DATE: Saturday, May 10, 1997                TAG: 9705100267

SECTION: BUSINESS                PAGE: D1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY MATTHEW DOLAN, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: CHESAPEAKE                        LENGTH:   67 lines

BROTHERS OF INVENTIONHOISTING HUNTING GEAR INTO THE TREETOPS IS MADE EASIER BY A DEVICE CREATED TO AVOID DROPPING WEAPONS.

Maybe it's brothers-in-law who are the mothers of invention.

H. Michael Tacoronte went a-bow-hunting with his sister's husband in Pennsylvania's treetops for the first time about three years ago. When he heard that he would have to use a length of rope to pull up his gear, he thought knots can untie, grips can loosen.

Tacoronte didn't like that. Too crude, too risky.

So this three-time small businessman brought his own device, crafted with nylon straps and fastened using his wife's sewing machine.

A business plan later, that home-stitched thingamajig is now sold as the Premiere Rifle and Bow Hoist, and the straps-and-hooks product has taken off. His home-based business, Ideal Hunting Products Inc., has sold some 15,000 nationwide at about $24 each via a toll-free number.

``A gun something like this,'' Tacoronte said, pointing to his gleaming M77 Mark 22 rifle, ``could get a little dirt in the muzzle if it falls and BLAM! there goes $4,500 and your head when you fire it.''

Tacoronte demonstrated how the hoist works near a lanky, branchless tree in his front yard. A loop is placed around the muzzle of the rifle, a stainless-steel trigger hook attached to its base. The gun should never be loaded when hoisting, he said.

There are separate leashes and hooks for a hunter's pack and bow, if necessary, designed to balance delicate and expensive gear.

Once a hunter shinnies up a tree and secures a position in a stand, he pulls his stuff up by the 25-foot hoist, gun balanced, bow secured and pack in tow.

``My brother-in-law once dropped all of his stuff and had to go back down to get it,'' Tacoronte said. ``When he got back to the tree stand, he had sweated and then he froze.''

When descending, the pack drops first and can be used to cushion the gun and bow, which follow it down.

The hoist attracted the recent notice of the hunter's bible, Field and Stream, and several other outdoors magazines.

This spring, he finally received 16 separate patents for his innovative approach. With a New York manufacturer sending boxes of hoists for storage in his garage and a trailer in his driveway to transport his wares to trade shows, Tacoronte said his business is hitting its stride.

This 40-year-old father of two is no novice to the niche business. Trained as a respiratory therapist in South Florida, he eventually co-founded, then sold, supplies of oxygen and other gases. Later he ran a country craft store with his wife and a balloon-sign enterprise.

Several local gun and hunting shop owners said they didn't recognize the new product, but offered mixed reaction to the hoist concept.

``Sounds like a great idea,'' said Robert Marcus, owner of Bob's Gun Shop in Norfolk. ``Unfortunately, people occasionally fall out of their tree stands if they carry too much up with them. It sounds like this would help.''

But Tom Casey of Shorty's Bait and Tackle in Chesapeake said he usually scoffs at the latest hunter gadgetry.

``Most of the problems of getting in and out of tree stands can be solved with simple hunter education,'' Casey said. ``People got more money these days and they always want to get the newfangled contraptions. Just use common sense, I say.'' ILLUSTRATION: [Color Photos]

MORT FRYMAN

The Virginian-Pilot

H. Michael Tacoronte shows the safe way to hoist weapons into a

treetop hunting stand.

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