Linda K. Burch - copyright September, 2000
 

Chapter 10 - "Courtship of the Whitetail"

This mornings reheated cowboy coffee and the smell of campfire smoke drifting in the trailer window are the perfect conclusion to this third day of deer archery season.  My muscles ache, my eyes are heavy, I am exhausted, and I like it.   The archery deer opener this weekend involved miles of scouting, erecting and relocating portable tree stands, sweeping trails, forging through swamps and thickets, and replenishing two bear bait sights - all of this for the first time on our own private land.   Yet another year in my Courtship of the Whitetail.

The last two mornings, walking to my deer stand at 5:45am, were surreal. Gear ready, pack loaded and treading with thoughtfully placed footsteps up the north trail, I didnt need a flashlight even though the sunrise was still an hour away.  The setting gibbous moon in the western night sky cast a silvery glow on the forest around me, and as if walking in a dream, everything was in slow motion.  The path was silent, moist from with the heavy settling dew of morning.   The east swamp was cloaked in a ground fog that shimmered in the moonlight, the mist undulating slightly with each tiny breathe of air. This dreamscape crescendoed  for a few incredible moments as the soft ivory glow of morning illuminated my right side and the silver gray moon shine was on my left.   Soon I came to my stand.  After inching silently up the sixteen feet while hugging the huge tree to keep from falling, I cinched my safety strap and pulled my bow up on a lanyard.  Settled in with an arrow nocked, I sat awash in moon light, looking down on a sea of softly illuminated leaves.  The forest wildlife answered the dawn with their calls and soon the first feathers of yellow sunlight pierced obliquely through the trees.  A twig suddenly snapped fifty yards from me, and I readied my bow for what I knew to be approaching whitetails.  Gracefully placing each  tapered hoof in the dried swamp grasses,  a doe and her two yearlings skirted the fence line and stopped ten yards from my tree.  

In the zone now, totally focused, and my muscles tight, I started to draw my bow with the ten yard fiber optic site on center.  Hesitating, I instead relaxed and took my release off the bowsting,  deciding that I didnt want to burn my archery tag this first day of the season.  I watched the trio exit down the path I had walked earlier.  

After the morning hunt, I set up another stand much deeper in the woods for the evening.  That stand, placed on a funnel and on the north border of a swamp trail,  was more productive than I had bargained for.  As the last minute of legal shooting time expired, a group of whitetails exploded out of the brush a hundred yards in front of me, and sprinted in my direction.  In the darkness, the deer became a sea of meandering gray ghosts circling my tree as they foraged for acorns and browse.  When it got so dark I could no longer see them, I quietly began to pack my gear.  Spooked, the small herd bolted back to the north, stopping to face my direction and filling the woods with a chorus of alarmed wheeze calls and stamping hooves.  I had ill prepared my stand trail and crashed around like an elephant in a glass factory through the brush  back to my waiting ATV.  I saw many more deer over the course of the four days and passed up shots at several.

Sitting on my tree stand is one of the sublime pleasures of life.  I know, some people fidget and get bored when they dont see a deer right away in the first hour.  I can spend six hours and remain contentedly occupied with both the forest activity around me and with contemplative thinking.  A woodpecker landed two feet from my face and skittered its way down the tree.  A hawk swooped from my right peripheral vision to the left a mere six feet away, turning to observe me mid-flight and landing on a nearby branch.  Ive had birds land on the brim of my hat and squirrels scold me within arms reach.  At dusk and at dawn, the woods is a fascinating montage of reality and fantasy.  Shadows become whitetails or bears and during feeding times, animal movement can be heard everywhere but not seen.  Every sound is magnified.  You can look through the woods, scanning intently to discern each intimate detail, or you can rest your head on your tree to gaze skyward through the umbrella of trees.

My thoughts on stand are both curious and serious.  Do woodpeckers get headaches?  Why are red squirrels so spastic?  Is that the same skunk I see on every stand, or different skunks?  Why do I love being in the woods and sitting here?  Can God hear me think?  Why do I miss my family, but still want to be here alone?  Is that a shadow or a whitetail fifty yards away?  Why do millions of leaves fluttering in a gentle breeze sound just like the ocean?  Why.

The campfire that burned so fast and hot on this windy evening is now dying out as I write this.  Before hunting season is over, I will harvest a whitetail deer - all in good time.  If there is heaven on earth for me, it is being here in the forest and it is in the Courtship of the Whitetail. It requires much attention to detail, and getting to know your intended. It requires an intimate knowledge of the animal itself, and of the forest, every hill, slough, funnel and thicket.  You dont want it over with too quickly and respect for the animal and the land is essential.   It takes time, commitment,  patience and focus.  The "thrill of the kill" is greatly overrated and soon gone.  The real thrill is in the process.

Linda K. Burch, EA, CTP
President
Data-Link Accounting Services, Inc.