I ran into a friend the other day who gave me crap for not posting anything for a while. I appreciated it. This used to be my favorite time of the bird season. Not as many people to contend with. Peace and beauty of a remarkably different quality. The “certain slant of light.” Snow concentrated the birds into predictable places, and they seemed to hold better. Now I just feel sorry for the birds and don’t have the heart to bother them. Big snow Januarys, along with very cold air and lots of wind make it hard to find bare ground and food. Their will to live far eclipses mine. I’m not sure if ch ..read more

“Maybe we fear that the work we depend on images to do for us — the work of immobilizing, and therefore making tolerable — will be undone if we throw the image back into the flow of time.” — T.J. Clark, The Sight of Death (8) “I think we hide, necessarily, from an understanding of what is most to be avoided in the sight of death.” — T.J. Clark, The Sight of Death (227) What is the “face of death”? We’re in a sport that makes us face death whenever we’re successful. And instead of shying away from it, discomforting as it might be, we photograph it, and most of us post the photos for others — fr ..read more

This will probably be the final post for a while about Hercules. The town hall meeting called by Hercules Silver Corp last night in Cambridge was, unexpectedly, packed (I took the photo above before everyone had arrived). Hundreds of people showed up for what was, expectedly, a PR presentation by Chris Paul, CEO, and Chris Longton, VP of Exploration. I recognized many ranchers, teachers, and other community members in the crowd, as well as journalists, representatives from Idaho Wildlife Federation, Idaho Fish & Game, and Backcountry Hunters and Anglers. Judy Boyle, the 7-term District 9 I ..read more

Some news about the Hercules Silver project on the Cecil Andrus Wildlife Management Area. First, Hercules is hosting a “town hall meeting” about its project this Wednesday evening (Dec. 13) at 7 p.m. in the Cambridge Exhibit Hall (see photo below). If you’ve hunted down there, and can make the meeting, it would be a great opportunity to ask questions or express concern for the future of that area, its wildlife inhabitants, and your rights to use public land in Idaho. Click on the picture to go to the Facebook page, and read the extensive comments from readers. Second, I’ve gotten a couple resp ..read more

I used to be an athlete a long time ago. In the summer of 1989, I watched the Boise Twilight Criterium bicycle race as men rode their bikes at lightning fast speed on laps downtown. I was smitten by the action and excitement. That same month on NBC Sports I watched Greg Lemond win the Tour De France (by just 8 seconds, over a Frenchman no less!) and decided at that exact moment that I wanted to race bicycles. Not having any money at the time, I borrowed $275 from my Mom to buy a used road bicycle, and by September of that year I entered my first race, the Bogus Basin Hillclimb, a 16-mile uphil ..read more

The two years we lived in Washington, as I’ve said here before, were not the easiest two years for us. We missed the chukar hills, empathized with our dogs’ longings for open hills of bunchgrass and sage, and just simply were unable to ignore the call to the hills. Local surrogates paled in comparison. When we returned to those hills last February, they were buried in snow. So we had to wait. Now that the snow’s here again, we’re recalling the patience required but it’s easier being here, no longer two days’ drive away. I’m busy trying to gainfully employ myself, and I’m liking the challenge a ..read more

We just got a shipment of Hells Canyon Beer Bucking Chukar t-shirts and hoodies! They’re available on the store, and will go fast. Also, we knocked $10 off the remaining stock of Chukar Culture t-shirts (they’re now $19). Get ’em for your favorite red-legged-devil chaser (even if it’s you!). We’re working on the Hells Canyon Beer hat situation, but probably won’t have those until after the New Year (sorry!). In the meantime, please order your shirts and hoodies, and imagine yourself living in this Chukar Paradise Property! Happy Holidays, everyone! Peat and Bloom appeal to Leslie for their Buc ..read more

50 miles from home, I realized that I forgot to pack my extra shells for our hunting and camping trip. I sat there for a few minutes in the passenger seat in silence and mad at myself at my unthinkable mistake and embarrassed to say anything to Bob. I wanted to run off and hide. It wasn’t totally unthinkable. It wasn’t like we forgot the shotguns or our boots this time. A couple of years ago, heading down the road for an out-of-town hunting trip we were about 45 minutes from home when I realized that both of our hunting boots were still on the boot warmers in the garage. We immediately turned ..read more

Hunted an old favorite yesterday, and I’m not hiding the location because I’m afraid it’s not long for this world. Peat and I went out for a rare solo hunt (Leslie and Bloom are nursing hurt wheels). The rationale was that the forecast was for nicer-than-normal weather with no precip, with an atmospheric river heading our way for the next week. We like to take advantage of windows. We headed out into torrential rain and wind, which I thought must be some kind of cosmic error that would soon be corrected. Instead, the rain continued for quite a while, then turned to fog so dense I couldn’t see ..read more

…I went hunting wild, After the wildest beauty in the world, Which lies not calm in eyes or braided hair, But mocks the steady running of the hour… —Wilfred Owen, from “Strange Meeting “ Hunting’s beauty lives wildly between control and chaos. What do you control? How do you deal with chaos? We have expensive, complicated electronic devices that tell us where our dogs are and track a ridiculous amount of data. They give us a sense of control. We got them because we disliked the chaos of hunting without them. I might argue they allow us to focus more on the beauty of hunting. The liminal. The ..read more