I hadn’t stepped inside a high fence since 1980. That’s when I had the chance to hunt Blue Mountain Forest, aka Corbin Park, in New Hampshire.
The boars, whitetails and elk inside the enclosure had close to 27,000 acres of totally wild terrain. I actually went up three times with friends as a guest of one of the members and never got a shot off. The animals were as wary as any I’ve ever encountered on the free range.
38 years later, I had my next opportunity to step behind a chain-link curtain. Oak Creek Whitetail Ranch in Missouri invited me to spend a few days enjoying their hospitality while seeing some of the largest on-the-hoof racks in America. I would also have the opportunity to take a shot at one of these monsters.
I chose to drive the 800 miles from South Carolina rather than take the airlines. Schlepping a firearm along was the main reason. Missing out on that unpredictable airport experience, plus the ability to haul all my stuff along with a giant empty cooler, made taking my pick-up truck a no-brainer. What’s a few more hours on the road listening to Sirius XM sports talk?
Believing that I would be in the lap of luxury, surrounded by the rich and famous (these are not cheap hunts), I brought my nicest “sit by the fire and sip a fine single malt” apparel. Turns out my fellow hunters included a carpenter from Connecticut, the owner of an auto repair shop in New Hampshire and his college-age daughter, and a professor from Louisiana. No dress-code required.
Not poor folk by any means, but hard-working people who have little time to hunt, so they make the most of their days in the woods.
By mid-December when I visited Oak Creek, it was late in the hunting season and the bucks had become masters in the art of staying alive. And while we saw many deer, including some genuine jaw-droppers, we were after one in particular. Hunting from comfortable box stands as well as making some spot-and-stalks, we could never quite close the deal on the big boy. Meanwhile we passed on several that I drooled over. “He’s just a 180,” my guide Mark would say as I was about to levitate with excitement.
It was my last afternoon to hunt when things got really interesting…
There’s something about the deer-hunting experience, indefinable yet undeniable, which lends itself to the telling of exciting tales. This book offers abundant examples of the manner in which the quest for whitetails extends beyond the field to the comfort of the fireside. It includes more than 40 sagas which stir the soul, tickle the funny bone, or transport the reader to scenes of grandeur and moments of glory.
On these pages is a stellar lineup featuring some of the greatest names in American sporting letters. There’s Nobel and Pulitzer prize-winning William Faulkner, the incomparable Robert Ruark in company with his “Old Man,” Archibald Rutledge, perhaps our most prolific teller of whitetail tales, genial Gene Hill, legendary Jack O’Connor, Gordon MacQuarrie and many others. Buy Now
