Frazz by Jef Mallett for November 13, 2024

When I worked for General Motors in Southern California in the late 1990s, we got the third Thursday in November off because it was the first day of deer season. In Michigan.

When deer wasting disease became endemic, I stopped even WANTING to eat wild venison. Before that, I enjoyed it off and on. And I hung with hunters so I got a share of it from time to time. Just the right amount. My main take on “hunting for the table” is that it’s generally more expensive than just buying meat. Think of the vehicle, Think of the rifle. Think of the hunting gear. Think of all that TIME. Of course if it’s really “hunting as recreation” with a side of “and we can eat some if we kill it” then it’s fine. I go out picking berries, for instance.

Mostly they’re on roofs and in the back beds of pick-up trucks.

Oh deer!

Here in Michigan it used to be the only way to find white tail deer was to head to northern lower peninsula or the upper peninsula. Now they are everywhere so there is no need to travel very far to find a hunting place. Somewhere I read that the DNR used to post spotters on over paces to count the vehicles with deer carcasses headed back south to know what the harvest was. Before the Mackinac bridge was built there used to be miles long backups for the ferries during deer season.

It used to be going north on 75 on Friday and south on Sunday was always a trial.

what’s the charming part

But how can I prove that I’m a tough, strong man unless I’ve used a high-power firearm to kill something that had no way to protect itself from me?

Here in NJ, while I don’t hunt, we need the hunt to keep the deer from completely getting out of hand.

Two days in a row now of claiming a thing isn’t a thing when IT’S STILL A THING. People still hunt. A lot. Yeesh.

Hunting is fine but i prefer to go finding

Since when has it no longer been a big thing?

And in the summer, the caravan of cars returned from the shore with whale heads strapped to the roof.

Frazz makes it sound like there aren’t as many deer in Michigan as there used to be. When I lived in Michigan I believe the state held they honor of having more car/deer collisions than any other state.

I lived in south east Michigan, and the deer were so prevalent, a local golf course had a lottery to give sharpshooters a license to cull the deer (where hunting was never allowed normally) at their course because there were so many and they were actually getting in the way and slowing or even stopping play every day. They were not afraid of humans and would be found in the fairways or even on the tee boxes and would not move when approached. There was quite a hullabaloo about this hunt from some people as they claimed it would be like shooting fish in a barrel because these deer were not used to having to hide during hunting season. Turns out these folks didn’t have much to worry about because after the designated time for the hunt was over, it was found only 4 deer were harvested. Apparently they were quite aware they were being hunted and made themselves scarce.

When I lived in northwestern Wyoming I would go bag a deer every year to feed my family. A buddy of mine had a mother with a hay farm outside town. As weather got colder, the deer would come down from Yellowstone by the hundreds and start devouring the fields. The farmers, including my friend’s mom, would beg hunters to come there and get their deer. He and I did so every Fall for 10 years, but I never could bring myself to call it “hunting”. We were harvesting.

1 shot gun shell used to equal a year’s worth of table meat in this house

I lived in the Arctic, hunting is for survival if you are native. Not so much now, but it is a tradition to maintain, especially with prices at North Store

Eh, not so gross. We’ve just gotten away from familiarity with what it takes to get meat. I’ve even heard of an anti-hunter complaining, “Why do they have to kill something? Why don’t they just get their meat from a store?”

Now I’m craving some venison chili!

It’s da second week a’ deer-camp! And all da guys are here!

We drink, play cards & shoot da bull, but never shoot no deer!

I couldn’t hit the side of a barn even if I was standing inside it with the door closed, so I don’t hunt. But I knew some guys who did, but mostly brought home stories of “bottomless duck soup” and “a five point buck who stole all [our] whiskey”

Sort of off topic, but you’ll notice that the living animals are called deer, while the meat version that appears on your dinner table is called venison. That’s actually a practice that dates back to the Norman Conquest of England in 1066, after which the French-speaking conquerors became the new aristocracy, while the defeated Anglo-Saxons were the working-class peasants, farmers, and servants. As such, they used their own words for the animals they tended every day: cow, sheep, pig. Their overlords only saw these critters as meat on their plates, so their French-derived words for them were beef (or veal if it was from a calf), mutton (or lamb), and pork.

What’s so charming about deer hunting?!

We like killing animal because the fun and adventure not really to feed ourselves.

and don’t forget the Christmas tree on the roof

In Minnesota deer hunting season is in full swing. Lots of folks out there hoping to shoot something.

I’m not seeing the “charming” part.