The statistics don’t tell all about the gun deer season

After several hours sitting in the stand, I caught a small amount of movement in some thick underbrush. The shape of a deer’s hind leg came into focus. My pulse quickened and I searched the underbrush with bino’s.

A spike that I didn’t want to shoot, the brush was too thick to shoot into. I watched the young buck for 20 minutes.

The instant rush from spotting a deer quietly and slowly browsing through thick brush after hours on the stand. Glimpsing the slightest movement, shape, or color that brings a deer into focus. It’s an enjoyable part of stand sitting.

I learn a lot by watching deer like that spike instead of shooting. I had to work hard to block out thoughts of fresh tenderloin, had it been a few days later and still nothing on the pole, the thoughts of fresh tenderloin might win out. I wonder now if he survived the season. Will I see him next fall while bow hunting? Will he move even more stealthily next year if he survived? How much antler will he grow next year?

This past Sunday evening at a retirement party, notes were compared as to who got what and who didn’t. One person’s husband enjoyed his best season of his life, another’s didn’t see a deer he could shoot. A different friend ate his tag for Kansas’s archery and ate all his tags in Wisconsin. Another’s brother and nephew did very well this deer season. A good friend shot the biggest buck of his life opening day. And a nephew shot a six point last Saturday afternoon from his stand.

Then people started to ask who processes their own deer, who grinds their own burger, who makes their own sausage, what kind of sausage? The hunt consumed much of the conversation. Even the guest of honor talked a lot of hunting.

In the next week or two a lot of information will be released about the hunt. How many licenses were sold, a preliminary harvest totals, and several other categories of data pertaining to the hunt.

The old debates will start again. There aren’t as many deer as the DNR says there are. Too many antlerless tags. Too few antlerless tags. Half the people don’t register their deer without the registration stations and the old paper tags. The idea of sifting through harvest totals for each county, I would much rather talk hunting at a retirement party. What was the buck harvest total this season compared to last season? What was the antlerless harvest total for this season compared to last season? What was the total harvest, county by county, all 72 of them? The harvest total could be down for the state and up for a certain region or vice versa. But no one talked about data and reports Sunday evening. They talked about deer materializing silently out of nowhere. They talked about spotting deer from the stand. About how good it felt to have venison in the freezer. We talked about our favorite recipes for venison.

When I kill a deer, I remove the tenderloins and keep them fresh for the day that I butcher the deer. I start by slicing up some potatoes and getting them seasoned and frying in a pan with some diced onions and minced garlic. Then I put some sliced onion into another pan with some butter and start sauteing the onions while I slice a good pound or so of mushrooms. I add the mushrooms to the onions and let those sweat down.

As the potatoes and the veggies finish, I melt a good stick, maybe more, of butter in a pan and just as it starts to brown, add the tenderloin sliced into bite size pieces and gently brown those to medium rare. I serve all right out of the pans with some rolls.

It’s a tradition in our family. It dates back to when I was a kid myself. But the harvest feast is way more than a tradition. Butchering deer takes time and effort. The feast of the freshest venison we eat all year and the most enjoyable meals of venison that year nourishes more than your body. It feeds your soul and brings joy that day.

We can study the deer season from many angles. What the hunt is about is the hunting, spotting deer from the stand, and the reason we hunt in the end is the food we gather.

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