RW and I returned from our antelope hunt in Wyoming very late on Sunday night. I spent most of yesterday processing the entire experience in my heart, soul and mind. I bird hunt, quite often with RW and sometimes I take my shotgun and harvest birds alongside him but this was my first big game hunt and the experience was profound. We took two antelope from Wyoming and I’ve spent the past couple of days putting words to paper in an attempt to convey the holiness of the event to you. I’m very aware that some of you are vegetarians or are opposed to hunting so know that the following photographs (tastefully taken) are part of my life experience and the words I have written to accompany the images are based on what I felt and observed while hunting the antelope in Wyoming. This is no attempt to affect your opinion on the matter of hunting and/or consuming meat, rather, it’s an attempt to convey the spiritual nature of harvesting animals and being part of an energy realm that has always existed, since the beginning, between all living things. The hunt, without further adieu:
[wild BLM horses on the run]
[watering the dogs]
[Robert and Pene loping through the sage]
[Wyoming sage flats for as far as the eye can see]
[RW building a fire in sub-freezing temperatures at sunset]
[warming up before hopping in bed]
[the rude awakening to snow and frigid temperatures on Sunday morning]
[Surprised!]
[that jet black eye]
[rolling home to Idaho with it’s gracious mountains]
[The last quarter of an antelope burger that I just ate for lunch. It was delicious.]
I just ate a frozen apple for breakfast.
It’s a cold morning in Wyoming, just South of the Wind Range. Robert and I are hunting antelope and are, as usual, classically under prepared for a weekend of camping when it comes to meal preparation. We forgot to bring breakfast, it’s freezing cold. Hence, the icy apple.
…..
It’s been a long night. We have parked on a low ridge above a BLM guzzler* on the undulating sage flats of Wyoming. Desolate, cold, barren country. I’m very warm in my down sleeping bag with Robert beside me and Penelope curled up behind my knees inside my bag. I usually wake up freezing on nights like these while camping but after eating dinner around a sage fed fire the only part of my body that is frigid in the night air is the very tip of my nose.
At one point in the night I wake up to star shine pushing through our tinted canopy windows and the low grunts of an antelope buck ushering his harem to and from the guzzler a quarter mile below our encampment. It’s magic. I sit up in my sleeping bag and attempt to peer out the window, hoping I can see the herd in the starlight. Tawny ghosts move with a wild sort of choreography down by the troughs; I shiver, and whisper at RW, “Can you hear them?”
Wild horses now, a merry and stout band,
curious about our human scent, our cold bed of ashes where
we cooked and ate dinner, the scent of dogs and territory marked
by Farley on low Wyoming sage.
Robert is first out of bed in the morning. I roll over and try to squeeze the last of the warmth out of my sleeping bag before peeling myself out of that feathery cocoon to put on a second long underwear layer, a windproof fleece, a down jacket, and down booties; my hiking boots are solid blocks of leather and rubber in the corner of the truck bed. They’ll stay there for the rest of the trip. In the night a cold layer of snow has descended upon us. A blanketing of the eyesight is what it really is. White precipitation blended with golden grasses and ink blots of sage, as far as the eye can see, will make spotting antelope more difficult. We round up the dogs, hop in the truck and begin to drive.
We catch a glimpse of a herd. Two bucks. Seven does. And before we know it, nine antelope burst into a 55MPH gallop over a ridge of sage.
They saw us coming a mile away, literally
and the men told the women to run.
The herd structure is very patriarchal. One buck will take on a harem of does and serve as a mate and protector of his ladies. He’s a true gentleman at all times. He stands atop ridge lines keeping watch for predators as his does feed, carefree below him. When the herd runs from prey, he places himself between his does and the threat. Watching herd behavior with these animals is fascinating, I’m drawn into pronghorn culture like a moth to the flame.
In all this hunting and stalking and laying bare of primal sense in a desolate landscape I can feel a wildness stirring in parts me; wildness that has, for years, been laid to genetic rest in my tightly coiled chains of DNA. The urge to stalk, hunt, gather and harvest seems to wash over me, solidly, and I take pleasure in squinting hard into the snow scape to spot white rumps, black cheek patches, bucks on ridge lines watching over the womenfolk — pronghorn.
When Robert finally fires his shots, we hurry to make sure life has ended swiftly. We follow the split hoof tracks over sage and snow, blinded by fists of weather as it plants firm, frigid punches in our eyes. The wind rises up and pulls invisible words from our mouths. We resort to waving our hands in the air in order to communicate in the wind and snow. We push through a small scale blizzard with low visibility to our first doe. She lies still on her side, her last handful of breaths are shallow and then cease all together. Her eyes are calm and jet black. I inspect her countenance, her last glance up into a flurry filled sky is gentle. I’m overcome by the holiness of the moment, by the harvest of a magnificent animal, by her matchstick legs, the stoutness of her body, the swirls of vanilla in her tawny coat and the coarseness of her eyelashes. I lay my hands on her face and feel the resonance of her animal warmth before it fades to cold. Right there, in that blizzard, on my knees in the sage, I offer my thanks. I take up the energy of her dwindling body heat into my cold hands. I thank the Creator.
I can feel the thankfulness radiating out of me.
In the distance, her buck, her protector stands.
Watching, unafraid, compassionate.
As the snow falls and the wind blinds I’m more aware than I’ve ever been of life cycles, energy cycles, my place as a human, my call to promote and practice ethical hunting, my instincts as an animal.
I’m overwhelmed by the courage it takes to be part of the food chain in this manner:
To be the one to strike the fatal blow upon a wild and free animal.
To view the beast as an animal and to be free, in that moment, from thoughts of anthropomorphism and childish sentiments.
To view my food as more than the busy aisles of a grocery store.
To be part of the process in harvesting it, without a cashier giving me a sum at the end of my checkout, without unwrapping my food from plastic packaging, without being asked, “Will that be credit or debit?”
To be filled with sympathy when a bullet isn’t as true as intended.
To sometimes have to end a life with bare hands when the bullet fails — like my husband does when his second shot at our second doe fails to kill immediately.
This omnivore has no dilemma, but she does have a spiritual connection to the tenderloin medallion she’ll eat for dinner tonight.
When she consumes that hard won meal, she’ll whisper thanks and then she’ll join a circle of energy that’s older than herself.
Older than the hills.
As old as the breath that first breathed it.
*A watering hole established by the Bureau of Land Management on open range for wildlife, bands of wild horses and burros.
