I respect hunters, but I’m not one of them. Fishing is about my personal limit on killing animals. I’m also a committed carnivore, so I recognize the hypocrisy in my reluctance to shoot my own dinner. (Though, I believe if I lived in a different time where meat didn’t come pre-packaged, I’d have no problem with getting my hands a little dirtier in the process).

This week I found myself in two separate conversations with friends who happen to be hunters, and the subject turned toward the pursuit of white-tailed deer. Their experiences were very different, and I found them interesting, so I thought I’d try and share those stories.

1) A Hunter’s Lament

Let’s call friend one “Joe”. Joe has been exclusively a bow hunter for years. His hunting experience has been one of silence, and patience. He would start before dawn and trek to one of several stands that he had erected in trees on property owned by a family member, climb up just as the morning twilight was beginning, and settle in for a quiet day of solitude.

This is the way he liked it, he said. No guns, no partners. He’d pass the time reading “with one eye” he said, and watching the forest with the other. He also had one ear cocked to the surrounding forest, trying his best to keep aware of movement behind him, movement he wouldn’t see because to turn around in the stand and look would almost certainly alert or spook any deer arriving from that direction.

He would typically set up on the edge of a small clearing where some targeted application of deer corn would encourage them to some and spend time in an area where he had a clear line of sight.

The deer generally cooperated. Still, Joe would go weeks without actually “drawing” on a deer – meaning to actually (slowly, calmly) pull the bowstring back and try to line up an actual shot. He got to know specific animals and their habits, and he was extremely careful to choose the right deer, at the right time, with the right circumstances under which he could make as clean a kill-shot as possible.

Bow hunting takes a lot of skill and patience, and those I know who do it have always expressed concern about their ability to make a kill quickly, and humanely. Almost every deer travels some distance after being hit (whether by arrow or bullet), but conscientious hunters want death to come quickly, without pain or panic. Deer that bolt can be tracked, of course, and part of the hunting experience is to follow the animal to its final resting place and begin the processing of the carcass before dragging the body back for proper butchering.

The way Joe described it, bow hunting had an almost surreal quality in that it was almost silent. It carried a strange combination of peace and violence, given that the intent was to kill, but in that intersection Joe always felt an opportunity to commune with the animal, express gratitude, and make sure he did it right.

Until one day he didn’t.

The deer was hit, it bolted, Joe climbed down and followed, and found the deer alive, but labored – his arrow having pierced both lungs but missed the heart. Apparently this isn’t uncommon, but something about this particular event struck Joe as unnecessarily cruel. He bonded with this deer, and he felt its suffering, and its fear. He put it out of its misery – and Joe hasn’t hunted since.

When pressed, Joe admits that the feeling had been building for a while – that the sport, the meat, the solitude, all of it wasn’t justified, and the older he got, the more guilt he felt. So, he stopped.

2) A Managed Landscape

Dan is not like Joe. Dan hunts any time and any way he can legally do it – rifle, shotgun, black powder, and bow. Dan prefers a high-power crossbow because he feels his strength and precision with a normal compound bow aren’t good enough. (He shares Joe’s concern for doing it right).

Dan also enjoys quiet solitude and is definitely more successful when he’s alone, but he also has a special place (separate from his primary hunting ground so that he can preserve the environment there), where he loves to bring new or curious hunters along. He loves to teach the skills necessary to successfully take a deer.

A lot of the actual mechanics are the same – establish several stands and let the deer acclimate to their presence, use trail cams to monitor habits, use corn to associate a particular location with food and safety. When moving, do it slowly, even to the point of looking first with your eyes and then slowly turning your head to look at a target.

Because his season is longer, with different weapons, Dan is a pretty successful hunter, but he sees his role as much larger than just taking deer out of the environment. He told me that he spends years monitoring the population on a 1,000-acre farm. He’ll target does to reduce the area’s attraction for bucks, and keep the buck population low and free from competition. This allows bucks to establish a harem that is “comfortable”, not so large as to invite others, but not so small as to cause him to wander.

He’s patient. He’s told me he’ll go several years without targeting a buck, and instead watches that animal grow and mature, until it’s both a valuable target, and he can be assured that a line of succession has been established by younger bucks with the right personality.

Dan claims that he’s been able to work with landowners to reduce nuisance herds that destroy crops to a healthy population that range across a wider area and minimize the impact of their browsing, all while enjoying the opportunity to take (and eat, and share) an animal himself from time to time.

Reflection

Again, I’ll admit this is all foreign to me, but I appreciate the deep understanding a hunter has for his prey, and stories like these make me appreciate the value in having exclusive access to a particular plot of land and its associated deer population. The respect hunters have for the animals is perhaps a bit counterintuitive, but it clearly exists, and it makes sense that a successful hunter would have to deeply understand his/her prey.

It’s estimated that about 6 million white-tailed deer are harvested by hunters in the United States every year. Another 1 million are killed by road traffic. This take results in the overall population remaining roughly steady between 30 and 33 million – and of course those populations can be excessive and destructive in some areas, and sparse in others. Active management through hunting licensure and tracking via state and federal natural resources agencies is crucial to help maintain a healthy population.

Humans are predators, and at least where I live, we’re the only meaningful predator available to keep prey animals like deer in check. In that regard, hunters are a vital part of a balanced ecosystem. It’s good to know that the practice is not just guys in camo running around with high-powered rifles, but it’s emotional, it’s measured, respectful, and with an eye toward long-term health of an area and a population. I respect that.

Besides, venison is pretty tasty.

Get Out There