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The National Park Rangers are advising hikers in Glacier National Park and other Rocky Mountain parks to be alert for bears and take extra precautions to avoid an encounter.
They advise park visitors to wear little bells on their clothes so they make noise when hiking. The bell noise allows bears to hear them coming from a distance and not be startled by a hiker accidentally sneaking up on them. This might cause a bear to charge.
Visitors should also carry a pepper spray can just in case a bear is encountered. Spraying the pepper into the air will irritate the bear’s sensitive nose and it will run away.
It is also a good idea to keep an eye out for fresh bear scat so you have an idea if bears are in the area. People should be able to recognize the difference between black bear and grizzly bear scat.
Black bear droppings are smaller and often contain berries, leaves, and possibly bits of fur. Grizzly bear droppings tend to contain small bells and smell of pepper.
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Two Barret sniper rifles were reeled from a canal in Florida. (Composite via Canva and Creative Commons)
Over a balmy winter weekend in South Miami-Dade, Florida, a young boy and his grandfather set out to fish along a canal. What they reeled in weren’t fish, but holy mackerel were they a catch.
Duane Smith was shocked when his grandson Allen Cadwalader pulled in two .50-caliber Barrett sniper rifles while magnet fishing, the Miami Herald reported.
Smith and Cadwalader went out with magnetic rods after viewing a YouTube video on it, and decided to drop lines in the C-102 canal.
“We ended up with two pounds of scrap metal and 40 pounds of gun,” Smith told the Miami Herald, adding, “I figured, since it was our first time, this was beginner’s luck.”
But luck struck twice, and the pair pulled up a second rifle one drop after the first.
“The Barretts had so much mass,” Smith noted. “The magnet went straight to them.”
Smith, 61, who formerly served with Army infantry, said that he was interested in the firearms’ lower recievers, where serial numbers are typically located. He immediately called police.
“Whoever did this is not your run-of-the-mill criminal,” said Smith. “It looked like it was something that someone would want to come back for.”
The guns are currently being processed at a local forensics lab.
This was far from the first time people have gone “magnet fishing” and found old weapons.
This YouTube video shows the discovery of an old Nazi MG-42 machine gun from World War II.
“For me a very exciting video!” said MjrCarnyx – WW2 Metal Detecting, who posted the video, which had more than 280,000 views, in 2019. “As you can see we had a few epic days with the guys from Dutch WW2 Magnet Hunters. It was absolutely unbelievable and I can’t thank them enough for taking me along. I really do hope you enjoy!”
President Joe Biden and Attorney General Merrick Garland announced today the creation of a “National Ghost Gun Enforcement Initiative” designed to crack down on homemade guns, sometimes referred to as “ghost guns.”
The announcement comes as Biden travels to New York City to meet with Mayor Eric Adams, who recently announced his own “Blueprint to End Gun Violence.”
“Today, the Department is announcing the launch of a national ghost gun enforcement initiative designed to prevent these unserialized firearms from being used to commit crimes, including by prioritizing bringing federal charges against criminal use of these weapons,” the DOJ explained in a statement.
As part of this new initiative, the DOJ will “train a national cadre of prosecutors on enforcement issues specific to the use of ghost guns in crimes.” These prosecutors will be available to “every district across the country.”
The DOJ will also send out a “set of materials” to assist investigators and prosecutors in bringing cases against those who use homemade firearms in crimes, and designate a “ghost gun coordinator” in each ATF field division.
The statement’s focus on crimes and criminals is doubtless intended to reassure law-abiding gun owners that the DOJ won’t come after them. But “ghost gun” owners may not be considered “law-abiding” for long.
At the behest of the Biden administration, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) proposed a new rule that would redefine what constitutes a “firearm frame or receiver.”
As part of this new rule, the ATF will ban “weapons parts kits” by redefining the term “firearm” to include “a weapon parts kit that is designed to or may readily be assembled, completed, converted, or restored to expel a projectile by the action of an explosive.”
This new definition requires companies that manufacture weapons parts kits to serialize unfinished receivers and conduct a background check on all customers prior to purchase.
The ATF assures gun owners that “nothing in this rule would restrict persons not otherwise prohibited from possessing firearms from making their own firearms at home without markings solely for personal use.”
However, the DOJ’s laser focus on “ghost gun” prosecution casts doubt on how gun owners who currently own non-serialized weapons parts kits will be treated. As GunsAmerica has covered previously, the ATF has banned a product, secured customer lists from gun companies, and used those lists to prosecute search warrants.
In the case of one firefighter from California, state agents discovered illegal firearms while assisting the ATF on its raid, and the state tried to prosecute him.
Considering this history, the DOJ’s assurance that its new task force will only target criminal ghost gun owners is small comfort.
