People are often surprised to learn that I am an avid
hunter. I'm not sure why. Perhaps because I am perceived as
well-educated (I would argue more like well-trained).Perhaps because I don't wear camouflage to dinner. I'm not sure.

People are usually even more surprised when they learn that
I didn't grow up hunting. My parents divorced when I was
quite young. Both my father and step-father took care of me
in their own ways, but neither one was a hunter or outdoorsman. None of my friends or their fathers hunted. In fact, in my circle of grade school friends, there was exactly one BB gun among
us. It was kept at my friend's family cabin, and the opportunity to shoot it approached nirvana for a certain 12 year-old boy.

I loved the outdoors from an early age. We were not
exactly a "camping family". As such, I will always be
grateful to the Boy Scouts of America for giving a kid with
a yearning for the outdoors the opportunity to experience
them in a way you really can't in a suburban park.

Typical kid stuff. Then, puberty hit and the relevant
obsessions changed.

Fast forward a decade and a half. I am now married, doing
my specialty training in Emergency Medicine. My wife has put grad
school on hold and is working at a title company to help
support us (I had a fancy degree at that point, but was
making less than $10/hour). My wife made fast friends with a
woman at work. In typical conspiring female fashion, they
thought they should get their significant others together,
too. If they knew what that friendship would foster, they
may have considered otherwise.

Rich and I hit it off immediately. We both appreciated a
finely crafted beer, but were not above drinking the cheap
stuff. We both loved all things automotive, and had similar
tastes in cars. Rich is quick-witted, but I'm still funnier. Just
ask me. Then, Rich offered to take me shooting. I found my
new best friend.

Rich is the kind of guy most other men want to be. He's self-confident without being cocky. He's tough when he needs to be, but isn't afraid to be gentle. He can
build/fix/fabricate most anything he puts his mind to.

You'd never mistake him for a bodybuilder, but I'm pretty sure he could hogtie a hippo
without breaking a sweat. Turns out he is a patient teacher, too.

Rich took me to a state-run gun range near his home. He
didn't realize just how inexperienced I was as a shooter. At
that point, I don't know if I had ever even shot a real gun.
He decided to start me out with his 12 gauge pump shotgun,
deer barrel affixed, shooting slugs with open sights. I
didn't do well. Rich quickly realized his mistake and set me
up with his .22 magnum with a telescopic sight. It was
soft-shooting and tack-driver accurate. I went from zero to
hero and was instantly hooked.

Rich developed a rare eye tumor in his twenties. A couple of
surgeries later, he had very little vision left in his right
eye. That's a problem for a right-handed shooter. Rich then
taught himself to shoot left-handed. Yet, all of his guns
are right handed. I can count exactly one day when I have
out-shot Rich, despite him learning to shoot with his
non-dominant hand later in life. Every other time we've been
out shooting or hunting together he makes me look like a
rank amateur.

With my residency training near complete, I knew I would be
moving out of Michigan to take a job in Wisconsin. As a
thank-you to Rich, I booked a pheasant hunt at a game farm
that spring. It wasn't exactly a dream hunt. The weather was
way too warm. Our guide was the owner's 10 year-old son,
whom had yet to complete his customer service training. Some
the birds apparently lacked anything resembling survival
instincts. Nevertheless, the owner's German shorthair
pointers impressed me. The few birds that flew well provided
great sport. Something inside me awoke. Ever since
then, from an admittedly inauspicious start, I have been
completely immersed in the world of guns, dogs and upland
birds. And I owe it all to Rich.

We could certainly use a few more men like Rich Dase. Rich
lost his manufacturing job a couple years ago as the
Michigan auto industry crumbled. He now has nearly completed
nursing school. He's at the top of his class, despite not
having been in school for more years than he probably cares to
admit. He is a mentor to new students in the program. And he still takes calls with the local volunteer fire department. I think we'll see him working in the ER or ICU sometime soon. If the nursing thing doesn’t work out, I think the hunting and shooting community could use him as an
ambassador. He’s certainly one hell of a mentor.

"Why do I do this?". That wasn't the first time I had that thought while hunting. I've thought the same just before wading into a semi-frozen cattail swamp to chase pheasants. I had a similar thought before plunging into a muddy lake to retrieve a duck because my ace birddog can't swim. I sunk to my sternum in mud.

This time it wasn't that bad. I was standing on a hill, overlooking a hundred-some acres of cover. The height of the cover varied from knee to chest high. It was just me and the dog after the pheasants. A hundred-some acres doesn't sound like a lot of land, but there's a lot a room to hide for a bird that is about the size of chicken. And the hens are safe. Not legal game. Add to that the fact the pheasants and can out run a birddog despite having legs only about as long as my thumbs. Doesn't help that they are as jumpy as a crack addict in between fixes. Oh, and these are late season pheasants. We are not the first hunter/dog crew they've encountered. The advantage clearly goes to the birds. I wonder why I don't take up golf. The golf ball isn't using every trick in the book to evade you. It just sits there. Then again, no one is trying to shoot the golf ball.

I decide to take a long walk along the perimeter of the cover. The idea was to drive the birds towards the center of the plot of land where it will be easier for the dog to work them. We had just about completed our loop when we came upon some thicker cover, about chest high. The place was full of pheasant tracks. Unfortunately, it was also close to the road. There's not much traffic on the rural byway, but the locals drive it like moonshiners during prohibition. I cradled my shotgun in my right arm and held the remote for the dog's electronic collar in my left. I'd have to call her off if she got much closer to the road, bird or no bird.

I could tell Whit hit scent in the thick of the cover. We worked our way towards the end, when Whit suddenly flash froze into a point. I angled towards her on the right. The rooster wasn't having it. It burst out of the cover, full cackle, full noisy flush of wings. I dropped it with the right barrel of my 80-plus year old side by side. The dog made a quick retrieve.

Most days, I'm happy taking one pheasant. The limit in our state is two. If we see more than two on any given hunt, I'm bordering on ecstatic. There was one other patch cover on this property that I wanted to work. We took a rooster out of it the month before, and had seen plenty of tracks from other birds. We weren't in the thick stuff long when Whit went on point again. This time, she froze with her head turned 90 degrees to her left. I angled in on the left side, hoping to pin the bird between Whit and I. Whit then began to turn her head, slowly, fluidly, without moving a single other muscle, until she was facing straight ahead. The bird was running. I released Whit right about the time she decided she wasn't waiting around for me. She ran about 15 yards and pointed again. Next, she relocated on her own, pointing again. The bird had run in a giant U, and was apparently trying to loop around behind us. They do that sort of thing.

The bird had finally had enough. It flushed. Rooster! I had to pass on the shot for a significant portion of its flight plan. I didn't want to shoot over the road, even though there were no cars in sight. Some habits you just don't want to break. I took a shot at it once it cleared the road. The bird went down into the thick patch of cover that produced the first bird. It didn't look hit, but that wasn't going to stop us from following it up. Whit and I both worked the cover and found nothing. No blood, no bird. When I got to the opposite end, I noticed fresh tracks on the thing that sort of resembled a trail. Darn bird had run out of the cover while we were fumbling around. I whistled the dog. She came running to me, only to notice the fresh trail. We were in hot pursuit!

Turns out these birds are pretty smart. This one ran 500+ yards on an open trail, into the woods and onto private property. It would live to outsmart another hunter. That's OK with me. Mike 1, Pheasants 1 is a pretty good score in my book.

Woodcock

I had it all set. October and November were carefully planned. I had a long stretch of time off at the end of October and early November. Prime time for pheasant and grouse hunting in Wisconsin and perhaps a road trip west. Never mind that I'd be working my tail off for the remainder of the four months in the schedule block. Then it happened. That heart to heart discussion with my wife, THE love of my life. My current job was not working for our family. Too much time away. Too much of my mental energy displaced to academic projects, meetings and duties, never mind the shifts in the emergency department. Something had to change.

I called one of my former partners who left academics to take a community job in Madison, Wisconsin. Turns out they were hiring, and they needed somebody yesterday. Making the decision to leave a stable job in this economy was not an easy one, but I had to do what was best for my family. My hunting season was scratched. Time would be scratched out around family life and working full time in the emergency department. The move date was October 1st, and after a few days off to settle in to the new place, I would start my new job. This year would not be the upland odyssey I had hoped for.

Yet, there is redemption.

I found a patch of public hunting land about 5 minutes from my new house. It didn't look real promising from the road, maybe the kind of place that state dumps a few pheasants to keep the locals happy, but really not much else. We worked some open fields on the front half of the property, curious about the possibility of pheasants. The season didn't open for another week and a half, but scouting never hurts. We found none. However, when we got over a small rise, I saw the glimmering yellow/green flutter of aspen leaves in a thick patch. I had decided to carry my 20g Franchi over and under that day. I knew there were some streams on the property and thought we might find a woodcock or two along the waterways. I had several boxes of steel #7 that I bought on clearance and wanted to use up. I thought they might make a nice load for woodcock. Within a minute of hitting the aspens, Whit, my six year old Weimaraner, got very birdy. I lost her in the thick stuff. All was silent for moment and then I saw the tan/brown flutter break through the trees. I took a desperate poke, and much to my surprise, Whit returned moments later with our first woodcock of the season in her mouth. Over the next half an hour, Whit moved fluidly from point to point. It was the kind of hunting I'd read about, but never experienced. The type of hunting pointing dog guys dream about. We flushed a total of 6 woodcock, five over points. The unpointed bird flushed to my right when whit was pointing one on my left. I had shots a four and brought home two. After shooting the second, I decided to leave. It is a pretty small covert, and I definitely didn't want to shoot it up. I also thought it would be pretty hard to improve upon from there.

I should mention that we were hunting in the rain. Not a sprinkle, but a deluge. And a Biblical one at that. Didn't matter. It was some of the most glorious, most sublime upland hunting I've ever experienced. All is well. Family life is again a priority, and it turns out the hunting season might not be so bad.