A more diverse range of who’s headed out hunting is creating a bigger, better hunting community.

In November 2021, Avery Toledo, a Puerto Rican man from Queens, New York, found himself in a hunting blind. Armed with a crossbow, he was quietly waiting for a buck to come within shooting range. Surrounded by the sounds of the forest-the birds, the wind, the squirrels-he watched the sky fade through pinks and purples as the sun rose through the trees.

Suddenly he saw a flash of brown at 70 yards. It was a buck chasing a doe. They passed quickly and too far out of range.

Although he could not shoot, that moment was still years in the making: Toledo grew up bonding with his dad while fishing the…READ MORE

By Megan Plete Postol