Deer Buck Quotes

Thinking like a Mountain We reached the old wolf in time to watch a fierce green fire dying in her eyes. I realized then, and have known ever since, that there was something new to me in those eyes - something known only to her and to the mountain. I was young then, and full of trigger-itch; I thought that because fewer wolves meant more deer, that no wolves would mean hunters' paradise. But after seeing the green fire die, I sensed that neither the wolf nor the mountain agreed with such a view.…I now suspect that just as a deer herd lives in mortal fear of its wolves, so does a mountain live in mortal fear of its deer. And perhaps with better cause, for while a buck pulled down by wolves can be replaced in two or three years, a range pulled down by too many deer may fail of replacement in as many decades. So also with cows. The cowman who cleans his range of wolves does not realize that he is taking over the wolf's job of trimming the herd to fit the range. He has not learned to think like a mountain. Hence we have dustbowls, and rivers washing the future into the sea.

That night, Ronan didn’t dream. After Gansey and Blue had left the Barns, he leaned against one of the front porch pillars and looked out at his fireflies winking in the chilly darkness. He was so raw and electric that it was hard to believe that he was awake. Normally it took sleep to strip him to this naked energy. But this was not a dream. This was his life, his home, his night. After a few moments, he heard the door ease open behind him and Adam joined him. Silently they looked over the dancing lights in the fields. It was not difficult to see that Adam was working intensely with his own thoughts. Words kept rising up inside Ronan and bursting before they ever escaped. He felt he’d already asked the question; he couldn’t also give the answer. Three deer appeared at the tree line, just at the edge of the porch light’s reach. One of them was the beautiful pale buck, his antlers like branches or roots. He watched them, and they watched him, and then Ronan could not stand it. “Adam?” When Adam kissed him, it was every mile per hour Ronan had ever gone over the speed limit. It was every window-down, goose-bumps-on-skin, teeth-chattering-cold night drive. It was Adam’s ribs under Ronan’s hands and Adam’s mouth on his mouth, again and again and again. It was stubble on lips and Ronan having to stop, to get his breath, to restart his heart. They were both hungry animals, but Adam had been starving for longer. Inside, they pretended they would dream, but they did not. They sprawled on the living room sofa and Adam studied the tattoo that covered Ronan’s back: all the sharp edges that hooked wondrously and fearfully into each other. “Unguibus et rostro,” Adam said. Ronan put Adam’s fingers to his mouth. He was never sleeping again.

Adults called it the nursery. Willy had the larger half, with a double bed, a good-sized basin, a cupboard with mirrored doors, a beautiful window looking down on the courtyard, the fountain, the bronze statue of a roe deer buck. My half of the room was far smaller, less luxurious. I never asked why. I didn’t care. But I also didn’t need to ask. Two years older than me, Willy was the Heir, whereas I was the Spare.

fountain, the bronze statue of a roe deer buck. My half of the room was far smaller, less luxurious. I never asked why. I didn’t care. But I also didn’t need to ask.

I now suspect that just as a deer herd lives in mortal fear of its wolves, so does a mountain live in mortal fear of its deer. And perhaps with better cause, for while a buck pulled down by wolves can be replaced in two or three years, a range pulled down by too many deer may fail for replacement in as many decades

This cook, Preacher? He's unbelievable. I had some of his venison chili when I first got to town and it almost made me pass out, it was so good." Hi slips curved in a smile. "You at venison, Marcie?" "I didn't have a relationship with the deer," she explained. "You don't have a relationship with my deer either," he pointed out. "Yeah, but I have a relationship with you--you've seen me in my underwear. And you have a relationship with the deer. If you fed him to me, it would be like you shot and fed me your friend. Or something." Ian just drained his beer and smiled at her enough to show his teeth. "I wouldn't shoot that particular buck," he admitted. "But if I had a freezer, I'd shoot his brother." "There's something off about that," she said, just as Jack placed her wine in front of her. "Wouldn't it be more logical if hunters didn't get involved with their prey? Or their families? Oh, never mind--I can't think about this before eating my meat loaf. Who knows who's in it?" -Ian and Marcie

Outsong in the Jungle [Baloo:] For the sake of him who showed One wise Frog the Jungle-Road, Keep the Law the Man-Pack make For thy blind old Baloo's sake! Clean or tainted, hot or stale, Hold it as it were the Trail, Through the day and through the night, Questing neither left nor right. For the sake of him who loves Thee beyond all else that moves, When thy Pack would make thee pain, Say: "Tabaqui sings again." When thy Pack would work thee ill, Say: "Shere Khan is yet to kill." When the knife is drawn to slay, Keep the Law and go thy way. (Root and honey, palm and spathe, Guard a cub from harm and scathe!) Wood and Water, Wind and Tree, Jungle-Favour go with thee! [Kaa:] Anger is the egg of Fear-- Only lidless eyes see clear. Cobra-poison none may leech-- Even so with Cobra-speech. Open talk shall call to thee Strength, whose mate is Courtesy. Send no lunge beyond thy length. Lend no rotten bough thy strength. Gauge thy gape with buck or goat, Lest thine eye should choke thy throat. After gorging, wouldst thou sleep ? Look thy den be hid and deep, Lest a wrong, by thee forgot, Draw thy killer to the spot. East and West and North and South, Wash thy hide and close thy mouth. (Pit and rift and blue pool-brim, Middle-Jungle follow him!) Wood and Water, Wind and Tree, Jungle-Favour go with thee! [Bagheera:] In the cage my life began; Well I know the worth of Man. By the Broken Lock that freed-- Man-cub, ware the Man-cub's breed! Scenting-dew or starlight pale, Choose no tangled tree-cat trail. Pack or council, hunt or den, Cry no truce with Jackal-Men. Feed them silence when they say: "Come with us an easy way." Feed them silence when they seek Help of thine to hurt the weak. Make no bandar's boast of skill; Hold thy peace above the kill. Let nor call nor song nor sign Turn thee from thy hunting-line. (Morning mist or twilight clear, Serve him, Wardens of the Deer!) Wood and Water, Wind and Tree, Jungle-Favour go with thee! [The Three:] On the trail that thou must tread To the threshold of our dread, Where the Flower blossoms red; Through the nights when thou shalt lie Prisoned from our Mother-sky, Hearing us, thy loves, go by; In the dawns when thou shalt wake To the toil thou canst not break, Heartsick for the Jungle's sake; Wood and Water, Wind air Tree, Wisdom, Strength, and Courtesy, Jungle-Favour go with thee!

Somehow the people who made tennis shoes knew what boys needed and wanted. They put marshmallows and coiled springs in the soles and they wove the rest out of grasses bleached and fired in the wilderness. Somewhere deep in the soft loam of the shoes the thin hard sinews of the buck deer were hidden. The people that made the shoes must have watched a lot of winds blow the trees and a lot of rivers going down to the lakes. Whatever it was, it was in the shoes, and it was summer.

In the next long minute, he felt an understanding spread deep down inside him, an understanding that he'd only felt with animals before--with poor old Hilda and the hawks he'd seen in tall bare trees and that buck deer, long ago in the woods, that spoke Ben's name and told him the world was a fine place to live, hard but fine.

I remember thinking that when it came to dating there was a thin line between becoming a trophy buck hanging out in a woman’s living room for life and being just another dead deer carcass in a ditch run over by a woman driver. Trophy bucks do not come easily, and my pride, which some girls viewed as arrogance, actually helped me stay pure.

I will believe anything about deer. Deer, in my opinion, are rats with antlers, roaches with split hooves, denizens of the dark primeval suburbs. Deer intensely suggest New Jersey. One of the densest concentrations of wild deer in the United States inhabits the part of New Jersey that, as it happens, I inhabit, too. Deer like people. They like to be near people. They like beanfields, head lettuce, and anybody’s apples. They like hibiscus, begonias, impatiens, azaleas, rhododendrons, boxwood, and wandering Jews. I once saw a buck with a big eight-point rocking-chair rack looking magnificent as he stood between two tractor-trailers in the Frito-Lay parking lot in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Deer use the sidewalks in the heart of Princeton.

window of his home on the Missouri River, and Patrick commented that his father’s writing could be compared with nature—a starkly beautiful and complex world that is richly patterned. At that moment two young whitetail bucks ambled up to a willow tree not more than fifteen feet away—a bucolic scene. Patrick moved closer to the window and suggested we watch to see what the two bucks did next. He explained that the annual whitetail rut was just beginning—a time when young males like the two before us typically sparred, instinctual behavior that was a kind of training for when they would compete for a mate. No sooner had he finished his explanation when the two deer squared off and began locking their antlers in playful combat.

Shortly after we returned from the Platte River in Nebraska, I scouted a few of our duck holes on my dad’s property. I wanted to see what kind of ducks had gathered on our land while we were gone. On this particular day, it was cool and crisp as it got close to sunset. As I sat in a deer stand waiting for nightfall, I was counting mallard ducks that flew over my head. Meanwhile, there were fox squirrels scurrying in the trees around me looking for acorns, while groups of wood ducks waited in the water for the squirrels to drop acorns. A few minutes later, fifteen wild turkeys walked in front of me. I thought to myself, Man, this is paradise. As I soaked in my surroundings, I heard the sounds of footsteps in shallow water. A majestic eight-point buck walked right in front of me. I raised my rifle and fired. The buck hit the ground. My dad was in the woods with me and heard me shoot. As we loaded up the deer, I shared the details of what I had seen with my dad. We both agreed that there is nothing better than the beauty of the outdoors. It was about as perfect a day as I’ve ever had in the woods.

Among the many people Chris met while doing charity work was Randy Cupp, who invited him and Bubba out to shoot with him come deer season. When Chris passed away, Randy made it clear to me that the offer not only still stood, but that he would love to give Bubba a chance to kill his first buck. With deer season upon us, the kids and I decided to take him up on the offer. Angel, Bubba, and I went out to his property on a beautiful morning. Setting out for the blind, I felt Chris’s presence, as if he were scouting along with us. We settled into our spots and waited. A big buck came across in front of us a short time later. It was an easy shot--except that Bubba had neglected to put his ear protection in. He scrambled to get it in, but by the time he was ready, the animal had bounded off. Deer--and opportunities--are like that. We waited some more. Another buck came out from the trees not five minutes later. And this one was not only in range, but it was bigger than the first: a thirteen pointer. Chris must have scared that thing up. “That’s the one,” said Randy as the animal pranced forward. Bubba took a shot. The deer scooted off as the gunshot echoed. My son thought he’d missed, but Randy was sure he’d hit him. At first, we didn’t see a blood trail--a bad sign, since a wounded animal generally leaves an easily spotted trail. But a few steps later, we found the body prone in the woods. Bubba had killed him with a shot to the lungs. Like father, like son. While Bubba left to dress the carcass, I went back to the blind with Angel to wait for another. She was excited that she might get a deer just like her brother. But when a buck walked within range, tears came to her eyes. “I can’t do it,” she said, putting down her gun. “It’s okay,” I told her. “I just can’t.” “Do you want me to?” I asked. She nodded. I took aim. Even though I was married to a hard-core hunter, I had never shot a deer before. I lined up the scope, walking him into the crosshairs. A slow breath, and I squeezed the trigger. The shot surprised me--just as Chris said it should. The deer fell. He was good meat; we eat what we kill, another of Chris’s golden rules. “You know, Angel, you’re going to be my hunting partner forever,” I told her later. “You’re just so calm and observant. And good luck.” We plan to do that soon. She’ll be armed with a high-powered camera, rather than a rifle.

The first time I saw your father, I’d just come home from the hunt. The forests of Calydon are thick with game, but the deer are so clever that it was the first time I’d managed to bring one down. I was so proud of what I’d done that I insisted on carrying the buck into the throne room myself and dropped it at my father’s feet before I noticed we had a guest.” She smiled at the memory. “I’ll bet Father thought you were Artemis herself,” I said. That made my mother laugh. “Not Artemis. You know how he feels about her. But he did say he mistook me for one of her huntress nymphs. That was just before he told me he had to marry me or die.” I made a face. “Father said that?” “Men say many things when they want to win a woman. Whether or not they mean what they say…” She shrugged. “Your father meant it. Poor soul, it seemed like he would die, because none of my father’s advisers thought I should marry him. Tyndareus came to Calydon as a landless exile; his brother had stolen his kingdom.” The story of Father’s early trouble and final triumph was so well known that the palace stones could tell it. “Did you come to Sparta to marry him after he won back his crown?” I asked. “Or did he have to go back to Calydon for you?” “Are you asking because you want to know, or because you want to distract me from what we need to talk about?

About the Phones Closing my car door, you always say - Watch for deer and text when you get home. I want to, I do, but I will forget. Time moves and I forget. - Look I am trying, I am, but it's not the kind of thing that trying solves. Once on the side of a highway, a cop told me about dragging a full grown buck out the windshield of a wrecked car all by himself. About the sounds it made, Like the devil learning what regret feels like. About the woman it kicked to death in the driver's seat. The phone call he had to make to her grown daughter after whose first question was, Did the deer survive? Different cop, different time, different highway. Said she keeps her phone on silent then spoke about securing the crime scene in that classroom in Blacksburg where one student shot all the others. Every single one of them had a cell phone, she said, and for hours after every single one rang and rang or vibrated across the floor in the same slow way that blood pools. No one was allowed to answer, no one, so instead the phones rang all night until batteries were empty, voicemails full of a thousand Call me when you get this so I know you're okays. Turns out time moves the way blood does. Batteries too. Runs out like a startled deer across a road. - Listen I am trying to find a way to tell you this. There are things that trying solves but this is not one of them.

What in the world happened?” Phil asked me. “Did you flip your truck?” “It’s a long story,” I said. “Let’s go duck-hunting.” We ended up having one of our best duck hunts of the season. When we returned to Phil’s house, I filled up about twenty bottles of water. My busted radiator leaked the entire way home, and I had to stop every couple of miles to fill it up with water. There was a body shop close to our house, so I pulled in there before going home. “Well, whatcha think?” I asked the mechanic. “Well, we can fix it,” he said. “I can get you a radiator.” “What’s it going to cost me?” I asked. “Well, what are you going to do with the deer?” he said. “I can get you a radiator for the deer.” About that time, the mechanic’s assistant walked up to my truck. “What are you going to do with the rack of horns?” the assistant asked me. “Hey, if you can fix my door so it will close, you can have the horns,” I told him. There’s nothing quite like good, old-fashioned redneck bartering. Unfortunately, I didn’t get off so easy with the damage to Missy’s car. In all the excitement of the day, I’d completely forgotten to tell her that I’d wrecked her car. When I got home, she told me somebody pulled in the driveway and sideswiped it. I couldn’t tell a lie. “You remember how you scolded me about forgetting to turn out the carport light?” I said. “Yeah,” she said. “Well, this is what happens when you start worrying about small things like that,” I said. A big argument ensued, but Missy took her car to the body shop, and it cost us several hundred dollars to fix it. Two days after we picked up her car, I was driving it to Phil’s house. Wouldn’t you know it? Another deer jumped in front of me in the road. I totaled Missy’s car. We had to buy her a new car, and my truck never drove the same after it was wrecked, either. I sold it for—you guessed it—a thousand bucks.

Men traveling alone develop a romantic vertigo. Bech had already fallen in love with a freckled embassy wife in Russia, a buck-toothed chanteuse in Rumania, a stolid Mongolian sculptress in Kazakhstan. In the Tretyakov Gallery he had fallen in love with a recumbent statue, and at the Moscow Ballet School with an entire roomful of girls. Entering the room, he had been struck by the aroma, tenderly acrid, of young female sweat. Sixteen and seventeen, wearing patchy practice suits, the girls were twirling so strenuously their slippers were unraveling. Demure student faces crowned the unconscious insolence of their bodies. The room was doubled in depth by a floor-to-ceiling mirror. Bech was seated on a bench at its base. Staring above his head, each girl watched herself with frowning eyes frozen, for an instant in the turn, by the imperious delay and snap of her head. Bech tried to remember the lines of Rilke that expressed it, this snap and delay: did not the drawing remain/that the dark stroke of your eyebrow/swiftly wrote on the wall of its own turning? At one point the teacher, a shapeless old Ukrainian lady with gold canines, a prima of the thirties, had arisen and cried something translated to Bech as, “No, no, the arms free, free!” And in demonstration she had executed a rapid series of pirouettes with such proud effortlessness that all the girls, standing this way and that like deer along the wall, had applauded. Bech had loved them for that. In all his loves, there was an urge to rescue—to rescue the girls from the slavery of their exertions, the statue from the cold grip of its own marble, the embassy wife from her boring and unctuous husband, the chanteuse from her nightly humiliation (she could not sing), the Mongolian from her stolid race. But the Bulgarian poetess presented herself to him as needing nothing, as being complete, poised, satisfied, achieved. He was aroused and curious and, the next day, inquired about her of the man with the vaguely contemptuous mouth of a hare—a novelist turned playwright and scenarist, who accompanied him to the Rila Monastery. “She lives to write,” the playwright said. “I do not think it is healthy.

I respect that some people need to hunt for food, but knowing and loving deer as I do, I cannot imagine any human being looking at a buck or a doe and pulling the trigger. It’s an unexpected downside of moving to the country. I had no idea that I’d be forced to wrestle with the heartbreak that consumes me when I hear gunshots in the distance. It’s times like this when I wish I wasn’t so sensitive. It’s all I can do to shake off the despair and go about my day.

The horse shot out a bolt of energy, but instead of incinerating the log, he arched it around a tree and exploded a hiding buck. Deer bits flew everywhere. I laughed and patted Diablo with approval.

Buck fever has saved many a buck’s life and can strike both experienced and new hunters.

It hadn't been a coincidence that Chase slyly mentioned marriage as bait, immediately bedded her, then dropped her for someone else. She knew from her studies that males go from one female to the next, so why had she fallen for this man? His fancy ski boat was the same as the pumped-up neck and outsized antlers of a buck deer in rut: appendages to ward off other males and attract one female after another. Yet she had fallen for the same ruse as Ma: leapfrogging sneaky fuckers. What lies had Pa told her; to what expensive restaurant had he taken her before his money gave out and he brought her home to his real territory - a swamp shack? Perhaps love is best left as a fallow field.

The blind was freezing cold and dark inside, and I was all alone and kind of scared. I unzipped the sleeping bag and wrapped it around me. Within ten minutes I was dead asleep on the floor. Dawn broke, and two and a half hours later, I finally opened my eyes. Oh, my goodness. I’ve been asleep a while. I pushed the sleeping bag off and stood up to peek out the window. Right in front of the deer stand were two deer--a doe and a small four-point buck (legal back then). My heart started beating hard in my chest. I grabbed my gun and eased the old rifle up onto the ledge. Then I squeezed the trigger and boom! The buck fell right over while the doe took off. I was so fired up. I climbed down the ladder, dragging the sleeping bag with me, and sat down by the dead buck. With no cell phone, I just sat, wrapped up in the sleeping bag, and waited for my dad. And, yes, I fell asleep again, right next to the warm body. “Son, get up.” A voice penetrated my sleepy head. I jumped up and wrestled my way out of my warm cocoon. Dad was there, and he was excited too. He’s not a big hugger, but he patted me on the back. “You got one.” I smiled up at him. “I can’t believe you just laid down beside him, though.” “Sir, I got tired and lay down and went to sleep.” “Gotcha. Well, he’s a good one,” Dad said.

Titty-Fuck If you titty-fuck a deer, will a stag blurt out, 'What the buck!'?

But no matter how tough a filming day can be, I’m grateful, and I look at it as getting paid to have dinner with my family. I am blessed. I’ve also realized, now that I’ve been blessed with a good paycheck, that I think I’m like my dad, and I really don’t care about money so much. It doesn’t make you happy. I had a great childhood, and I never even had my own bedroom. What does make you happy is doing for other people. Whether it’s taking fresh deer meat or ducks to some neighbors in need down the road or flying down to the Dominican Republic to help build an orphanage, it’s people that matter, not money. When I went to the Caribbean with Korie a while back to help build the orphanage, I came with bags full of new Hanes underwear and T-shirts. When I handed out those little packages, worth just a few bucks each, the kids literally fell to the ground, crying with happiness. They were the happiest, funniest little kids, grabbing my beard and smiling big. They have nothing, and some free underwear made them happy. It was a big wake-up call for me as I realized how much I have and how a little inconvenience like the Internet going out can ruin my day. I don’t want to live like that, like the world owes me a comfortable life and I’m not happy unless I have all the conveniences. I want to live a fulfilled life, and I want my kids to live a fulfilled life too. I want more for my kids. I want to show my kids how to have faith in Jesus, how to use the Bible as their guide to life, and when they grow up, I want my kids to change the world. I also want Jess and me to continue to learn how to love each other, and I want us to grow old together and be just like my mom and dad. My idea of happiness is being with my family in a cabin in the woods or at a campout, sitting around a campfire telling stories, roasting marshmallows, and watching the fireflies.

The poor sorry Buck Answering a fake matting call. How long will you wander, my Deer? Wander/lust right into the crosshairs.

You ate venison, Marcie?” “I didn’t have a relationship with the deer,” she explained. “You don’t have a relationship with my deer either,” he pointed out. “Yeah, but I have a relationship with you—you’ve seen me in my underwear. And you have a relationship with the deer. If you fed him to me, it would be like you shot and fed me your friend. Or something.” Ian just drained his beer and smiled at her enough to show his teeth. “I wouldn’t shoot that particular buck,” he admitted. “But if I had a freezer, I’d shoot his brother.” “There’s something off about that,” she said, just as Jack placed her wine in front of her. “Wouldn’t it be more logical if hunters didn’t get involved with their prey? Or their families? Oh, never mind—I can’t think about this before eating my meat loaf. Who knows who’s in it?” Ian

When they got back to town the hunters had returned and Mel was delighted to see no evidence of murdered wildlife in the truck beds or tied to roofs. But her elation was short-lived, because once inside the bar she learned that they had bagged two bucks, four-by-fours, both of which had already been taken to the meat processor to be butchered. “Oh,” she whined emotionally. “Who did it?” Jack looked at his feet. But he made an attempt. “I think Ricky did it.” Mel met Rick’s eyes and the boy put up two hands, palms toward her. It wasn’t him. Mel leaned against her husband and, unbelievably, started to cry. Jack shook his head, put an arm around her and led her away from the gathering, back toward the kitchen. As he did so, David was bouncing up and down on Mel’s hip, waving his arms wildly and reaching for his dad. “Melinda,” Jack said. “You knew we were going hunting. We didn’t torture the deer. We’re going to have venison.” “I hate it,” she sniveled. “I know you hate it, but it’s not a cruel thing. It’s probably more humane than the way cattle are slaughtered.” “Don’t try to make me feel better about this.” “Jesus, I wouldn’t dare,” he said. “What’s wrong with you?” “I don’t know,” she whimpered. “I’m weepy.” “No shit. Here, let me have him. He’s out of his mind.” “Sugar,” she said. “I should go nurse him.” “He’s going to be riding his bike up to the breast before long.” “He doesn’t want to give it up.” “Understandable. But you’re worn out. Maybe you should go home and go to bed.” “I don’t sleep till he sleeps. And he isn’t going to sleep until he detoxes.” “All right,” Jack said, taking his son. “Go cry or wash your face or nap or something. I’ll hang on to the wild one until he calms down a little.” He kissed her forehead. “This really isn’t like you. Not even over deer.” “By the way, you smell really bad,” she said. “Thank you, my love. You smell really good. I’ll wash this off before I smell the rest of you, how’s that?” She

Cameron,” Abby said in a whisper. “There are deer in the yard!” “Really?” he asked. “Why are you whispering? Can they hear you?” “I don’t want to scare them off. Oh, I wish you were here. There’s a baby. And a couple of deer look ready to pop. Not as ready as I look, but wild animals probably don’t get this big.” He laughed into the phone. “I told you, you’re perfect.” “If you’d been home another half hour, you’d have seen them. Cameron, there are six of them.” “Any bucks?” “Just the mamas. And one baby.” “That’s a fawn,” he said. “It looks like it’s barely born. He’s wobbling on his legs. Oh, I wish you could see him.” He

A dozen deer stood in the pasture right across the fence. The big buck held his head proud and tall, antlers gathering snow as he watched over his harem. "Isn't he majestic?" She turned around so she could keep an eyes on him longer. "Not as majestic as you look in that coat," he said. "It's a work coat, for God's sake, Finn, and that's a horrible pickup line." "Just stating facts.

were married. We hadn’t been together long enough for me to explain, or demonstrate, to her that every hunting trip is not a killing trip—and that more often than not you don’t get anything. Nope, I intended to show her that I was a predator machine. So I didn’t feel sad at all when the deer simply disappeared from view at the crack of the rifle. I am certain that it did not feel a thing. When I hiked down to it, I learned that I was still a decent shot, at least. I had aimed for a spot right between the buck’s eyes, and that’s where I had placed the bullet. It took me ten minutes of rooting around in the brush to find the three-point side of its antler, which had been separated from the rest of the skull by the 180-grain Silvertip. Before I started field dressing the deer, I sat down next to it in the brush, with my feet pointed straight down the hill and my hand holding my Buck knife resting on the buck’s gray coat. I needed to do some introspection for a second, on a deep level, to consider and ponder why and how I am able and supposed to kill deer, and on a more pragmatic level, to remember how to gut one of these things out. In my more-or-less educated opinion, it’s morally acceptable and

Beer nuts are a $1.75, but deer nut are under a buck!

The line of travel is a good guide. Bucks tend to walk in a straight line, while does tend to wander somewhat irregularly as they walk. Female deer generally walk pigeon-toed, and their tracks demonstrate an erratic line of travel. A buck’s feet, however, turn outward slightly, and this can be easily seen in the tracks.

I spook four deer, a buck and three does. This makes me consider putting in a request for reincarnation as a deer. But I’d probably get shot so they could mount my antlers on a bunny skull at some steakhouse.

The story is as important as the hunt.

Marshmallow the Outdoor Invader Cat... is not involved in this story. She is orange, has lots and lots of teeth, hangs out outside, and beats up raccoons for fun. She has also been known to jump a full-grown buck deer and mug squirrels. If she carried a wallet, it would look like the one Jules carried in Pulp Fiction.)

pointer—in this area we were all hunting together. I felt like getting jealous again, but I knew better now. That said, it was frustrating to see him having so much success while Dad and I weren’t seeing anything only a few hundred yards away from him. So, the season that had started off so well for us had really begun to stink. I was becoming discouraged and starting to lose interest. Little did I know, all of that