California Coast & Ocean

Growing up poor on a ranch in the Owens Valley meant that my grandfather was expected to hunt to put meat on the table. Deer hunting was a timeworn rite of passage for a young man. Grandfather invested in a Savage 30-30 rifle, ventured to the high country behind Bishop with his friends, and shot his first buck, a dandy "five-pointer." According to Grandmother, the image of the buck's gray lifeless eyes set against the stark and sunlit gray granite outcroppings of the High Sierra did not sit well with him. He quietly cleaned the gun and put it away, never to fire another shot.

Hunting isn't for everyone, and it hardly runs in my family. Nonetheless, I developed a late-blooming love of the sport. I enjoy armed hikes through field and marsh as much as backpacking or casting a fly to rising trout. A love of the outdoors and its inhabitants steered me toward all these pastimes, hunting included, and toward the inevitable conclusion that our habitat is so widely altered, and increasingly threatened by ignorance and destruction, that only hunters and conservationists working together can save what little is left of wild nature.

When my inner Elmer Fudd prevents me from bringing home meat, I bring home the memory of a marsh coming to life at dawn, and that's equally satisfying. I hope that when my son gets a bit older I can pass these joys on to him. He inherited his father's adventurous palate, so I'll bet one day he'll join me for the supreme delight of a slightly under-roasted, thus seemingly bloody, wild duck paired with a fine bottle of Pinot Noir. Mom can join us for dessert when she reenters the dining room.

No, hunting isn't for everyone, and many would say it's for no one. Fellow conservationists or, more aptly, environmentalists, are confused when I say that I enjoy shooting and eating wildlife almost as much as I enjoy working to protect its habitats and species. Although many of my co-workers at the Coastal Conservancy collaborate with hunter-based organizations like Ducks Unlimited, it's a stretch to say that they fully accept that management and protection of nonhuman species demands harvest--that ducks, deer, or red foxes need to be shot, or in some other way killed in some wildlife reserves so as to protect their overall populations. From the other barrel, fellow hunters, whose introduction to the sport was typically familial, are even more surprised to learn that my father did not, in my tender youth, part the proverbial curtain, open the gun case, or otherwise expose me to the wonder and lore of hunting, the subject of much legend and purple prose. In fact, my father never mentioned hunting to me. If I'm rash enough to reveal this, my fellow hunters grow downright worried, as if a secret agent from the SPCA had infiltrated their ranks.

Although I began hunting when I was well into my twenties, and have lived in cities my whole adult life, I've stumbled along, caused no accidents and, thanks largely to more proficient and patient friends, managed to put a modest amount of wild game on the table. To me the sporting life is a joy and an excuse to appreciate the outdoors in solitude or with close friends. Besides, I like to think I'm doing my part for wildlife population management.