Little Windy and the Wingshooting Woman
She was a great Nordic beauty, and she came with a duck lease. She was a green-eyed freckle-faced redhead, long of hair and limb, married a couple of times before I met her but neither lasted too long. Her name, literally translated, meant "the daughter of an angel of...
Requiem for a Peregrine
Everything about the peregrine falcon is spectacular — even in death. "One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds." – Aldo Leopold Early one evening toward the end of April, my English setter, Tina, and I were on the...
Nothing To Do for Three Weeks
I left long before daylight, alone but not lonely. Sunday-morning stillness filled the big city. It was so quiet that I heard the whistle of duck wings as I unlocked the car door. There would be ducks leaving Lake Michigan. A fine sound, that, early of a morning. Wild...
The Knobbly Buck
The magnificent old buck was a once-in-a-lifetime prize…and now it stood only 25 yards from his son’s stand.
Arriving in Tinkhamtown
“He was going back to Tinkhamtown. It was a long way, but he knew where he was going. He would follow the road through the woods and over the crest of a hill and down the hill to the stream, and cross the sagging timbers of the bridge, and on the other side would be the place called Tinkhamtown. He was going back to Tinkhamtown.”
Sam “Bird” Fite
Seven Decades of Chasing the Elusive Drummer
Woodcock Days
The best hunting spots are secrets among friends, where a bird in the bag is just a bonus. A mist conceals these mountains. They are gray like bone. The sun will not rise above them for another hour, and yet it is eight o'clock. This is a favorite spot. I find...
Rising Buffalo
Instead of just two bulls, Theodore Roosevelt and his party were suddenly confronted by a huge herd of angry Cape buffalo. The buffalo rose like massive black warriors from the papyrus swamp. Theodore Roosevelt and his party had just come face-to-face with one of...
Bad Day In the Bush
On the morning of September 30, 2001, professional hunter Johan Calitz awoke with a start. Outside his tent the quiet sounds of a safari camp coming to life mixed with the chatter of raucous francolins greeted the sunrise. This is how Johan began most days, his ears...
Experts Warn Mountain Lion Attacks Likely To Rise If Colorado Ballot Measure Passes
In David Baron’s 2004 environmental classic, The Beast in the Garden, the science author explains why large predators like mountain lions are increasingly frequenting suburban communities—specifically his hometown of Boulder, Colorado. Since the 1980s, mountain lion...