Joyce Kilmer said he would never see a poem as lovely as a tree, and he was right.  Did he ever consider the value of a tree beyond its beauty?  A tree’s beauty is much more than bark deep.  

Sitting on my deer stand on the ridge overlooking Buck Creek, I am near a huge whiteoak farther along the ridge. I often look at that tree as it goes through changes from early fall to winter and consider what the tree has seen over its lifetime.

The big whiteoak is about 40 inches in diameter, giving it an estimated age of 300 years.  And whiteoaks can live to be 600 years old, so it is just middle aged!  It was standing full-grown on that hillside long before I was born and could be standing there long after I am gone.

In the way back time machine of my mind, I imagine a squirrel burying an acorn on that ridge in the fall 300 years ago, then not being able to find it during the winter.  That spring, a small twig pokes out if the ground and two tiny leaves sprout from it.  It is dwarfed by the grown oaks and other trees living there.

The twig slowly grows, getting taller with the passing years.  When about 20 feet high, a bluejay builds its nest in the fork of a limb.  Many more bird and squirrel nests will decorate the limbs of this tree as it becomes the giant old man of the area over the next 200 years.

During that time, the strong limbs and trunk protect the nests in storms that the tree weathers. Although other trees on the ridge get hit by lightning and killed, somehow the big one avoids this fate.  And its spreading roots hold it in the wind and bring in enough water that it survives droughts that kill others nearby.  It lives by taking water they need, but that is nature.

When the whiteoak is 20 years old and 25 feet tall something wonderous happens in May. Small knots appear at the ends of last year’s branches while others grow at the tips of new branches.  Those knots on old branches grow into green two-inch-long fuzzy stings that produce pollen.  The female ones on the new branches become tiny eight of an inch-long greenish red flowers.

After pollination, a bud starts to grow.  By fall it is an acorn an inch long.  The tree has only a few dozen this year, but by the time it is fifty years old it is producing thousands of acorns every year.  The acorns come in three to five-year cycles, with best years producing up to 10,000 from our tree but only a few hundred at the bottom of the cycle.

Those acorns control wildlife numbers. In abundant years whitetails store up plenty of fat to survive the winter. Squirrels bury many more than they will need during the winter, and other animals and birds find and eat them.  In lean years deer starve during the winter without their fat reserves and many birds and animals do not survive.  Whiteoak acorns are the manna of the woods and many depend on it.

When the tree was young, I imagine a Native American sitting on the big rock a few feet from the tree, patiently knapping a piece of flint.  I have found some of his failed efforts by the rock. The females of his tribe gather the acorns, grind them up and boil them, making a kind of acorn meal that sustains the group.

Based on the size of the trees growing on the flat areas, about 100 years ago a farmer cleared and terraced this hillside.  The remains of his small house sit at the top of the hill, up the long gentle slope from the sharp drop on ridge at the creek.

He and his family slowly and painstakingly cut trees, dug up stumps, move rocks and flattened areas to create bands on the hillside to grow crops.  The rocks were moved to the terraces he created between the flat areas, the remains of them are piled ever fifty feet or so.  This ground was very rocky and not very fertile.  

Based on that and the size of the house remains, he was probably a poor farmer with a family that did all the work.  They managed to scratch out a living, growing most of the food they ate and a small cash crop to buy the necessities.   

And they depended on wildlife from the woods and fish from Buck Creek for much of their protein.  I imagine one of them sitting under the big oak, hoping to “bark” a squirrel with his muzzleloader or, even better, shoot one of the rare whitetails. 

The big oak survived their axes, probably because of its size and location. Smaller trees up the slope were easier to get to the fireplace, and the big one right on the ridge did not interfere with their crops.

The whiteoak continues its life cycle, taking in water, carbon dioxide and sunlight during the day to produce oxygen, acorns, leaves and wood.  The falling leaves decay and fertilize the ground around the tree for other plants. And its roots hold the soil, preventing erosion.

At some point the mighty tree will fall, its life ended by lightning, drought or old age. Its trunk lying on the ground will provide hiding places for all kinds of bugs, as well as food for them.  It will slowly rot away, leaving its final nutrients in the ground where it fell.

In the way forward time machine in my mind, I see a squirrel burying an acorn from a nearby oak, probably the offspring of the fallen giant, in the rich soil where the big oak died, starting the cycle all over again.

As a southerner, walking in my winter wonderland was quite different from the song.  No sleigh bells rang, but there were cows lowing, squirrels barking and crows crawing.  And almost never did snow glisten, fog and wet glittering leaves were much more common.   

 Treks in the woods were more stalking than walking since my trusty .22 semiautomatic, a gift for my 8^th birthday, was always with me.  Squirrels were my usual target but just about any wild critter was fair game, if in season.   

Those trips were always learning experiences to a curious boy.  I learned to identify green briar, which we called smilac, as one of the few green vines in the gray and brown woods.  There was scattered honeysuckle, too, and later I found out how much deer depend on them for food in harsh winters.   

Often, I could smell a cedar tree before seeing it, especially after as rain. And I did seek out thick cedars as protection from a sudden shower.  I still got wet, but not as soaked as I would have without the tree over me.   

I had favorite places to sit and watch for squirrels, and I often time traveled from them.  Some of those travels were fantasy, some based on history.  Although no cave men ever lived in my part of the world, I could imagine crouching on my rock grasping a club waiting on a sabretooth tiger.  

  A little more realistic were the times I would have my bow and arrow, dressed in a loin cloth and hoping for a deer for the tribe’s dinner.  At times I could be dressed in gray, clutching my rifle hoping to spot a hated Yankee in his blue.  

  My favorite were the times I imagined my coonskin cap topping my head, with my flintlock rifle that never missed any target.  I did carry a small hatchet and pretended it was like the one the frontiersmen carried.   

The woods had moods, too.  When the sun was bright and the sky clear and cold, everything seemed to sparkle.  Even the drab browns and grays of winter seemed happier on those days. The branch gurgled louder, and everything seemed more lively.  

  On rainy days, the world was subdued.  Colors were almost nonexistent and sounds muffled.  Footsteps didn’t crunch in the leaves and even the branch seemed to sigh over limbs and rocks rather than have a happy gurgle.  

  Foggy days were different still.  Like on rainy days, everything was subdued, but familiar objects became strange.  The big white oak still looms large but seems threatening as it disappears into the gloom. That tall stump you leaned on yesterday now looks like a scary figure with the limb behind it an imagined raised arm and knife.   

In fog, everything is muffled.  I could actually move through the woods as quietly as I imagined I could as Davy Crockett. Leaves that still fell ghosted down without a crunch.  And the branch gurgles were deadened by the thick fog.   

Most winter days required a fire as some point, to either warm hands or cook a kill.  Dry days were no problem, just get some leaves and twigs to start slightly bigger sticks.    

But on foggy or rainy days, it was a challenge.  I would first find a fairly flat rock to keep my effort off the soggy dirt.  Then I would gather bark from a cedar or pine tree, peel some of it off to get to the dry under layer and carefully protect it from the wet.    Nothing on the ground was suitable since twigs and leaves were soaked. So breaking small branches off a dead tree was the option.  If I was careful enough I could get a fire started even on the worse days.   

I always wanted to start my fires the same way as the imagined people of my mind, but flint and steel never worked for me, and a bow and stick never produced even a whiff of smoke.   

To be prepared I always had some strike anywhere matches, heads carefully dipped in melted wax to seal them, with me.  They were usually in a small pill bottle in my pocket and in the bottle were some cotton balls soaked in the same melted wax.     The waxed cotton would burn hot for a few minutes and start a fire on even the wettest day.   

Some of my best meals were eaten over such a fire. I liked roasted robin, they were easy to shoot and clean.  And they tasted good, even if as tough as an old shoe after roasting on a spit to too well-done chewiness. Squirrels were also a regular feast roasted on the fire, but for some reason never tasted as good as the ones mama fried with gravy or made into squirrel and dumplings.   

Trying to find other things to cook was interesting.  I read about cooking and eating acorns but every way I tried they were so bitter they were inedible.  Later I found the acorns needed to be ground up and soaked to remove the tannin from them.   

Mushrooms popped up like magic throughout the woods after a rain, and I wanted to try them but was always afraid of them. It was drilled into me that toadstools were poison, and I never learned to be sure enough of the ones that were edible to try them.   

Fish were in the branch and I caught them regularly, but they were never big enough to cook on a fire.  A dozen of them cleaned and boiled barely made good stock for a fish stew. I never tried to cook fish in the woods.   

Try walking in a winter wonder land around here this year, and take a kid with you if possible, to enjoy the imagination of the young.

 Pogo famously said “We have met the enemy and he is us.” All too often hunters and gun owners are our own worst enemy. Going all the way back to Aesop and his fables, the statement “United we stand, divided we fall,” applies to us and our rights.

    I am constantly amazed at the infighting among groups that have similar goals and beliefs.  Hunters look down and condemn other hunters for not holding the same ideals as they do.  Gun owners think their guns are going to be safe and support banning the kinds they don’t use.

    One of the worst examples was a recent article/news story in Georgia Outdoor News magazine.  When some Georgia deer hunters went to their deer camp this year, they found a nest of rattlesnakes ten feet from their bunkhouse in the middle of camp.  They killed them.

    Other hunters, and many tree huggers, condemned them for killing the snakes.  Even other hunters called them names and hated on them. Not only did they give nonhunters a bad image of hunters, they caused hard feelings among groups that should support ourselves.

    Get real.  I have never enjoyed killing just for the fun of killing.  I do not kill snakes when
I see them in the wild. Nonpoisonous snakes in my yard are left alone.  But I recently killed a copperhead
I uncovered when moving some tin. I would not leave it to bite me or my dogs.

    There has long been a “war” between bow and gun hunters.  Gun hunters do not like bow hunters having an early season just for them, and bow hunters say the activity of gun hunters make getting close to deer more difficult for them.

    When cross bows were first legalized, traditional bow hunters hated anyone using a cross bow. They are right that it takes a lot more skill to kill a deer with a traditional bow, but why condemn those that use crossbows?  It gets more folks in the woods to find the joy of the outdoors and hunting, and we should support each other.

    The same thing happened when compound bows first came on the market.  Recurve bow hunters condemned them. They are easier to use and more accurate, so folks using them were not really bow hunters. 

    If you don’t want to use a crossbow or compound bow, fine, but do not condemn fellow hunters if they do.  Many of us are too old to pull back and hold a compound bow, much less a traditional recurve bow, but we can get in the woods and enjoy hunting with a crossbow.  The same applies to young hunters and those with disabilities that prevent use of a traditional bow.

    Georgia legalized baiting for deer last year, based on the desires of the majority of hunters attending hearings on it. I don’t like baiting, there are many problems with it, from spreading disease to making it easier for predators other than us to kill deer. And baiting removes the need to learn hunting skills.  You can shoot deer over bait, but you are not really hunting.

    Since baiting is legal, many will do it, including me. But I am not really a deer hunter, I just want to harvest a few does for my freezer.  And I can not shoot a rifle due to a port in my right shoulder, but I can get close enough to does on bait to harvest some with my crossbow.

    If you don’t like baiting, don’t bait. But don’t condemn others for using legal methods.

    Trophy hunting is similar.  I will get condemned if I shoot a small buck, even though it is legal.  I have seen folks whine about a young hunter killing their first deer when it was a small buck. They want it to grow bigger, hoping to kill it themselves when it reaches trophy size, I guess.

    Bass fishermen are just as bad. The catch and release of bass has helped bass populations, but too many fishermen have adopted it almost as a religion, even when removing small bass may help a lake.  There is nothing wrong with keeping a few bass to eat, especially in cases of spotted bass where this invasive species has hurt the lake.

    There is a movement to ban and confiscate ugly guns that many don’t like.  The AR-15 shoots a legal bullet for deer hunting, and millions use them for a variety of reasons. But too many hunters that don’t use them for hunting see no reason to not ban and confiscate them.  When the gun banners realize many bolt action and lever action rifles shoot bigger, more powerful bullets, you can bet they will come after them, calling them sniper rifles.

    Its similar for shotguns.  A semiautomatic shotgun is the choice of many hunters, and a ban on semiautomatic guns would include them. Should hunters that use double barrel shotguns be ok with the ban?

    Its easy to accept things that don’t affect you, until they do.

    Too many people have lost touch with nature. 
They live in cities and suburbs where they seldom contact nature, even if they go hunting a few times a year. They are happy in their own little world and see no problem condemning those that don’t hold their views.

    Our whole society seems to have gone this way.
A big part of this is social media.  It is far too common to sit safely behind a computer and rant and rave about your favorite prejudice, from hunting and fishing to politics and religion, without ever considering the other side.

    And you are likely to never even hear the other side.  The echo chamber of Facebook and Twitter assure you will hear and be heard only by those with the same prejudices.

    Consider those with differing views and maybe, just maybe, they will consider your views.  You may be surprised both sides have legitimate concerns.

Last week I watched with sad amusement the kids protesting “climate change.”  I wonder how many of them live in cities where their only contact with the natural world is walking by a park surrounded by buildings.

    Country kids and adults are in contact with the real, natural world and see weather changing constantly. We see cycles in the weather and have all our lives.  But climate change true believers insist if they don’t spent huge amounts of our money to do “something” about the weather  we are all gonna die soon.

    The funniest thing I saw was a reporter interviewing some young, gullible activists.  He asked them what they, personally, would give up to protect the climate.  Their cell phones, expensive clothes, air conditioning, travel and other things? 

    The confused look and sputtering answers were priceless. They want others to give up things, never themselves.

Have you ever been to a turkey shoot? I remember attending them with my dad when I was a kid. We would drive to a field where paper targets with a big “X” on them were hung on a wire and a shooting line established away from the targets. Hay bales often offered backstops and places to sit near the firing line.

Each shooter put a dollar in a hat and got to fire one shell at his target. The one with a shot hitting closest to the center of the “X” won a turkey. There were often side bets between the men on who would win each round.

I will never forget one shoot. On one shot, the wad managed to hit the target, leaving a big hole near the “X” was vislible from the shooting line. There were quite a few bets that would win, but when the targets were checked, one tiny hole was right on the “X” and won.

Turkey shoots are still held, usually as a fun raiser. Check around for one and see if you can win a turkey!