BCJ_FALL17 Digital Edition

SPEECHLESS: WYOMING ARCHERY MOOSE. PAGE 32
BACKCOUNTRY
JOURNAL
The Magazine of Backcountry Hunters & Anglers Fall 2017
PLUS: HANGING WITH MY CHUMS,
FOUR-YEAR VIRGINIA DEER HUNT, FIND
YOUR EAGLE EYES, A CONVERSATION
WITH REMI WARREN AND MORE
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 1

2 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE
TRUE GRIT
“TEN MORE MINUTES, CID.” She had stopped talking a few minutes
before, a telltale sign of something awry. It’s a trait we share. We were on a
trip of a lifetime put together by First Lite to celebrate her 9th birthday: her
first backpacking trip into the storied Frank Church-River of No Return
Wilderness in central Idaho.
It was hot – too hot. The first mile of the hike had been easy going
along Marsh Creek. The excitement was heavy and the promise of hungry
cutthroat trout motivating. But the next mile got steeper. Cid’s llama, Marshall,
ate some yarrow, which made its mouth numb, which in turn made
him slobber incessantly. In good time, said slobber dripped on the back of
Cid’s calves.
As happens with a group, our plans to stop for lunch in “another 15
minutes” turned into 20, then 30 minutes. Finally, we found a respite next
to the creek and I got Cid to dunk her head in the cool, clean water. Tears
commenced, along with pleas to head home. My young daughter had hit
her limit.
If you’ve spent any time in the woods or on the water you know the
feeling: a conviction that it can’t get any worse and won’t get any better. It
doesn’t matter if you hunt, fish, kayak, mountain climb or mountain bike ,
you know that feeling and how hard it is to overcome.
Grit. That word best describes the moment when it’s all up to you, no
one else, to carry onward. The mountains, streams and cliffs don’t care who
you are. They give handouts to no one. There are no shortcuts, no one to do
it for you. When the chips are down, you have to dig deep inside and find
that spirit to carry you through. Grit is one of the endearing qualities that
only public lands and waters can create.
Cid’s face gradually changed from bright red to a softer shade of pink.
Her breath had returned to normal and she had added some much-needed
fuel to her tank. She still wasn’t convinced she could power through, but her
mood was changing. She started to talk again.
I decided to tell her a story about Theodore Roosevelt, an often-discussed
icon in the Tawney household. Roosevelt grew up with debilitating asthma.
Instead of succumbing to the affliction, he worked hard to overcome it.
He climbed peaks, boxed and lived the strenuous life. He and no one else
made the choice to overcome something that could have easily hampered
his lifestyle. He showed grit.
After finishing the story, I let the words linger and left Cid by herself to
contemplate. When I came back minutes later, she was ready to roll.
Cid crushed it on the remaining mile of trail – a mile even steeper than
the last. She beat many of the adults and raised her arms in triumphant joy
upon reaching our alpine lake destination. Her exuberance had returned,
and she promptly jumped into the icy waters and, for effect, ate a black
stonefly nymph. While my story about T.R. may have motivated her, she
did it herself. She learned a life lesson, and I couldn’t be more proud.
Each and every day, Backcountry Hunters & Anglers members, dedicated
volunteers and badass staff work to protect and promote your public
lands and waters, those place where you too can challenge yourself and find
that inner grit.
We covet those places. We need those places. They’re part of our DNA.
Not only do we channel that grit in the field, it also drives us to protect and
promote those very places.
Enjoy all that fall has to offer, and I hope to see you on the trail. Stay
gritty!
Cidney Tawney and her pack llama, Marshall, take a much-needed
breather on their way to go fish some high alpine lakes deep in the
Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness.
Onward and Upward,
Land Tawney
President & CEO
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 3

WHAT IS BHA?
BACKCOUNTRY HUNTERS & ANGLERS
is a North American conservation
nonprofit 501(c)(3) dedicated to the
conservation of backcountry fish and
wildlife habitat, sustaining and expanding
access to important lands and waters, and
upholding the principles of fair chase.
This is our quarterly magazine. We fight to
maintain and enhance the backcountry
values that define our passions: challenge,
solitude and beauty. Join us. Become
part of the sportsmen’s voice for our wild
public lands, waters and wildlife.
Sign up at www.backcountryhunters.org.
THE SPORTSMEN’S VOICE FOR OUR WILD PUBLIC LANDS, WATERS AND WILDLIFE
Ryan Busse (Montana) Chairman
J.R. Young (California) Treasurer
Sean Carriere (Idaho)
Ted Koch (New Mexico)
Ben O’Brien (Texas)
Michael Beagle (Oregon) President Emeritus
President & CEO
Land Tawney, tawney@backcountryhunters.org
Alberta Public Lands Coordinator
Aliah Adams Knopff, aliah.knopff@gmail.com
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
STAFF
Ben Bulis (Montana) Vice Chairman
Heather Kelly (Alaska)
T. Edward Nickens (North Carolina)
Mike Schoby (Montana)
Rachel Vandevoort (Montana)
Southeast Chapter Coordinator
Josh Kaywood, josh@backcountryhunters.org
Backcountry Journal Editor
Sam Lungren, sam@backcountryhunters.org
STATE CHAPTERS
BHA HAS MEMBERS across the
continent, with chapters representing
35 states, the District of Columbia and
two provinces. Grassroots public lands
sportsmen and women are the driving
force behind BHA. Learn more about what
BHA is doing in your state on page 26. If
you are looking for ways to get involved,
email your state chapter chair at the
following addresses:
• alaska@backcountryhunters.org
• alberta@backcountryhunters.org
• arizona@backcountryhunters.org
• britishcolumbia@backcountryhunters.org
• california@backcountryhunters.org
• capital@backcountryhunters.org
• colorado@backcountryhunters.org
• idaho@backcountryhunters.org
• michigan@backcountryhunters.org
• minnesota@backcountryhunters.org
• montana@backcountryhunters.org
• nevada@backcountryhunters.org
• newengland@backcountryhunters.org
• newmexico@backcountryhunters.org
• newyork@backcountryhunters.org
• oregon@backcountryhunters.org
• pennsylvania@backcountryhunters.org
• southeast@backcountryhunters.org
• southdakota@backcountryhunters.org
• texas@backcountryhunters.org
• utah@backcountryhunters.org
• washington@backcountryhunters.org
• wisconsin@backcountryhunters.org
4 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017
• wyoming@backcountryhunters.org
Donor and Corporate Relations Manager
Grant Alban, grant@backcountryhunters.org
Southwest Chapter Coordinator
Jason Amaro, jason@backcountryhunters.org
State Policy Director
Tim Brass, tim@backcountryhunters.org
Campus Outreach Coordinator
Sawyer Connelly, sawyer@backcountryhunters.org
Collegiate Curriculum and Outreach Assistant
Trey Curtiss, trey@backcountryhunters.org
Office Manager
Caitlin Frisbie, frisbie@backcountryhunters.org
Conservation Director
John Gale, gale@backcountryhunters.org
New York and Pennsylvania Public Lands Coordinator
Chris Hennessy, c.hennessey@comcast.net
Great Lakes Coordinator
Will Jenkins, will@thewilltohunt.com
JOURNAL CONTRIBUTORS
Jack Ballard, Reid Bryant, Jan Dizard, Natalie England,
Ryan Hughes, Mark Hurst, Ken Keffer, Paul Kemper,
Emily Madieros, Spencer Neuharth, Jared Oakleaf, Tim
Romano, Dusan Smetana, Dale Spartas, Maddie Vincent,
George Wallace, Merv Webb, Dakota Wharry
Cover photo: Dusan Smetana
Backcountry Journal is the quarterly membership
publication of Backcountry Hunters & Anglers. All
rights reserved. Content may not be reproduced in any
manner without the consent of the publisher. Writing
and photography queries, submissions and advertising
questions contact sam@backcountryhunters.org
Published October 2017. Volume XII, Issue IX
JOIN THE CONVERSATION
Operations Director
Frankie McBurney Olson, frankie@backcountryhunters.org
Central Idaho Coordinator
Mike McConnell, whiteh2omac@gmail.com
Communications Director
Katie McKalip, mckalip@backcountryhunters.org
Social Media and Online Advocacy Coordinator
Nicole Qualtieri, nicole@backcountryhunters.org
Northwest Outreach Coordinator
Jesse Salsberry, jesse@backcountryhunters.org
Membership Coordinator
Ryan Silcox, ryan@backcountryhunters.org
Merchandise and Membership Specialist
Ty Smail, smail@backcountryhunters.org
Chapter Coordinator
Ty Stubblefield, ty@backcountryhunters.org
Interns: Ryan Hughes, Carter Birmingham, Alex Kim, Emily
Madieros, Maddie Vincent, Dakota Wharry
BHA LEGACY PARTNERS
The following Legacy Partners have committed
$1000 or more to BHA for the next three years. To
find out how you can become a Legacy Partner,
please contact grant@backcountryhunters.org.
Lou and Lila Bahin, Bendrix Bailey, Mike Beagle, Sean
Carriere, Chris Cholette, Dave Cline, Dan Edwards,
Todd DeBonis, Blake Fischer, Sarah Foreman, Whit
Fosburgh, Stephen Graf, Ryan Huckeby, Richard
Kacin, Ted Koch, Peter Lupsha, Robert Magill, Cholly
McGlynn, Nick Miller, Nick Nichols, William Rahr,
Adam Ratner, Jesse Riggleman, Jason Stewart,
Robert Tammen, David Tawney, Lynda Tucker, Karl
Van Calcar, Michael Verville, Barry Whitehill,
BHA HEADQUARTERS
P.O. Box 9257, Missoula, MT 59807
www.backcountryhunters.org
admin@backcountryhunters.org
(406) 926-1908

Paul Kemper photo
ARCTIC NATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE, ALASKA
BY MADDIE VINCENT
IMAGINE A PLACE UNTOUCHED BY THE WORLD as we
know it, where your eyes never find an end to the tundra, rivers,
mountains. Where there is more wild than your mind can comprehend
and the stillness moves every inch of your being into a
state of calm isolation. No filters. No friend requests. Just raw life.
Few places offer an escape more real than the Arctic National
Wildlife Refuge, America’s 19.6 million-acre, multi-faceted
crown jewel of the wildlife refuge system. The refuge is home to
47 mammal, 42 fish and 201 bird species that span a wide range
of arctic and subarctic ecosystems. But it’s the number with a dollar
sign that’s grabbing people’s attention: $3.5 billion of total oil
revenue the Trump administration believes is beneath the refuge’s
Coastal Plain.
However, these numbers are questionable, and the threat of oil
drilling in the Arctic Refuge is not new. Conservationists have
been fighting attempts to open the area to development since the
late ’70s. But with the nation’s current political climate, coupled
with the state of Alaska’s voted-on support, oil drilling is closer to
becoming a reality.
The Coastal Plain is a 1.5 million-acre biodiversity hotspot,
known as the biological heart of the refuge. Oil drilling would
disrupt the habitat of hundreds of species, including the calving
grounds of the Porcupine Caribou Herd. The Porcupine Caribou
are the furthest migrating mammal herd on earth and are sacred
to the native Gwich’in people.
“Drilling in the refuge would impact the caribou and exacerbate
climate change. The last thing we need is to put the pedal to
the gas on climate change,” said Barry Whitehill, a BHA Legacy
Partner and Alaska Chapter board member.
Whitehill hunts the refuge every year, as well as guiding whitewater
floats through the Brooks Range, one of the most remote
areas within an already isolated refuge. This isolation draws a special
kind of adventurer willing to be exposed to the elements.
“When hunting in the refuge, you feel like you’re part of a process
that’s been going on for eons,” Whitehill said. “It’s the last
place you can feel what Lewis and Clark felt.”
Hunting in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is unique for
more than just its challenging landscape. In 1980, it was established
as the refuge it is today under the Alaska National Interest
Lands Conservation Act. Under ANILCA, the secretary of the
interior had to identify special values of the refuge, from scenic
to archeological, before a conservation plan could be considered.
Roger Kaye, a 30-year U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service employee and
the first BHA member from Alaska, helped develop hunting as
one of these special values. He sees it as a key to the refuge’s protection.
“Hunting is not recreation here. It’s not the place to just get
your animal. It is a place to hunt in the wilderness and become a
part of the natural scheme for a moment. Hunters feel it in their
bones,” Kaye said.
YOUR BACKCOUNTRY
Kaye’s book, Last Great Wilderness: The Campaign to Establish
the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (2006), details the movement
to protect the Arctic Refuge and the conservationists who were instrumental
in its designation. He believes the campaign was rooted
in a growing fear for the technological future – and that hunters
played a crucial role in proposing and supporting the refuge.
“Some guys were concerned with the ethics of hunting and
thought there ought to be a place that exemplifies a venerable
hunting experience,” Kaye said. “So, this is the place where we
draw the line. It’s a place of skill, effort and perseverance, not
gadgets and vehicles.”
Kaye says that because the refuge is renowned, it attracts a special
segment of hunters, like Whitehill, who help maintain the
wilderness character and ecological integrity. He believes that if
the area is open to drilling, the quality of the wilderness and hunting
experience will vanish.
“People are concerned with the numbers of caribou and
muskoxen that will be impacted, but the whole issue is not a
numbers issue. The essential wildness is the concern because when
you put oil fields out there, more than 10 generations of caribou
will be displaced and will lose their migratory knowledge. Their
wildness will be lost.”
Now, almost 30 years after its establishment, ANILCA is getting
a second look. In a government memo issued Aug. 11, 2017,
the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service outlines its request from the secretary
of the interior to amend the section of ANILCA that restricts
oil exploration plan submissions in the Arctic Refuge. The
department must respond to this request by Sept. 30, 2017, and
if these changes are accepted, companies will be able to apply to
explore oil drilling within the refuge’s boundaries.
Dean Westlake, an Alaskan Inuit and state representative, supports
oil exploration and helped draft a resolution in support of
drilling that made it through to Washington, D.C., last March.
Westlake believes that drilling on the Coastal Plain will help protect
the refuge by getting more people to have a vested interest.
“A lot of times, its the commercialization of something nearby
that makes it pertinent to what you’d like to see in perpetuity,”
Westlake said in a phone interview with BHA. “If we develop,
now everyone is going to be in this to make sure this wildlife is
secure. What company wants to get in there and be accused of
wildlife extinctions?”
Kaye and Whitehill disagree and are working with the Alaska
BHA Chapter to educate people about the refuge and to broaden
their support base, which they believe will help protect the refuge.
“The biggest thing we’re trying to do is take people out, expose
them to the refuge’s fragileness and exponentially increase the
voices that say it’s not a barren wasteland – it should be fought for
and protected,” Whitehill said.
Maddie is a journalism graduate student, University of Montana
soccer team member and Backcountry Journal intern.
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 5

BACKCOUNTRY
JOURNAL
The Magazine of Backcountry Hunters & Anglers Fall 2017
Volume XII, Issue IX
Table of Contents
Features
Speechless: Dreams, Nightmares and Wyoming Moose 32
By Jared Oakleaf
My Chums 36
By David Zoby
For the Love of the Hunt 42
By Natalie England
Poem: Do the Math 45
By George Wallace
Sweat Equity 48
By Mark Hurst
A Conversation with Remi Warren 54
By Ryan Hughes and Sam Lungren
Dusan Smetana photo
6 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

Departments
President’s Message 3
True Grit
Your Backcountry 5
Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Alaska
BHA Headquarters News 8
Podcast & Blast, New Staffers, Photo Contest Winners, Elliott State Forest,
National Monuments Review
Backcountry Bounty 11
Faces of BHA 13
Katie DeLorenzo – Albuquerque, New Mexico
Public Land Owner 15
Sabinoso Wilderness, New Mexico
Stream Access Now 16
BHA members defend and improve sportsmen’s access to lakes in LA, SD and WA
Backcountry Bistro 19
Venison Chislic
Beyond Fair Chase 21
Fair Chase and Public Access
Kids’ Corner 23
Nuts About Fall
Opinion 24
Worth Fighting For
Chapter News 26
Instructional 56
Eagle Eyes
End of the Line 62
Black Out Pack Out III
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 7

BHA HEADQUARTERS
BHA PODCAST & BLAST
IN JULY, BHA KICKED OFF BHA’s Podcast & Blast featuring the vocal and interviewing talents of Hal
Herring, an award-winning journalist and contributing editor at Field & Stream. With each new podcast
you can expect to hear conversations that are both entertaining and provocative. Guests so far have included
Randy Newberg of On Your Own Adventures, Mike Schoby of Petersen’s Hunting, Steven Rinella of
MeatEater, Anthony Licata of Field & Stream and conservation legend Jim Posewitz. As of mid-September
the podcast had more than 100,000 downloads across iTunes, Stitcher and Podbean. It also can be found
on YouTube.
Hal has written for a wide range of publications including The Atlantic, The Economist, High Country
News and Bugle. He’s a lifelong outdoorsman, mountaineer, hunter and fisherman and is well known for his
deeply reported, thought-provoking stories and essays. Born and raised in northern Alabama, Hal moved to
NEW FACES ON STAFF
AS BHA CONTINUES TO GROW so does our staff of passionate
conservationists. We are proud to introduce three new members
of our team.
CHRIS HENNESSEY, New York and Pennsylvania Public
Lands Coordinator. Chris
grew up in suburban Philadelphia
with a passion for
hunting, fishing, camping
and nature. Now a resident
of the outdoor mecca of State
College, Pa., he is surrounded
by the ridges and valleys
of the Allegheny Mountains.
There, and across the country,
he enjoys many types of
public land recreation with
his wife, Tina, and their children PattyAnn and William.
Chris spent most of his career in newspapers and public relations.
His conservation ethic was honed while directing communications
at a land trust in State College. He is excited to be on
board at BHA and looks forward to working with members in to
protect our precious woods and waters.
JOSH KAYWOOD,
Southeast Chapter Coordinator.
Josh grew up
backpacking, climbing and
kayaking in the Blue Ridge
Mountains, where he developed
a passion for the
outdoors. While attending
college at the University of
Mississippi he was introduced
to a new landscape,
the Mississippi Delta, where
BHA RESPONDS TO LEAKED DOI NATIONAL MONUMENTS REPORT
IN APRIL 2017, PRESIDENT TRUMP SIGNED an executive
order instructing Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to review national
monument designations from the past 21 years, a total of 27
monuments. Zinke toured the country for four months visiting
some of the monuments and speaking with proponents both for
he fell in love with waterfowl hunting. The cypress swamps and
fields of the delta provided a new lens through which to view the
outdoors and inevitably led to his growing interests in small game
hunting, as well as bowhunting whitetails and black bears.
Before coming to BHA, Josh was an entrepreneur in healthcare,
largely focusing on business development. Josh is a founding
member of the Southeast Chapter and served as its first chair,
which fostered a desire for a deeper level of commitment to the
BHA mission.
ALIAH ADAMS KNOPFF, Alberta Public Lands Coordinator.
Aliah has always had a
passion for wild places, especially
the mountain backcountry
of Western Canada
and the U.S. She grew up
hiking, backpacking, skiing
and being outdoors with
family. She is now passing
on these traditions to her
own children. Aliah was introduced
to hunting in her
early 20s, and she now uses
her annual fall hunts to spend time in the mountains and ensure
a freezer full of wild Alberta meat to fuel her family.
Aliah’s interest in conservation led her to pursue undergraduate
degrees in environmental science and international relations.
Over the past six years, Aliah has been an environmental consultant
working with Alberta’s large mammals, including mountain
goats, bighorn sheep, cougars and bears.
As the Alberta public lands coordinator with BHA, Aliah will
focus her passion for the outdoors and conservation on fostering
a collaborative network of individuals and organizations with a
shared purpose of preserving the ecological integrity of Alberta’s
public lands and wild spaces.
and against the protection. In August, Zinke turned in his review
to President Trump, but it was not made public.
On Sept. 17, The Wall Street Journal published a leaked version
of Zinke’s report. It outlined a plan for changing the management
of 10 iconic American national monuments and reducing the
8 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

oundaries of at least four of them, including Utah’s Bears Ears
and Grand Staircase-Escalante, Nevada’s Gold Butte and Oregon’s
Cascade-Siskiyou. Within the report Zinke concluded that past
presidents had overstepped their powers under the Antiquities Act
to prevent economic activities such as grazing, timber production
and mining rather than to protect specific objects as the act was
intended. Zinke also suggested three new national monuments:
one to cover roughly 130,000 acres in Montana next to Glacier
National Park, the Badger-Two Medicine Area of the Lewis and
Clark National Forest; the Jackson, Mississippi home of Medgar
Evers, an NAACP field secretary who led protests against segregation
and was murdered in 1963; and Camp Nelson, a Civil War
Union Army supply depot in Kentucky.
“While the administration’s report remains unconfirmed, vague
details being reported at this time should concern public lands
sportsmen and women,” said Land Tawney, BHA president and
CEO. “If these recommendations reflect the Interior Department’s
suggested course of action for Congress and President
Trump, our public lands, waters, wildlife and outdoor traditions
could be at risk.”
OREGON’S ELLIOTT STATE FOREST TO REMAIN PUBLICLY ACCESSIBLE
ESTABLISHED IN 1930, the Elliott State Forest was given to
Oregon by the federal government to provide a sustainable source
of school funding through timber harvest. Over time, divergent
public interests led to a loss of revenue on the land and resulted
in the state proposing its sale in fall 2015. BHA reacted quickly,
launching a petition to protect the 93,000-acre forest that received
over 4,000 signatures.
In August Gov. Kate Brown signed S.B. 847 into law, transferring
ownership of the Elliott from the school trust fund to
an alternative state land management entity that does not have
the same fiscal management constraints. The Oregon State Land
Board had postponed ruling on the Elliott’s fate to give state lawmakers
time to develop a plan that would keep the forest publicly
accessible.
“Finding creative ways to keep public lands in public hands
is paramount in our fight against losing access to the lands and
waters that we as sportsmen and women love,” said BHA Oregon
Chair Ian Isaacson. “Just as important is engagement by the public.
We must be active participants in the entire process, no matter
how difficult, tiring and frustrating as it may be.”
Headquarters News reported and written by Backcountry Journal
intern Dakota Wharry.
PUBLIC WATERS PHOTO CONTEST WINNERS
First place: BJ Stone – “Montana Public Waters Handshake”
Second place: Sara Schroeder – “Waterfall on
Montana’s Rocky Mountain Front”
Third place: Jason Hayes – “Teaching kids how to pack into the
mountains, then catch, fillet and cook their own fish over an
open fire is an unforgettable experience”
Most Creative: Dave Quinn – ” Flippin’ out on a rare hot day on the lower Stikine River near
the BC/Alaska boundary”
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 9

BACKCOUNTRY BOUNTY
1
3
2
4
1
2
3
4
5
Angler: Jessica Smail, BHA Member Species: Rainbow
Trout State: Montana Method: Fly Rod Distance from
nearest road: One mile Transportation: Foot
Hunter: Bob Sorvaag, BHA Member
Species: Mule Deer State: Idaho Method: Rifle
Distance from nearest road: Two miles
Transportation: Foot
Hunter: Kyle Demmit, BHA Member Species: Ruffed
Grouse State: Washington Method: Compound Bow
Distance from nearest road: Five miles Transportation:
Foot
Hunter: Tom Martin, BHA Member Species: American
Alligator State: Florida Method: Rod & Reel/Harpoon/
Bang Stick Distance from nearest road: One mile
Transportation: Boat
Hunter: Allie D’Andrea, BHA Member Species: Pronghorn
State: Wyoming Method: Compound Bow Distance
nearest road: Two miles Transportation: Foot/Bike
Send submissions to sam@backcountryhunters.org 5
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 11

12 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017 2016

FACES OF BHA
KATIE DeLORENZO: Albuquerque, New Mexico
Advertising Professional, NM Chapter Board Member, Train To Hunt Finalist
HOW DID YOU START
HUNTING?
My dad is a really avid hunter
so I grew up around it. He would
bring animals home, and I was
always aware of what he was doing,
and he would show me all of
the biology. If he brought a turkey
home, we’d see what it had
been eating and I would watch
the butchering process happen,
so that was kind of my first taste
of it. I had been coaching soccer
for 12 years, so I wasn’t really
active and then got tired of
coaching and blew out my knee
and had four surgeries and my
dad was retiring, so I thought,
‘Oh my gosh I need to learn this
stuff.’ So I went on a few hunts
and got hooked. I went on a bighorn
sheep hunt – it was a ewe
hunt in the Latir Wilderness –
and that was a life changing hunt
for me. My dad and I hiked into
the backcountry, and I killed
an animal and carried it off the
mountain on my back. It was a
big moment because I’m 115 lbs,
and my dad didn’t think I could
carry the sheep. So that kind of
challenge and that experience of
having that solitude and hunting
an animal that you have to carry
out – it just changed everything
for me, and I started thinking
about it more like a sport and
setting challenges and goals.
WHAT ROLE DOES
SOCIAL MEDIA PLAY IN
MODERN HUNTING?
To me, women hunting wasn’t
that novel because my older sister
is a very accomplished hunter.
When I started putting my own
stories out there, I really saw a
need for education about what
this lifestyle is about. There are
many people who have no clue
what is available to us. We have
access to this amazing public land
where you can go explore and see
such diversity in the environment,
species and even the exotics that
have contributed to our hunting
opportunity like ibex and oryx.
There’s a need for education and
advocates to make hunting approachable.
Whether that’s a person
who has never heard about it,
or a female who wants to get into
it and needs a buddy to go do archery
with, my main goal is to be
that source and speak about hunting
in a responsible way and open
those conversations to help people
understand. There are also many
who are not supportive of hunting,
and if I can help justify it in
a way that’s understandable, that’s
a huge win for me. I’ve received
pretty gnarly messages from anti-hunters.
Education is the best
thing we can be doing with social
media to being responsible promoters
of our lifestyle.
WHAT ATTRACTED
YOU TO BHA?
Goodness, I would just say
the energy around it. I keep a
pretty close eye on everything
that’s happening in the social
realm, and to me, it just seemed
like they have a lot of traction
and momentum right now. The
message really struck a chord
with me, because I think being
a native New Mexican and having
a sense of reverence instilled
in me since a young age for our
public lands and wildlife, it was
kind of like a wake up call as
an adult: Here I am, enjoying
all of this stuff, and it’s part of
my heritage I feel very strongly
about. Yet I’ve never been
involved in advocating for it.
So, really, it was the energy
and momentum paired with an
amazing group of people here
in Albuquerque that I am confident
will make a positive impact.
I’ve worked with a lot of
other organizations, and what I
love about BHA is it’s an opportunity
to make a real impact
on my state. It’s important to
me that future generations will
be able to experience what I’ve
experienced in the outdoors.
WHAT IS THE BIGGEST
THREAT TO HUNTING
AND FISHING?
I really feel at a basic level,
that it’s just the loss of public
lands either via access constraints
or sale – and I wonder
how I can help in fighting this. I
work at one of the top ad agencies
in the Southwest and I’m
exposed to cutting edge communications
on a daily basis, so
I have the ability to find a synergy
between my professional life
and my biggest passion. I hope
that by promoting hunting and
bringing people on board with
it, we can continue supporting
our wildlife model and continue
to be able to hunt and fish
in America. We are all born
with this right and only a few
of us are fighting for it, and it
could go away at any moment. I
want to wake my generation up
and say, ‘Hey, guys, it could go
away at any moment. What can
you be doing to help?’ Whether
that’s taking a little kid fishing
or hunting or getting someone
involved so that they’re contributing,
I think hunter recruitment
is a really big topic for us
right now. Who am I to enjoy
all that New Mexico has to offer
and then not fight on its behalf?
If it really means so much
to me, then I need to put my
money where my mouth is.
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 13

14 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

PUBLIC LAND OWNER
Joel Gay photo
SABINOSO WILDERNESS, NEW MEXICO
BY RYAN HUGHES
NEW MEXICO’S SABINOSO WILDERNESS is 16,030 acres
of remote desert. Creeks lined with cottonwoods and willows flow
through the bottoms of massive canyons cut into the landscape.
Rocky cliffs loom over groves of pines and junipers where elk,
mule deer, black bears and turkeys may be caught roaming. The
Sabinoso is a landscape that is equally beautiful as it is unforgiving.
It is also completely surrounded by private land, making it
the only wilderness area that is inaccessible by overland travel.
Legislation to designate the Sabinoso as wilderness failed several
times before finding its way its into Omnibus Public Lands
Management Act of 2009, where it recieved President Obama’s
signature. But since its designation, the Sabinoso has remained effectively
closed to any who wish to hunt, hike or explore. In 2016,
the Wilderness Land Trust purchased the adjacent Rimrock Rose
Ranch with plans to donate the ranch to the BLM. If accepted,
this donation would allow passage into the Sabinoso through the
southwestern boundary.
A chorus of conservation organizations have since urged Secretary
of the Interior Ryan Zinke to accept the donation of the
3,314 acre ranch and open the Sabinoso. At press time, the secretary
had not officially accepted the donation, athough he has
indicated that he plans to do so.
“I originally had concerns about adding more wilderness-designated
area,” Zinke said in a statement. “However, after hiking and
riding the land it was clear that access would only be improved if
the U.S. Department of the Interior accepted the land and maintained
the existing roadways.”
As it stands, the only way to gain entry into the wilderness
is by obtaining permission to cross a surrounding ranch or by
miraculously dropping in from the sky. The lack of opportunity
for hunting the Sabinoso leaves curiosity in the minds of many
hunters. This makes any insights and experiences of hunting in
the Sabinoso valuable. With a special draw archery mule deer tag
in hand, New Mexico BHA member Joel Gay was able to secure
permission to cross a surrounding private property. Though he
was not sure what to expect there, Joel was enthused to have the
opportunity to venture into an untouched landscape surrounded
by both controversy and curiosity.
“This is some really tough country. And it’s beautiful country.
And it probably hasn’t been hunted in many years,” Joel said.
What Joel found was rugged terrain and a desolate landscape.
Trails were scarce. The September heat was practically begging
him to pack up his gear and end his hunt, but the sight of fresh
game tracks kept him on his toes as he glassed his way through the
southern portion of the wilderness. Though he walked out of the
Sabinoso emptyhanded, Joel gathered a rare perspective, piquing
curiosity of what game might inhabit the northern regions.
“It’s criminal that we have a wilderness area in the United States
that’s currently landlocked with no access to it,” Joel said. “We
need to get access to it. It will be great for anybody who wants to
see some beautiful country and try to get a turkey in the spring
or fall – and even knock themselves out by trying to get a deer.”
Zinke made his statements following a visit to the Sabinoso,
where he toured the area on horseback alongside Sens. Tom Udall
and Martin Heinrich, both of New Mexico and vocal supporters
of the Rimrock Rose Ranch donation. They were joined by BHA
President and CEO Land Tawney. In a press release, Sens. Udall
and Heinrich show appreciation for Zinke’s support, along with a
recognition for the importance of public lands.
“This is a major gain for New Mexico and would not be possible
without the generosity of the Wilderness Land Trust and
the dedication of the local community and sportsmen who have
championed this effort for many years,” Heinrich said. “I am
grateful that Secretary Zinke visited our state and recognizes just
how special the Sabinoso truly is. Traditions like hunting, hiking,
and fishing are among the pillars of Western culture and a thriving
outdoor recreation economy.”
BHA Southwest Chapter Coordinator Jason Amaro helped
lead a grassroots campaign to secure to access to the Sabinoso
Wilderness. He believes that Zinke deserves recognition for taking
a pro access stance, but as a New Mexican hunter, he is still
awaiting the land donation to be finalized.
“If there was any doubt that sportsmen and women have a
voice, the secretary’s announcement should settle that debate,” Jason
said. “Together, hunters and anglers unanimously urged Secretary
Zinke to do the right thing, and now we’ve taken a step to
securing public access to one of New Mexico’s premier wilderness
areas. We thank Sens. Heinrich and Udall for their leadership to
get us here and look forward to continued partnership with Secretary
Zinke and his staff to finalize this long awaited agreement.”
As hunters dream of entrance into the Sabinoso, hunting season
inches closer. Though Zinke’s plan to accept the land donation is
worthy of applause, his actions will be the true testament to his
commitment to both public lands and American sportsmen.
Ryan is an intern at Backcountry Journal.
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 15

STREAM ACCESS NOW
PUBLIC WATERS ACCESS:
BHA members work to defend and improve sportsmen’s access
to lakes in Louisiana, South Dakota, Washington
BY MADDIE VINCENT
IN OUR SUMMER 2017 ISSUE, Backcountry Journal highlighted
water access concerns across the nation through narratives and
a comprehensive chart of each state’s access laws. That data makes
it clear that the battle for access to public waters is far from won.
Legal issues continue to arise, making this issue an all-important
focus for BHA. Right now, that focus is lake-heavy as we fight to
protect and restore access in three states.
CATAHOULA LAKE, LOUISIANA
Catahoula is well-known as the largest freshwater lake in Louisiana.
The 30,000-acre reservoir is one of the most important habitats
for migrating ducks and shorebirds in the Mississippi Flyway.
For over 100 years, people have hunted and fished Catahoula
Lake, evidenced by the numerous duck blinds that decorate its
shallow waters. Brett Herring of ShellShocked Guide Service has
hunted the lake since he was 12 years old and says it still isn’t easy.
“What makes it difficult to hunt Catahoula is the constant water
fluctuations. You always gotta be on your toes and you gotta
be willing to work. It’s a constant battle with Mother Nature,”
Herring said.
However, these water fluctuations are at the root of a bigger
challenge than anything Herring has seen. A July district court
ruling defined Catahoula as a floodplain wetland of Little River –
not a lake – which changes more than just its name.
Little River winds through the Catahoula Basin, historically a
meandering stream for half of the year and an overflow for backed
up tributaries for the other. In 1973, the Jonesville Lock and Dam
was built, allowing greater control over a fluctuating waterbody.
This turned Catahoula into a more permanent lake, while still
allowing the flood-drain cycle responsible for the abundance of
duck feed and other vegetation. But in Crooks v. State, the court
deemed the dam unlawful expropriation of the Little River’s banks
by the state, which owed the area’s private land owners almost $38
million in damages and $4.5 million in oil and gas royalties.
In Louisiana, the land below the ordinary high water mark of a
lake is owned by the state, whereas the land between the ordinary
high water and low water marks of a river can be privately owned.
That means Catahoula’s river designation puts other non-permanent
and seasonally flooded waterbodies, along with a dynasty of
duck hunting, at risk of privatization. This has people like BHA’s
Southeast Chapter Coordinator Josh Kaywood worried.
“Because the Army Corps of Engineers built dams all over, almost
every lake is a river dammed up,” Kaywood said. “If this case
goes through, it sets a dangerous precedent that has the potential
to affect waterbodies across the entire country.”
The State of Louisiana filed an appeal to Crooks v. State that
will most likely be heard next summer. Kaywood and his chapter
are putting together a game plan to promote legislation in favor
of public access. In the meantime, hunting and fishing on Catahoula
will continue as before. And Herring plans to continue, as
he’s always done.
“If the appeal doesn’t go through, it’s definitely going to be a
different way of life on Catahoula,” Herring said. “But, as lake
hunters, we’ve always had to learn to adapt. It’s tough, but I like to
think we’re some of the toughest duck hunters there are.”
NON-MEANDERED LAKES, SOUTH DAKOTA
Around the same time as Crooks v. State, the Open Waters
Compromise (HB 1001) was enacted after a special session of the
South Dakota legislature.
The special session and resulting emergency legislation stems
from the thousands of relatively new lakes in northeastern South
Dakota. Up until about 20 years ago, this region was known
for its mix of pastureland marshes and farmland. Then, the ’90s
brought precipitation that didn’t stop. In ’96 and ’97, the state
had one of the biggest snowfalls in history, and its melt-off helped
permanently sink the meadows under 10 to 20 feet of water, creating
lakes known as prairie potholes.
Lakes in South Dakota fall in the public trust, meaning if they
are legally accessible through a public road, they’re fair game.
Northeastern South Dakota has a section line road almost every
mile, so legal access is easy, and the new lakes have become recreational
hotspots. South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks maintains
91 active fisheries, mostly for walleye and perch, whose growth
rates are extreme due to the great amount of vegetation. This vegetation
also attracts thousands of waterfowl in the heart of the
Central Flyway.
But some landowners aren’t happy about sharing their land. In
2003, their complaints and attempts to close the lakes influenced
the South Dakota Supreme Court to order the state legislature to
find a compromise between landowners and sportsmen. However,
the legislature failed to act. So last spring, after more complaints
and failed closures, the court ruled all non-meandered waters
closed to public access. Their ruling drove the state legislature to
assemble a study committee to take a closer look at South Dakota
water law and come out with a band aid piece of legislation, HB
1001.
In the late 1800s and early 1900s, lakes across South Dakota
were surveyed. If the lakes were at least 40 acres and of a permanent
nature, they were considered “meandered lakes” held in the
public trust. Most of the lakes in northeastern South Dakota are
considered non-meandered because they are a result of excessive
flooding and were not a part of the original survey. So, because
these northeastern lakes are non-meandered, the state legislators
decided in HB 1001, or the Open Water Compromise, that landowners
may buoy off their sections of the lakes as private.
Because this is a compromise, landowners have some restrictions.
First, as part of the public trust, access to a water body is
guaranteed, regardless of its designation. This means if a section
line road runs right up to a lake, the public has 33 feet of access
16 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

on either side of the road’s center line. However, at the 34 foot
line, landowners can post No Trespassing signs and buoys after
notifying SDGFP. Second, in Section 8 of HB 1001, legislators
identified 27 non-meandered lakes as open to the public due to
their heavy and consistent recreational use. If landowners would
like to buoy off their portions of a Section 8 lake, they would have
to go through a petition process with SDGFP.
As of early September, only four landowners have requested
permission to close off lake areas. SDGFP Special Projects Coordinator
Kevin Robling, whose focus is on HB 1001, is working
closely with landowners and sportsmen to ensure the bill stays
true to its name.
“This is a unique situation because it is privately owned land
under public trust waters, but we’re working with landowners
closely. This is a very open and transparent process,” Robling said.
Although HB 1001 doesn’t fully restore access, it buys more
time for a state that’s already 90 percent privately owned and at
risk of losing more of the little access it had to begin with. HB
1001 will sunset in June 2018, meaning the state legislature must
take action during the next session to make it permanent, or else
it will disappear and the lakes will be closed to the public. Robling
would like to see that sunset clause extended to three years so he
has time to work with the bill and its commission.
DRY LAKE, WASHINGTON
While sportsmen and waterfront landowners are often pitted
against each other in water access issues, the Washington BHA
Chapter has shown it doesn’t have to be that way.
Dry Lake, also known as Grass Lake, is a shallow home to largemouth
bass, yellow perch, bluegill, crappie and brown bullheads
near Chelan. The lake is one of 33 easements the Washington
Department of Fish & Wildlife received as compensation for
construction of the Rocky Reach and Rock Island dams on the
Columbia River. Most of these easements are water banks surrounded
by private property with no legal way in from the road,
resulting in confusion and trespassing conflicts.
Joe Bridges, a Washington Department of Fish & Wildlife
biologist who helps resolve landowner conflicts, reached out to
BHA and other organizations for financial support to turn a few
of these easements into identifiable access points. Washington
BHA Board Member Bob Mirasole toured the proposed sites with
Bridges.
“I drove out with Joe to see what the scope of the project was,
and basically, it was a slam dunk type of thing,” Mirasole said.
“There wasn’t any question as to why this wasn’t a good thing to
support.”
Bridges and Mirasole worked with landowners to create a primitive
boat launch, parking lot and signage for the Dry Lake access.
It’s been open for two months now and is the first leg of a three access
project. Mirasole believes this project will set a precedent for
future collaboration between the Washington BHA and WDFW
to ensure public access across the state. He will continue to work
with Bridges to raise funds for development of the Horse Lake
Road and North Road access sites along the Wenatchee River, key
steelhead and salmon fishing spots.
Maddie is an intern at Backcountry Journal.
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 17

“
As we head into the holidays, realize the great bounty that we
collectively inherited didn’t happen by accident. Reflect on your
”
experiences in the woods and on the water and give back to
those special places that have given you so much.
WAYS
YOU CAN
GIVE
BECOME A
LEGACY PARTNER
BECOME A LIFE
MEMBER
- LAND TAWNEY
PRESIDENT AND CEO
PLANNED GIVING
BEQUESTS
WORKPLACE
MATCH
CHARITABLE
ANNUITIES
IRA ROLLOVER
LIFE MEMBER
PREMIUMS FROM
KIMBER FIREARMS
SEEK OUTSIDE TENTS
ORVIS FLY RODS
JACKSON KAYAKS
18 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017
CONSERVATION LEGEND JIM POSEWITZ, AUTHOR OF BEYOND FAIR CHASE, WITH HIS SON CIRCA 1982
WELCOME NEW BHA LIFE MEMBERS!
Michael Guran
Charles Smith
Daniel Wieking
Mike Doden
Jon Gillespie-Brown
Nicholas Maus
Matt Little
Joshua Watts
Stephen Mason
Luke Moffat
Gretchen Rebarchak
Montana Raft Frames
Bart Gliatta
Mike Filkowski
Brian Book
Christian Miller
Stacey Roth
Dennis Dunn
Craig Zeinstra
Joe Stribley
Mark Rasmussen
Josh Rhodes
Karl Malcom
Joe Kondelis
Brandon Sheltrown
Matthew Lee
Nathan Zientek
Bruce Sillers
Gabriel Halley
Scott Harton
Ajax Moody
P. Francois Smuts
Adrian Castelli
Chris Davis
Tim Fontaine
Russell Hrisbeck
Michael Tollefsrud
John Lynn
John Sullivan
Daniel Laughlin
Erik Bentley
Call GRANT ALBAN at 406-926-1908 OR
Visit www.backcountryhunters.org/donate

BACKCOUNTRY BISTRO
DEER CHISL C
Read more
about out-ofkitchen
food prep at
backcountry
hunters.org
BY SPENCER NEUHARTH
WE RETURNED TO CAMP EAGER TO EAT something that
wasn’t another uninspiring ham sandwich. Though only Day Two
of the hunt, the heavy gambrel next to the cabin meant venison
on the menu. Hungry as we were tired, it was easy to decide on
supper. South Dakotans know the right way to do it.
As I peeled a backstrap from the mule deer, my friend Logan
dumped some olive oil into a fire-lit Dutch oven. The pot was
crackling as I cubed the loin. I sank the small chunks of meat, covered
in Cavender’s Seasoning, into the oil not long after. In about
the time it takes to nuke a bowl of ramen, the meal was served.
“Chislic is the food God eats. We’re just fortunate enough that
he shares some with us,” Logan muttered as we sat by the fire.
Chislic, typically fried mutton on a stick, is only known among
the select few who call South Dakota home. Although unheard of
elsewhere, it is wildly popular in my home state. So much so that
the area’s largest newspaper declared it “South Dakota’s favorite
food.” The region’s largest magazine deemed the southeastern corner
of the state “Chislic Circle.”
It’s within that Chislic Circle that the dish arose. The name
comes from the Turkic word “shashlik,” meaning cubed red meat
on a stick – the same root as shish kebab. It’s believed that chislic
was first prepared here in the 1870s by an immigrant from the
Crimean Peninsula of Eastern Europe. Since then, it’s become a
staple for the Mount Rushmore State.
In Freeman, population 1,300, sticks of chislic are served by
the dozen, and the the town literally goes through hundreds of
thousands of sticks a year. One bar, Papa’s, estimates that they
sometimes serve up to 3,000 sticks a week. Not far away is the
Turner County Fair, which sells nearly 10,000 sticks a day during
the five-day gathering.
Chislic is almost always served as mutton or lamb, but what
small town you’re in plays a role in how your chislic arrives. In
Yankton, chislic comes with a side of toast. In Menno, it’s served
with saltines. In Freeman, it’s deep fried with slices of onion. In
Sioux Falls, it’s grilled on a set of small kebab sticks.
There are some chislic sins that Dakotans are mindful of: You
shall not marinade it, overcook it or leave any leftovers. Marinating
chislic takes away from the simplicity and trends away from
the 1870s-inspired meal. Overcooking it robs the meat of tenderness,
which is easily done with such small portions. Leftovers
won’t do justice the second time around, as flavor and juiciness are
unmatched with fresh, hot chislic.
Although chislic is almost always made with sheep in restaurants,
some people use beef or venison. In those rare instances, it’s
vehemently referred to as “beef chislic” or “deer chislic.”
Deer chislic is as versatile as mutton, which is what makes
it such a great camp meal. Any deer lodge or tent site should
have access to a grill, stove or fire, making this dish ideal for the
culinarily limited places hunters often find themselves.
Chislic should be sliced into small, un-uniform pieces that are
roughly as wide as a quarter and thick as your thumb. The best
cuts for venison are the backstraps and round roasts, as these offer
the biggest hunks of meat that require the least amount of trimming.
Like mutton, it’s acceptable to serve it loose or on a stick.
Either way you do it, deer chislic is so simple and delicious that
it’s sure to be a hit at any deer camp. In my opinion, it’s about
time for this secret dish to make its way beyond the borders of
South Dakota.
FRIED DEER CHISLIC
Half of a backstrap, cubed
Two onions, sliced
Garlic powder
Black pepper
Salt
Olive oil
In a Dutch oven, heat up just enough oil to cover the meat.
Once the oil is hot, drop in the onions for 1 minute.
With the onions still in the Dutch oven, drop the chislic in for
2 minutes.
Remove both the onions and chislic, transferring to a paper
towel for blotting before serving.
Generously apply garlic powder, black pepper and salt.
GRILLED DEER CHISLIC
Half a backstrap, cubed
Cavender’s Seasoning
Kebab sticks
Thread the chislic cubes on small kebab sticks, close enough to
almost touch each other.
On a hot grill, cook the chislic for three minutes, or until you
see the sticks start to char.
Remove from grill and generously apply Cavender’s Seasoning.
Spencer is an outdoor writer and photographer out of South Dakota.
He joined BHA in 2017 upon the state getting its own chapter.
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 19

20 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

BEYOND FAIR CHASE
Daniel Wilde photo
BY JAN E. DIZARD
FOR ROUGHLY TWO-THIRDS OF THE 20TH CENTURY,
hunters and fishers were the bedrock of conservation. But beginning
in the early 1970s, the ground shifted. The accomplishments
of the conservation movement, to which hunters contributed
mightily, began to pale in the face of new environmental
issues and a new environmental movement that had priorities
not centered on restoration of game and fish and the habitats on
which they depend. Indeed, protection of wildlife and opposition
to management practices that enhanced wildlife habitat became
dominant. Hunters and the new environmental movement diverged.
The result, sadly, has weakened both. Both now face a
different challenge as serious as the one we faced a century ago.
Strong political forces mean to take advantage of the split between
hunters and environmentalists and are determined to turn the
public lands over to the states. As BHA has made clear, should
this happen, hunting and fishing opportunities will be curtailed.
More than access is at stake in the threat to public lands. Broad
access to hunting and fishing opportunities is crucial to sustaining
the ethic of fair chase. A page from my own experience reveals the
link between access and a robust hunting ethic.
When I was new to western Massachusetts and hadn’t had time
to get my bearings, I hunted the only public lands open to hunting:
state-run management areas stocked with pheasants. Crowds
of hunters assembled in designated parking lots, waiting for the
legal shooting hour. Then, like an invading army, hunters and
dogs streamed into the field. I witnessed heated arguments over
whose dog had first pointed a pheasant and whose shot, among
a volley of shots, brought the bird down. It was a scene designed
to bring out the worst in us, not the best. To be sure, even in
those less than ideal situations most hunters were respectful of
others and mindful of elementary safety. But frayed nerves and an
inevitable sense of competition made it likely that tempers would
flare and, even more troubling, that ill-considered shots would
be taken.
In the East, where I live, private lands dwarf public lands. But
FAIR CHASE AND PUBLIC ACCESS:
JOINED AT THE HIP
more and more private land is being put off-limits to hunting.
Each year, more private lands are decorated with signs declaring
the land closed to public access. This is creating a cascade
of unwelcome effects. Crowding on what remains open is first.
The crowding in turn degrades the habitat over time and requires
more and more investment in upkeep, straining agency budgets.
As noted, the experience of hunting is diminished. Men and
women are drawn to hunting for a variety of reasons, but being
in close proximity to hundreds of other hunters is not usually one
of them. Hunters give up, license revenues decline and state agencies
are further cash strapped. But also – and this is crucial – the
ethic of fair chase is weakened by the crowding and the race to
get to the bird first. Finally, those who can afford leases or private
clubs will do so and, in effect, withdraw support for maintaining
broad public access. This re-commercialization of hunting is well
underway all across the country, and it threatens to undermine
the fundamentally democratic character of the North American
Model of hunting and wildlife management.
It is well we remember that our hunting heritage has been
based upon a fundamental principle: the Public Trust Doctrine.
The doctrine holds that some resources, among them wildlife, are
held in common. Like the air we breathe, our wildlife belongs to
everyone. Democracy is not simply about voting and politics. It is
about distributing, not restricting, access to those things we hold
in common, among them public lands and the recreational opportunities
they afford. If the opportunity to hunt or fish is constricted
by restricting access or, what amounts to the same thing,
degrading habitat by mining, drilling, loosely regulated grazing
and rapacious logging, the hard-won commitment to fair chase
will be sorely weakened as hunters are forced to hunt in ever fewer
and more crowded public management areas. Need I add that the
hunting behavior that will ensue will make hunters an easy target
for those who oppose hunting?
Jan is a board member of Orion: The Hunters’ Institute and a life
member of BHA. A retired professor, he splits his time between western
Massachusetts and northern California.
This Backcountry Journal department is brought to you by Orion:
The Hunter’s Institute, a nonprofit and BHA partner dedicated to
advancing hunting ethics and wildlife conservation. To learn more,
visit orionhunters.org. To comment on and discuss this article and
others, go to backcountryhunters.org/fair_chase.
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 21

SUMMER SCAVENGER HUNTERS
Hazel Larson admiring her catch
The BHA Kid’s
Summer Scavenger
Hunt Extravaganza
was another great
success! Kids were
instructed to complete
tasks listed in
Backcountry Journal and
find items from a list,
then send in their photos
to win a Public Land
Owner T-shirt!
Ryan Olson searching for fish food before snoozing on the way home Colton Dukehart inspecting his found feather
Eleanor and Stewart Davis preparing for their scavenger hunt
Sam McCaulou hiking on his public lands
Walker Larson (above) catching a fish, and Tristan Mieczkowski (below) cooking a fish

KIDS’ CORNER
NUTS
ABOUT FALL
Michael Furtman photo
BY KEN KEFFER
THE FORESTS ARE CHANGING COLORS and the leaves will
be dropping soon. Football season is here, and so is hunting season!
It is an exciting time of year to be in the backyard and in
the backcountry. The temperatures might be dropping, but the
fall is heating up for the animals. They are busy finding food and
preparing for winter.
FILLING UP
Fall can be frantic for many critters. Have you ever watched the
squirrels in your neighborhood? Sure, you see them coming and
going all year long, but sit and study them for 5-10 minutes in the
fall. Observing animal behaviors will make you a better naturalist
and a better hunter. In autumn, squirrels scurry about with added
urgency. They collect seeds and nuts and store them up for winter.
Gray squirrels tend to bury nuts throughout their entire home
range. Red squirrels generally collect their bounty in one location.
If you’re out hunting in the woods, look for red squirrel middens.
These are piles of pine cone scales. The squirrels store up a
supply of cones and then sit on their favorite perch snacking away.
They chew into the cones to get to the pine nuts (or spruce nuts
or fir nuts) and the cone scales get tossed aside like peanut and
sunflower seed shell. This leaves behind a messy pile of cone scales
that can be many inches deep. If you’ve found a midden while
squirrel hunting, you’ll know you are in the right spot.
ABUNDANT ACORNS
Acorns are the seeds of oak trees. They are a treat for a bunch of
creatures large and small. There are about 90 species of oak native
to North America. Oak trees take years to mature before they
start producing acorns. Some species make acorns after 20 years.
Others can take 50 years or more before the first acorns appear.
The amount of acorns made by each tree is different from year to
year. Great weather leads to large amounts of acorns. These mast
years become an all-you-can-eat buffet for everything from deer
mice to white-tailed deer.
The acorn caps can make a great whistle. Pinch it between your
pointer fingers and your thumbs while holding the top away from
you. Press your thumbnails to your lower lip and give it a blow.
Adjust until you get a pure whistle. Even if you don’t have an oak
tree around, you should be able to find some fall leaves. Collect
a few and examine them closely. Can you tell the top from the
bottom? How many differently colored leaves can you find? Find
a leaf that has at least three colors on it.
DUCK, DUCK, GOOSE
A few duck species will munch on acorns. Wood ducks especially
seem to bob for acorns in shallow water like you might bob
for apples. Woodies, along with mallards, will munch on acorns
right from the forest floor, too. In the fall, Canada geese also will
get in on the acorn meal plan. So how do ducks and geese eat such
a hard food? They swallow acorns whole. Then, with the help of
a special organ called a gizzard, they crush the acorns. Waterfowl
eat small pebbles of rock that are stored in the gizzard. This helps
grind up hard foods. These birds are the original dine and dashers.
They eat up as quickly as they can before moving to a more
protected area to finish digesting. However, acorns are not on the
menu for much of the year. Instead, they are just a fall treat for
waterfowl.
Fall is the season for wildlife to fatten up for winter. It’s also the
time of year when hunters harvest their bounties to feast upon.
Next time you’re in the woods, thank the trees. Their seeds and
nuts help feed the animals each fall.
Author, naturalist and BHA member Ken Keffer grew up hunting
and fishing in Wyoming. He has written seven books connecting
families to nature, plus the Hiking Wyoming’s Bighorn Mountains
guidebook. Find him at kenkeffer.net.
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 23

OPINION
Dale Spartas photo
WORTH FIGHTING FOR
BY REID BRYANT
“WE ABUSE LAND BECAUSE WE REGARD IT AS A COMMODITY BELONGING TO US. WHEN WE SEE LAND AS A
COMMUNITY TO WHICH WE BELONG, WE MAY BEGIN TO USE IT WITH LOVE AND RESPECT.”
– Aldo Leopold, A Sand County Almanac
This passage from Leopold’s seminal conservation work alludes
knowingly to what remains essential about being a hunter. Central
to the process of becoming a hunter, and central to the identity
found upon arrival, is the community of which Leopold speaks.
This is not just a community of peers, but a community of all
things in nature. When I became a hunter, I ceased to walk over
the land. As a hunter, I became an element of that land, a cog in
a remarkable living machine that is as old as the Earth itself – and
as timeless. Leopold spent a career reflecting on this community
and the role of humans within it. He sat and he watched “like a
mountain,” and he learned by reflective observation. He also took
up a gun each autumn and went hunting, learning a bit more
about himself, and his human ecology, than he’d known before.
Aldo went on to assert that, “In short, a land ethic changes the
role of Homo sapiens from conqueror of the land-community
to plain member and citizen of it. It implies respect for his fellow-members,
and also respect for the community as such.” This
construct is somewhat hard to grasp for most folks, simply because
humans have the capacity, the resources, the vision and the
ingenuity to assert dominance over a natural system at will. We
do so each and every day as we increasingly live outside of nature.
It is why we have survived and flourished, and it is also why, you
might say, we have become disenchanted with and disconnected
from our natural world. We have lost our place in the community
that allowed us a sense of place since time immemorial, and we’ve
in turn become confused about our role.
It is ironic, therefore, that taking up a gun in fall to shoot a bird
or a deer might serve to re-establish a fundamental philosophical
and ecological order. It is ironic that deploying a man-made machine
and ostensibly asserting dominance over a wild creature,
or even more paradoxically a non-endemic, one-time-stocked
creature, could help me regain a sense of myself. It is most ironic,
I might add, that in light of the availability of pre-packaged,
pre-cooked, profoundly inexpensive food I would ever choose to
spend time and money shooting at a piece of meat that, more
often than not, disappears unscathed into the backdrop. But I do
this and love doing it and I seek to do it again. In turn, it makes
me care a little more about the creatures I seek, and the places in
which I seek them.
I am neither a student of psychology nor a student of philosophy,
so I can’t authoritatively say why I am drawn to hunting
or what it means that I am compelled in this way. I assume that
humans were hunters for so long that it became a part of our
wiring, and only fairly recently did we disconnect from a personal
relationship with food acquisition. I can say, and with some confidence,
that in becoming a hunter I was afforded an awareness of a
new community, or perhaps a forgotten community, and one that
my ancestors knew well. My friend Kurt Rinehart, who is one of
the finest naturalists I know, often says that in being a hunter he
is offered a seat at the table. I love this analogy. It is resonant on
a level that both speaks to basic human need, and to essential human
consciousness. As a hunter, in North America anyway, your
table is laid with a host of wild foods so delicate and rare that
they are, in themselves, great treasures. These foods are offered
24 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

in quantity for the cost of a hunting license and some wonderful
days spent afield. Beside you at the table are people who, like you,
see value in being outdoors, in taking responsibility for a linear
connection to the food they eat and the realities of that. There is
a shared identity at the table and a shared pride in place. There is,
at root, community. But a seat at the table offers far more lasting
value than simply a fine piece of meat, served in good company.
When I became a hunter, I attained a vested interest. My very
identity became reliant upon the nourishment of a species, the
preservation of access, the maintenance of legislation that allows
me to pick up a gun and go looking for a bird to shoot. In becoming
a hunter, I learned to be a part of a larger construct, one in
which animals rise from habitat and I, also a piece of the habitat,
aim to harvest them. In this construct, I match my skills against
a bit of nature and I witness unpredictability. I begin to notice
things I rarely noticed before; the crackle of turning leaves on
an October afternoon, the smell of prairie wheat, the glint of a
cottonwood grove. These became things synonymous with my
identity, and I began to care for and about them. When that new
office building threatened my pet woodcock covert, I took notice.
When an unknown blight did in my precious quail, I threw some
money towards land stewardship and avian research. I became a
part of a community that hinged on my involvement and investment.
Without my care, that community would suffer an incremental
blow.
In short, hunting connects me, in a visceral way, to something
of value. That something is a layer cake of resources, natural and
otherwise, that I suddenly see as a part of my personal geography.
As a hunter, I begin to rely on those resources to provide me with
a sense of place, a sense of self and a sense of belonging. Within
said community I am a member alongside the game and the cover
and the greater ecosystem. I truly become a citizen of what Leopold
called a land-community. As a citizen I am a stakeholder, one
with both rights and obligations.
I firmly believe that in hunting I cannot help but learn to become
a better steward of the land and the critters that exist upon
it. As a hunter, I am reminded that we humans are but one species
of those critters, albeit with a bit more firepower and footprint
than most others. As a hunter I am out with my feet on
the ground, gaining intimacy with the land community in a way
I otherwise could not. I become, as poet Marge Piercy once described,
“a native of that element.” I revisit this land community
with a hunter’s eyes and an acute awareness that the experience I
seek hinges on the health of that community. I pull my seat up
to the table, and I care deeply about who is in attendance, and
what is being served. In the absence of this intimacy, conservation
becomes something remote and academic. In the presence of this
intimacy, with blood beneath my fingernails and mud on my pant
cuffs, it becomes something well worth fighting for.
Reid is a writer, hunter and angler living with his wife and daughters
in southern Vermont. By day he works for the Orvis Company
where he serves as endorsed operations manager, though he manages
to sneak in plenty of time in the uplands and wetlands around the
fringes of the workday. His first book, The Orvis Guide to Upland
Hunting, was released in September 2017.
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 25

CHAPTER NEWS
BHA CHAPTERS:
From wildlife advocacy to wedding cakes, BHA
chapter leaders spread the word far and wide
ALBERTA
With the trees already starting to
turn, we find that summer is starting to
wind down. The reluctant decision is made
to put away the angling equipment, and
start the task of preparing for the hunting
season. Extremely dry conditions are
impacting the majority of Alberta, and
with ever-present forest fire smoke moving
in every day, our chapter members made
the very best of summer. Our chapter
organized two camping weekends in the
headwaters of the Oldman River, where
cutthroat trout were caught and released,
lies were exchanged, friends made, and
laughs shared. Our advocacy efforts are
starting to yield results, with BHA being
invited to attend stakeholder meetings. It’s
gratifying to see, considering we are still
quite young as a chapter. BHA is also attending
an upcoming work session to go
over the final management plan for the
Castle Mountain plan. We hope to see our
recommendations to preserve hunting and
angling activities put in place. Conservation
projects are now on the top of the
priority list, and the chapter is starting to
plan with partner groups over the upcoming
months. We look forward to seeing the
impact our motivated members will have
on various efforts around the province. For
the hunting season, some of our members
have been fortunate enough to have drawn
tags for the prized sheep that populate our
backcountry regions. One of our members
managed to fill his trophy sheep tag
on opening day and earned himself a 30
km hike with a fully loaded pack! Once the
morning temperatures become crisper and
the deer start the yearly routine of playing
hide and seek with those who invade the
forest, we’ll be certain that fall has indeed
arrived. – Neil Keow
BRITISH COLUMBIA
The British Columbia Chapter
has had a busy summer. As a follow up
to the Wildlife Management Roundtable
we hosted in March, we encouraged numerous
other conservation organizations,
environmental groups and land base user
groups to continue this collaboration,
align our common interests and efforts
and lobby for meaningful changes to our
wildlife management system. These diverse
interest groups were able to set aside differences
and collaborate on a unified message
to government. Wildlife and the ecosystems
that support them are important and
require dedicated funding, resources and
science based decision making to create a
wildlife management plan for the region.
This plan could then be used as a template
for the province. What makes this effort so
unique and historic is that we were able to
bring together groups that often have been
at odds with each other. We have representation
from guide outfitters, trappers, BC-
BHA, environmental groups, and other
resident hunter groups. Our first course of
action with this coalition was to draft and
deliver a briefing note and summary for
our elected representatives, government
officials and First Nations explaining our
collaborative position and emphasizing the
need for wildlife management to become a
priority in our region. We are encouraged
by this collaborative effort and hope that it
is the start of a new era for wildlife in BC.
We also hosted our first Pint Night at
the Heid Out in Cranbrook on Aug. 24
for an enthusiastic crowd of about 30
backcountry enthusiasts. By the end of
the night we had six new members. We are
planning to host a Pint Night in a major
centre in each region of the province this
winter to promote and hopefully infect the
province with BHA values and bolster our
membership.
A big thank you goes out to Alan Duffy,
our new Kootenay Region chair, who
stepped up to the plate to tackle our growing
regional issues and meeting schedule,
which now allows me as provincial chair
to tour the province, host Pint Nights and
drink beer. Thank you, Al! – Bill Hanlon
CALIFORNIA
The California Chapter had a
busy summer attending events such as the
Last Chance Broadhead shoot in Petaluma,
creating a Habitat Watch program and
capping it all off with a visit from Ty and
Grant from Missoula, MT.
The Habitat Watch program is now up
and running for our state’s 17 National
Forests. We’re hoping to create a quarterly
summary to identify opportunities for
volunteerism and public comment periods
on potential projects. There are still a few
spots that need to be filled; if you are interested
in helping out please contact the
chapter at the email address below.
To highlight our summer Grant and
Ty from the Missoula office paid a visit to
California, covering ground from San Diego
to Sacramento while hosting Hike to
Hunt events and Pint Nights. It was great
to see so many members old and new looking
to get involved.
We are trying to find more ways to get
members together. Pint Nights are a great
way to get folks where members can meet
one another. If you are interested in coordinating
one please contact the chapter
at California@backcountryhunters.com.
– J.R. Young.
COLORADO
Ryan McSparran is the latest
addition to the Colorado BHA Chapter
Leadership Team (CLT), filling the chapter’s
social media coordinator position.
Thank you, Ryan! Members can send Ryan
Instagram content at ryan@peakoutfitter.
com. We encourage you to use the #coloradobha
on Instagram, in addition to the
usual hashtags like #keepitpublic.
The Colorado chapter approved its first
official group (i.e., subchapter) during
July: the Southeast Colorado BHA Group,
26 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

covering the greater Pueblo, Colorado
Springs and Woodland Park region. For
additional information contact the Southeast
CO Regional Director (RD) Ty
Woodward (woodward.tyrel@gmail.com)
or SE CO Assistant RD Ben Montgomery
(ben.montgomery.iv@gmail.com). Thank
you, Ty and Ben!
The chapter is also looking for volunteers
to form a Denver (metro area) Group
and a Southwest (Durango area) Group.
Contact chapter chair David Lien if interested:
dlien2@yahoo.com. In addition,
the chapter has Habitat Watch Volunteer
(HWV) openings. Anyone interested in
volunteering can contact HWV Program
Coordinator Don Holmstrom at donho2@comcast.net.
Colorado BHA Southwest Regional
Director Dan Parkinson is leading up the
chapter’s Bighorn Sheep Observation Volunteers
program in the San Juan Mountains.
The program is designed to help
identify possible conflicts between bighorn
and domestic sheep on grazing allotments
in the San Juans. For additional information
contact Dan at docdanp@gmail.com.
The Gunnison Public Lands Initiative
is a community-based working group initiated
by U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet. The
group is working with county commissioners,
ranchers, hunters, anglers and local
communities to create balanced public
lands legislation for Gunnison County.
Colorado BHA is represented in this effort
by Tony Prendergast (tonyp@paonia.
com) and Kevin Alexander (kalexander@
western.edu). Thanks, guys!
Colorado has two college chapters:
the Colorado State University (CSU)
and Western State Colorado University
(WSCU) Backcountry Hunters & Anglers.
Contact CSU chapter president Matt
Eischens (matteischens@hotmail.com),
and WSCU chapter president Johnathan
Kelley (johnathan.kelley@western.edu),
for additional information. – David Lien
MICHIGAN
The Michigan BHA Chapter
experienced a 600 percent membership
growth since early 2016! The chapter
partnered with outdoor lifestyle brand,
Lifestyle Lost, for a river cleanup day and
Pint Night to follow at Big Boiler Brewing
Company, with additional support from
Northern Michigan Fly Fishing Service
and Michigan Trout Addicts. The chapter
held another Pint Night, organized by
Neil Summers, at the North Pier Brewing
Company in Benton Harbor in mid-August.
Chapter members participated in the
Hike To Hunt Challenge, with an especially
active group in Howell, Michigan. On
the policy front, BHA members responded
to a call to action to submit comments
in support of keeping forest roads in the
Pigeon River Country State Forest closed
to ORVs. Of over 1,000 comments, the
Department of Natural Resources said
they were “overwhelmingly in favor or the
DNR’s proposal to keep the roads closed
to ORVs, with only one in favor of opening
them.”
As of press time, the chapter was busy
preparing for its first annual Chapter Rendezvous,
hosted by BHA board member
Bob Busch at his Buckley’s Mountainside
Canoe Livery on the Chippewa River near
Mt. Pleasant. The Rendezvous will feature
paddling, campfires, a Hike to Hunt and
seminars on wild game preparation by
chapter chair Jason Meekhof, still-hunting
public land by chapter secretary Drew
YoungeDyke, “Why You Suck at Fly Fishing”
by trout guide Alex Cerveniak and a
yet-to-be-named seminar by BHA board
member Mark Kenyon, host of the Wired
To Hunt Podcast. Mark is fresh back from
an Alaska caribou hunt with Steven Rinella,
who Michigan BHA members flocked
to see at a book signing in Battle Creek in
late August. The Rendezvous has received
tremendous support from Jay’s Sporting
Goods, HAWK, Princeton Tec, SOG
Knives & Tools, Mountain Khakis and
Bronc Box, arranged through chapter treasurer
Allen Crater. – Drew YoungeDyke
MINNESOTA
Minnesota BHA collaborated
with the Wisconsin Chapter in July to
host the first Midwest Backcountry Brewfest
in Hudson, WI. Vortex Optics, Maven
Optics other sponsors attended, as well as
David and Melinda Lien, of BHA Colorado, displayed their BHA pride on their wedding day
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 27

Idaho Backcountry Barbeque in full swing
food vendors, breweries, and musical
groups all gathered to support public
lands. Both chapters gained a bunch of
new members, and more companies are
lining up to get involved next year.
The next weekend we gathered for the
5th Annual Chapter Rendezvous at Wild
River State Park, where we grilled up
pronghorn, woodcock and venison and
shared stories of the past year while strategizing
for the future. We are stoked to
announce that our chapter membership,
which was about 100 last year at this time,
has grown to nearly 350!
We have hosted Pint Nights to boost
public land awareness and membership
in Brainerd, Walker and one in Minneapolis
where DNR Commissioner Tom
Landwehr addressed the importance of
preserving our public lands.
As the BWCA public forum came to a
close, Minnesota BHA helped Sportsmen
for the Boundary Waters generate 125,000
comments opposing the proposed sulfide-ore
copper/nickel mining project. We
will continue to stay on this issue in the
upcoming months and push for a 20 year
moratorium!
Our chapter made huge strides in
reaching new audiences this summer,
with Jamie Carlson, Dan Born and Mark
Norquist making podcast appearances and
Mercedes Akinseye distributing BHA literature
at the Game Fair, a new venue for us!
Great job, everyone!
We will be teaming with the Minnesota
DNR again for the Learn-to-Hunt
program. Our Mentorship Committee
Leader Ben Peña and other BHA members
will be hosting new adult hunters as they
try hunting for the first time at St. Croix
State Park for a special whitetail season.
Our post-season Chapter Meeting/Bonfire
will be in Northfield on Dec. 2. – Aaron
Hebeisen
NEVADA
The Nevada Chapter has been active
during the hot desert summer and has
plenty on tap for the fall. We have continued
to hold monthly Pint Nights with our
partners at IMBĪB Brewing, which have
been well-attended and fertile ground for
recruiting new activists and board members.
We’ve had Hike to Hunt events in the
Reno and Elko area where members and
friends took advantage of the opportunity
to get outside, raise some money and catch
some fish. The Elko event has had few participants
but covered some nice high alpine
and high desert terrains. Hikers have
traveled well over 230 miles and gained
a bit more than 18,850 feet in elevation.
Great scenery, and few to no people on
the trails most days have made every hike
great, often culminating with alpine lake
swims. The Reno event had approximately
a dozen participants and covered over
80 miles through group and solo outings
to Marlette Lake, Relay Peak, Mt. Rose
Peak and other areas. Some days over 60
pounds were loaded in the packs to train
for hunting season. Other days light and
fast were the objective to get to some incredible
fishing as quickly as possible.
Our chapter has dug deep to contribute
to bringing Shane Mahoney’s Wild Harvest
Campaign to Nevada. Our Department
of Wildlife has invested in becoming
a partner of the program. The hope is for
expanded public education of the benefits
of our traditions to our economy and to
wildlife conservation. We are excited about
it!
On the advocacy front, we have provided
comment on Nevada’s national monuments
under review by the Department
of the Interior and supported our state
Wildlife Commission in their review of
potential disposal lands with high wildlife
values.
We’re planning a Full Draw Film Tour
event in early December and a potential
membership meeting in the spring. Finally,
we’re staying active in trying to get our
regulations on smart rifles passed through
the Legislative Commission. –Kyle Davis
NEW ENGLAND
In May, Maine members gathered
for a backyard rendezvous and wild foods
feed at the home of Anthony Zotini in Appleton.
Board member Jenna Rozelle introduced
the group to a cornucopia of wild
plants, free for the picking. Andy Billipp
hosted a second annual rendezvous at his
farm in Connecticut where members from
Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island
attended. Member Tom Wansleben,
of MA. Fish & Wildlife, gave a detailed
presentation on scouting for whitetails
and Neal Hagstrom of CT. DEP’s Inland
Fisheries Division gave a talk about stream
access and long term fishery conservation
challenges. Local brew, pizza and a museum
show of sporting art were on the menu
in June when members met in Shelburne,
Vermont.
On the policy side, the New England
28 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

Chapter submitted comments on proposed
recreational development and wildlife
management on the Green Mountain
National Forest, and Vermont members
are forming a state team to address wildlife
habitat conservation issues. In Maine,
Jon Robbins submitted comments on
behalf of the chapter in support of an expanded
list of Maine Heritage Fish Waters
that are critical for native brook trout and
Arctic char. In a clear victory for wildlife
habitat conservation, earlier this year the
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced
approval of the Great Thicket National
Wildlife Refuge. USFWS is now authorized
to purchase land from willing sellers
in several New England states to protect
and restore habitat for the threatened New
England cottontail; these lands will be actively
managed and open to hunting for
other species. In 2016 our chapter submitted
comments in support of the refuge
proposal, which was the subject of a Backcountry
Journal article last year. Want to
get involved? Contact us at newengland@
backcountryhunters.org. – Robert Bryan
NEW MEXICO
As we wrap up our first full year,
the New Mexico Chapter can report strong
growth, a rising influence on wildlife and
habitat policy, and unbridled enthusiasm
among conservation-minded sportsmen
and women in our state.
Over the last 12 months our membership
has expanded tenfold, thanks largely
to an increased social media presence and
outreach by our board. Working with local
businesses, our Pint Night program has
gone from zero to monthly and is now expanding
to include other major cities and
joint operations with neighboring states.
Our bank account has swelled alongside
our membership and got a big boost when
we hosted the Full Draw Film Tour in Albuquerque
in July with Land Tawney as
our guest speaker. This fall the board will
conduct its first ever strategic planning session,
focusing on further growth and onthe-ground
projects.
But meetings, films and fundraising aren’t
really the point. Protecting our public
lands and hunting and fishing opportunity
is what we do. In July we helped host Interior
Secretary Ryan Zinke on tours of our
two threatened national monuments to
show him the importance of these monuments
to hunters and anglers. We also encouraged
him to open the landlocked Sabinoso
Wilderness to the public. In the last
year we have been outspoken on county
road closures and testified before the State
Game Commission on improving hunting
opportunity on public lands. Those efforts
will continue in the coming year, with the
voice of New Mexico BHA Chapter getting
stronger all the time.
In the meantime, hats off to Chairman
Jon Graham for helping us make amazing
progress this year, but he and his family
have been deployed by the Air Force to
Germany. The board elected Katie DeLorenzo
and Jarrett Babincsak as co-chairs,
and they have already started planning to
make the next 12 months even better than
the last. – Joel Gay
OREGON
The days are getting shorter, bugles
are filling the air and the fight for our
public lands is more important than ever.
That’s why Oregon BHA and our members
have continued to fight relentlessly for
the wild places we love.
The fate of the Elliott State Forest and
S.B. 847 are shining examples of how calling,
emailing, writing your representatives
and participating in the public process remain
effective tools to protect our lands.
Last month, with the help of senator Arnie
Roblan’s legislation, Gov. Kate Brown
signed a bill to avert the need to sell the
forest. Our voices were heard, but we must
stay vigilant and continue to remain involved
in this process. Oregon BHA will
continue monitoring the events surrounding
the Elliott and its future and need our
members to be ready for action at a moment’s
notice. Management of the forest
is integral to its health, and remaining an
active participant in the decision making
process is a necessity. Finding creative
ways, such as S.B 847, to protect our lands
from sale or transfer is definitely a breath
of fresh air.
Protecting access to our public lands is
a common theme recently, and that’s why
Oregon BHA has submitted comments on
the Central Cascade Wilderness Strategies
2017 Plan. Doing so has given our chapter
a seat at the table while the Deschutes
and Willamette national forests begin the
multi-year NEPA process to review the access
and management policies of five wilderness
areas though the Cascades Range.
Fighting to maintain access for hunters
and anglers in these wilderness areas is
the top priority and driving force for our
Chapter’s involvement in this process.
– Ian Isaacson
SOUTH DAKOTA
As a new chapter we were excited
to host our first big event in our state, the
after-party at the Total Archery Challenge
held at Terry Peak Ski Resort in the Black
Hills of South Dakota. Nervous about the
newness of BHA to South Dakota, we
were unsure as to what the turnout would
be. We were not only surprised but beyond
grateful at the amount of families and archers
who came to support the organization.
We were able to talk with like-minded
individuals and share equal passions for
public land and water. Everyone enjoyed
good food, live music, the raffles and - the
coolest thing - witnessing a young man
who won the Kimber rifle give it back to
us to be auctioned off to raise more money
for BHA. Selfless acts like demonstrated
by this young man inspire us to continue
to look at the bigger picture in keeping our
public lands in public hands.
We look forward to hosting an even bigger
and better TAC After Party next year,
and we want to invite you to the great state
of South Dakota and join us in the fun and
festivities.
This summer we have also partnered
with the local Forest Service office and
have started cleaning up a few trails in
Spearfish Canyon. We look forward to
volunteering much more with them in the
future by keeping our public lands clean
and user friendly.
South Dakota has been dealing with local
water issues regarding non-meandering
lakes, public access and the public water
trust. There was a special legislative session
in June that passed a bill to reopen
the main fisheries for a temporary fix-
,;however public access to these waters is
being threatened monthly with each game
commission meeting. The bill has a Sunset
clause of June 2018 and will be addressed
in a likely heated battle this upcoming legislative
session! -Ashley Kurtenbach
TEXAS
The Texas Chapter had a busy
summer with multiple events across the
state including events in Austin, Dallas,
Fort Worth, San Antonio and El Paso.
Along with Hike to Hunt and Pint Nights,
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 29

The WA Chapter volunteered with the Washington Department of Transportation with the removal of 5.5 miles of fladry fencing. The goal of the project was to remove the
temporary fencing, which was put in place during the winter to stop elk from crossing Interstate 90 near Vantage, WA, where over 20 had already been hit by vehicles.
we hosted two Full Draw Film Tour
screenings. Austin Archery Country in
Austin and Tailwaters Fly Fishing Co. in
Dallas were incredible and allowed the
Chapter to utilize their shop for the Full
Draw events. The “grand finale” of the
summer was a special Storytelling Night
with Jim Shockey at the Yeti Flagship store
in Austin. Shockey spoke to a full house:
He was entertaining, insightful and the
beer was cold.
As a chapter we will continue to build
on this momentum, so please look out for
additional events in the coming months.
We encourage you to connect with us
through our Facebook page – Texas Backcountry
Hunters & Anglers or Instagram
– @texas_bha. It’s a great time to be a
part of the Texas Chapter of BHA, and we
look forward to sharing hunting or fishing
stories with you at an event soon! – Colin
McDermott
UTAH
Utah BHA went huge again this
summer. After circling the wagons for
chapter rendezvous in July, chapter members
participated in the Total Archery
Challenge, Treasure Mountain Archery
Shoot, and marched on the state capitol
in Salt Lake City during the “This Land
Is our Land” public lands rally supported
by the outdoor recreation industry. Land
Tawney and Tim Brass were in attendance,
and chapter members carried the rally after-party
long into the evening.
Utah Chapter leadership also stayed
busy this summer. Central Region Board
Members Jason and Kait West got local
members into the Wasatch Mountains
throughout July and August as part of the
Hike to Hunt Challenge. Southern Region
Board Member Braxton McCoy was
featured in the previous issue of the Backcountry
Journal for his efforts recruiting
and trying to engage rural communities on
public land issues, and chapter Chairman
Joshua Lenart was appointed in August to
the Central Region Advisory Council to
represent sportsmen’s interests in deciding
wildlife legislation within Utah’s Division
of Wildlife Resources.
The Utah chapter is taking a break from
chapter meetings and events in September
but will return to monthly meetings beginning
in October.
The chapter is still looking to recruit
new board members and fill two open
leadership positions. If you have been an
active member during the past year and
are looking to get more involved in the
planning process, consider submitting an
application before the general elections
in January 2018. Please contact the Utah
chapter (bhautahchapter@gmail.com) if
you would like more information on how
to become a board member or how to get
more involved with the individual steering
committees. – Joshua Lenart
WASHINGTON
The Washington Chapter continued
to build capacity this summer, refining
our chapter bylaws and adding dedicated
volunteers across the state. We were involved
in a number of successful events
including a Wild Game Feed near Spokane,
Pint Nights in Twisp, Wenatchee,
Redmond and Issaquah, the Northwest
Mountain Challenge at Stevens Pass,
Full Draw Film Tour screenings, and the
Mutton Buster Archery Shoot at Red’s
Fly Shop in the Yakima Canyon. We also
hosted Land Tawney, Steven Rinella and
over 200 passionate public land owners for
Campfire Stories at the Filson headquarters
in Seattle.
Chapter Board Member Ryan Los
worked with the Washington State Department
of Transportation to organize a
volunteer field day removing fladry (wire
fencing with hanging ribbons) along five
miles of I-90 through important elk and
mule deer winter range in central Washington.
The fladry was installed to reduce
animal-vehicle collisions, and a new fence
will replace it. Wildlife crossings are also
being constructed nearby, and chapter
leaders are supporting that project. Chapter
members spoke up for continued
protections for Hanford Reach National
Monument and discussed public lands issues
with elected representatives including
Congressman Dan Newhouse.
Our chapter also worked to further outline
our conservation objectives for 2017-
2018 focusing on public lands defense,
protection of vital wilderness areas such as
the Methow Headwaters and Skagit River
watershed, promoting sustainable management
of recreation, vehicle travel and other
activities on our public lands, and informing
Washington hunters, recreationists and
outdoor advocates about conservation issues
in the Pacific Northwest relevant to
BHA’s mission and work.
Those wishing to contact the Washington
Chapter or get involved with conservation,
events, education or other volunteer
committees should contact secretary.bha.
wa@gmail.com or join our Washington
Chapter of Backcountry Hunters & Anglers
Facebook group. – Chase Gunnell
30 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

SPEECHLESS
Dreams, Nightmares
&
Wyoming Moose
BY JARED OAKLEAF
32 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017
Dusan Smetana photo

MY MOMENT OF ELATION WAS QUICKLY REPLACED BY A FEELING OF SICKNESS AND HORROR.
After 13 years of applying, I had drawn a Wyoming Shiras moose tag. However, the tag was not for the area I had
intended. With some errant keystroke I’d applied for a hunting district one number higher than that of my dream hunt.
Instead, I drew an area with limited public land and even less moose habitat. Included in that prize was the loss of
preference points and a five-year waiting period before becoming eligible to apply again. I frantically sent off a letter
to the tag review board in hopes someone in Cheyenne would take pity on me.
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 33

THE RESPONSE FROM THE WYOMING DEPARTMENT
of Fish & Game arrived the following week:
The tag review board has determined that applicant error caused
you to draw Moose Area 27. Under Wyoming State law, we cannot
grant your request as your circumstances do not meet the state’s criteria
that provides for the return of a tag and restoration of preference
points. In order to return your tag and restore your preference
points one of the following must occur: you are injured, you are
called to active duty in the military forces, or you are deceased.
I carefully considered each option. Death, of course, was out, if
for no other reason than it would mean I really would never get
to harvest a moose. I’m also not sure what good preference points
do for a dead man. I’m too old to enlist, so that was out too.
Injury was the most likely option, but self-mutilation requires a
resolve reserved for only the most questionable of intellects. I realized
that if I was going to torture myself,
it would have to be the natural torture of a
challenging hunt.
Over the course of the summer I managed
to accumulate 16 thorough scouting
days, but with little success. I was happy for
the landscape knowledge I had gained, but
my inner dialogue was now overwhelmed
with a litany of questions. Maybe I should
wait for the rut, or should I wait until the
weather brings them out of the high country
in a neighboring state? Will I be forced
to hunt with a bow during rifle season?
Worse yet, will I be forced to set down my
bow in order to punch my tag?
I was letting my hackneyed hunting script define success and,
worse yet, I was using it to suppress self-pity. I had allowed the
pressure of a once-in-a-lifetime tag to corrupt the experience.
My prepared script made its final gasps on Day 11 of a 14-day
run during archery season. Staring up the steep slopes ahead, I
recounted the miles hiked, the adversity and the rare moose encounters.
My body responded with an overdramatic sigh. I was
beat; the mountain had won. In a shameful climax of self-pity I
asked the sky, This is my once-in-a-lifetime moose hunt?
My mind began a silent yet productive self-negotiation, a
much-appreciated passenger to the quietude of a solo hunt.
The pessimist in me tapered out with some thoughts: Why was
I letting self-pity cripple my moose hunt? Likely because the distance
between my expectations and reality was rather wide and all
my attempts to close that gap had failed.
Then the optimist took over and won the negotiation: Adversity
on a hunt is merely the topo lines on the map of a great story.
Sometimes the lines stack up and the terrain to the goal seems
steep; other times those lines widen and the goal comes within
sight. I must face topography and adversity to produce a great
hunting story. In the end, antlers stand only as a tribute to that
story.
From that moment forward, the amount of adversity and adventure
governed the measure of a trophy moose – not a mathematical
formula.
34 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017
IN A SHAMEFUL
CLIMAX OF SELF-
PITY I ASKED
THE SKY, THIS IS
MY ONCE-IN-A-
LIFETIME MOOSE
HUNT?
My 14 day run was nearing the end. As my family and friends
began to pack up to return to their own lives, I was starting to
think more about my next trip than the few days left in this one.
I had noticed a strong uptick in rutting activity and in the previous
two days and had seen more bull moose then the last 28 days
of combined hunting and scouting time. It turns out that bull
moose are far more active once they shed their velvet. As my family
and friends departed, they each encouraged me to stay. That is
what I needed to grind it out to the end.
On the morning of Sept. 14, I slipped into a promising basin.
My plan was to hunt the morning then head for home. I arrived
at the basin at sun-up and let out some cow calls. I then waited
for 30 minutes before sounding a bull challenge across the basin.
I cupped my hands around my birchbark horn and let out a series
of sounds that stretch the capacity of the human vocal system:
Whoaaa! Whoaaa! Whoaaa! The calls echoed
across the slopes. I couldn’t help but feel like
I was shouting a challenge across a moose
coliseum.
The woods lit up with sound. Squirrels
did their best to imitate thousand-pound
mammals, bird songs rang as true as steam
whistles and then, off in the distance, I
heard what I believed to be antlers smacking
trees. The cornucopia of noises left me
questioning if I had actually heard a moose.
I waited, then repeated the bull calls.
Whack! A clangorous verification came
from the top of the basin. I answered back
with more calls. He countered with booming
vocalizations of his own. As the bull continued
his bellowing, he cleared the abyss of spruce and fir that
lay across the large meadow in front of me. A Shiras gladiator of
Alaskan proportions, indeed a monster.
I told myself to relax and took some calming breaths while
the paddled challenger took out his aggression on an aspen sapling.
He was behaving as if he was trying to loop behind me, so
I cupped my hands and threw some bull calls in a direction that
might place him upwind and within range. He answered but continued
his clip toward my downwind. But, at the meadow edge,
he turned 90 degrees and started advancing along the treeline in
which I was hidden. He was coming and coming fast.
I drew as the bull passed a thick clump of aspens 30 yards from
my position. He kept coming towards me at a quartering-on angle.
The angle demanded I wait to shoot until he was nearly in my
lap. I kept expecting him to realize that he had been duped and
turn to leave, but instead he maintained a collision course.
At five yards he finally veered into a broadside position. I nearly
rushed the shot, but instead gave myself a little more time to settle
the pins. I triggered the release with back tension and the string
dumped with a surprise thud. The arrow flew true.
At the shot, the bull wheeled and charged directly at me. In
hindsight, I believe he thought his antagonizer had stuck him
with an antler. An aspen sapling standing at a mere 2 yards between
him and me thwarted the charge and bumped him ever so
slightly to my left flank. I could have reached out and touched his
gray-brown flank as he charged past.
I bull called at him in a desperate attempt to slow an adrenaline
Dale Spartas photo

fueled death run. My call seemed to relax and slow his retreat. I
watched as the bull circled into the timber and walked just out
of sight.
I knew it was a direct hit, but I also knew that the animal’s will
was strong. In the meantime, I used my satellite communication
device to contact my family and ask for help. My dad readily offered
to make the three hour trip. I am lucky to be able to count
on family, and I have used them in my meat procurement predicaments
to a degree that I hope they never ask for reprisal.
At nearly the 30 minute mark, I heard the bull take what I
knew to be his final gasps. I felt relieved and at the same time
suspicious. Suspicious that such a moose had chosen to cross his
path with mine. Suspicious that maybe it had come too easy; I
had hunted only for 14 days. Most of all, I was suspicious that this
hunt unfolded in a way that defied the script of dreams.
I stood and cautiously snuck
up to the timberline where I
last had seen the bull. He lay
motionless a mere 40 yards
from where he had made his
last charge. He was indeed a
monster. I have no idea what
the hell ground shrinkage is,
but certainly that day I came
fully aware of “ground swell.”
I took some quick photos and
began to debone the animal.
Over the years I have learned
how to make quick work of an
elk, but this animal was different.
The bull had died with his
front legs underneath him and
his back legs splayed, which
added extreme resistance to
this already challenging task. I
sweated profusely in the 70-degree-plus
weather as I battled
to budge the immovable object
before me to one side. My
script always involved consuming
the meat, and I was beginning
to worry that it was all going to spoil before I could pull it
off the carcass – the final contour lines of adversity on my map
of adventure.
I forced myself to focus and go back to doing one thing at a
time. I gave up on the notion of pushing him on a side and instead
began to peel off the hide and extract exposed muscles. Eventually
I freed enough weight and resistance to use all the power I had to
land him on a side. After that, the pieces came off quickly.
At one point I pulled a hind leg off and tried to squat it up in
order to carry it to a shady location. Lifting up with my legs I
nearly fell over and lucky for me the crotch seam, not a muscle,
tore in my pants. The struggle continued as I fought to bag and
hang the anvil-sized hunk of meat. As I looked back at the remaining
pieces needing hung I became distinctly aware of the fact
that moose are several magnitudes larger than elk.
As I returned to the carcass I looked out in the meadow and,
like a beacon of hope, there was my father ambling toward me.
My spirit lifted to have help bagging and hanging the remaining
pieces.
It took us four trips to pack it all out, eight overburdened
backpack loads of flesh. Each of the heavy trips with my father
brought about an ephemeral joy and a desire to freeze time. I like
to think my father felt the same way, but based on his swearing,
I tend to think he just wanted the backpack-induced suffering to
end. As always, the last load was the antlers and skull.
The antlers on my back intermittently banged on trees as my
mind began to finally allow the story to become a reality. I had
killed a bull moose. I had killed a bull moose on public lands with
my bow. He was earned by miles on my feet and died a sporty
distance (two miles) from the nearest road. I had called him to five
yards before making a solid shot on vitals. I shared in the joys of
meatpacking with my 68-yearold
father. And how could I
forget the part of the script that
included drawing the wrong tag
and trying to give it back, the
self-pity, the reframing of my
expectations a mere 72 hours
prior. The expanse between my
expectations and reality was
again immense, but now in the
opposite direction.
As I write this I look across
my living room at the bull’s
massive skull and antlers that
hang precariously below my
woefully inadequate eight-foot
ceilings. I still cannot help but
shake my head in disbelief. I
had reduced my expectations
to a representative of the species
whose antler size was compensated
by the adventure and
effort. Instead, what I received
was one hell of a testament to
the adversity, the exhaustive effort,
the family support, the adventure,
and the 30 days of my life spent learning a new landscape
within my home state.
In this case, my map of a great story displays across a massive
set of antlers, but if you look closely, you see the immense topo
lines that comprise the paddles, some twisting and turning, others
stacked tight, all of them representing a different challenge. Writing
this story has taught me that adversity and adventure encountered
during a hunt can be only loosely represented by words but
never fully captured. The lines within the antlers tell it all and do
so in a way that renders me speechless.
Jared is a BHA life member born, raised and living in Lander,
Wyoming. He works for the Bureau of Land Management and volunteers
for several conservation organizations. He credits mule deer with
teaching him to have high fidelity to his home range.
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 35

My
CHUMS
BY DAVID ZOBY
I’VE SEEN RUBBER-BOOTED GILLNETTERS SORTING
salmon in Homer, Alaska, singing out each species as
they went. Coho, coho, red, coho…dog. And the lowly dog
salmon – as dead as all of the other salmon – is separated
from the pack, tossed roughly in a bin as if of no worth.
Fertilizer. Pet food. Food for the starving, the inconsolable,
the ones we’ve given up on. They call them dogs and old
boots, zombie-spawners and calicos. Ragged-out-old-dogheads,
they say, dismissively, with mean spiritedness. But
I am saying there is an infinite mistake is handling fish like
this – any fish, but this fish in particular – a fish who asks
nothing, but keeps his yearly promise. This abundance you
seem to marvel at is an illusion. There’s a message in the
grin of a chum salmon. I’m saying the best I ever tasted
was a dog salmon I filched out of a pod of spawners that
had run up out of the sea on a lark and ended up in a pool
where they could go no farther. I’m saying the chum saved
my life, or at least put off the inevitable.
Tim Romano photo
36 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 37

DEEPLY TROUBLED. In my wandering 30s. Shoestring budget.
However I choose to describe my state of being doesn’t begin to
capture how low I felt that summer. And it was already ending.
I booked a ticket to Alaska with an open-ended agreement to return.
I brought a backpack, the collected poems of Yeats, some
fly-fishing equipment and a truly disposable camera. I landed in
Kenai and sort of hung around the main drag, drinking beer in
the fug of a billiard hall under the eternally arcing king salmon
mount, listening to stories of seine haulers, walking down to the
public access with my hands thrust in my pockets and watching
fishermen drag their weighted flies for sockeye. The season was
on life support, the fireweed blooming, drooping under so much
rain. Immediately, I felt I had not traveled far enough.
I hitched a ride to Homer. I walked along Bishops Beach, passing
bonfires close enough to hear the songs those gathered were
playing; pausing, but never approaching. It rained for six days
and my tent wasn’t up to the challenge. I was forced to shelter in a
hostel where most of the patrons were deep in the revelry of prolonged
sunsets. There was a group of seiners who spent their time
guessing at the tides and wreaking havoc in the community area.
One of them burst into the entertainment room and switched the
channel while I and two octogenarians were just finishing “The
Candidate.” The fishermen hit the ping pong balls so hard, they
fractured the fragile shells.
On the Spit, tucked between gift shops, I discovered a water
taxi service that specialized in shuttling depressed people to remote
areas, people like me who wanted to exchange a few dollars
for thousands of acres of unknown wilderness. The company
didn’t promise happiness, but they guaranteed promptness. They
said the blueberries and watermelon berries were ripe. I booked a
trip across the bay for a few days alone at a yurt in Kachemak Bay
State Park. I was to be on the dock, at slip F6 at exactly 8:55 a.m.
“Could I possibly leave now?” I said, desperate for a change
of pace. There were hordes of people fingering ceramics, carved
whalebone, paying way too much for single-origin coffee. There
were Germans marching in the drizzle from gift shop to gift shop,
their boots thudding on the boardwalk.
“We have to have the right tides,” said the attendant.
I walked to the Safeway in the rain. I bought a sack of fried
chicken, bagels, peanut butter, some oranges and bottles of water.
I bought a growler of red ale from the brewery. All of this, I
forced into the gaping mouth of my backpack. I slept on Bishops
Beach under the wild sweeps of headlights as teenagers drove their
rotting trucks out onto the wet sand and did donuts. Somewhere
along the way I left the poetry near a payphone.
The captain – and here I use that word lightly – taxied me to
my drop off, timing the tide imperfectly. His warning about bears
seemed rehearsed. His timing was off. He told me the stream only
held a few old chums, and maybe some confused char. He said at
least I had good weather. He threw the engines in reverse, churning
up shellfish and gravel in the props, wished me luck, and ordered
me to hop off via a truncated ladder. I waded ashore with
my heavy load, glancing back once to see the water taxi already
well underway. I found the yurt – a tan colored tent reinforced
with wood staves – tucked into the spruce maybe 30 yards from a
stream. It featured a door, a tiny woodstove and two thoroughly
sagging cots. I discovered a fire ring and cooking grate on 100
yards from the yurt. Fissures of faded toilet paper, wisps of purple
monofilament, and flakes of foil were the only signs of human activity.
There were so many bear tracks that I immediately walked
500 yards down the beachfront and tossed the eight-piece fried
chicken dinner, sack and all, into the sea.
I was suddenly alone in a way I had never been before. There
were brooding glaciers to the west, great whale-like figures that
seemed nailed to the heavens. There was the irritated ocean with
its birds. To the east, I could not see Homer, or even a skiff out on
the water. The stream boiled with pink salmon. The riffles were so
clear I could see the their yellow eyes, their individual markings,
38 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

ghastly scars where seals had nearly cashed them out. I counted
seven juvenile eagles – brown and sort of wet-looking – in a dead
tree. Bloated on fish, they were too stuffed to chortle or even fly
away when I approached snapping like mad with my 10 dollar
camera, wasting all of my film. There were ravens about. I could
hear them grokking somewhere back in the maze of dripping
trees. I had achieved what I had set out to, and my first thought
was to build a roaring fire and signal for rescue.
Alas, there was nothing to do but fish. My whole life I had
longed for a place where one could only fish and, having found it,
I grew sullen and disappointed. I wandered down to the stream
and began walking the banks. Startling at my shadow, hundreds
of pinks surged forward, and their stampede frightened the salmon
just upstream, setting off a chain reaction of surges, tripping
forward, far out of sight, around the bend. I ducked under the
thick underbrush, the wet leaves shedding their accumulated
wealth down my back. I found it easier to walk along the bear
trails that jigsawed the stream bank.
I came to a flat where the stream spread out over a sandy bottom.
Giant black cottonwoods leaned over the flat, spewing clots
of wool into the air. In pools and depressions, huge chum salmon,
their broad backs rising out of the water, their green flanks barred
with deep red and purple slashes, paired and spawned, the males
snapping their grotesque choppers at other males. Char and trout
zoomed underneath the large fish, gorging themselves on salmon
eggs. Puffs of sperm clouded the water. Loose eggs rolled along in
the current like gemstones. The chums – nearly every one of them
sporting bird scars – let me get alarmingly close. I dared myself
to stoop down and touch one. I chose a particularly brutish buck
with saber teeth. I knelt beside him. When my wrist brushed him,
he exploded and shot upstream, leaving fists of sperm in his wake.
I climbed the bank and followed a bear trail upward into the
woods. The trail led to a homesteader’s cabin perched over a deep
pool where the chums gathered in the racing water. I stood on
the porch and looked in. There was a woodstove, cupboards,
Nixon-era dishes and a note pinned to a support beam. IF YOU
WANT TO STAY HERE CALL MRS. ALBRIGHT AT 907-
333-4545. The porch was in perfect view of the stream, salmon
cinema. There was a bench. Upstream, the creek branched into a
series of freshets a few inches deep. Characteristically deep-bodied,
the chums could go no further. Nor could I. So, I sat down
with a clear view of the pool and watched salmon for a few hours.
I used a plastic bead and a bare hook for a while and caught
brilliant Dolly Varden. They were just beneath the salmon. If you
could keep your hook from fouling a salmon, and you had something
like faith, you could catch a char on every other cast. These
were sea-runs, and their throats were black, their sides chrome.
They had a terrible will to fight, each one like a severe painting of
rough weather breaking toward sunshine. I caught I-don’t-knowhow-many,
their silver-blue bodies thick and powerful. Hours
went by. I felt it was time to get back to the yurt. I decided to
catch a chum for supper.
They swayed in the current, finned in the back eddies. I tied on
a simple purple streamer. There were hundreds of fish, chums and
pinks, some in better condition than others, some chums pushing
an honest 15 pounds. The bucks had monstrous, doggish heads,
with elongated teeth. These I tried to avoid, but the river had a
funny current and my fly invariably drifted to a group of bachelors
on the fringe.
At times I felt my graphite rod would buckle. Upon being
hooked, the chums raced around the pool, unwilling to vacate the
area, sending frightened char darting in all directions. They broke
the surface maybe once – more rolling than leaping – then tried to
head back to sea. It took all of my drag to stop them. I had owned
this reel for years and never touched the drag. But even the most
bedraggled dog salmon had me tuning and fussing with the drag
as if I were trying to dial up a distant radio signal: Gram Parsons
Sam Lungren photo
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 39

playing live in 1973 would be good, I thought.
A tired dog salmon would find the swift current and just lay
there, sideways, allowing the force of the river to test my leader.
Or they had a way of rubbing the leader upon rocks which,
at times, seemed to indicate intelligence. It took time to weed
through the spawned-out chums and finally catch a relative newcomer.
I caught a six-pound buck that was so bright I thought
he was a coho. After inspecting him closely, I detected the faint
bars just beginning to emerge on his flanks. I recognized his deep
shape, his far-gone stare, his doggish head. I struck him on the
noggin, bled him quickly, and headed downstream carrying him
by the tail.
It had been a half-day since I had eaten a real meal. I gathered
scraps of driftwood and built a fire in the pit. I sliced the orange
into halves and squeezed them over the meat. There were some
abandoned spices in the yurt: salt, cayenne, lemon pepper, the
usual suspects. I splayed the salmon out over the coals. I splashed
ale on the flesh for effect. It was past midnight
and the lights of Homer were emerging
in the distant haze. First, I yanked out
the cheek meat. I stood in the smoke and
mosquitoes. I looked back to the ocean
while I munched. I ate the whole fish with
my hands, licking my fingers as I went,
and tossing the clean skeleton out into the
tide when I was done. Chum, I’ll have you
know, is almost pure protein, with huge
doses of B12 and magnesium to boot, or
so I’ve been told. I could feel the power of
the fish leaking into my system, or perhaps
it was the growler of beer that I had all
but polished off. Packed full of fresh dog
meat, I felt invincible, ready to howl at the
moon or run off any bears.
The next day it rained so hard I remained
yurt bound. I sorely missed old Yeats, his poems about village
drunks and swans. There was almost nothing to read but for a
few magazines that were composed almost entirely of advertising.
I stoked the woodstove with photos of beautiful people and fast
cars, watches, log houses with elk antler chandeliers, Scottsdale,
Big Sur, Livingston. There was a ledger in the yurt where people
were encouraged to write about their experiences. Most people
wrote about bears and eagles. One family had tried gold panning
but came up with nada. They wrote about the cabin upstream
and the dog salmon gathered there. WE POPPED THE CHAM-
PANGE AT MIDNIGHT TO CELEBRATE OUR FOURTH
YEAR TOGETHER. WE LOVED OUR TRIP TO THE YURT.
WE’RE COMING BACK NEXT YEAR. But these paragraphs
and snippets were separated by huge gaps of time. Months and
years swam by with no one coming to the yurt, no one writing in
the journal.
When the rain stopped, I went back out for chums. Chum
salmon, when at sea, look like all the other salmon, silver, and
bomb-shaped. Indeed, they mix in the sea with the other breeds
and spend their time hunting candlefish, herring and other oily
morsels. But when they hit the freshwater things begin to change
at an alarming rate. I’ve heard people call them the tie-dyed fish,
40 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017
I CAUGHT A SIX-POUND
BUCK THAT WAS SO BRIGHT I
THOUGHT HE WAS A COHO.
AFTER INSPECTING HIM
CLOSELY, I DETECTED THE
FAINT BARS JUST BEGINNING
TO EMERGE ON HIS FLANKS.
I RECOGNIZED HIS DEEP
SHAPE, HIS FAR-GONE STARE,
HIS DOGGISH HEAD. I STRUCK
HIM ON THE NOGGIN, BLED
HIM QUICKLY, AND HEADED
DOWNSTREAM CARRYING HIM
BY THE TAIL.
calicos, hippy-fish, due to the purple and pink bars that seem
freshly painted on their flanks. Overnight they have messy blotches
of vibrant ink on their sides. Each fish has unique bars. No two
are the same. As they approach their moment to spawn, these
marks grow in intensity. The whole fish darkens, ripens toward
a sort of bronze or green related somehow to the color of the
stream. On the bucks, the fangs come out, the skull contorts.
Chum, more than other salmon, are likely to choose short
rivers for spawning. They spawn much more closely to estuaries
and tidal flats. Their deep chests make it impossible for them
to use thin water. Of course, they also run 3,000 miles up the
Yukon River. I know that these two statements may seem to contradict,
but if you truly knew chums, you’d be able to allow for
contradictions. Unlike other salmon, juvenile chums head for the
open sea as soon as they can free swim. Fidgety, they do not hang
around instream for a season or two. They take their chances in
the tides. The most widely distributed salmon, they are the only
Pacific salmon to have populations above the Arctic Circle. You
can catch them in Russia, Japan, Alaska,
B.C., Washington, Oregon, California
and the little, rarely visited stream where
I spent a few days alone. You can learn
all of this without giving yourself over to
mosquitoes and damp clothing. That is,
if facts are what you’re after. But if you
seek a clear-eyed glimpse at solitude, a
preview of the wine-dark seas, I’d say that
the chum salmon is a good place to start.
It was time to go back. Up at the pool I
noticed pushki plants 9 feet tall, shy chocolate
lilies growing in rock fractures, watermelon
berries pulling down plants that
crowded six feet. All of this had been here
all along, but my fixation on chums had
caused me to miss out. And why not admit
it? Even after days of being with them, I was still crazy about
chums. I’ve heard people say that chum is a derivative from the
Chinook word tzum, which means spotted. But perhaps through
a happy coincidence the other meaning applies here. They are
friends, pals, chums. Maybe we call them dogs because they are
loyal and stay by your side. Look at the way they wag in the current.
When I went down to the beach to meet the water taxi, fresh
chums were arriving at the mouth of the creek. Harbor seals
bobbed in the bay. They were unsure of my intentions, but I knew
exactly what they were up to. They were fishing for chums. The
salmon, dodging the seals, stormed the creek entrance, leaping
over a shallow sand bar as they went, showering the sea grasses
with sequins of scales and blood. The dark shapes of seals moved
with incredible speed, but even they came up empty handed on
most attempts. Birds squawked overhead and the seals rushed forward,
nearly beaching themselves on the bar. An insignificant dot
on the bay, my captain, bumped over the rough water to take me
home.
Dave is better now. He lives in Casper, Wyoming, with his two
black Labs, Rocket and Henderson.

42 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017
For theLove
OF THE HUNT

BY NATALIE ENGLAND
WHEN I WAS BORN, my grandfather came to the hospital and
brought me a balloon. On it, he wrote “My little deer hunter.” He
and Dad made sure I became one.
I tagged my first deer when I was in elementary school and grew
up with the expectation of packing Thanksgiving leftovers out to
our communal deer lease for the opening of whitetail season. I can
still remember hyperventilating myself into a tizzy the first time
I aimed crosshairs at a doe from the window
opening in our blind.
I am a proud Texan. Because the land here
is privately owned, hunters generally have to
know someone who knows someone if they
want to find a place to set up deer camp. In
my 30-plus years, this is the only hunting I’ve
known – until last fall when Dad invited me
to go with him into the Colorado backcountry.
Dad has hunted the Colorado mountains
for most of the past decade, from horseback
and base camps, so once we drew our mule
deer tags for the beginning of November we
began our march of process. Hunting in Colorado
requires a different kind of resilience,
another form of physicality. We prepared all
summer with activities like target practice, running, burpees, kettlebell
swings and yes, more burpees, plus gear planning filled six
months before we packed up his truck and camper and loaded out
of central Texas to the San Juan Mountains.
Dad told me before we left that it would take a day or so for
my eyes to adjust. I nodded my head, as if to understand, but
you can’t comprehend the magnitude until it’s sweeping before
you. The mountains emerge as God’s majestic, wondrous creation
that is both a constant reminder of his threatening strength and
comforting consistency.
On the opening morning of southwestern Colorado’s third rifle
season, Dad and I left camp on foot in the dark under a steady
downpour. Slick, pooling mud molded like clay to our boots.
Though an answered prayer to the people who cultivate land in
the San Juan Mountains, the rain only added an inconvenient
stressor to my flatland outlook. Keeping dry and accounting for
conditions emerge as controllables that now seemed out of my
control. Yet, instead of attempting to better these circumstances,
Dad and I sat to absorb them. We found a log and looked out over
the valley. We knew it was an ideal spot to look and listen as the
mountains came to life. No deer walked into our view, but we felt
their presence and so it was a good day.
Under that blanket of rain and throughout the course of the
next week filled with roaming ridge-lines and valleys, I fell in love
with the hunt, in love with hunting and in love with hunting with
my dad. Yes, I grew up hunting deer in Texas, but I don’t feel I
truly experienced the hunt until I grappled with GPS coordinates,
aching quadriceps and a backpack that carried everything I could
imagine for survival and not one thing more.
I learned this lesson and truly experienced nuance on the last
day of our hunt, in predawn cold, as I squatted at 8,300 vertical
feet for the most satisfying restroom break of my life, if not the
UNDER THAT BLANKET OF
RAIN AND THROUGHOUT
THE COURSE OF THE
NEXT WEEK FILLED WITH
ROAMING RIDGE-LINES
AND VALLEYS, I FELL IN
LOVE WITH THE HUNT, IN
LOVE WITH HUNTING AND
IN LOVE WITH HUNTING
WITH MY DAD.
most well executed. My instinct was to hold it, but the newness of
this setting indicated I should do otherwise. I hoped nobody was
watching, but then realized, who cares if they were?
Dad and I didn’t leave the Colorado mountains with a deer, its
meat, or prized antlers, but I was still satisfied. I spent a week in
the mountains, learning from my dad as we experienced together
the raw realities of nature.
The industrious, hardworking spirit of our native state fuels
my soul, and a sense of belonging grows from generations of ancestors
who traveled west from Arkansas and
Missouri, seeking opportunity and challenge.
Two centuries ago, Texas was an uncharted
beacon of promise. Wild, uncultivated, dense
and vast, the sprawling geography of the Lone
Star State called those who were bent toward
independence, willing to tackle the unknown
for the promise of what could be. However,
most of that land is private now. The journey
deep into the public lands of Colorado is
likely the closest I’ll ever get to the curiosity
and courage of our Texas bloodline.
While Texas has a lot to offer, public land
represents only a small fraction, 4 percent of
the entire state. But western states like Colorado
boast millions of public acres where we
can roam, explore and discover. It’s ours. We
all share in it – share in the joys and the responsibilities. On this
hunt, they allowed me to, if only for a few days, savor the same
sense of wonder that stimulated my family hundreds of years ago
to settle what was wild and to their west.
Natalie is a writer based in Austin, Texas. She studied journalism
at The University of Texas and has worked as a narrative craftsman
and storyteller for almost 20 years.
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 43

44 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

DO THE MATH
BY GEORGE WALLACE
A soft orange jack-o-lantern glow from the wall tent
Serves as the lighthouse
Guiding one weary hunter down from the mountain
His hands just washed in six inches of fresh snow
Four friends cook supper, do dishes, haul water
Feed stock, cover tack, and the fifth,
Having finally eaten, snuffs out the lantern
For all to see the night
Ten degrees and a million stars
Six nose bags, the smell of molasses and oats
And one sound in the galaxy
Horses and mules chewing
Steam still rises from five backs
Pack pad prints still legible as we brush and
Knead large warm muscles of shoulder and haunch
Tingling relief for freezing hands
The heat, cold, the infinite quiet
The ancient bond of men and animals
Four days steady work among companions
All converge to provide a hard to quantify peace
The next day in high dark timber
We prepared and later, for us, they carried
Eight quarters, four pieces of loin
Nested in rib platters and bagged in muslin
Now hanging, still warm but cooling, from wind-bent aspen
In 24 hours more
After the packing out of meat and hide
Camp will break and find its way
Into parcels sorted and scaled for balance then arranged
Into 10 side and five top packs – all 600 pounds assigned
To fit the needs of our tired companions
Back onto Decker, sawbuck and cable-rigged strip-down saddles
Loaded by 10 beat-up hands into a millennium blend of
Leather, canvas, rawhide and nylon panniers
And secured by a cultural mix of Latigos and Vasquos,
Double diamonds, basket hitches and then mantied
With well-used lash ropes – chased, locked and daisy-chained
All parts seasoned with rain, snow, mud, blood, saddle soap, sweat
And lots of miles
Two days of preparation, a day of travel and now
A like amount of drying, washing, cleaning, folding
Then five families and 15 hours of cutting, grinding, mixing
Ah, the tasting and tailoring of sausage, the weighing and wrapping
Two dogs, three coyotes, four raptors, two guilds of ravens
Wait their turns nearby for butchers to recycle what’s left
Still-sore horses and mules resting and rolling in corral dust
They all know, and in our dreams and memories so do we
That a half-second trigger pull is tucked in there somewhere
A necessary but insufficient part of the story
When you do the math
George farms north of Fort Collins, is a professor emeritus of CSU’s Warner
College of Natural Resources and is a BHA member who writes and
speaks about public lands. He looks forward to having three generations,
including a grandson with his first elk tag, in backcountry camp this year.
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 45

46 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 47

SWEAT
Equity
By Mark Hurst
WE DIDN’T GIVE HIM A NAME. We
didn’t call him old crab-claw or spike or lefty
or any other nonsense. We just hunted him
hard for four seasons in a way we could feel
good about when it was all said and done.
No special privileges, no advantages, just
honest sweat and a little blood and a lot of
hard work in the wildest country we could
find.
Every day was the same. Wake up at 3
a.m., drive an hour in the dark to the George
Washington National Forest, park the Jeep,
don the packs, then climb for two hours. A
long, cold vigil on the stand and then a long,
cold descent through moonlit darkness, listening
to the blood pounding in our ears all the way down.
About once a year, he would sneak in close enough to let us
know he was still out there. One morning my daughter heard him
grunt somewhere off to the south. Then not another peep. A cold
wind rose up out of nowhere to drown out each new syllable, then
a year of deafening silence.
Another season, he cruised by my son on the tail of an estrus
doe. The dense Virginia undergrowth was so thick that only a few
brief glimpses of tan-yellow hide and bone-white horn betrayed
him above the sound of Caleb’s own beating heart, the waxy laurel
dancing in the rifle scope and a dark, shadowy outline slipping
through the tangled green hell.
Every season was like that. Hours upon hours of uninterrupted
ABOUT ONCE A
YEAR, HE WOULD
SNEAK IN CLOSE
ENOUGH TO LET
US KNOW HE
WAS STILL OUT
THERE.
boredom and a brutal, punishing slog on either
end, always or nearly always for nothing,
not an ear flickering in the brush, not a tail
twitching in the timber, not a flash of horn,
not a doe or a fawn and surely not a buck. Just
mornings and evenings and whole seasons of
endless nothing.
This could be because, not too far from
where I was standing, just about any deer that
dared to step across the invisible boundary
onto neighboring private land was fair game
just about any time of the year. As one senior
game management official recently described
it, between the damage pemits and virtually
unlimited bonus tags, private land hunters
could legally shoot more than 350 does a year, all with little or no
regard to the impact that might have on the neighboring public
land herd.
I’ve hunted the alpine in Colorado, ruined my feet on the impossibly
vertical ridges of the Frank Church, soaked in the cold,
wet, hypothermic gray of Kodiak Island and the Brooks Range.
It’s true, they’re all harder and they’re all far more likely to kill you.
But there’s always the promise of game there too.
These days though, not so much on the national forests of
Virginia. Twenty consecutive years of liberal bag limits and ever-lengthening
seasons have cut the public land herd in half and
pushed 70,000 hunters out of the woods for good.
48 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

Merv Webb photos
Around noon, a shaggy black shadow
materialized out of the brush somewhere
behind me and drifted across a
log before it froze like a statue, lingering
an eternity for reasons I still can’t
explain. Two hundred and fifty pounds
maybe. The license to kill the bruin was
stuffed in the pack hanging on a hook
just below my gun.
The truth is, I thought about it –
painted the crosshairs across his broad
black shoulder and watched him magnified
through that narrow little tube for a
very long time.
But no matter how hard I tried, some
part of me knew that I wasn’t there for
him. That part of me wouldn’t let my
finger pull the trigger. A few seconds
more and the bear made the decision for me. No rush. He just
turned and walked away, due north, out of my life forever.
Caleb came home from college a few days later, the weekend
before Thanksgiving. We had just this season and the next, then
he was off to the Navy. It’s hard to know or even guess why he still
wanted to hunt this way. Neither of us had killed a deer in four
years, and the truth is, we’d hardly seen any. But while most folks
his age would have long since walked away – and most already had
– he’d only grown the stronger from it, only more determined.
Usually, sometime after we made the
crest of a ridge, we’d pause to catch our
breath and I’d say something to bleed off
a little tension. Something like, “OK,
next week, I’ll go get the golf cart, drive
you out to the blind and we’ll set up on
the food plot and wait for a shooter…”
He’d just shake his head and stare off
into the timber, laughing a little bit between
breaths and wondering, I suppose,
how a hunt like that could ever have become
the new gold standard in the land
of Daniel Boone.
About a week after the bear came
through, and four hours into yet another
fruitless morning on the stand,
it dawned on me that somehow, somewhere
along the way, failure had become too easy to live with.
I wasn’t getting any younger and this surely wasn’t getting any
easier. And maybe, just maybe, since I was going to all this trouble
anyway – packing a 12-pound stand three miles up the side of a
mountain – that maybe, just maybe, I might ought to show a little
more enthusiasm.
So I climbed down from the tree and eased over to a trail camera
I’d hung nearby. For the first time that year, I found him captured
there in all his digital glory, frozen in time on that little
screen in my cold, gloved hand. Head down, he’d been traveling
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 49

on a beeline toward some obscure destination planted firmly in
the forefront of his little deer mind.
But something about the angle didn’t quite suit me, so I pulled
the little camera off the tree and moved it back a touch. Just as
I finished hanging it in its new home, I heard movement in a
thicket above me. When I looked up, I couldn’t believe my eyes.
Five seasons completely devoted to that one deer. Countless miles
and buckets of sweat and now there he was, alive and breathing
and staring back at me through the maple and laurel. Those same
regal antlers, that same Roman nose, that unmistakable gravitas
that always seemed to surround him. But also now, the clear signs
of age that never end well for a deer like that in a place like this.
The leaves rustled a little when I picked up the gun, but still
he didn’t move. I raised the rifle without much hope that I could
ever thread a bullet through all that mess, but honestly I didn’t
plan to try. I wanted Caleb to kill this deer. I watched through the
glass and thought about all the life that was wrapped up in that
moment for both of us, some part of me living in the deer, some
part of him living in me.
I felt the years of frustration and futility and the nagging fear
that even now, a couple of spindly limbs might still separate me
from feeling the weight of all that meat on my back and sharing
everything that would mean with my own flesh and blood son.
But then a tiny window arose from the chaos, the slightest
crease in space and time and laurel, the gauntlet of all those challenges
that forever stood between us.
I still wish Caleb had killed that deer instead of me. But in the
evening, we shared the load together and poured out our sweat
under a cold November moon in the gathering darkness along the
roof of the Appalachian Highlands. We knew that we could never
have asked for anything more.
I may never hunt a wiser deer, and I probably won’t kill another.
Some part of me doesn’t care. That part, the same part that
stayed my finger when faced with the bear, knows I come for the
sweat and the blood as much as anything. I come for the simple
freedom to walk where I choose to walk and to hunt how I chose
to hunt. Anything other than that is nothing I care to know.
Mark is a new member of the Capital Region Chapter of BHA. He
settled close to home in Harrisonburg, Virginia, after a long career in
the Navy, only to find that Virginia’s public land deer herd had been
cut in half. Now he’s trying to do something about it.
50 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 51

52 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL SPRING FALL 2017 2017

FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 53

A Conversation With
REMI WARREN
Hunting guide, outfitter, television host and outdoor
writer, Remi Warren has hunted around the world and
collected vast experience. We chatted with Remi to get
his take on public lands, hunting media and
careers in the outdoors.
BY RYAN HUGHES AND SAM LUNGREN
BHA: What drove you to pursue a career in hunting?
REMI: For me, hunting wasn’t just something I liked. It was
something I was completely obsessed with. It was all I thought
about. It was all I cared about. It was all I read about or did. I was
very singularly focused, and I couldn’t see myself doing anything
else. Even when I was in high school all I cared about was hunting
and I decided it was what I want to do, so I got into guiding pretty
much right out of high school. I still went to college for spring
and summer semesters but I’d take the fall off to guide in Montana
and other places as well. I loved it so much that I thought it
didn’t even feel like work. It’s just what I love to do.
How did you start filming hunts and get involved with TV?
I’ve always been into filming. I watched outdoor television
growing up. It was a rare thing, but I’d watch outdoor shows on
the weekends – DVDs, videos. Then when I was 15 years old I
got a cheap video camera, and I filmed everything I could. I’d film
myself scouting all the time. I filmed myself, my friends and my
family out hunting. I was just always into it. During high school
I started taking college classes early, and I took a film production
class. I thought that it’d be cool to take those classes and use them
to film hunting videos.When I was going to college I saved up my
money and bought a camera and just started filming everything.
I figured I’d use it for guiding and outfitting videos, but I didn’t
really have an actual plan – I just loved to video and loved pho-
54 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

tography. It was something that I enjoyed doing, so I just took the
gear along with me anyways. I always had it with me whether I
was guiding, hunting on my own, or hunting with friend.
How did your videos develop
into you becoming a public figure
in the hunting world?
It was something I was doing
anyways. I ended up having a ton of
content. That’s when I got hooked
up with Tim Burnett of Solohunters.
He started this new show
and needed content. I happened
to see something somewhere. He
also happened to live near me. I
brought over all my videos and he
was like, “Holy smokes, this stuff is
pretty good!”
I felt really fortunate to be able
to go hunting almost year-round.
Most years when I was out hunting
and guiding, I’d have 120 consecutive
days in the field. If I was
able to do this every day and learn
so much so fast, it was my obligation
to share what I learned. I realized that I probably stacked up
more experience than a lot of people get the opportunity to in
their lives. I could share the experience with guys who may not
be able to go out that much but really want to make the most
out of the time that they have. It’s the coolest thing for me when
someone says that they’ve learned something or that they were
inspired to do a certain trip. To be honest, a lot of the things I did
were inspired by other people. I always had hunting magazines.
I watched hunting videos – any hunting video I could get my
hands on. One of my dreams was to go to Africa because I’d read
Death in the Long Grass so many times. All these influences really
shaped my desire for adventure. I picked up bow hunting because
of things I saw on TV and in magazines. I didn’t even know a single
bow hunter until I was probably 21 years old. Everything was
taught in a book, read in a magazine, or watched in a video. I was
really inspired by those things, and I hope to pass that on and do
the same for someone else.
Do you have any commentary on issues within the outdoor
media?
One of my main critiques is that some people do not show the
respect that is needed. I believe that hunters love the animals that
we are chasing because without them we wouldn’t be doing what
we are doing. When I see someone not showing respect to the
animal and respect to the way of life, I think that’s a big slap in
the face. I think the majority of hunters care about those things. I
think a lot of hunters care about keeping the places that they hunt
huntable – good habitat, conservation, keeping land public. They
care about the meat that they take home and the time that they
had with their friends and family. Anything that does not show
those characteristics of hunting just puts a sour taste in my mouth.
And it does the same to people who may not hunt. Hunting ethics
have always been self regulated. Look at the turn of the century
FOR ME IT’S MORE OF A
WHERE THAN A WHAT.
I LIKE HUNTING IN THE
MOUNTAINS AND I LIKE
BACKCOUNTRY AREAS. IT
WOULDN’T REALLY MATTER
WHAT I’M HUNTING, BUT
THE TYPE OF PLACE THAT
I’M HUNTING. ANYTHING
THAT HAS A LOT OF
ADVENTURE, REMOVED
FROM PEOPLE AND
CIVILIZATION.
when animals started to disappear from the landscape. It was the
hunters who put them back and started conservation efforts. And
it was also hunters who created what we consider fair chase ethics.
How do you handle yourself as
a hunter? What does it mean to be
a hunter? How do you decide what
is OK and what’s not OK beyond
the law? Now that someone can
produce anything that they want
and post it for the public to see, I
think we need a new awakening of
what ethics are and what it means
to be a hunter. Anything that does
not show respect to the animal and
the landscape is not okay.
What is your involvement with
conservation and BHA?
Growing up in Nevada, I’m used
to having access whereever I want
and hunting public land. There’s no
other state that has as much public
land as Nevada, at least in the
Lower 48. It’s 80 percent public.
We don’t know what a trespassing
sign is. And as a guide, a lot of my clients were thirsty to hunt
some public land. In Nevada, growing up not being told you can’t
go somewhere is really important to me. It’s how I live. And I
think it is very important to keep those places public. A lot of
what protects these lands happens at a governmental level, and an
individual might not have the ability to fight those things, but as
a collective organization we can really protect what we hold dear.
If you had to only hunt one species for the rest of your life,
what would it be?
I really enjoy archery hunting mule deer. But I also enjoy calling
for elk and elk hunting. For me it’s more of a where than
a what. I like hunting in the mountains and I like backcountry
areas. It wouldn’t really matter what I’m hunting, but the type of
place that I’m hunting. Anything that has a lot of adventure, removed
from people and civilization. It’s all about the place for me.
What is your spirit animal?
Definitely a wolf.
Now make your best wolf sound, Remi.
(Remi howls.)
What advice can you offer to people who want to pursue a
career outdoors?
The main thing is to just do it. You have to just do it, and not
give yourself options to do something else. I’ve heard people say
they want to, but they are going to do something else until it
works out. If you make it your only option, then you’re going to
figure it out. That’s always been my approach – if there’s something
I want to do, I just start doing it, and I’ll figure it out along
the way.
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 55

INSTRUCTIONAL
EAGLE EYES
BY JACK BALLARD
EVERY HUNTER WITH A SMIDGEN OF EXPERIENCE has
tasted it. From cottontail chasers to safari-goers, the chagrin of
having an animal that should have been spotted bolt to safety is a
more regular occurrence than most care to remember. Inattention
is sometimes the culprit. At other times, it’s simply a failure to
correctly interpret the visual cues that could have betrayed the
animal’s presence.
My father had an exceptional eye for spotting mule deer, a favorite
quarry he had hunted and observed on our family’s western
Montana ranch for decades. On one occasion he slammed the
pickup to a halt on the way to mend the barbwire fence on a back
pasture. He’d spied a mule deer buck bedded in the brush on a
slope on the opposite side of a deep ravine. Even after offering my
two brothers and me a detailed description of the animal’s whereabouts,
I didn’t really spot the pale-faced old stag until I peered
FAMILIAR FACES
1
Dad’s incredible ability to spot mule
deer certainly benefitted from his better
than average eyesight. But his everyday
experience with the odocoileus
hemionus species, observing them on a
year-round basis in a plethora of situations
and variety of habitats (he hunted them in the mountains of
southwestern Montana as well as on the ranch), allowed him to
easily discern them from the landscape.
In runners’ circles, a seemingly inane but insightful maxim
at it through the glass of a worn 6x Weaver scope atop dad’s cherished
Model 70 Winchester .220 Swift rifle.
The experience spawned an infrequent, direct question to my
mostly austere sire. His response to his youngest son’s “how did
you see that deer?” was a cryptic, “you just have to know what to
look for.” For nearly four decades I’ve pondered his response. For
years it seemed absurd. Now I interpret it as a pithy description
of those who have truly developed “eagle eyes” for spotting game.
“What to look for” is easier stated than described, but here are
some of the things the raptor-eyed among us look for, whether
they can verbalize it or not.
Jack has written hundreds of articles on hunting, conservation and
wildlife biology. He recently completed two books, Wildlife Photography
and Large Mammals of the Rocky Mountains, which will be
published by Rowman & Littlefield later this year.
states “to run faster you have to run faster.” It underscores the
idea that if your goal is to hold a six minute per mile pace over a
5k, you first have to run that fast for some shorter distance. When
it comes to spotting game, we might say “the more you’ve seen
it, the easier it is to see.” This is especially true for hunters given
the opportunity to hunt novel species such as bighorn sheep or
moose. Laying eyes on the intended quarry as many times and in
as many different environments as possible beforehand will make
it easier to recognize them on the hunt.
56 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

IT STARTS WITH THE PARTS
2
We never did see the entire body of
the buck my dad spotted in the brush.
Only its aged gray face and heavy, dark
antlers were visible beneath its resting
place under a mountain mahogany.
Learning to recognize a part of an animal
is one of the visual challenges especially
pertinent to young hunters, especially those whose mentors
lead them into the hardwood forests of New England in pursuit
of whitetails or the lodgepole tangles favored by elk in the West.
More often than not, woodland game animals are first observed
as the mocha ear of a cow elk or a couple of ivory tines on the
antler of a buck.
Parts are sometimes easier to spot with a change in perspective.
When hunting elk in heavy timber I regularly drop to my knees
to look ahead in “elky” cover. On more than one occasion I’ve
spied the brown legs of wapiti, body parts indiscernible from a
standing position.
3
FLATLINE
4
5
FOCUS
An older sister once gave me a book
titled “The Outdoor Observer” for
Christmas. The author spent a chapter
or two describing the habits of several
animal species and how to spot them.
Most of his advice seemed sophomoric
COLOR IS KEY
My wife and I recently had our house
painted. The shades on a chosen sample
card all looked about the same green to
me, but Lisa agonized over “sea foam”
versus “pastel sage.” The characteristic
colors of a species are subtly different
than their surroundings, and in some
STOP AND SEE
Locomotion, even at the proverbial
snail’s pace, requires some visual monitoring
of the ground at one’s feet. A
stationary hunter, by contrast, has the
luxury of exclusively focusing on the
middle and outer portions of his or her
visual field. This not only promotes a
to a teenaged ranch kid, but I distinctly remember one nugget.
When looking for game animals in the timber, pay particular attention
to horizontal lines and shapes in a vertically-oriented universe.
That horizontal line might be the back of deer. Scrutinizing
horizontal shapes will doubtlessly lead to inspecting fallen trees
but may as easily reveal the body of an elk.
cases hues are strongly associated with gender. For example, the
body of a mature bull elk is typically lighter (more tawny than
brown) than that of a cow. The ability to recognize colors more
specific to one’s quarry than the habitat in which it exists is one of
the few ways in which human vision is superior to that of game
animals.
more deliberate scrutiny of habitat; it also aids in the detection
of motion, the primary means by which animals become aware
of hunters.
Becoming an eagle-eyed hunter isn’t all about superior distance
vision. In most cases it’s just a matter of knowing what to look
for.
FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 57

58 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 59

60 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 61

END OF THE LINE
BLACK OUT PACK OUT III
MY BINOCULAR LENSES OSCILLATED between shoeless archer
and sleeping elk. I thought of Aldo Leopold’s words about
how a hunter “ordinarily has no gallery to applaud or disapprove
of his conduct.” Perhaps that’s why I felt somewhat voyeuristic,
lying on my stomach, peeking through binoculars through sagebrush,
watching Ty’s stalk unfold from barely 200 yards away.
We’d started hiking at 3:45 a.m. The last full day of a 10-day
trip – no one was trying to slack off. Five miles lay under our belts
before the sun began to lend form to the crinkled juniper coulees
and Ponderosa-dusted buttes. Ty, Chad and I assumed sentry
posts on three sides of a bare promontory knob. After cursory
scans of the more familiar front country, all eyes turned toward
the distant drainage we’d left camp so early to explore.
Through the smokescreen sunrise, everything about the basin
just looked juicy. North-facing ponderosa stands, labyrinthine
coulees, green grass in the bottoms – a distinct rarity in this thirsty
country. It was perhaps the farthest from a road one could get in
our unit. And frankly, we’d bumped a lot of elk and mule deer
in that direction over the previous four days of blown stalks and
occasionally incautious wanderings. The basin had to be loaded.
Before the red September sun had cleared the distant peaks,
Chad picked out a bull coming over a hill into a tall, timbered
bowl. Though well over two miles distant, antlers glinted bright
and long. We were all pretty much fine with any legal bull at
this point, including the “spork horn” Chad came within a few
steps of arrowing with his recurve bow the day before. But what
hunter can resist going after a monster elk into the far reaches of
the backcountry? Well, maybe those who have experienced a truly
tough pack-out from that kind of area – but we’ll get to that later.
A route in place, we launched further into the remoteness. Right
away, we had to decide not to pursue two mature bulls wandering
an adjacent timber pocket. Across the main coulee and over the
first ridge, we bumped a bull with two cows. Then two raghorn
bulls over the next rise. We got the drop on the fourth band, but
the wind switched before we could make a second move.
Frustrated but determined, we finally circled behind the high
hill where the big bull had bedded. Ty and I waited in the shade
while Chad went to confirm what we all suspected.
We snacked and gathered ourselves in the shifting shade of a
wide ponderosa, the early afternoon sun cranking up toward the
90s. We needed a slower, more deliberate approach. A quirk of
this country provides for long-range glassing, while at the same
time hiding potentially dozens more interstitial animals. Anyway,
we didn’t want Ty to get heat stroke for a second time in a week.
We headed across the bowl and over the far ridge. Peeking over
the top, I could see a young bull lying asleep beneath a tree on the
opposing slope. Lowering the binoculars from my eyes, I noticed
Ty looking at me.“Well, you spotted it,” he said frankly.
We’d switched between rules a few times that week, from youspot-it-you-got-it,
to taking turns, to Rochambeau. But I’d gotten
inside 50 yards on a stalk the day before. Maybe I was sluggish in
the hellishly hot weather, but Ty looked hungry. “Nah man, you’re
up,” I said. He headed out almost immediately.
Half an hour of slow, intentional steps brought Ty above the
young elk’s pine sanctuary. Suddenly the bull was
on his feet and running, frantically aware that
something was amiss. Ty cow called loudly
and the elk stopped, turned and began
to walk back. A seductive mew really
grabbed the bull’s attention and briefly
brought forth the red rocket. The two
stood staring at each other for a long
moment. Then the bull took a final step,
turning to his right. Ty drew and fired in
a smooth motion. Then both he and the elk
disappeared from view.
For 15 agonizing minutes, Chad and I speculated and pulled
out our hair. Then Ty reappeared on the skyline, lowered his head
and punched a bow-clenched fist in the air.
We’d barely finished celebrating, photographing and paying our
respects over the dead elk before the reality of the situation set in.
Lengthening shadows would help, but we were still far from the
trucks with meat yet to be made. We set to work, and, four hours
later, three even parcels of boned-out flesh lay in bags draped over
juniper as the last of the sunlight dissolved.
We’d each started with four liters of water, not a drop remaining
when the butchering was through. We decided to first walk down
to a nearby lake to refill and wash off the day’s sweat and blood.
It might have looked like some pagan ritual: three men in inky
darkness wearing only boxers and headlamps, standing thighdeep
in a lake, one rhythmically pumping water into a bag held
by another. We lounged after on the cool, grassy shoreline before
heading back up the hill to put the real weight on our backs.
Just before midnight we strapped all gear, bows and thirds of
an elk to our packs and started to stumble home. With no trail,
arguments soon arose over the proper course through the maze of
coulees. Beyond tired, I eventually declared that my fellows could
follow me and my GPS or find their own route; I didn’t much care
either way. At 4 a.m. we reached the high promontory where we’d
begun the day glassing and, thankfully, the trail. We all sat down
with our 90-plus-pound packs and immediately fell asleep.
I awoke two hours later, shivering violently in my sweatdrenched
T-shirt, just as daylight began to define the eastern
horizon. Ty was still sitting upright in his backpack supported by
antlers, head back and snoring softly. Chad lay in a fetal curl next
to his load. I started talking aloud so the boys might join me in
this world. We were soon walking again, glad that the worst was
behind us but dismayed we were only halfway there.
Thirty hours after leaving them, we arrived at our vehicles. I
checked my GPS tracker: 8.82 miles from the kill site. It was 10
a.m. but a Coors Banquet never tasted so good. We got the meat
on ice, packed up tents and the camp kitchen, then embarked on
the long journey home. As I rode along in Ty’s dust cloud, the
antlers of his first bull elk strapped to his roof, I couldn’t drum up
one ounce of regret for our collective decision to kill such a large
mammal so far in the backcountry. My body’s anguish rapidly
melted into memories I’ll hold forever.
-Sam Lungren, editor
62 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017

FALL 2017 BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL | 63

64 | BACKCOUNTRY JOURNAL FALL 2017