Tools of the Trade

It’s official. Deer hunting season is over. It didn’t end with nearly the fanfare with which it started. Back in the fall, sporting goods stores were selling things like Quarter Deer Bags, anybody who was anybody was wearing their fashionable Blaze Orange, and, oh yeah, we could hear gunshots echoing all over our valley. Not the “just another day on the outskirts of gang territory” gunshots we occasionally heard in California. No, these were “Mmmm. Venison…” gunshots. But, now it’s quiet again. All that’s left of Deer Season 2006 is a little deer hunter kit we found at the base of our hill.

About an acre of our property is wooded, berry-bushed, and mostly untamed aside from the walking path Rob machetes every year. The area is a favorite among the local deer. We have a family of four that checks in at the house most evenings, just to see what new flowers and plants we’ve arranged for their nightly buffet. They are patiently awaiting the Feast of Grapes in our front yard (we call it a vineyard). It’s a constant struggle to convince these deer – and their many friends – that they may want to move along to tastier pastures. Yes, in the grand scheme of things they were here first, but until they start chipping in for property taxes, we really don’t feel like feeding them all of our carefully chosen exotic fruits and bulbs. So, when a neighbor kid asked if he could hunt deer on our property, we agreed – with the caveat that we were not to be able to witness any of his recreating. “Stay below the crest of the hill and fire away from the house.”

We assume it was a fine season. We didn’t see or hear anything troubling. A few days ago, though, we trotted down the hill and discovered that the neighbor kid was pretty serious about his deer hunting.



That metal cage contraption was actually clinging to one of our trees, about 6 feet above the ground. It is a deer stand – not to be confused with the (faux) standing deer that was several yards in front of it. The kid apparently climbed up the tree and would sit in the deer stand (begging the question why it’s not called a deer sit), watching for dinner. Presumably the decoy lured deer, no doubt curious why one of their friends had a van Gogh thing going on. The antlers there on the ground are plastic. Best we can figure, Neighbor Kid banged these together to simulate rutting (SO prevalent here; man, we can barely carry on conversations what with all the rutting going on outside). Again, we have no idea how effective any of these tools were for our neighbor friend. All we do know is that family of four currently seems to prefer tulip leaves over crocus petals.