I Saw No Deer

By George Karalis

Every year, there is this matter of becoming more fully integrated into the environment in which I hunt; to understand the ebb and flow, how the whitetail responds, and especially, how the buck keeps guard.

Every year it is a matter of learning how to better identify the flow of nature, to see her currents and to learn how to wade in gently and undetected, to dissolve into her spirit and to become one with her. Passionate indeed. It is about respect and doing it right.

And the summer serves as the eve of a new season. With it there is a summer calm which replaces the intense anticipation; the anxiety of the earlier months of the year. Those months when it was yet so far away, that I would find myself in the woods with bow.

It is as if though I was adrift at sea, away from shore, away from my lover’s arms. Knowing it would be a long time and all that I could do is dream. Preparation yes, with resilience to be sure, but with the sting of knowing, that I must wait.

But now the tide has turned and the Sun’s rays strike me a bit more softly, whispering that the time is drawing near. And the stoicism is replaced with a calm determination, knowing that I will be with her yet again and soon. And with bow in hand, I will share with her the setting Sun and wait to see what she will bring to me.

And I recall one such special day.

I saw no deer on a cold, windy and snowy Christmas Eve. It had been a great season, but a challenging one and I’d hunted hard. I was getting tired of getting out there. So I just figured I’d get out there, do some scouting and maybe hunt a little.

Against a cold strong wind, with my cold weather gear I set off. Skirting a known big buck thicket, I found no tracks in or out. So I continued on to the next one, a different thicket, but it was the same story. I headed off to the ridge picking up the trail of two hunters and their dogs. I followed their path wanting to figure their impact on the deer. I judged that they had hunted the morning based on their sign.

These hunters where familiar with the terrain; they knew where to cross the ridge to hunt the break line of the thicket. They knew where to enter to cross the swamp. They knew where to cut across the thicket to where the creek bends so they could get back. They had covered my entire early season hunting grounds, deliberately and thoroughly. Not a deer track did I see.

I headed to the other swamp, on the other side of the ridge that the creek empties into, from which it forms and continues once again. The small game hunters do not go there, as it is big timber skirting the reeds, with no easy creek crossing, still no sign.

I try crossing the creek at an unfamiliar spot and my leg goes through the still fragile ice and I fall forward onto the opposite bank, the weight of my backpacked stand and sticks sending me sliding forward. I get up, dust myself off and wonder what am I doing out here?

And as I’m brushing the water off my pants, I see his tracks. Unmistakable, splayed and round in the snow, they press deep into the earth. His gate is wide. I am no longer tired.

And he is traveling again with another deer as he always does late in the season, for the last three years that I have hunted him. They break off from one another and head to the thicket, as I’ve watched them do so many times, before they come together again and bed close.

I setup at the funnel and waited, but they did not come, that night. I watched the woods grow darker and the snowy floor grow brighter as the evening slid into night. The wind blew strong and heavy as I shared the evening with them in that same thicket.

I wondered at the marvel of it. And that is enough, for me to try once more.

By George Karalis