My mother usually was right about most things, but one bit of advice she gave me was dead wrong: "You've got plenty of time to hunt, Bern," she would say to me. "You have other more important things to deal with right now. The hunting will wait."
No, it won't wait because of a number of realities. First, the price of some hunting has escalated out of reach, for example, $25,000 or more for a Stone sheep hunt. But more ominous is that physically everyone becomes less able to perform certain routines in hunting that we take for granted when young.
For example, when I was 27 years old I drew my first Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep permit in Wyoming. I climbed everywhere and didn't give a second thought to the physical difficulty because I was young, tough and in shape. Twenty years later I drew the same permit in the same hunting area. I was in decent physical condition, but that hunt was one of the most taxing I have experienced.
A half dozen years ago at age 52 I still was packing elk quarters on my back on a freighter frame. Then in 2002 I went on my last sheep hunt -- a Stone sheep hunt in the Pelly Mountains of the Yukon Territory. The horse ride back to base camp just about killed me due to excruciating pain in my right hip. I found out later that I had cartilage deterioration and arthritis in the hip. Five months ago I had it replaced. But then I developed something called "heterotopic ossification" -- a calcium buildup on the hipbone. That is why I am still hobbling about like an old man this long after surgery. (I am scheduled for more surgery to remove the calcium deposits in November.) I will have to struggle through the upcoming hunting season as best I am able.
With all this in mind, imagine my chagrin when after 21 years of applying, I drew a bull moose permit in Montana this year, beating 50-to-1 odds in the drawing! Now I am scrambling to try to put together a hunt.
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My young friend, Capt. Ed Johnson, U.S.M.C. and son of Larry and Tish Johnson of Jamestown, has offered to accompany me. He says one of his younger brothers might join us. Rob Brooks, long-time Helena friend who has hiked and fished with me in the past, and also done considerable stock work for me, has hunted moose in the same area near Dillon, Mont. He has volunteered to drive down there with me this summer and show me the area. Dave Pac, recently retired mule deer research biologist and a long-time friend, also wants to go on the scouting trip. My old friend John Thorp offered to lend us his game cart to haul out the quarters. So it looks as if I am going to have some assistance, which I desperately need.
Next, I have to shoot the .300 Weatherby on the range and make sure it is shooting the way I wish. I will continue to limp up the alley with my walking staff and Labradors, trying to keep in some semblance of physical shape for this hunt.
Last month when I was in North Dakota I visited my friend Ron in Mandan. I've known him for almost 40 years and we have done considerable hunting and fishing together. "Isn't it a shame," he said "That you couldn't have drawn this permit in a previous year when it would have been easy for you?"
At age 61 Ron has some kind of bizarre nerve condition where even riding in a pickup truck for more than a short drive is unbearable for him. Since I have known him, he has talked of elk hunting and other adventures. Those activities very well may have passed him by. Before I departed he looked me in the eye and said, "When you get ready to write an article about waiting too long go on hunting trips, use me as an example."
Do it while you can!
