The Mundane White Deer

Remember this: Try as adults might, some things are just ridiculous.

The new celebrity on the Hunting block is an eleven-year-old boy who shot a white deer. From the articles posted to the internet, all of the hunting shows and magazines are calling either to congratulate or to recruit for the story of the week. That must put a dent in grown men’s agendas, who are striving to get into the hunting business and have been up-started by a child.

The little boy legally killed the deer in his home state of Michigan. I say that is Michigan’s problem. This clears him of any wrong-doing, legally.

From the articles, the parent and boy admit there were several hunting participants out to kill this animal. It is fairly skinny so there couldn't have been much meat except for burger and sausage.

The prudent question to ask here is: why advertise this when it will be gifted with negative connotations and adult attacks on a child? By now the boy realizes he has adults grouping around him like the buffalo so I doubt he feels unsafe.

It isn’t about losing your right to hunt. It’s not about a child’s right to hunt. It’s not really much about nothing. It is just about the spectacular, spectacular which I have come to abhor.

I have seen this many times on the internet; persecution and laments. I guess someone wants to prove their point of being singled out, misrepresented, and disavowed. Also, the idea that someone needs other people to rush to their aid to validate their entitled or legal right to do something seems a bit so yesterday with this hunting fodder.

There are posted by others stating the albino or white deer is an anomaly and should be smited off the breeding landscape of deerdom.

There is also the abuse subjugated on the child by the public via the parent wanting their child to be famous. I couldn’t do that to my son, as I have said before. I want to protect him not toss him out in the fray, empty-handed or for money’s sake.

I also know there are people that do not like you. They will one plus or like such things to get a rise out of you because deep down you crawl under their skins. You’re welcome.

My problem with this tired storyline came in the form of the SCDNR posting an article about this little boy to their website. It was ambiguous as to whether the SCDNR supported it or not. I am sure there will be a sound biological reason for the post.

This drama was playing out in Michigan, not South Carolina. People have shot albino and pied deer here. It’s not made into a three ring circus, which is what hunting has become. Setting the tone for showing your ignorance, attacking your fellow man, prostrating children out to start or win arguments on debates, and just low down dirty morals and ethics.

I began reading the posts on the SCDNR Facebook page. One candid misogynist fellow commented, with colorful profanity, that women perusing the SCDNR Facebook page needed to stay at the shopping mall and keep posts to ourselves, as we didn’t hunt.  Of course, the SCDNR took the comments down which I was thankful for. I guess the attitude against women hunting in South Carolina is alive and well in some people.

It also illustrates how the article can polarize South Carolina constituents using the SCDNR Facebook page to be for or against this little kid shooting a deer. I wondered whether the poster at the SCDNR understood or realized they were providing an outlet to make the constituents using the services of the SCDNR look like ignorant southerners or fiends out to attack a child. Why would someone do that? Is it that important to cause a controversy?

I don’t live in the land of fairy tales and people do act the same all over the world to different degrees, but why invite the devil into your hunting lodge?

Granted the SCDNR hopefully does understand as a state agency they should not dabble in picking and choosing individuals that go along with personal beliefs or agendas. Those posts should be for their private pages. This service the SCDNR provides is for everyone, not people just on one bandwagon. It was not education because this fodder can be found elsewhere and commented on outside of the SCDNR.

People didn’t seem to be pleased with the SCDNR person posting this article. It’s too disruptive and that is the reason for it; disruption.

When I considered the fall-out from the white deer I thought people were concerned this little boy would think that there is nothing he can’t tromp upon because he is entitled by law. What happens one day when he gets older and this ideal has stuck with him? This ideal that has been re-enforced by adults and he goes outside of the law because he feels entitled? What then when he cries foul to being persecuted or misrepresented?

I asked myself, what is the real message being sent to children?

I can understand the people of that area being upset. There was probably some faux ownership of this animal that spiraled down into perceiving it as a pet. There was also the hope that maybe one day they too would see it. Now that day is gone unless another one appears. The next white deer can be shot down because it is genetically undesirable, legal to hunt, or just to spite everyone for killing it because you can.

There are hunting participants that do consider the sentiment of non-hunters. They see these animals as something to keep around because it gives people hope even if the animal is a mundane.

The dark side of this is hunting participants that will go out of their way to kill any white deer just to hold it up to non-hunters’ faces, grin and say,  “You can do nothing about this.” Then walk off with a happy spite because they won. Won what I say? They have subjected another person to loss and molestation while making themselves look less than human. Maybe that is what human is; spiteful and vindictive.

Given the child has some square right to flaunt his quarry for bragging rights amongst the internet hunters, which was secured by his family. It is not like he did an epic thing. He just shot another deer of a different color. Not that I am down-playing his accomplishment, if that is what you call it, but this is true. He is not a character in Homer’s Iliad that quested for something and destroyed terrifying beasts along the way. The white deer probably walked by or was on a corn pile. It didn’t jump up into the stand or run from the trees with fangs bared.

I shake my head and laugh at this kind of thing.

Not too far from where I live dwells twin, albino girls. Their mother is of African descent. I would watch their mother braid their powder white hair down at the park. Sometimes they would ride bikes in the evening. I wonder sometimes if people could have decided to take their life at birth because they were considered genetic anomalies or weak genes. I then reflect on the treatment of albinos in Africa. They have their body parts stolen by force to go in potions or witch doctor remedies. One lives a normal life, the other in fear, and the white deer doesn’t know it is in dire circumstance because of its color. It gets killed anyway because it’s legal or someone wants its head and hide. I could beg the question to let it just live. There will always be another person with that desire to shoot it.

I’m waiting for the photo and story of a baby in diapers jumping into the fray of a wild hog herd, kill them all with one stroke, changes its diaper, writes its own article and shows up on the Joe Rogan show or the Sportsman’s Channel. All while planning to save everyone from hunger with just one fish.
Lessons learned:
Everything has a price on its head.

Everything can be ripped from this Earth for whatever reasoning.

Nothing is sacred.

Written by: W Harley Bloodworth

~Courtesy of the AOFH~

Being Taken Seriously Or Not?

Remember this: Maintain your reputation at all times. Don't let anyone drag you down.

Recently, I have been seeing a lot of blogs and posts on the behavior of women, I assume, that hunt. I  thought every once in a while you have people that call out others who are charicatures of the hunting endeavor, male or female.

My mind set was traveling along the lines of differing view points. I asked myself some questions.

Do women want to be taken seriously overall?

I would think the answer to this is yes. Women actually do want to be out in the field with their prospective other, even if they are man handling a gun or not. On the other hand, they might want some me time while the prospective other is out beating the bushes or talking a lot of bat guano with his friends. This is a win-win situation.

People in general like to feel accomplished. Believe it or not. Some women do feel the need to be regarded as the prospective other's rare jewel, instead of shame and regret. Men like to know they have something rare that their buddies don't have or probably never will have. That is one of the underlying tones of trophy hunting. How good a specimen it is and if its rare.

Rarity.

Men will brag on their woman like they would brag on their favorite hunting dog, gun, or truck.
Men are just simple that way.

As for security sake, I asked the question to myself: What if the prospective other was injured, which caused them to be unable to provide? What if there was no prospective other?

Women do not like to worry about the basic necessities of life, such as food and shelter. If the other half of your union, be it legal or not, is down for the count, you certainly want some reassurance  that life can be handled with very little anxiety. If you are by yourself, the last thing you need to be thinking about is how someone is going to circumvent what you have to do to survive.

If a woman ever left a man it was because of anxiety to her thinking.

How does seeing women prostrated on social media in pseudo hunting photos help the cause of women in outdoor sports?

Undoubtedly, it is not helping the role of women to much. It has generated a topic of interest. These pseudo images do generate a lot of merchandise sales for the product, but not necessarily the model.
As for posted photos, it's either going to make you want to be like that, exercise like crazy, or go on an eating binge with ho-hos. There is no way in this lifetime you'll ever look like that without a plan and commitment.

If you put a photo up of a nice looking, mostly naked woman in hunting gear she will be all the craze by men's post. Another woman will view the reaction, then mimic it hoping to get the same result. She will get the same result but not the one she was hoping for. In her mind, she was hoping to find the one. In real time, she's just being objectified like the model in the photo. Unfortunately for her, the only one getting paid is the model.

Posting seductive photos of oneself is zero in your bank account.  You also open yourself up for ridicule, losing someone you could have had a chance with, or total ruination; at least in your mind. On social media, smearing someone can go all the way to the end of Google Planet. That is as far as it gets.

Hunting aside, there are people out there with low moral character. You've made yourself a target for people of low moral character who will stalk you while making you slowly pull your photos out of sight. There is such a thing as negative attention.

Would a woman that hunts want something better for herself? Does the belief the questionable, sleazy redneck is the way to go?

Then again, you can find a person of low moral character wearing a business suit. Trust me when I say, they are on the internet right now googling.There are some people that do take pictures of themselves, but before social media hit, that was something private for yourself.

Is it necessary to show the whole world what your mama gave you?

Sadly, men might comment up and down on a post of  naughty girl pictures. When it comes to their mate they don't feel like sharing, especially with the whole world and their buddies.

As a guy, do I really want ten of my buddies getting a good look at my gal's back or front porches? What if said buddies got the idea to come over while you weren't there?

Male animals fight over females all the time, good breeders or not.

Does a woman want her picture posted up beside a trophy kill? Isn't she the same thing? One more conquest to claim or reminiscence over? Valueless and the topic of some gaggle of men's degrading comments? The butt of someone's jokes that makes others perceive her as less of a human?

Anytime you place a visual out in the public you are inadvertently, unintentionally advertising. Let us get one thing straight though, people do know what they are doing and what will come of it. In this case, do not feel so bad for them when overtly sexual comments ensue. The road travels both ways on this subject. .

The creepy little mind is what connects the dots on what the viewer thinks you're saying even if your message is different from the one they receive. With that being said, I do exclude the more formal sports where tweed is worn (only because tweed is awesome). You don't have to dress in camo all the time given the game you are chasing. We are looking at allowances here because they exist.

If there is a group of people that contend women were not a part of hunting and shooting before, this is a valid statement. (For those that say, this is not true, go visit a museum, that illustrates the idea; a museum where out-of-date reliquaries are left out of mainstream; it is history, not current). Instead of being a by-standers, they are actual participants. There is also within that group, like minded people that feel to maintain a momentum of self-decorum or even self respect, it would be prudent to exercise some kind of restraint when being a role model (even if you don't think you are one or chose to be one) for other women. I can understand arguments ensuing on this subject. People tend to want to do whatever they please, even if it brings them grief at their own hands.

Overall there is an undertone of hunting being under attack, so how one would present themselves to avoid a bad reputation to the outdoor sports, or to oneself, is something you need to take into account. Never make what you are endeavoring to do look bad. If you make it look bad it will reflect poorly on you. I say that, but the Herblock that I am, must ask the tough questions.

You are your own salesman.

I would think it would be the same thing for women. If before in the past other women were not mixed up in the hunting soup, but now you had your chance, why would you do things to make it seem uncomely or a turn off?

Women in hunting want to make strides without setbacks. Once you can overcome the supposed difference in men and women, there can be a camaraderie between the two sexes when out in the field. If that leads into something else that is a little bit stronger than a passing physical infatuation, then so be it. You will not suffer for it. If you take up hunting merely to find a husband or a boyfriend, eventually he will see right through you. You'll be back at the house, as a non-participant or by-stander.

There is also the scenarios where you will be thinking you've found "a live one" only to be disappointed. The person is trolling for someone they can enjoy for the moment or a fantasy.

The bigger question is overall as a group, do women want to be respected for our skill and our respectable position in society? Do we use hunting only as a platform to get a date or a husband?
No one that I know of likes to do something for the sake of nothing. At the same time, one person would be insulted that the strides they make in the global outlook on hunting is degraded by the acts of a handful of misguided souls.

There is a big difference in sharing yourself with one or two people versus sharing yourself with the world.  Even with one or two people, they only glimpse a small fragment of you and not the deeper self of who you are. Non-disclosure can work wonders for your self-esteem.

As a female who hunts, I don't think about this as I get ready to go spend my time in the woods or on stand. I just enjoy myself and let that be a controversy for late night blogging after the hunting is done.

Again do you want to be a person who posts as an activist with words of rage while squirming in your computer chair hoping to get someone to notice your tirade? Do you desire to get in an online altercation or are you just going to do what you do without all that tantrum crap?

Really it boils down to a personal choice. What do you chose to do? Sexual innuendo photo on social media or not?

Do you want to be taken seriously or not? If so, act like it.

Written by: W Harley Bloodworth

~Courtesy of the AOFH~

The Mystique of the Whitetail

Remember this: People see deer everywhere even in their dreams.

Since whitetail season has opened on Sept 1, I have thought alot about the mystique of the animal.  The deer can suit itself to the circumstances. Depending on the terrain, the whitetail seems to be able to blend in, being a russet, tawny, pied color markings for the brush areas. When the deer comes out of the hardwood forest, the coat can be beech tree gray. There are deer now showing the albino trait. It can look like a log when it is lying down, or be standing in broomstraw eyeballing you down. Most bucks learn to stay in the tree line while a doe or two makes themselves a very easy target. If you have one buck to eight doe, I guess this would make for a wonderful strategy. Make no mistake, deer especially in herds if they are truly wild have a strategy for giving the hunter a wide berth. Unless they are not paying attention.They have the inate ability to move through brush without making a sound. A hunter can't miss the twig with its snap that sounds like dynamite to your ears.Their legs can look like thin trees or saplings. Everything about the deer is visually deceptive.
Deer in different parts of the country vary in size and weight depending on the availability of nutrients. These nutrients can be wild grown but agriculture and food plot management by the discriminating hunter can supplement any shortage. They eat whatever is seasonal. If you go by weight a buck could be 135-165 lbs down South but up North the weight could be 300 lbs. Does are between 125-160 lbs. When you are hunting them, they don't make for very big targets especially running. If you hog dress one out, you find that you lose a percentage (25%) of what that weight would be in meat because so much goes to bone, entrails, skin, and antlers. Don't be surprised when you go to the wildgame processor and get back much less than what you thought you had: you are not eating the complete deer.

There are about thirty subspecies distributed from Canada to Central America. All of these can overlap and interbreed causing a mixture of varying physcial traits
Because of their adaptability, they can outsmart you unless you're using some high tech gadgetry but its not under heard of for someone to jump a buck. In this day and age, technology has taken all of the challenge out of the hunt.

At one point in their evolution, they were solely diurnal but when the concept of hunting was introduced they become more and more nocturnal in their browsing habits to avoid being killed. In the poor light of nightfall, you may see the ghostly shadow of movement as they weave in and out of the tree line. The deer will walk down the inside of canal ditches to avoid being seen on flat land, hide in briar balls, or sleep beside a barn where farm animals are kept. They will even fall in with a herd of farm animals just to seem like one of the crowd. The browse that they eat can consist of 600 or more different kinds of plant material.

Whitetail are masters of skulking only second to turkey. Bears and cougars are just silent and deadly.
Whitetail do not migrate, which benefits the hunter because the home range can be a square mile. Even if during the breeding season, a buck is looking for does but will add a couple of miles to his roaming area. A buck could have a base camp, if you will, where he will move out but then come back fairly quick. This is a survival mechanism. Go but don't stay gone to long. I have often wondered at this particular rigid philosophy. If the habitat changes then so when the creature.

With this said, looking for game trails is a good habit, especially heavily used game trails. Usually where they feed and where they bed is a short distance. They will take the same path you might cut through the woods but be weary. It can be abandoned just as fast as it is made.Usually you'll see lots of tracks, scat, or the smell of breeding season as homones and urine are cast about. Sometimes in the case of trampling, the current path you have found might change by a couple of hundred yards so walking about to assess the situation or rethink your strategy is a must.Sometimes they just find something a little better to enjoy.

When the breeding season comes you might get a chance because hormones are raging and stupidity or carelessness reigns supreme. While breeding the buck will show himself more out in the open. He'll seek out and clash with other bucks for mating rites. Bucks will walk themselves to death while in the rut. The mating season will see them eat and drink less which puts them in a poor state of health. This could also contribute to their 'slip of the mind' when trying to avoid being shot.
With this being said, a buck can hide right underneath you for the remainder of his days on a square mile of land. He will see you before you see him. He lives there and he knows where you are. I argue again, if you use cameras this will upend your hunting experience to some  degree. Everywhere I look there is a stand, a camera, and a photo. All you have to do is come back, sit and wait.

Whitetails are color-blind but they see motion really well. This probably contributed to the high sales of camo cover to help the hunter be undetectable. As a rule, a buck sometimes ignores a stationary object unless there is a sound or smell that tips him off. A deer can see you blink your eye from 60 yards away. I argue this point now because if you went by television the deer must be acclimated to a person in a tree with little forethought of danger. Being really still then waiting for them to turn their head is something you would really have to remember unconsicously when you are excited about one walking into your sights. Fast or sudden movements will not win you the day.

Their hearing is acute. They can hear your stomach growling, a twig snap, or a click of some metal bumping. Muffling stand parts is essential. You can fool them with rattling or grunt calls which mimic the different sexes or offspring. You would really need to know what that sounds like because you just can't blow your horn an expect them to accept you for another deer.

With these few tidbits being said it is not always an animal that is easy to hunt. I do experience internal conflict on this subject due to the relative ease to kill one now. Agriculture and human population growths have made the whitetail homeland smaller. Sightings are more frequent especially at night when they hang around highways eating the grass off the side of the road. 

Deer that have become less inclined to avoid humans are not much sport because they start to look and act like a tame goat or cow. This makes them lose their mystique. Even though mystique is an illusion it is one worth chasing blindly after.

Written by: W Harley Bloodworth

~Courtesy of the AOFH~
 

A Closer Inspection of Non-Hunters and Hunters.

Remember this: Throughout the  years of hunting, social media as we know it today did not exist in the same form.

In the 'good old days' people came together for social functions be it hunting, dancing or celebrating some special occasion on a regular basis. Neighbors interacted and depended on others in their community while relying on hunting as a resource to provide food in good times and bad. Hunting was a social function and people physically spoke and interacted face to face. That is not done anymore.

If a hunter did claim wild game for food there was the option of tanning a hide or in later years mounting a trophy head. If someone came over to your house that is where you displayed your mount to others that you most likely were very close to. There would be no judgments except for the appreciation of the endeavors based on your time spent afield.

In the current age of media, photo sharing has become very present on social media. Anyone can post or present a photo of any subject no matter how pristine or vulgar the image may be. Depending on the individual psychological make-up or de-sensitivity of a person, how that image or subject matter therein contained will be ingested or processed is left to be seen.

In the past there was not an extreme pinpoint attack on hunting whereas now the evidence of such an attack is rampant. This has been increased by the availability of the internet and sharing sites. There are many arguments from both sides of the duck blind which requires close scrutiny. Before those arguments can be approached who are the players and why do they hunt? Why do they not?

For a moment let's take a closer inspection of people that do hunt. People hunt for many reasons. What prompts people to hunt? For all intensive purposes the reason people hunt is for food. That is a pretty basic fundamental human need. There are several scenarios that could lead to this. Let's imagine a few for a moment.

• There is an unemployed single parent that has a child or children but for reasons are denied the ever hated EBT food assistance program on the part of working people. Most people do not believe life is lived as a commune where one person does work while the other does nothing but eat off their back. They do not take into consideration the person in question may have a hard time getting back on their feet or even feel they are entitled to help these people. This is because most people think the charity case should be achieving in their timeline and considerations. Other than stealing out of peoples gardens, shop lifting, or taking the ornamental cabbage at the local bank that has been so nicely landscaped: hunting is an option to explore. This parent would probably forego the problem of what other people think at learning to hunt. In order to feed their children, hunting solves starvation. The dilemma here in their psyche would be: I have to kill something to feed my children. Who is more important? My children or the animal in question. If there is no other workable option to supplement nourishment what one believes could be over-ridden to provide for the family.
• Due to an abundance of farmed livestock, processed meats are readily available at the grocery stores. Unfortunately there are many reports that processed livestock that are not free range might be providing questionable health problems due to antibiotics, feeding habits, and processing techniques. The discerning health nut may turn to eating just vegetables while excluding meat. Then again the option of hunting wild game and solely living off of the food you hunt brings a wider health benefit while supplementing with free ranged livestock that are only farm raised.
• A person may decide to take a vacation on a planned hunting excursion. The goal is to hunt a specimen that is worthy to be food, a trophy for appreciation and nostalgia, and memories. Even when a person is hunting the idea of food is at the front of his/her unconscious. You do not want to kill a diseased animal because what would you do with the meat? You can't really eat the meat. You would only be doing a mercy kill and keeping others of that species from becoming infected unless the problems are based on old age.  The problem herein would be the treatment of the body.
• A person is employed with a conservation agency. The employee has been directed to hunt and terminate X amount of a species for the delicate balance on a plot of land.
• A farm owner has a herd of cows that have been menaced by pack animals or the individual varmint. He decides to protect his herd of cows by trapping, tracking or hunting.

Even though each situation is not covering all the reasons or ideas on 'why' people decide to hunt it can set the stage for a discussion for each situation. This kind of conversation is more appropriate because it is not single or feeble minded. People at times live their lives like mules with blinders on. They only think and go one way. Why would a person decide not to hunt? Give that not all non-hunters are vegans should be taken into consideration.

• There is an abundance of meat and vegetables available at the grocer. The individual does not want to know how food is processed but only wants the food to be readily available while no questions are asked. As long as they don't see what they consider  is a 'murder scene', decide not to dwell on the details only the outcome: food on the plate.
• The individual decides personally eating meat is not for them but doesn't condemn hunting.
• Due to some previous trauma an individual decides that they do not believe in the slaughter of animals but eats plant material only. Even though the vegan has more reverence for animal life because the mentality is that animals are equal to humans. Plants are like objects without a life force yet feeds animals/people to help them maintain life. In this situation it seems the individual doesn't have a full grasp on the necessity for sustenance to maintain an optimum level of life.
• People who are detached emotionally from human relationships for psychological reasons. They maintain animals are basically pure because animals are instinctual and simple. Animals give love freely and unconditionally without making demands on them. They believe animals are helpless and oblivious to the fact that animals kill one another or people. The person that has no reverence for human life or their own because they exhibit self hate. Animals are elevated above human life and would be willing to take part in terrorist like activities to satisfy their open ended agendas. This kind of person would kill all humans and let animals take the world regardless of real life animal behavior.
• Persons that only eat plant material but holds the belief that all life on planet Earth can eat the same kind of uniformed food regardless of nutritional requirements, there will be no fighting or killing within or outside of species, no living thing shall eat another, and basic universal harmony through non violence from birth until death.

The main goal into this inquiry is to take a look at a particular vantage point from the differing sides. Given these simple examples non-hunters are driven more by emotional and psychological reason but reject biological instincts to hunt for their food in the wild. Hunting is rejected as a part of the self or the identity.

Hunters are driven by instinctual needs for food but vary in concept based on emotional and psychological reasoning. Basic biological instinct is not rejected but accepted as a part of the self and the hunter identity.

The crisis lies in the suggestion by both sides that the perspectives of the other are flawed and how this perspective is addressed or handled.

Could it be that non-hunters are trying to make up for a guilt where the human population has exploded hence strangling out wildlife and their lands? Is it so that hunter's are stewards of that ever decreasing space trying to manage the wildlife on it? Does there lay a possibility of compromise on each groups' behalf to come to a civil agreement without a winner. These are reasonable questions. Could there be better questions: yes.

If the argument is more important than finding a solution then the "cause" is just an illusion to help perpetrate a pointless never-ending war.
Its worth a closer inspection but there are other topics to explore.

Written by: W Harley Bloodworth

~Courtesy of the AOFH~