Family Traditions - A Reminder of a hunters why. By Tom LaLond

How did you get introduced to the adventurous world of hunting? For the majority, I’d bet money that it was a family member. Either dad, mom, brother, sister, uncle, or grandpa. Our hunting roots all tie back to one common thing, family traditions. Now as a family grows how does a person stay really active with their hunting and land management goals? There’s one, incredibly busy friend of mine who has identified a very fulfilling and productive way to improve his properties hunt-ability and his family’s bond. Sean Graese is the owner of Northstar Bison, his family’s grass fed Bison operation in Rice Lake, WI. When he’s not organizing and directing the many aspects of this business that ships high quality meats all over the country, Sean is running around town or the house with his wife, Sami, and 3 boys Lincoln, Miller, and Griffin. So where did he compromise his work or family time in order to get more hunting opportunities? He didn’t. Sean brought his family into his beloved outdoor adventures! This

This season Sean received permission to plant a food plot that would extend onto his neighbors property edge. Armed with a tractor, tiller, and a bag of Big ‘n Beasty Sean and his 2 oldest boys Lincoln and Miller, baby Griffin was just born and unable to do much tilling, set out afield for some family time. They turned over the ground, green vegetation and all, broadcast the Frigid Forage, and then lightly turned over the top soil to incorporate the seed mix. It’s such a simple, and unorthodox planting technique that we couldn’t believe how well everything germinated and grew in. Lincoln and Miller.

loved running through the tilled soil while being able to broadcast the seed. Now that the table was set all they needed was to get an ambush point set up. The construction of the log shack was a favorite of the boys. It was a simple concept again, that turned out spectacular. It was a black-backed log cabin style blind nestled just off the food plot edge overlooking a staging area. Sean noticed that this project helped teach the family about the hard work and benefits of perseverance. So what’s the lesson or reason to be excited about this example? It’s no secret that our hunter recruitment numbers are going in a downward trend. Much of that is due to families struggle of getting kids involved early enough, before they get so distracted by other opportunities. This story is an example of how an incredibly busy family reset their priorities in order to do their part of adjusting that involvement declination into a positive trend. Now ask yourself, what can you do within your sphere of influence to turn this down trend, upward? Start with your own family traditions.