well in America, and we wouldn’t have it any other way.

As we move on and continuously evolve in this outdoor lifestyle, new areas of interest inevitably pop up. Needless to say, the outdoor lifestyle in 2018 is drastically different than it was in 1918, or even just ten years ago in 2008.

While land and wildlife management are not new ideas by any stretch, they have evolved and become something of a new dream in the outdoor community. Now more than ever we have outdoorsmen and women with land and wildlife management aspirations. Hunters who hope to further immerse themselves in the outdoor lifestyle by connecting with the outdoors at a deeper level.

So many public land hunters who live the do-it-yourself lifestyle just dream of one day having access to private property so they can put their own touch on it. Many of you reach out to us and others on social media to share that dream.

Some of our most popular posts here and on social media center upon land management or deer management. Modern outdoorsmen and women are in love with the idea of putting their own touch on a piece of land and making it better for the wildlife and recreation alike.

More hunters than ever before are trading the camouflage for work boots as they mount their tractors to plant food plots, alter the landscape, and break a sweat in the name of better hunting and a more sustainable renewable resource.

Thanks to incredible stewardship examples set by organizations like the Quality Deer Management Association, National Wild Turkey Federation, and outdoor television showing us how rewarding management can be, we now have a new age of outdoorsmen with a different dream. A dream of putting their hands on a piece of property and leaving a lasting legacy.

Harvesting clean meat, punching tags, and putting trophies above the mantel will always be the end-goals of the hunter, but the means of getting to those end-goals are changing. Hunting is no longer a simple game of relentless pursuit of bag limits. A growing sector of hunters are now more concerned with the journey to reach that bag limit. Seeking a deeper connection to that final taste of success.

As urban and suburban sprawl claim more rural areas by the year, we now have more people dreaming of living that country lifestyle on their own slice of heaven. Owning and maintaining a farm property with hunting and outdoor recreation in mind. Practicing quality wildlife management to give themselves and their neighbors better hunting now and in the future.

Fifty years ago you would have been hard pressed to find an average outdoorsman or woman who knew what a food plot was. That may be a stretch, but you get the point. Most hunters were focused upon the hunt and the harvest. Only a select few people were actually planting food plots and stringently practicing quality management, and that can even be true going back as recently as the 90’s.

Fast-forward to the current era and you would be hard pressed to tune into a show on your favorite outdoor network without hearing about food plots and management. It seems like every outdoor pro has purchased or leased a farm with the hopes of planting and managing it. Even if they aren’t actually doing it, you can bet that high-dollar outfitter with the giant bucks is. You even have shows and publications out there that only cover the management aspect of hunting.

People are making it their life’s work to obtain that slice of outdoor heaven. Just look at companies like Whitetail Properties, which make their hay by selling hunting and recreational properties. Outdoorsmen and women are dropping massive amounts of money to obtain land, buy equipment to work it, and ultimately reap the rewarding lifestyle that comes with that process.

It’s pretty easy to see that land and wildlife management have become a massive sector of the outdoor lifestyle, and it’s only growing in popularity. As a generation of hunters who have grown up on outdoor television begin to reach adulthood, you will see more and more of this new American outdoor dream. It has become somewhat of the norm in the hunting industry, and that’s a good thing for all of us.

More folks practicing quality wildlife management and getting their hands dirty in hopes of bettering the land will only up the quality of hunting for all of us.

Without looking at the numbers and statistics, it sure seems as if we see more record book deer hit the ground each season. Maybe it’s just the social media factor and the fact that we now live in an instant information sharing society, but it sure seems as if the quality of whitetails is at an all-time high. The same can be said of turkey hunting and other game species. If social media pictures are any real clue, then something good is happening.

Managing for quality deer or other game species is an addictive and rewarding process that hooks you if you give it a chance. When you work hard and connect at a deeper level with the land and the game you pursue on it, you begin to redefine success. A good management whitetail doe becomes a trophy. Getting pictures of a stud 3.5-year old buck with incredible potential is almost as thrilling as the harvest.

With more people than ever before spreading the good word of land and wildlife management, we have more people wanting to get involved.

After all, it’s the new American outdoor dream.