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Field Notes

Essential gear, history, and all things Filson, broken down by experts in the field.

mark3
Featured

Grit: Marc Warnke’s Pack Goats

Goats are one of the earliest animals domesticated by humans. While they’ve been utilized for countless purposes, it’s still oddly uncommon in America to use them as pack animals, but one man hopes to buck the trend.

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5 Min
sefesfs
Field Notes

Castner’s Cutthroats: Alaskan Scouts

Handpicked by Colonel Castner during WWII, the Alaska Scouts was a rouge’s gallery of tough Alaskan trappers, miners, hunting guides, dog sledders, and many Alaskan Natives. Learn more about one of the American military’s most unique units.

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2 Min
efwefwefwe
Profiles

Filson Life: Mush

In Alaska’s North Slope, professional dog musher Lauro Eklund and team set out to hunt the migrating porcupine caribou for winter sustenance.

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2 Min
dfsads
Profiles

Pure Passion: Tori Hickel

“On the pond, it didn’t matter if we had icicles on our eyelashes or frostbitten toes, we were out there for the pure passion and joy of it.” –Retired professional hockey player and coach Tori Hickel. Learn more about Tori on The Filson Journal

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2 Min
Field Notes

Retreat To Whidbey Giveaway

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Marc29
Featured

Grit: Marc Warnke’s Pack Goats

Goats are one of the earliest animals domesticated by humans. While they’ve been utilized for countless purposes, it’s still oddly uncommon in America to use them as pack animals, but one man hopes to buck the trend.

Read more

5 Min
Field Notes

Unleash the Kraken Giveaway

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Field Notes

Filson x Kraken Puck Drop Instant Win Game

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cast1
Field Notes

The Black Beauty: A Short History of Cast Iron Cookware

There is something about a cast iron skillet that tugs at the heart of any outdoorsman. It’s almost as if its burley black surface has retained a hint of every fire it has hovered over and every dish it has cooked. Holding one, you can feel its history coursing through it, almost like it has a story it wants to tell over a couple of beverages by the bonfire.
Well, it does have a story, one that is almost as old as recorded history.

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3 Min
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Field Notes

The Route North: Inside Passage

In honoring Filson’s 125-year legacy, we voyaged along the ancient coastal route of the Pacific Northwest’s Inside Passage. Learn more about the significance of this historic marine highway.

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Field Notes

Dispatches from the North: Kotzebue Sound Salmon

“Fish are hitting already, splashing. Seals surface nearby. Andrew whoops, “Rich!” and roars down-current to find a spot. I wring my sopping gray gloves, curl stiff cold fingers around the lines, and start pulling in salmon.”

Seth Kantner has fished commercially in Alaska for 49 seasons. He’s also a best-selling author, wildlife photographer, and wilderness guide. During changing seasons in the arctic, we’re excited to have Seth writing for us about his life in Alaskan Arctic and on Kotzebue Sound. Read the first of the series exclusively on The Filson Journal.

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5 Min
portrait of Mary in the woods
Profiles

Mary Goddard: Imprints of Copper and Community

Carved into silver, the fiddlehead catches my eye as light reflects off a displayed cuff’s surface. We are standing in Mary Goddard’s studio in Sheet’Ká (Sitka), Alaska. On the wall, seemingly fresh splotches of paint sample shades of green that seem to bring the most northern rainforest into the small space. Copper sheets, large unfinished tina’as, and a formline eagle and raven sit waiting to take flight on her worktable.

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5 Min
STORIS, United States Coast Guard
Field Notes

Storis: The Galloping Ghost of the Alaskan Coast

The Storis began her long career as an ice patrol tender for the United States Coast Guard, commissioned on September 30, 1942. She was to patrol the east coast of Greenland, on the lookout for German activity. It was an appropriate assignment for a vessel so named: “storis” means “great ice” in Scandinavian.

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3 Min
a helicopter pilot flying a small helicopter herding a black cow in the direction he wants him to go
Field Notes

The High Flying Cowboy: texas Helicopter wranglers

Historically, rounding up cattle used to take a team of twenty men several days on horseback, but now high-flying cowboys finish the job in a matter of hours.

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4 Min
Wolf running near Yellowstone, MT
Field Notes

Western Wolves Swept Up In Culture Wars

Many animals kill for a living, but wolves compete with Homo sapiens in that they eat elk, deer, moose, and sometimes livestock. The debates about wolves are in part about biology, economics, and disagreements over the consequences of having wolves on the land. But the debate also reveals how much we are willing to share, and how we see our place in the world.

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3 Min
Cowboy on horse
Field Notes

George McJunkin’s Discovery of a Lifetime

Born sometime between 1851 and 1856, McJunkin originally came from Texas, and as a young man worked his way across Colorado and New Mexico as he pursued the life of a professional cowboy. He was a self-made in this respect: he worked the trails on cattle drives, trained horses to sell in Santa Fe, and helped a family called the Roberds establish a ranch on the Purgatoire River in Colorado.

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3 Min
teal blue background with a sketch of a fish, white text overlay reading, HUNT GATHER TALK
Field Notes

Hunt Gather Talk Podcast | Season 3

Renowned wild game chef, Hank Shaw, has spent a lifetime gathering wild edible plants, hunting, and fishing the land and waters of North America. This season of ‘Hunt Gather Talk’ dives deep into, fish and seafood.

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7 Min
a blonde haired woman wearing hiking gear standing in a forest looking off into the distance
Field Notes

A Sea Change in Southeast Alaska

The USDA’s proposed Southeast Alaska Sustainability Strategy charts new management direction for the Tongass, centered on the responsible stewardship of public land and water. Learn more about the initiatives taking place and how you can support the Tongass.

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9 Min
Indigenous artwork
Signature Materials

Filson x Canadian Arctic Producers

Canadian Arctic Producers (CAP) was formed to promote and preserve the art of First Nations communities in remote northern territories. Filson collaborated with CAP to create two unique pieces, featuring artwork from Josephee Kakee and Solomon Karpik. All proceeds will support CAP’s continued mission.

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2 Min
a blurry image of two sled dogs running across the snow with read harnesses and lines in front of and behind them
Field Notes

The Dynamic of the Line: the anatomy of a dog team

Sled dog teams consist of 12-16 dogs to traverse difficult terrain, while following specific commands from a musher. Learn the anatomy of a sled dog team and what it takes to build a good team.

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4 Min
Military boot
Field Notes

Extreme Cold Vapor Barrier Boots

The U.S. Army’s first cold weather boots were called “Mickey Mouse Boots” for their oversize appearance. Officially designated the “Type I” & “Type II” footwear model, it was first worn by soldiers and Marines during the Korean War in the 1950s as standard issue footwear.

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2 Min
a muskox standing stoiclyon rocky snow covered ground looking off into the distance
Field Notes

The Survivors: Alaskan Arctic Musk Oxen

With no reason to fear mankind, the muskox was almost driven to extinction by the advent of guns that ripped through the slow-moving herds. In Alaska and on the rest of the planet, they simply disappeared by the late 1800s. All that was left of an animal that had been around since the time of the caveman were fuzzy stories passed down through Indigenous communities.

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4 Min
four people on snow machines in the early light of day driving across an ice sheet in Alaska
Field Notes

Filson in the Field: Searching for Muskox in the Alaskan Arctic

As a company founded on equipping folks headed into the frozen desolation of the Klondike goldfields in 1897, we knew that we needed to do something that was a bit off the beaten path. With this in mind, we decided to head to the western edge of Alaska, above the Arctic Circle to tell the tale of the remarkable rebirth of an animal that was hunted to extinction in North America over a century ago, the musk ox.

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4 Min
black and white historic photo of hockey players colliding mid ice, one falling behind the other
Field Notes

The Evolution of Hockey Gear

When a modern NHL team takes to the ice, players are protected from head to toe, the focal point of which is their large colorful sweater. The need and developments we see today are the result of decades of tinkering and improvements based on poor experiences that defined the need for such gear.

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2 Min
Shadowy figure in the sky
Field Notes

3 Spooky Legends of the American West

In the Santa Lucia mountains of California, there have been sightings of a mysterious figure in the late afternoon sun. The figure appears suddenly as a tall, dark shape against the sky, arms spread apart, with a halo or corona of sunlight radiating from behind. Various sightings have also described a person wearing a dark billowing cloak or large hat. Once spotted, they usually disappear quickly, or sometimes turning to “follow” the viewer.

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2 Min
Filson upland hunting gear
Signature Materials

Six Crucial Pieces of Upland Hunting Gear

On a hunt for Gambel’s Quail in the Arizona desert, having the right gear makes all the difference. While traversing dusty arroyos, keeping hydrated, and avoiding cactus needles, Edgar Castillo shares six pieces of crucial gear from personal experience.

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3 Min
Ice hockey puck on frozen lake
Field Notes

Unofficial Rules of Pond Hockey

The heart and soul of hockey lives out on the ice at lakes and ponds across North America—these local proving grounds are where legends are made and communities built. For many, it’s a rite of passage. Culture. A place to gather to shake off the deep freeze. Though these tend to be unstructured matches, a few “unwritten rules” still exist. Don’t be a hoser—save your fights for the bar. Everyone’s welcome, no matter age, gender, or skill level. These are just a few from an unofficial list.

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2 Min
Vintage photo of the Seattle Metropolitans in 1919
Field Notes

125 Years of Hockey: A Diverse & Surprising History

Hockey has a diverse history that may surprise even lifelong fans. From the first professional all-Black league formed in Nova Scotia to the Pacific Coast Hockey Association, funded by two brothers during the logging era, it’s a sport with an exciting story to tell.

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3 Min
close up image of the front of a orange and red float plane
Field Notes

Northwest Beaver Mechanics

Founded in 1988, Northwest Seaplanes is based in Renton, Washington, and has a fleet of five Beavers and one De Havilland Otter, aircraft called the “best bush planes ever built.” Crafted during a twenty-year span from 1947-1967, they were instrumental in opening up far-flung frontiers and are highly cherished aircraft that pilots still swear by today.

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3 Min
an areal photo of a yellow and red forest service plane dropping water on a raging fire above the treelike
Field Notes

We Helped Restore a Forest Service Lookout Tower That Was Almost Consumed by Flames

A team of eager and passionate Filson employees, together with the National Forest Foundation, were wrapping up a restoration project at First Butte lookout tower, the fourth tower our team has volunteered to help restore. As we were putting the final touches on the tower, we received the news that a new wildfire had started near the site.

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4 Min
a black and white image of a helicopter flying up to pull the hanging log to the drop zone away from the logging site
Field Notes

A Short History of Helicopter Logging

The practice of helicopter logging is still employed in parts of the world today, including the US and Canada. Often the USFS will use it to thin forest lands in the wildland-urban interface near cities and towns to mitigate wildfire danger. Several logging companies employ it to target specific types of wood and to work in rugged, steep mountainous slopes.

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2 Min
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