As a non-hunter, I have no business spending extended time at a deer camp. However I have visited a few deer camps during hunting season. Very interesting. I'm interested in the hard-core camps in bare bones structures. These shacks have been cobbled together by the hunters themselves and as they settle over time will let in daylight here and there. It gets cold during hunting season, but a roaring fire easily overwhelms any cold that comes in through the cracks.
It's sad to see a hunting shack gradually get civilized. The first major concession is a generator for lights. Now a muffled roar out back disturbs the quiet. Next the hunters have the electric co-op bring in power. Once a well is drilled I cross that place off my list of deer camps I have known.
Homo sapiens were hunter gatherers for 200,000 years between the time we split off from our ape forebears and the time we settled down on the farm a mere 12,000 years ago. That's a lot of ingrained habit to sequester in a factory or behind a desk. Modern man and some women relieve pressure by dreaming of November. The culmination is a week or two in deer camp.
When an animal was killed during hunter-gatherer days, the clan gorged. If two animals were killed at the same time the clan gorged some more. This behavior is replicated in deer camps, though 90% of what is gorged on comes from town. There's a ritualized menu going back to the foundations of the camp. One night will be thick steaks, another might be a fish fry with summer's bounty out of the freezer. Crock pots full of roasts or beans make a generator excusable. Side dishes are family-size bags of chips and cookies.
When a deer is shot, it's quickly gutted, skinned and butchered and there will be a venison fry very soon after. Nuthatches and other birds take care of the offal. A wolf might stop by to gorge. The hunters grow sleepy with bellies full of meat and copious amounts of camp beer. Tales of the hunt are their bedtime stories, but it's early to bed for the hunters. They must be in their stands an hour before first light on the morrow. Even the modern hunter-gatherer has to endure some uncomfortable hours.
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ReplyDelete" Tales of the hunt are their bedtime stories, but it's early to bed for the hunters. They must be in their stands an hour before first light on the morrow. Even the modern hunter-gatherer has to endure some uncomfortable hours."
ReplyDeleteAt the 1980s-era Davidson camp in Palmville, we used to hear ”It's daylight in the swamp!” if we weren’t all up and heading out to our stands before dawn’s early light. Now, at Helms-Reynolds Camp, our cellphone alarms quietly awaken us until over the ensuing weeks, our bodies settle into the routine of up at 5:30 gone by 6:30 for dawn at 7:44. Some hunters are driven to their stands nearly a half mile away while others walk a shorter distance dependent on stand selection and wind direction.
I’ve listened to deer hunting stories all my life, all centered around northwest Minnesota, whose characters were aunts and uncles, and cousins or friends of the family. My two favorite ‘characters’ were brother-in-laws, my uncles Martin Davidson from whom I purchased our farm, born in 1900, and Clifford Palm, my mother's younger brother a WWII combat veteran, born in 1915. Though their age difference was 15-years, they frequently hunted together, and as their stories go, had fun doing it. The camaraderie that Jackie’s eldest son, John Helms, and I share during deer hunting (our age differences being similar to theirs), closely resembles Martin and Clifford's as; by and large throughout the day, humor and their enjoyment of walking the woods, despite the weather, are major ingredients.