Tag: hunting

Guest Post by Francis Marion

Prologue:

I am big believer in the idea that the recipe for raising good kids is simple. Be patient and give them your time. If you spend time with them, take and interest in who they are and what they like and include them in activities (both work and play) that are gateways to adulthood then most of the time you’ll end up with good kids. I’m especially proud of both of mine. They are both turning out to be very fine human beings.

 

In the years that I have lived in British Columbia I have learned that hunting deer in the southwestern region of the province is simple. In the opening days of September the deer are still in their summer range. This means they are up high. As the season wanes, the weather cools and the first snows hit they move to lower elevations.  I say this facetiously of course, as this is where the simplicity ends.

Early deer season in our part of the world is decidedly not simple. I am a child of the prairies and growing up in Saskatchewan, “deer hunting” meant pushing whitetails out of pockets of bush in the agricultural zones. It is an activity as much akin to wing shooting as anything else. The same activity pursued in my current local is dramatically different. Here, just getting to where the game lives is more akin to an “Iron Man” competition than it is to hunting elsewhere and the older I get the less that statement seems like hyperbole.

Over the years I have learned a few important things about hunting in the high country: everything is steeper, further and heavier. Small mistakes can compound themselves quickly. Too little water, the wrong clothing, a slip of the knife or the foot or grabbing the wrong branch can spell disaster. Simply being in the alpine is risky. Hunting deer and other game there is challenging. Successfully taking game there is life affirming. It is why I go back year after year whether I am successful or not.

Continue reading “The Initiate”