YOU’LL GET THERE, BUD.
There’s nothing quite like the first time you venture to ask for help on a Facebook hunting forum:
“Boots on the ground!”
“It’s called hunting, not shopping!”
“Best option is for you to retake your CORE!”
“Do your homework!”
Chances are, if you have had to ask questions that receive this kind of response, you didn’t have someone to teach you how to hunt. I’ve been there. Now don’t get me wrong, deep in the woods of these comment threads there are small shining beacons that read,
“PM me”
Every once in a wolf moon, some kind soul decides that the poor, hapless idiot who’s “not asking for spots but if someone could just tell me a place to start” deserves a chance. And he does. Because behind that desperation is a longing for a skill that can’t be understood until it is experienced. Even if he’s done his homework and gotten boots on the ground, there is nuance in the wild that we have not learned to see while living in this fake world of packaged food and heated steering wheels.
Sometimes, an old hunter is looking for a new friend or hunting partner. Other times, someone wants to validate his own feelings of superiority by passing down information to the less-fortunate. Still other times, and arguably and hopefully most frequently, a spirit of charity overtakes a skilled hunter and he decides to impart his wisdom on the desperate soul.
In the best case scenario, these two strike out into the woods and wisdom is shared. From the signs to look for on trees and the ground to the way animals bed to protect themselves with their senses from all directions to the way one needs to walk over different terrain - myriad intricacies are shared verbally and through osmosis. It’s not that one cannot learn some things by reading them or listening to others talk about them, it’s that some information was meant to be passed down in person the way it always was.
If you feel this way and you don’t have someone to give you hunting wisdom, find someone. It takes time to find a good mentor in the same way it takes time to find a good friend; but when it works, you usually get both. So join your fish and game clubs, go to a 3D archery event, talk to anyone who seems like they might just be a good hunter and be ready to listen and observe. Hunting is hard but like any other skill, it can be learned.
And if you are a seasoned veteran of the hunt and you’ve read this far, take a chance on a new hunter. There is something special about teaching someone a skill that will change their life for the better. Like hunting, it has to be experienced to be understood.
Until next time, keep your socks dry!
