campfire-tendreloins

Pack Essentials – Raingear

As hunters from across the state returned from the woods with webbed feet this year, it served as a good reminder that it actually does rain here in Colorado.  That is if they could even get to their hunting grounds with the amount of flooding across the Front Range, as many were unable to do so.

I think I may have hurt the feelings of our good friend, Kyle Hurt, as I nicknamed him “Swishy” over the course of our hunt.  While he had good raingear in his pack, it wasn’t exactly bowhunter friendly and made quite a bit of noise walking through the woods.  If there’s one thing I’m critical of in bowhunting outwear it’s ultra-quiet construction.  This has been a persistent issue for bowhunters, as many of the new high-tech fabrics perform well but they are just not quite enough for the close quarter work required by bowhunters.

After making fun of “Swishy” he came back to town and started doing some homework and forwarded the following:

Came across this article in the most recent issue of outdoor life. Kinda timely based on our hunt and having some “issues” with my raingear….especially since we actually needed it this year.

I was hoping to see something like this and, Matt, some of your readers on your blog or Facebook might want to be alerted to this and the need to have good rain gear.  

I think the three most important factors for me (after waterproofness) would be: 

Quiteness, packability and weight. I am giving my consideration to the Badlands-Exo as it seems to get good ratings in all three.

http://www.outdoorlife.com/blogs/hunting/2013/10/gear-test-best-hunting-raingear

I was reluctant to pass on somebody else’s gear review, but the thing I really liked about the article was the associated decibel (dBA) rating for each garment.  The engineer in me likes to see something that is quantifiable vs. the subjective opinion of the reviewer.  I think Mr. John Taranto did a good job of putting the test together and while I haven’t personally had my hands on all the tested materials, I’ve seen enough or heard enough about each manufacturer to know it was worth passing along.

 

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