Chasing Ghosts: Another Hunt Story

A biologist might describe a deer as a hooved ruminant. She'd be wrong.

Deer are ghosts.

They materialize in the forest out of thin air, then disappear in an instant.

They crash loudly through the trees just a few feet away without ever coming into view.

They emerge from unexpected places, offering a fleeting glimpse, leaving you wondering if you really saw anything.

They will haunt you with their absence for days, and then suddenly a gang of them will sneak up behind you.

This year I started hunting on the 19th of October, and for two weeks I sat in the woods every chance I got. An hour hear and there, a few mornings, mostly afternoons. Oftentimes I'd get home from work with just enough daylight left to sit in my stand for 45 minutes or so, keenly alert for the footsteps of a deer. Keenly alert. There was a time or two I nodded off. Several times. But in between naps I was keenly alert.

Mostly I sat in the same spot, watching the slow but steady progress of autumn.

This year I hunted 14 times. That means I spent almost 14 hours sitting in the woods waiting for a deer to walk by. Every twig snap and leaf flutter triggers the anticipation that an encounter is eminent. Those "anticipation triggers" might happen every minute or so during a hunt. And during those 14 hours I put my eyes on a grand total of 9 deer. If you do the math, it adds up to a lot of disappointment.

Fall leaves. When they flutter in 

the distance, you might think 

you'd seen a deer tail.

One of the nine was a pronghorn buck who trotted by in a few seconds. Another was a doe who came running up behind me, and stopped just a few feet from my stand. She nosed around for a moment behind me, and then began to creep past, still unaware of me. At first I couldn't tell if she was passing to my left or my right, and I sat frozen. She went right and I slowly craned my neck around to get a glimpse. I spied her and began to raise my gun, too soon. She saw the movement and was gone in an instant.

On eight of my hunts I saw nothing but forest, and while forest is pleasing, I nonetheless felt some discouragement. Would this be the year I ended the season with a goose egg?

I wondered if all the deer had left our little patch of woods, perhaps due to our own neglect, or maybe global warming, or possibly the other hunters got them all. Or maybe I had lost my touch.

On several evenings just as last shooting light was fading, a time when deer are often on the move, I heard shots ring in the distance, and knew that a neighboring hunter had ended her evening with success. I wasn't certain whether to feel disheartened or encouraged.

Me, in my lucky shirt.

But I was wearing my lucky shirt, a gift from Kate. I've worn it on almost every successful hunt over the years. True, it's my one hunting shirt but I wasn't about to take any chances by hunting shirtless.

Perhaps the smart move is to go back to buying ground beef from the store. But then there's that uniquely powerful surge of excitement when even a little pronghorn buck goes trotting by, and I'm back in the stand the next day.

On November 3rd I did a morning hunt in my stand by the driveway. I had been striving in recent days for a state of calm acceptance during my hunts, but about 45 minutes in I had seen nothing and disappointment loomed again.

Then gradually I began to feel a sense that something was about to happen. I had neither seen nor heard anything close to deer-like, but somehow felt they were just outside my sense of perception. I had planned to end my hunt at 8:15, but decided to stick it out for another 15 minutes.

As 8:30 neared, I detected movement in my peripheral vision to the right. Normally I try to turn my head very slowly, as deer are very attuned to movement. But this time I turned more quickly, just in time to see that a deer had materialized in the driveway.

It was a doe, ideal for filling the freezer with a year's supply of venison sausage, but before I could raise my gun she had, like a phantom, disappeared back into the woods. I knew if I tracked it's direction I might get another glimpse, perhaps even a shot. But I also knew that deer often travel in groups, so I held my gaze on the drive. Sure enough, a second doe emerged from the woods. It was in range, and the target was clear.

My shot made contact, but the deer and its companion ran. I sat in my stand, transfixed on its path, but it disappeared from view. I heard what sounded like a distant crash into the leaves, and hoped it had fallen, but uncertain. I waited in the stand for a few beats, fearing I wouldn't find it, and then climbed down slowly.

I searched carefully and slowly, my actions belying a sense of panic and dread that the deer was lost. Had my aim been off?

I found it quickly, crumpled up in the brush close by, and relief washed over me. Later as I skinned it, I saw that my aim was true.

Our dog Daisy is quite interested in our ungulate forest inhabitants, so before retrieval I decided to see if she could track it. I took her to the spot where the deer had been hit and let the leash go slack to let her go where she would.

Daisy, on the scent of a deer.

She headed straight into the woods on the trail the two does had taken. I followed, Daisy ecstatic that she was leading me on an adventure. She went straight to the doe. Good dog, Daisy!

I gave the same opportunity to Pepper, but he expressed no interest whatsoever in the scent trail, and even upon being taken to the fallen deer was more interested in chewing a nearby twig. You're a good dog too, Pepper.

When I was considering becoming a hunter, I looked carefully at the economics. I went so far as to add up the cost of all my equipment (which can be generously described "budget friendly"), assumed it would last about 10 years, and divided that by the pounds of meat I expected to harvest. If memory serves, my cost was in the neighborhood of $2 per pound. Quite a deal!

This year I decided to take a slightly different approach and consider the theoretical cost of my labor. That's fourteen hours in the stand, plus four hours hauling it out of the woods, skinning and quartering, plus ten hours deboning, cubing, grinding, packaging and cleaning up. Even at minimum wage that adds up to [an embarrassingly high number that has been redacted] per pound.

Hmmm....

While Kate and I thoroughly enjoy the fruits of this labor, even after seven seasons I have some discomfort with taking the life of a deer, and Kate even more so. Nonetheless, for the first time this year she accompanied me on the retrieval of the animal from the woods. As we walked I shared the story of the hunt with her in great detail, and if she feigned interest it was a convincing performance. She told me she did it because she wanted to share an experience that was so important to me. So yes, young lovers, it's possible to become even more smitten over time.

This season has been one of repeated disappointment, self-doubt, brief moments of panic, exhausting effort, punctuated by a very few and fleeting moments of adrenaline surge. All in search of a very elusive ghost and some way overpriced meat. Is it worth it?

Look for me in the woods this time next year. I think you'll find the answer.