THE WHITETAIL DEER
The whitetail deer is now, as it always has been, the most plentiful and
most widely distributed of American big game. It holds its own in the
land better than any other species, because it is by choice a dweller in
the thick forests and swamps, the places around which the tide of
civilization flows, leaving them as islets of refuge for the wild
creatures which formerly haunted all the country. The range of the
whitetail is from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and from the Canadian to
the Mexican borders, and somewhat to the north and far to the south of
these limits. The animal shows a wide variability, both individually and
locally, within these confines; from the hunter’s standpoint it is not
necessary to try to determine exactly the weight that attaches to these
local variations.
There is also a very considerable variation in habits. As compared with
the mule-deer, the whitetail is not a lover of the mountains. As
compared with the prongbuck, it is not a lover of the treeless plains.
Yet in the Alleghanies and the Adirondacks, at certain seasons
especially, and in some places at all seasons, it dwells high among the
densely wooded mountains, wandering over their crests and sheer sides,
and through the deep ravines; while in the old days there were parts of
Texas and the Indian Territory where it was found in great herds far out
on the prairie. Moreover, the peculiar nature of its chosen habitat,
while generally enabling it to resist the onslaught of man longer than
any of its fellows, sometimes exposes it to speedy extermination. To the
westward of the rich bottom-lands and low prairies of the Mississippi
Valley proper, when the dry plains country is reached, the natural
conditions are much less favorable for whitetail than for other big
game. The black bear, which in the East has almost precisely the same
habitat as the whitetail, disappears entirely on the great plains, and
reappears in the Rockies in regions which the whitetail does not reach.
All over the great plains, into the foothills of the Rockies, the
whitetail is found, but only in the thick timber of the river bottoms.
Throughout the regions of the Upper Missouri and Upper Platte, the Big
Horn, Powder, Yellowstone, and Cheyenne, over all of which I have
hunted, the whitetail lives among the cottonwood groves and dense brush
growth that fringe the river beds and here and there extend some
distance up the mouths of the large creeks. In these places the
whitetail and the mule-deer may exist in close proximity; but normally
neither invades the haunts of the other.
Along the ordinary plains river, such as the Little Missouri, where I
ranched for many years, there are three entirely different types of
country through which a man passes as he travels away from the bed of
the river. There is first the alluvial river bottom covered with
cottonwood and box-elder, together with thick brush. These bottoms may
be a mile or two across, or they may shrink to but a few score yards.
After the extermination of the wapiti, which roamed everywhere, the only
big game animal found in them was the whitetail deer. Beyond this level
alluvial bottom the ground changes abruptly to bare, rugged hills or
fantastically carved and shaped Bad Lands rising on either side of the
river, the ravines, coulees, creeks, and canyons twisting through them
in every direction. Here there are patches of ash, cedar, pine, and
occasionally other trees, but the country is very rugged, and the cover
very scanty. This is the home of the mule-deer, and, in the roughest and
wildest parts, of the bighorn. The absolutely clear and sharply defined
line of demarkation between this rough, hilly country, flanking the
river, and the alluvial river bottom, serves as an equally clearly
marked line of demarkation between the ranges of the whitetail and the
mule-deer. This belt of broken country may be only a few hundred yards
in width; or it may extend for a score of miles before it changes into
the open prairies, the high plains proper. As soon as these are reached,
the prongbuck’s domain begins.
As the plains country is passed, and the vast stretches of mountainous
region entered, the river bottoms become narrower, and the plains on
which the prongbuck is found become of very limited extent, shrinking to
high valleys and plateaus, while the mass of rugged foothills and
mountains add immensely to the area of the mule-deer’s habitat.
Given equal areas of country, of the three different types alluded to
above, that in which the mule-deer is found offers the greatest chance
of success to the rifle-bearing hunter, because there is enough cover to
shield him and not enough to allow his quarry to escape by stealth and
hiding. On the other hand, the thick river bottoms offer him the
greatest difficulty. In consequence, where the areas of distribution of
the different game animals are about equal, the mule-deer disappears
first before the hunter, the prongbuck next, while the whitetail holds
out the best of all. I saw this frequently on the Yellowstone, the
Powder, and the Little Missouri. When the ranchmen first came into this
country the mule-deer swarmed, and yielded a far more certain harvest to
the hunter than did either the prongbuck or the whitetail. They were the
first to be thinned out, the prongbuck lasting much better. The cowboys
and small ranchmen, most of whom did not at the time have hounds, then
followed the prongbuck; and this, in its turn, was killed out before the
whitetail. But in other places a slight change in the conditions
completely reversed the order of destruction. In parts of Wyoming and
Montana the mountainous region where the mule-deer dwelt was of such
vast extent, and the few river bottoms on which the whitetail were found
were so easily hunted, that the whitetail was completely exterminated
throughout large districts where the mule-deer continued to abound.
Moreover, in these regions the table-lands and plains upon which the
prongbuck was found were limited in extent, and although the prongbuck
outlasted the whitetail, it vanished long before the herds of the
mule-deer had been destroyed from among the neighboring mountains.
The whitetail was originally far less common in the forests of northern
New England than was the moose, for in the deep snows the moose had a
much better chance to escape from its brute foes and to withstand cold
and starvation. But when man appeared upon the scene he followed the
moose so much more eagerly than he followed the deer that the conditions
were reversed and the moose was killed out. The moose thus vanished
entirely from the Adirondacks, and almost entirely from Maine; but the
excellent game laws of the latter State, and the honesty and efficiency
with which they have been executed during the last twenty years, have
resulted in an increase of moose during that time. During the same
period the whitetail deer has increased to an even greater extent. It is
doubtless now more plentiful in New York and New England than it was a
quarter of a century ago. Stragglers are found in Connecticut, and, what
is still more extraordinary, even occasionally come into wild parts of
densely populated little Rhode Island—my authority for the last
statement being Mr. C. Grant La Farge. Of all our wild game, the
whitetail responds most quickly to the efforts for its protection, and
except the wapiti, it thrives best in semi-domestication; in
consequence, it has proved easy to preserve it, even in such places as
Cape Cod in Massachusetts and Long Island in New York; while it has
increased greatly in Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine, and has more
than held its own in the Adirondacks. Mr. James R. Sheffield, of New
York City, in the summer of 1899, spent several weeks on a fishing trip
through northern Maine. He kept count of the moose and deer he saw, and
came across no less than thirty-five of the former and over five hundred
and sixty of the latter. In the most lonely parts of the forest deer
were found by the score, feeding in broad daylight on the edges of the
ponds. Deer are still plentiful in many parts of the Alleghany
Mountains, from Pennsylvania southward, and also in the swamps and
canebrakes of the South Atlantic and Gulf States.
Where the differences in habitat and climate are so great there are many
changes of habits, and some of them of a noteworthy kind. Mr. John A.
McIlhenny, of Avery’s Island, Louisiana, formerly a lieutenant in my
regiment, lives in what is still a fine game country. His plantation is
in the delta of the Mississippi, among the vast marshes, north of which
lie the wooded swamps. Both the marshes and the swamps were formerly
literally thronged with whitetail deer, and the animals are still
plentiful in them. Mr. McIlhenny has done much deer-hunting, always
using hounds. He informs me that the breeding times are unexpectedly
different from those of the northern deer. In the North, in different
localities, the rut takes place in October or November, and the fawns
are dropped in May or June. In the Louisiana marshes around Avery’s
Island the rut begins early in July and the fawns are dropped in
February. In the swamps immediately north of these marshes the dates are
fully a month later. The marshes are covered with tall reeds and grass
and broken by bayous, while there are scattered over them what are
called “islands” of firmer ground overgrown with timber. In this
locality the deer live in the same neighborhood all the year round, just
as, for instance, they do on Long Island. So on the Little Missouri, in
the neighborhood of my ranch, they lived in exactly the same localities
throughout the entire year. Occasionally they would shift from one river
bottom to another, or go a few miles up or down stream because of
scarcity of food. But there was no general shifting.
On the Little Missouri, in one place where they were not molested, I
knew a particular doe and fawn with whose habits I became quite
intimately acquainted. When the moon was full they fed chiefly by night,
and spent most of the day lying in the thick brush. When there was
little or no moon they would begin to feed early in the morning, then
take a siesta, and then—what struck me as most curious of all—would go
to a little willow-bordered pool about noon to drink, feeding for some
time both before and after drinking. After another siesta they would
come out late in the afternoon and feed until dark.
In the Adirondacks the deer often completely alter their habits at
different seasons. Soon after the fawns are born they come down to the
water’s edge, preferring the neighborhood of the lakes, but also
haunting the stream banks. The next three months, during the hot
weather, they keep very close to the water, and get a large proportion
of their food by wading in after the lilies and other aquatic plants.
Where they are much hunted, they only come to the water’s edge after
dark, but in regions where they are little disturbed they are quite as
often diurnal in their habits. I have seen dozens feeding in the
neighborhood of a lake, some of them two or three hundred yards out in
shallow places, up to their bellies; and this after sunrise, or two or
three hours before sunset. Before September the deer cease coming to the
water, and go back among the dense forests and on the mountains. There
is no genuine migration, as in the case of the mule-deer, from one big
tract to another, and no entire desertion of any locality. But the food
supply which drew the animals to the water’s edge during the summer
months shows signs of exhaustion toward fall; the delicate water-plants
have vanished, the marsh-grass is dying, and the lilies are less
succulent. An occasional deer still wanders along the shores or out into
the lake, but most of them begin to roam the woods, eating the berries
and the leaves and twig ends of the deciduous trees, and even of some of
the conifers—although a whitetail is fond of grazing, especially upon
the tips of the grass. I have seen moose feeding on the tough old lily
stems and wading after them when the ice had skimmed the edges of the
pool. But the whitetail has usually gone back into the woods long before
freezing-time.
From Long Island south there is not enough snow to make the deer alter
their habits in the winter. As soon as the rut is over, which in
different localities may be from October to December, whitetail are apt
to band together—more apt than at any other season, although even then
they are often found singly or in small parties. While nursing, the does
have been thin, and at the end of the rut the bucks are gaunt, with
their necks swollen and distended. From that time on bucks and does
alike put on flesh very rapidly in preparation for the winter. Where
there is no snow, or not enough to interfere with their travelling, they
continue to roam anywhere through the woods and across the natural
pastures and meadows, eating twigs, buds, nuts, and the natural hay
which is cured on the stalk.
In the Northern woods they form yards during the winter. These yards are
generally found in a hardwood growth which offers a supply of winter
food, and consist simply of a tangle of winding trails beaten out
through the snow by the incessant passing and repassing of the animal.
The yard merely enables the deer to move along the various paths in
order to obtain food. If there are many deer together, the yards may
connect by interlacing paths, so that a deer can run a considerable
distance through them. Often, however, each deer will yard by itself, as
food is the prime consideration, and a given locality may only have
enough to support a single animal. When the snows grow deep the deer is
wholly unable to move, once the yard is left, and hence it is absolutely
at the mercy of a man on snowshoes, or of a cougar or a wolf, if found
at such times. The man on snowshoes can move very comfortably; and the
cougar and the wolf, although hampered by the snow, are not rendered
helpless like the deer. I have myself scared a deer out of a yard, and
seen it flounder helplessly in a great drift before it had gone thirty
rods. When I came up close it ploughed its way a very short distance
through the drifts, making tremendous leaps. But as the snow was over
six feet deep, so that the deer sank below the level of the surface at
each jump, and yet could not get its feet on the solid ground, it became
so exhausted that it fell over on its side and bleated in terror as I
came up. After looking at it I passed on. Hide-hunters and frontier
settlers sometimes go out after the deer on snowshoes when there is a
crust, and hence this method of killing is called crusting. It is simple
butchery, for the deer cannot, as the moose does, cause its pursuer a
chase which may last days. No self-respecting man would follow this
method of hunting save from the necessity of having meat.
In very wild localities deer sometimes yard on the ice along the edges
of lakes, eating off all the twigs and branches, whether of hardwood
trees or of conifers, which they can reach.
At the beginning of the rut the does flee from the bucks, which follow
them by scent at full speed. The whitetail buck rarely tries to form a
herd of does, though he will sometimes gather two or three. The mere
fact that his tactics necessitate a long and arduous chase after each
individual doe prevents his organizing herds as the wapiti bull does.
Sometimes two or three bucks will be found strung out one behind the
other, following the same doe. The bucks wage desperate battle among
themselves during this season, coming together with a clash, and then
pushing and straining for an hour or two at a time, with their mouths
open, until the weakest gives way. As soon as one abandons the fight he
flees with all possible speed, and usually escapes unscathed. While head
to head there is no opportunity for a disabling thrust, but if, in the
effort to retreat, the beaten buck gets caught, he may be killed. Owing
to the character of the antlers, whitetail bucks are peculiarly apt to
get them interlocked in such a fight, and if the efforts of the two
beasts fail to disentangle them, both ultimately perish by starvation. I
have several times come across a pair of skulls with interlocked
antlers. The same thing occurs, though far less frequently, to the
mule-deer and even the wapiti.
The whitetail is the most beautiful and graceful of all our game animals
when in motion. I have never been able to agree with Judge Caton that
the mule-deer is clumsy and awkward in his gait. I suppose all such
terms are relative. Compared to the moose or caribou the mule-deer is
light and quick in his movements, and to me there is something very
attractive in the poise and power with which one of the great bucks
bounds off, all four legs striking the earth together and shooting the
body upward and forward as if they were steel springs. But there can be
no question as to the infinitely superior grace and beauty of the
whitetail when he either trots or runs. The mule-deer and blacktail
bound, as already described. The prongbuck gallops with an even gait,
and so does the bighorn, when it happens to be caught on a flat; but the
whitetail moves with an indescribable spring and buoyancy. If surprised
close up, and much terrified, it simply runs away as hard as it can, at
a gait not materially different from that of any other game animal under
like circumstances, while its head is thrust forward and held down, and
the tail is raised perpendicularly. But normally its mode of
progression, whether it trots or gallops, is entirely unique. In
trotting, the head and tail are both held erect, and the animal throws
out its legs with a singularly proud and free motion, bringing the feet
well up, while at every step there is an indescribable spring. In the
canter or gallop the head and tail are also held erect, the flashing
white brush being very conspicuous. Three or four low, long,
marvellously springy bounds are taken, and then a great leap is made
high in the air, which is succeeded by three or four low bounds, and
then by another high leap. A whitetail going through the brush in this
manner is a singularly beautiful sight. It has been my experience that
they are not usually very much frightened by an ordinary slow
track-hound, and I have seen a buck play along in front of one,
alternately trotting and cantering, head and flag up, and evidently
feeling very little fear.
To my mind the chase of the whitetail, as it must usually be carried on,
offers less attraction than the chase of any other kind of our large
game. But this is a mere matter of taste, and such men as Judge Caton
and Mr. George Bird Grinnell have placed it above all others as a game
animal. Personally I feel that the chase of any animal has in it two
chief elements of attraction. The first is the chance given to be in the
wilderness; to see the sights and hear the sounds of wild nature. The
second is the demand made by the particular kind of chase upon the
qualities of manliness and hardihood. As regards the first, some kinds
of game, of course, lead the hunter into particularly remote and wild
localities; and the farther one gets into the wilderness, the greater is
the attraction of its lonely freedom. Yet to camp out at all implies
some measure of this delight. The keen, fresh air, the breath of the
pine forests, the glassy stillness of the lake at sunset, the glory of
sunrise among the mountains, the shimmer of the endless prairies, the
ceaseless rustle of the cottonwood leaves where the wagon is drawn up on
the low bluff of the shrunken river—all these appeal intensely to any
man, no matter what may be the game he happens to be following. But
there is a wide variation, and indeed contrast, in the qualities called
for in the chase itself, according as one quarry or another is sought.
The qualities that make a good soldier are, in large part, the qualities
that make a good hunter. Most important of all is the ability to shift
for one’s self, the mixture of hardihood and resourcefulness which
enables a man to tramp all day in the right direction, and, when night
comes, to make the best of whatever opportunities for shelter and warmth
may be at hand. Skill in the use of the rifle is another trait;
quickness in seeing game, another; ability to take advantage of cover,
yet another; while patience, endurance, keenness of observation,
resolution, good nerves, and instant readiness in an emergency, are all
indispensable to a really good hunter.
If a man lives on a ranch, or is passing some weeks in a lodge in a game
country, and starts out for two or three days, he will often do well to
carry nothing whatever but a blanket, a frying-pan, some salt pork, and
some hardtack. If the hunting-ground is such that he can use a wagon or
a canoe, and the trip is not to be too long, he can carry about anything
he chooses, including a tent, any amount of bedding, and if it is very
cold, a small, portable stove, not to speak of elaborate cooking
apparatus. If he goes with a pack-train, he will also be able to carry a
good deal; but in such a case he must rely on the judgment of the
trained packers, unless he is himself an expert in the diamond hitch. If
it becomes necessary to go on foot for any length of time, he must be
prepared to do genuine roughing, and must get along with the minimum of
absolute necessities.
It is hardly necessary to point out that the hunter worthy of the name
should be prepared to shift for himself in emergencies. A ranchman, or
any other man whose business takes him much in the mountains and out on
the great plains or among the forests, ought to be able to get along
entirely on his own account. But this cannot usually be done by those
whose existence is habitually more artificial. When a man who normally
lives a rather over-civilized life, an over-luxurious life—especially in
the great cities—gets off for a few weeks’ hunting, he cannot expect to
accomplish much in the way of getting game without calling upon the
services of a trained guide, woodsman, plainsman, or mountain man, whose
life-work it has been to make himself an adept in all the craft of the
wilderness. Until a man unused to wilderness life, even though a good
sportsman, has actually tried it, he has no idea of the difficulties and
hardships of shifting absolutely for himself, even for only two or three
days. Not only will the local guide have the necessary knowledge as to
precisely which one of two seemingly similar places is most apt to
contain game; not only will he possess the skill in packing horses, or
handling a canoe in rough water, or finding his way through the
wilderness, which the amateur must lack; but even the things which the
amateur does, the professional will do so much more easily and rapidly,
as in the one case to leave, and in the other case not to leave, ample
time for the hunting proper. Therefore the ordinary amateur sportsman,
especially if he lives in a city, must count upon the services of
trained men, possibly to help him in hunting, certainly to help him in
travelling, cooking, pitching camp, and the like; and this he must do,
if he expects to get good sport, no matter how hardy he may be, and no
matter how just may be the pride he ought to take in his own craft,
skill, and capacity to undergo fatigue and exposure. But while normally
he must take advantage of the powers of others, he should certainly make
a point of being able to shift for himself whenever the need arises; and
he can only be sure of possessing this capacity by occasionally
exercising it. It ought to be unnecessary to point out that the
wilderness is not a place for those who are dependent upon luxuries, and
above all for those who make a camping trip an excuse for debauchery.
Neither the man who wants to take a French cook and champagne on a
hunting trip, nor his equally objectionable though less wealthy brother
who is chiefly concerned with filling and emptying a large whiskey jug,
has any place whatever in the real life of the wilderness.
The chase of an animal should rank according as it calls for the
exercise in a high degree of a large number of these qualities. The
grizzly is almost our only dangerous game, and under certain conditions
shooting the grizzly calls for considerable courage on the part of the
hunter. Disregarding these comparatively rare occasions, the chase of
mountain game, especially the bighorn, demands more hardihood, power of
endurance, and moral and physical soundness than any other kind of
sport, and so must come first. The wapiti and mule-deer rank next, for
they too must be killed by stalking as a result of long tramps over very
rough ground. To kill a moose by still hunting is a feat requiring a
high degree of skill, and entailing severe fatigue. When game is
followed on horseback, it means that the successful hunter must ride
well and boldly.
The whitetail is occasionally found where it yields a very high quality
of sport. But normally it lives in regions where it is extremely
difficult to kill it legitimately, as the wapiti and mule-deer are
killed, and yet comparatively easy to kill it under circumstances which
make no demand for any particular prowess on the part of the hunter. It
is far more difficult to still hunt successfully in the dense brushy
timber frequented by the whitetail than in the open glades, the
mountains, and the rocky hills, through which the wapiti and mule-deer
wander. The difficulty arises, however, because the chief requirement is
stealth, noiselessness. The man who goes out into the hills for a
mule-deer must walk hard and far, must be able to bear fatigue, and
possibly thirst and hunger, must have keen eyes, and be a good shot. He
does not need to display the extraordinary power of stealthy advance
which is necessary to the man who would creep up to and kill a whitetail
in thick timber. Now, the qualities of hardihood and endurance are
better than the quality of stealth, and though all three are necessary
in both kinds of chase, yet it is the chase of the mule-deer which most
develops the former, and the chase of the whitetail which most develops
the latter. When the woods are bare and there is some snow on the
ground, however, still hunting the whitetail becomes not only possible,
but a singularly manly and attractive kind of sport. Where the whitetail
can be followed with horse and hound, the sport is also of a very high
order. To be able to ride through woods and over rough country at full
speed, rifle or shotgun in hand, and then to leap off and shoot at a
running object, is to show that one has the qualities which made the
cavalry of Forrest so formidable in the Civil War. There could be no
better training for the mounted rifleman, the most efficient type of
modern soldier.
By far the easiest way to kill the whitetail is in one or other of
certain methods which entail very little work or skill on the part of
the hunter. The most noxious of these, crusting in the deep snows, has
already been spoken of. No sportsman worthy of the name would ever
follow so butcherly a method. Fire hunting must also normally be ruled
out. It is always mere murder if carried on by a man who sits up at a
lick, and is not much better where the hunter walks through the
fields—not to mention the fact that on such a walk he is quite as apt to
kill stock as to kill a deer. But fire hunting from a boat, or jacking,
as it is called, though it entails absolutely no skill in the hunter,
and though it is, and ought to be, forbidden, as it can best be carried
on at the season when nursing does are particularly apt to be the
victims, nevertheless has a certain charm of its own. The first deer I
ever killed, when a boy, was obtained in this way, and I have always
been glad to have had the experience, though I have never been willing
to repeat it. I was at the time camped out in the Adirondacks.
Two or three of us, all boys of fifteen or sixteen, had been enjoying
what was practically our first experience in camping out, having gone
out with two guides, Hank Martin and Mose Sawyer, from Paul Smith’s on
Lake St. Regis. My brother and cousin were fond of fishing and I was
not, so I was deputed to try to bring in a deer. I had a
double-barrelled 12–bore gun, French pinfire, with which I had
industriously collected “specimens” on a trip to Egypt and Palestine and
on Long Island; except for three or four enthralling but not
over-successful days after woodcock and quail, I had done no game
shooting. As to every healthy boy with a taste for outdoor life, the
Northern forests were to me a veritable land of enchantment. We were
encamped by a stream among the tall pines, and I had enjoyed everything;
poling and paddling the boat, tramping through the woods, the cries of
chickaree and chipmunk, of jay, woodpecker, chickadee, nuthatch, and
cross-bill, which broke the forest stillness; and, above all, the great
reaches of sombre woodland themselves. The heart-shaped footprints which
showed where the deer had come down to drink and feed on the marshy
edges of the water made my veins thrill; and the nights around the
flickering camp-fire seemed filled with romance.
My first experiment in jacking was a failure. The jack, a bark lantern,
was placed upon a stick in the bow of the boat, and I sat in a cramped
huddle behind it, while Mose Sawyer plied the paddle with noiseless
strength and skill in the stern. I proved unable to respond even to the
very small demand made upon me, for when we actually did come upon a
deer I failed to see it until it ran, when I missed it; and on the way
back capped my misfortune by shooting a large owl which perched on a log
projecting into the water, looking at the lantern with two glaring eyes.
All next day I was miserably conscious of the smothered disfavor of my
associates, and when night fell was told I would have another chance to
redeem myself. This time we started across a carry, the guide carrying
the light boat, and launched it in a quiet little pond about a mile off.
Dusk was just turning into darkness when we reached the edge of the
little lake, which was perhaps a mile long by three-quarters of a mile
across, with indented shores. We did not push off for half an hour or
so, until it was entirely dark; and then for a couple of hours we saw no
deer. Nevertheless, I thoroughly enjoyed the ghostly, mysterious,
absolutely silent night ride over the water. Not the faintest splash
betrayed the work of the paddler. The boat glided stealthily alongshore,
the glare of the lantern bringing out for one moment every detail of the
forest growth on the banks, which the next second vanished into absolute
blackness. Several times we saw muskrats swimming across the lane of
light cut by the lantern through the darkness, and two or three times
their sudden plunging and splashing caused my heart to leap. Once when
we crossed the lake we came upon a loon floating buoyantly right out in
the middle of it. It stayed until we were within ten yards, so that I
could see the minute outlines of the feathers and every movement of the
eye. Then it swam off, but made no cry. At last, while crossing the
mouth of a bay we heard a splashing sound among the lilies inshore,
which even my untrained ears recognized as different from any of the
other noises we had yet heard, and a jarring motion of the paddle showed
that the paddler wished me to be on the alert. Without any warning, the
course of the boat was suddenly changed, and I was aware that we were
moving stern foremost. Then we swung around, and I could soon make out
that we were going down the little bay. The forest-covered banks
narrowed; then the marsh at the end was lighted up, and on its hither
edge, knee-deep among the water-lilies, appeared the figure of a
yearling buck still in the red. It stood motionless, gazing at the light
with a curiosity wholly unmixed with alarm, and at the shot wheeled and
fell at the water’s edge. We made up our mind to return to camp that
night, as it was before midnight. I carried the buck and the torch, and
the guide the boat, and the mile walk over the dim trail, occasionally
pitching forward across a stump or root, was a thing to be remembered.
It was my first deer, and I was very glad to get it; but although only a
boy, I had sense enough to realize that it was not an experience worth
repeating. The paddler in such a case deserves considerable credit, but
the shooter not a particle, even aside from the fact to which I have
already alluded, that in too many cases such shooting results in the
killing of nursing does. No matter how young a sportsman is, if he has a
healthy mind, he will not long take pleasure in any method of hunting in
which somebody else shows the skill and does the work so that his share
is only nominal. The minute that sport is carried on on these terms it
becomes a sham, and a sham is always detrimental to all who take part in
it.
Whitetail are comparatively easily killed with hounds, and there are
very many places where this is almost the only way they can be killed at
all. Formerly in the Adirondacks this method of hunting was carried on
under circumstances which rendered those who took part in it objects of
deserved contempt. The sportsman stood in a boat while his guides put
out one or two hounds in the chosen forest side. After a longer or
shorter run the deer took to the water; for whitetail are excellent
swimmers, and when pursued by hounds try to shake them off by wading up
or down stream or by swimming across a pond, and, if tired, come to bay
in some pool or rapid. Once the unfortunate deer was in the water, the
guide rowed the boat after it. If it was yet early in the season, and
the deer was still in the red summer coat, it would sink when shot, and
therefore the guide would usually take hold of its tail before the
would-be Nimrod butchered it. If the deer was in the blue, the carcass
would float, so it was not necessary to do anything quite so palpably
absurd. But such sport, so far as the man who did the shooting was
concerned, had not one redeeming feature. The use of hounds has now been
prohibited by law.
In regions where there are no lakes, and where the woods are thick, the
shooters are stationed at runways by which it is supposed the deer may
pass when the hounds are after them. Under such circumstances the man
has to show the skill requisite to hit the running quarry, and if he
uses the rifle, this means that he must possess a certain amount of
address in handling the weapon. But no other quality is called for, and
so even this method, though often the only possible one (and it may be
necessary to return to it in the Adirondacks), can never rank high in
the eyes of men who properly appreciate what big game hunting should be.
It is the usual method of killing deer on Long Island, during the three
or four days of each year when they can be legally hunted. The deer are
found along the south and centre of the eastern half of the island; they
were nearly exterminated a dozen years ago, but under good laws they
have recently increased greatly. The extensive grounds of the various
sportsmen’s clubs, and the forests of scrub-oak in the sparsely settled
inland region, give them good harbors and sanctuaries. On the days when
it is legal to shoot them, hundreds of hunters turn out from the
neighborhood, and indeed from all the island and from New York. On such
a day it is almost impossible to get any work done; for the sport is
most democratic, and is shared by everybody. The hunters choose their
position before dawn, lying in lines wherever deer are likely to pass,
while the hounds are turned into every patch of thick cover. A most
lively day follows, the fusillade being terrific; some men are
invariably shot, and a goodly number of deer are killed, mostly by wily
old hunters who kill ducks and quail for a living in the fall.
When the horse is used together with the hounds the conditions are
changed. To ride a horse over rough country after game always implies
hardihood and good horsemanship, and therefore makes the sport a worthy
one. In very open country—in such country, for instance, as the
whitetail formerly frequented both in Texas and the Indian Territory—the
horseman could ride at the tail of the pack until the deer was fairly
run down. But nowadays I know of no place where this is possible, for
the whitetail’s haunts are such as to make it impracticable for any
rider to keep directly behind the hounds. What he must do is to try to
cut the game off by riding from point to point. He then leaps off the
horse and watches his chance for a shot. This is the way in which Mr.
McIlhenny has done most of his deer-hunting, in the neighborhood of his
Louisiana plantation.
Around my ranch I very rarely tried to still-hunt whitetail, because it
was always easier to get mule-deer or prongbuck, if I had time to go off
for an all-day’s hunt. Occasionally, however, we would have at the ranch
hounds, usually of the old black-and-tan Southern type, and then if we
needed meat, and there was not time for a hunt back in the hills, we
would turn out and hunt one or two of the river bottoms with these
hounds. If I rode off to the prairies or the hills I went alone, but if
the quarry was a whitetail, our chance of success depended upon our
having a sufficient number of guns to watch the different passes and
runways. Accordingly, my own share of the chase was usually limited to
the fun of listening to the hounds, and of galloping at headlong speed
from one point where I thought the deer would not pass to some other,
which, as a matter of fact, it did not pass either. The redeeming
feature of the situation was that if I did get a shot, I almost always
got my deer. Under ordinary circumstances to merely wound a deer is
worse than not hitting it; but when there are hounds along they are
certain to bring the wounded animal to bay, and so on these hunts we
usually got venison.
[Illustration:
ELKHORN RANCH
]
Of course, I occasionally got a whitetail when I was alone, whether with
the hounds or without them. There were whitetail on the very bottom on
which the ranch-house stood, as well as on the bottom opposite, and on
those to the right and left up and down stream. Occasionally I have
taken the hounds out alone, and then as they chevied the whitetail
around the bottom, have endeavored by rapid running on foot or on
horseback to get to some place from which I could obtain a shot. The
deer knew perfectly well that the hounds could not overtake them, and
they would usually do a great deal of sneaking round and round through
the underbrush and cottonwoods before they finally made up their minds
to leave the bottom. On one occasion a buck came sneaking down a game
trail through the buck brush where I stood, going so low that I could
just see the tips of his antlers, and though I made desperate efforts I
was not able to get into a position from which I could obtain a shot. On
another occasion, while I was looking intently into a wood through which
I was certain a deer would pass, it deliberately took to the open ground
behind me, and I did not see it until it was just vanishing. Normally,
the end of my efforts was that the deer went off and the hounds
disappeared after it, not to return for six or eight hours. Once or
twice things favored me; I happened to take the right turn or go in the
right direction, and the deer happened to blunder past me; and then I
returned with venison for supper. Two or three times I shot deer about
nightfall or at dawn, in the immediate neighborhood of the ranch,
obtaining them by sneaking as noiselessly as possible along the cattle
trails through the brush and timber, or by slipping along the edge of
the river bank. Several times I saw deer while I was sitting on the
piazza or on the doorstep of the ranch, and on one occasion I stepped
back into the house, got the rifle, and dropped the animal from where I
stood.
On yet other occasions I obtained whitetail which lived not on the river
bottoms but among the big patches of brush and timber in the larger
creeks. When they were found in such country I hunted them very much as
I hunted the mule-deer, and usually shot one when I was expecting as
much to see a mule-deer as a whitetail. When the game was plentiful I
would often stay on my horse until the moment of obtaining the shot,
especially if it was in the early morning or late evening. My method
then was to ride slowly and quietly down the winding valleys and across
the spurs, hugging the bank, so that, if deer were feeding in the open,
I would get close up before either of us saw the other. Sometimes the
deer would halt for a moment when it saw me, and sometimes it would
bound instantly away. In either case my chance lay in the speed with
which I could jump off the horse and take my shot. Even in favorable
localities this method was of less avail with whitetail than mule-deer,
because the former were so much more apt to skulk.
As soon as game became less plentiful my hunting had to be done on foot.
My object was to be on the hunting-ground by dawn, or else to stay out
there until it grew too dark to see the sights of my rifle. Often all I
did was to keep moving as quietly as possible through likely ground,
ever on the alert for the least trace of game; sometimes I would select
a lookout and carefully scan a likely country to see if I could not
detect something moving. On one occasion I obtained an old whitetail
buck by the simple exercise of patience. I had twice found him in a
broad basin, composed of several coulees, all running down to form the
head of a big creek, and all of them well timbered. He dodged me on both
occasions, and I made up my mind that I would spend a whole day in
watching for him from a little natural ambush of sage-bush and cedar on
a high point which overlooked the entire basin. I crept up to my ambush
with the utmost caution early in the morning, and there I spent the
entire day, with my lunch and a water-bottle, continually scanning the
whole region most carefully with the glasses. The day passed less
monotonously than it sounds, for every now and then I would catch a
glimpse of wild life; once a fox, once a coyote, and once a badger;
while the little chipmunks had a fine time playing all around me. At
last, about mid-afternoon, I suddenly saw the buck come quietly out of
the dense thicket in which he had made his midday bed, and deliberately
walk up a hillside and lie down in a thin clump of ash where the sun
could get at him—for it was in September, just before the rut began.
There was no chance of stalking him in the place he had chosen, and all
I could do was to wait. It was nearly sunset before he moved again,
except that I occasionally saw him turn his head. Then he got up, and
after carefully scrutinizing all the neighborhood, moved down into a
patch of fairly thick brush, where I could see him standing and
occasionally feeding, all the time moving slowly up the valley. I now
slipped most cautiously back and trotted nearly a mile until I could
come up behind one of the ridges bounding the valley in which he was.
The wind had dropped and it was almost absolutely still when I crawled
flat on my face to the crest, my hat in my left hand, my rifle in my
right. There was a big sage-bush conveniently near, and under this I
peered. There was a good deal of brush in the valley below, and if I had
not known that the buck was there, I would never have discovered him. As
it was, I watched for a quarter of an hour, and had about made up my
mind that he must have gone somewhere else, when a slight movement
nearly below me attracted my attention, and I caught a glimpse of him
nearly three hundred yards off, moving quietly along by the side of a
little dry watercourse which was right in the middle of the brush. I
waited until he was well past, and then again slipped back with the
utmost care, and ran on until I was nearly opposite the head of the
coulee, when I again approached the ridge-line. Here there was no
sage-bush, only tufts of tall grass, which were stirring in the little
breeze which had just sprung up, fortunately in the right direction.
Taking advantage of a slight inequality in the soil, I managed to get
behind one of these tufts, and almost immediately saw the buck. Toward
the head of the coulee the brush had become scanty and low, and he was
now walking straight forward, evidently keeping a sharp lookout. The sun
had just set. His course took him past me at a distance of eighty yards.
When directly opposite I raised myself on my elbows, drawing up the
rifle, which I had shoved ahead of me. The movement of course caught his
eye at once; he halted for one second to look around and see what it
was, and during that second I pulled the trigger. Away he went, his
white flag switching desperately, and though he galloped over the hill,
I felt he was mine. However, when I got to the top of the rise over
which he had gone, I could not see him, and as there was a deep though
narrow coulee filled with brush on the other side, I had a very ugly
feeling that I might have lost him, in spite of the quantity of blood he
had left along his trail. It was getting dark, and I plunged quickly
into the coulee. Usually a wounded deer should not be followed until it
has had time to grow stiff, but this was just one of the cases where the
rule would have worked badly; in the first place, because darkness was
coming on, and in the next place, because the animal was certain to die
shortly, and all that I wanted was to see where he was. I followed his
trail into the coulee, and expected to find that he had turned down it,
but a hurried examination in the fading light showed me that he had
taken the opposite course, and I scrambled hastily out on the other
side, and trotted along, staring into the brush, and now and then
shouting or throwing in a clod of earth. When nearly at the head there
was a crackling in the brush, and out burst the wounded buck. He
disappeared behind a clump of elms, but he had a hard hill to go up, and
the effort was too much for him. When I next saw him he had halted, and
before I could fire again down he came.
On another occasion I spied a whole herd of whitetail feeding in a
natural meadow, right out in the open, in mid-afternoon, and was able to
get up so close that when I finally shot a yearling buck (which was one
of the deer farthest away from me, there being no big buck in the
outfit), the remaining deer, all does and fawns, scattered in every
direction, some galloping right past me in their panic. Once or twice I
was able to perform a feat of which I had read, but in which I scarcely
believed. This was, to creep up to a deer while feeding in the open, by
watching when it shook its tail, and then remaining motionless. I cannot
say whether the habit is a universal one, but on two occasions at least
I was able thus to creep up to the feeding deer, because before lifting
its head it invariably shook its tail, thereby warning me to stay
without moving until it had lifted its head, scrutinized the landscape,
and again lowered its head to graze. The eyesight of the whitetail, as
compared with that of the pronghorn antelope, is poor. It notes whatever
is in motion, but it seems unable to distinguish clearly anything that
is not in motion. On the occasions in question no antelope that I have
ever seen would have failed to notice me at once and to take alarm. But
the whitetail, although it scrutinized me narrowly, while I lay
motionless with my head toward it, seemed in each case to think that I
must be harmless, and after a while it would go on feeding. In one
instance the animal fed over a ridge and walked off before I could get a
shot; in the other instance I killed it.
In 1894, on the last day I spent at the ranch, and with the last bullet
I fired from my rifle, I killed a fine whitetail buck. I left the
ranch-house early in the afternoon on my favorite pony, Muley, my
foreman, Sylvane Ferris, riding with me. We forded the shallow river and
rode up a long winding coulee, with belts of timber running down its
bottom. After going a couple of miles, by sheer good luck we stumbled on
three whitetail—a buck, a doe and a fawn. When we saw them they were
trying to sneak off, and immediately my foreman galloped toward one end
of the belt of timber in which they were, and started to ride down
through it, while I ran Muley to the other end to intercept them. They
were, of course, quite likely to break off to one side; but this
happened to be one of the occasions when everything went right. When I
reached the spot from which I covered the exits from the timber, I
leaped off, and immediately afterward heard a shout from my foreman that
told me the deer were on foot. Muley was a pet horse, and enjoyed
immensely the gallop after game; but his nerves invariably failed him at
the shot. On this occasion he stood snorting beside me, and finally, as
the deer came in sight, away he tore—only to go about 200 yards,
however, and stand and watch us, snorting, with his ears pricked forward
until, when I needed him, I went for him. At the moment, however, I paid
no heed to Muley, for a cracking in the brush told me the game was
close, and I caught the shadowy outlines of the doe and the fawn as they
scudded through the timber. By good luck, the buck, evidently flurried,
came right on the edge of the woods next to me, and as he passed,
running like a quarter-horse, I held well ahead of him and pulled
trigger. The bullet broke his neck and down he went—a fine fellow with a
handsome ten-point head, and fat as a prize sheep; for it was just
before the rut. Then we rode home, and I sat in a rocking-chair on the
ranch-house veranda, looking across the wide, sandy river bed at the
strangely shaped buttes and the groves of shimmering cottonwoods until
the sun went down and the frosty air bade me go in.