The Pittsburgh Pirates have turned the corner on a 20-year drought of winning seasons and our family has never given up on them even in the bleakest times.

Hope springs eternal and the Buccos are just one example. One of my other great hopes is to score big on the Pennsylvania Elk license drawing.

It, too, has been a life long pursuit of making applications and hoping to at least get in the game. Sept. 13 will be the day of the drawing for 26 Bull Elk tags and 60 Antlerless Elk tags.

I’m not normally superstitious, but can I finally get lucky on Friday the 13th? The good news is that the elk herd is very healthy and the numbers allotted for this year’s hunt is an increase over last years numbers of 65 tags. As I always say, “Getting the tag is the easy part…getting one home is the project!”

I’m keeping my fingers crossed for the elk drawing and our Bucs!

Luck runs out

My luck on Lake Erie finally ran out with the weather taking its toll on our group. Even though we caught some fish in the rolling waves, we also caught most of our group with being seasick.

The good news is that we caught a few lunkers and my wife Renee caught her personal best 30-inch walleye. She and I didn’t get sick, but all of our friends were down for the count and were officially DNF as we pulled the plug on this trip.

I have had plenty of great days on Lake Erie and a few that were scary or less than desirable. One thing for sure is that you always better respect the Lake.

Goose, dove season

The early goose and dove season officially opened Monday in Pennsylvania. The bag limits are generous and the possessions limits have increased this year.

The estimated Pennsylvania resident Canada goose population is estimated to be around 279,000 birds with a desired population to be 150,000. A licensed hunter with both a migratory bird stamp and the federal duck stamp is allowed to have eight geese daily with a possession limit of 24 geese in the early season from Sept. 2 through Sept. 25.

Dove hunters will have a 15-bird limit set with a 45-bird possession limit. Hunters sure can burn a lot of ammo in the pursuit of these birds in the early season, but remember that the waterfowl rules call for non-toxic shot for geese and that you are required to clean up spent shell hulls after your hunts.

Archery season near

The fall-like weather has the archery hunters scrambling for supplies and deals. With archery season opening Oct. 5, the archers will be scouring the shelves of local sporting good stores and online catalog businesses for all the new and tried and true equipment that they might need.

A new pack of broad heads for hunting arrows can easily set you back 30-50 dollars. I figured that an archer shoots in one arrow release the same as most rifle hunters shoot in a box of typical rifle ammo. With an overhead expense like that, you better be practicing with your bows!

Online purchasing

I used the online license purchasing opportunity with the PGC Outdoor Shop and it went smoothly.

They use the Active Network out of Nashville, Tenn., and it took around 8-10 days to arrive. If you are not in a hurry to get a license, it is very convenient but if you need it now, you better just use the old fashioned over the counter method of your favorite local license vendor.

About 25 different states and provinces use this system to renew or buy licenses online by contacting www.active.com/outdoors.

Ammo shortages

The ammunition shortages that were a big pain earlier in the summer seem to be lightening up now.

Ammunition for handguns and .22’s was near impossible to find at any price. Then it started to show up at outrageous mark ups and now it is showing up on retailers shelves at near reasonable prices.

I recently purchased (a box of 50) .22 shells for $2.19 that worked out to $21.90 for a brick. That I can live with!

Jay Hewitt is an outdoors columnist for the Butler Eagle