By Craig Dumas
Editor’s note: With NFL fans less than a week away from an unmercifully long off-season, we’re taking a break from Super Bowl hype to reintroduce you to another group of sportsman lingering through off-season depression.
Well, near as I can tell, ‘zilch’ and ‘diddly-squat’ are roughly the same amount, which leads me to believe if you’re a true hunter you know this is the time of year laden with lull and waste. Nada, nyet, zero, and zip are all descriptive words for this time of year. Tis’ the season of mere small game and yet smaller meals due to the size – or lack thereof – of this small game. (Although a good-sized rabbit with the trimmings can satisfy even the heartiest of appetites.)
Now is the time to start planning your meals for the upcoming season (still nine months away), how and when you will be arriving for Opening Day, making sure the rifle is clean and safely tucking it away yearning for the next opportunity to fire. If you’re a diehard hunter, I suppose there’s something to hunt anytime of year; one just needs to refer to the yearly hunting guide published by the state government. I, for one, must also ‘kill’ time by visiting the Almont Smoke House in Almont, MI to salivate over the variety of meats which include venison, elk, turkey, pheasant, etc., all processed into tasty snack sticks, jerky, and salami. Even entire birds are readily smoked and available for the most daring of taste buds. These animals are butchered and sold to the luckless hunter in need of the wild taste unearned from previous season. I, for one, fill the shopping cart to the rim and go home stocking my freezer with a variety of these to pacify my appetite for wild game.
With our firearm and extended, or ‘late’, season come and gone, I can only ponder what I’m going to do as I watch a six-point buck looking to bed down for the night in the back 40 behind my house. This is what brings on the depression and makes me toss the idea around of just going back there with a .22 and bag that trophy. And since it is getting late, those antlers are due to fall off anytime so a kill now would generate a decent wall mount sans head but nonetheless a trophy. Or, I could let it go, hoping it will make it to next year without being poached. (Since we live in the boonies, it’s entirely possible – and probable – the deer will be taken on any given day by another lawbreaker.
So on it goes. Turkey applications were being accepted after the first of January. I don’t particularly care for wild turkey (unless it’s in a rock glass with a few cubes) and find it difficult to skin. I’m told, however, if you do it right away, the feathers are easy to pull out. On the other hand, if you wait, you might as well try to skin the thing as the colder it gets, the harder it is to do. So I’m not too fond of turkey hunting. (But I do make an exception when it’s destined for the deep fryer. There’s something to the technique of brining it or injecting it with your favorite marinade. Without this preparation, it’s just not as flavorful and mouth-watering a taste to die for.) Other than that, as long as it’s dark meat, I’ll settle for the once a year sit-down just before Christmas. It’s the only time of year you’ll have the excuse to fall asleep (via an overdose of tryptophan, no doubt) during your favorite football game late in the afternoon.
With all this pondering which can – and does – take months, the new thoughts of the previously mentioned meals, preparedness, and scheduling of the calendar begin to take shape. By now I have these days memorized from the calendar and the premeditated workings on the wife for her to schedule time-off has begun. I can, for the most part, reason with her and the quiet mental celebrations have begun. Believe me, it’s a struggle to convince her to not cash in vacation time in lieu of my extended stay in the great north woods. And especially this year when Opening Day is on a Saturday, which means I have a full week and a half to bring home the goods. See, it’s happening already – happiness is starting to work it’s way back in!
Soon spring will bring thoughts of the newborns and more frequent visits up north to do some surveying, tree trimming and biking. It will awaken the urge to study the adult deer and see what they’re eating and when. It’s too many a morning you can find me standing at the doorwall with a coffee in one hand and my mini binoculars in the other. There are quite a few runs or paths the deer take to taunt and tease the unarmed observer. These are the best times for a hunter such as me to see the hope and potential of another years’ herd making it through the winter and promising for a successful season.