Failure to obtain tag leaves me with the birds

It looks like I’m going to spend most of my time hunting birds this fall.

Nothing new there except I had other plans. I was going to mix in a little sheep and elk hunting along the way, give the dogs a break, and let the shotguns cool.

I’d applied for a ewe tag which I figured wouldn’t be too hard to draw, but figured wrong. My name wasn’t drawn.

Then a couple of days ago I checked the FWP website and discovered I’d also failed to draw a cow elk tag.

Now it’s down to antelope and I’m not holding my breath. Those tags are few and far between this year.

The dogs won’t mind. They seldom ask for a day off. But I was hoping for an excuse to sit and glass, and hunt at a slower pace instead of the breakneck speed required to keep up with the spaniels.

Apparently chasing dogs is my lot in life.

I’m not complaining, but still-hunting through the Breaks at first light certainly had its appeal. So did naps in the sun once the day began to warm.

The dogs won’t let me rest, let alone close my eyes and doze. They whine and bark if I stop. Jem is content to hunt without me if I don’t keep up. Ace doesn’t understand what’s happening if I stop and we’re not back at the truck. Even Spot, at her advanced age, doesn’t like to take a break.

Hunting big game can be strenuous -- long days of hiking and packing -- but it also takes patience, a lot of stopping and looking and staying hidden.

Bird hunting, on the other hand, is almost always fast-paced. And it’s loud. While big game hunters try to be as quiet as possible until the trigger is pulled, bird hunters, it seems, are always yelling at their dogs or each other.

Neither do big game hunters have something to dress, clean and butcher nearly every time they return home like bird hunters do. And after that work’s done there are the dogs, who always need to be fed and brushed, and sometimes doctored.

I was looking forward to a few days hunting without them, just me and my thoughts in the great outdoors. FWP had other plans, though.

“He’s getting old,” some sadistic desk jockey at the department must have thought, “let him chase his dogs all fall. We’ll give those sheep and elk tags to some young buck who doesn’t need a break.”

Oh well, at least the dogs won’t mind.

Parker Heinlein is at

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