Who are the core hunters? This is the Family Deer Camp on a small lease they can barely afford, or those that hunt the dwindling public land. It’s the grandpa trying to teach the youth hunter that lacks the basic respect to listen. It is the Mother that was raised hunting now single and trying to make an outdoorsman out of her own son or daughter. They are not the rich elite, the privileged or sponsored, they just have that special heritage that may go back for many generation in families and friends.
For me it was what my father taught me in the hills of Arkansas and what the Medicine Man taught me in the plains of Oklahoma. I learned Alaska, and California myself, then it was an Old Man in Louisiana that I learned the family values in the old hunting camp, not long ago but gone forever, reminding me of Steven Foster’s Old Folks at Home.
There are many memories, the old ways somehow were better. Now I think about Elmer Keith’s book “Hell I was There.” You know I was there too just a little later but not much. We can’t bring back the old days but we can keep what we have without much change, perhaps we can make things great again for the core hunter.
I really don’t think the barrage of technology and hype along with the shaming of the lesser privileged or experienced will do much to make things better but it seems the trend. The worst enemy of the core hunters are themselves.
You have to go by the rules of Fair Chase, train the next generation to hunt ethically, while setting an example. Not such a tall order really but vital to the future. It’s not about trophies, or ego, or some sort of an advertised obsession; far deeper really es the human need for adventure.
You should know now human beings do not do well locked inside some sort of work cubical in a concreate jungle of a City with no real fresh air or wide open spaces. Ruark said to the effect “If a man gives up his good way of life and common values, he better first insure he has something of value to replace them.” Good words indeed, but in the tumultuous world we live in sometimes, and more than often no longer make the rare common sense required to live the good life, rich or poor.
Well, I don’t know about you, but the hunting season will be opening for me soon. It’s that way around the country, I’m ready the long hot summer was boring as usual and I’m ready for some action. It’s not about killing something, I hunt because its in the blood, while I’m sure some don’t hear the call. I don’t care about them but they want to do away with me as if it was some social war against the class A personality. Something tells me that doesn’t work. So in the end I will support the Core Hunter, teach them what I know and Pass it on.