HELENA — Montana's general big game season starts Saturday, October 22. It's a busy and important time for retailers, like Capital Sports, as hunters finalize their preparations, and one of the managers at Capital Sports, Bart Bratlien, is ready for it.
"The largest number of opportunities for hunting will be available after this Saturday," said Bratlien.
Hunters preparing should start with the most important purchase: the hunting license. The type of license you buy determines when and where you can hunt. Next, you want to make sure you have proper gear. There are a lot of options.
"Clothing, ammunition, all the camping supplies, a lot of folks like to go out and set up a big hunting camp, so they need all the camping supplies for that and generally the majority of the stuff we sell here is geared toward hunting and fishing, so yeah it's a big time of year for us," said Bratlien.
Capital Sports created a checklist to help hunters manage their gear. They split the checklist into two sections. One section is items they recommend you to take, such as a GPS, duck tape, bear spray, beef jerky, and so on. The other section they labeled as the essentials. It has items like your hunting license, blaze orange gear, first aid kit, your firearm of choice and ammunition.
"There are certain things a person has to have," said Bratlien, "your warm clothing, rain gear, fire starting supplies, along with all the necessities like your hunting ammunition and your rifle and hunting knife."
For more details on Montana's various hunting seasons visit the Fish, Wildlife and Parks hunting webpage.
