Idaho the Carnivore State

A friend of mine who is just starting deer hunting with his son asked me what I do with the remains of a deer or elk when I get one. I take the meat out - and whatever else is necessary to satisfy game regulations, or perhaps if there is something worthy mounting on my wall, but besides that, the creatures of the night generally clean up the rest. I gave him stories of some past hunts as illustrations, but perhaps the most recent is the best ... from my journal.

9/28, PM

I decided to climb the hill for a break after work. Near the top I looked east and saw something worth a closer look. Pulled up the binos and - a deer, bedded out in the wheat stubble, some half mile away. I decided to try. The wind wasn't really in my favor, but to go down and around, or way north and around, to get downwind, didn't seem very practical. Plus, there wasn't a whole lot of daylight left. Somehow as I closed the distance the wind didn't betray me - alternately moving this way and that - I think the periodic (wind) direction changes worked in my favor. I used scattered conifers and a few bushes to mask my approach. At a hundred or so yards I shed my rangefinder, binos, quiver, shoes, and socks. I crossed sixty yards barefoot, my one arrow knocked. About fifty yards out I made her location and adjusted my approach. She got up. Grooming herself. I adjusted my approach. I watched. I maneuvered forward. She came slightly my way as she headed toward the timber. At twenty five yards, her head went down (for a last bite before goodnight), I drew, yellow pin, and took the shot. ... thhhuuk - sound of impact. She ran off limping.

The deer appeared mortally wounded. It ran up behind a big pine tree and kind of looked like it keeled over. I retreated for my shoes and socks, remaining arrows, and other stuff. It was getting dark so I decided to pursue. I found the arrow - `pass through' - covered with dark blood. I set it in the ground where I found it. Around by the big pine the deer jumped up and ran around the hill. DANG! I followed. At the edge of the timber I saw it again - as it dove over the edge. I went south to see if it would head for the thick stuff - but no. Good - I didn't want the deer going there.

I decided to back off. The deer would probably park on the semi-open timber hillside, and die there - if I didn't further harass it. I would come back at midnight? ... or in the morning.

The arrow smelled of vegetation - a stomach shot - the deer was mobile then; midnight would be too soon. I would wait until morning.

9/29, AM

After breakfast with the fam I headed up. I found where I hit the deer, the big pine, and over to where I saw the deer last. No blood. I decided to simply cover the whole hillside by traverses, some 15 to 20 yards apart. If that didn't produce, I would go over to the thicker north side, and do the same. I was pretty sure the deer didn't go into the thick stuff south, and in fact would not be more than several hundred yards away. I started at the top, and worked back and forth on down. I elevated my consciousness ... (in God), and saw motion below me on the hillside through the trees. Magpies - several of them. I broke off my traversing to go look. Probably my deer. They were concentrated - likely on something. They flushed. As I descended I caught the smell of a dead animal - the kind of smell when other creatures have found my deer before I have - and started eating. My deer was near, but probably ruined. I did, but also kind of didn't, want to find it.

A large dark thing, sixty yards distant, caught my attention. A creature, a moose? ... no, a bear. I tried to close the distance. I knocked an arrow. I came upon my deer - eaten into, stomach first. A large bear crap next to. The bear stayed out of bow range. I broke off, returned home, traded bow for rifle, changed my underwear, and headed back.

By the time I returned to the kill, more of the deer was gone. So was the bear. Another large `loaf' of bear crap. Plenty of magpies, but magpies only. I looked and hiked all around. The wind was bad, and betrayed my approach. I'll come back this evening, from a better direction.

9/29, PM

Jared and I headed up to look for the bear, this time again with rifle. I made a fabulous shot on a coyote on the way up. Before getting to the deer kill site Jared had to break off - so I went on alone. I came to the spot, amazing. No deer. I had to look around to make sure I was at the right spot. I was. There were no bones, no fur, no blood. The giant bear craps from the morning feast earlier were gone. The area looked almost as though it had been re-constructed, vacuumed clean ... no matted earth, no drag marks. There wasn't even any smell. NOTHING!

As I climbed on out to the top of the draw to take in the sunset, it struck me, ... even the magpies were gone.

In fading light and hiking back down to my Jeep, another coyote bounded out in front of me and across the wheat stubble.

So, come to Idaho. Enjoy the scenery. Hunt, fish, hike, take pics. All day long. But as the sun gets lower in the sky, begin thinking about safe lodging. The night is for the healthy and stout of heart. And whatever you do, don't fall, or get cut, or otherwise injured, and don't get sick ... as the limp, the diseased, and the animals leaving blood trails, don't last long here ... they disappear, without a trace.