A HUNTER'S APOLOGIA

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The good, the badand the misunderstood.

I top the ridge at first light and stop to catch my breath. Almost at once I glimpse movement on a ridge running parallel to mine, a hundred yards or so across a shallow draw. Through binoculars, in the soft amber light of dawn, I count the shadowy forms of a dozen elk trailing along in single file, fully exposed but only a jump away from the protection of the dark forest. At the rear of

the procession marches a big bull with large, well-formed antlers. Beautiful. He is herding a harem of 11 plump cows.

I hunker down in a tangle of knee-high Gambel oak and glass the bull and the terrain separating us. No way, I figure, that I can sneak across the open draw to within bow and arrow range—40 yards at the extreme—without being spotted. Better to lure the bull to me. If I can.

I pull a small, horseshoe-shaped neoprene disk from a pocket of my camouflaged jacket, place it against the roof of my mouth, hold it there with my tongue, inhale and let go with a humble but heartfelt imitation of a bugling bull elk.

The big bull's reaction is immediate and violent; the magic is working (it doesn't always). This is the height of the rut, the annual breeding season, and my imitation bugle has duped this monarch into believing I'm a rival bull after his harem. He barks (yes, barks) and lurches at his cows, sending them crashing off into the protection of the forest. Now he stares my way. Unable to spot my camouflaged form crouching low amongst the brush, he vents his anger on a handy pine sapling, slashing at the little tree with his massive antlers, gouging out big chunks of bark and shearing off limbs with each violent toss of his big black head. The racket generated by this tantrum is considerable, a threat meant for me.

Answering in kind, I pick up a fist-sized rock and bang and rake it against the base of the nearest bush. That does it. The bull stamps, gives the denuded sapling a parting slap and plunges off the ridge and down into the draw that separates us, quickly dropping below my line of sight. To keep him hot, I bugle again.

The bull reappears, now on my side and closing the furlongs between us like a quarter horse. Just when I begin to think he's going to run me over, he pulls up short behind a juniper. Through the needles of the scruffy tree I can see only a few buff patches of hide and an occasional flash of polished antler. The bull would expect to have spotted his challenger by now. Not having done so, he's growing suspicious. To reassure him, I bugle again, at the same time inching my recurve bow back to full draw. Easy does it.

The bull snorts, stamps and paws the ground, then steps defiantly out from behind the juniper . . . and stands there, little more than 20 yards distant, quartering on, not quite broadside, staring directly at me. I hesitate. This is something to see: His neck is dark and rut-swollen, his eyes rolled back and visibly bloodshot, his teeth gnashing, the heaves and falls of his chest highlighting thick ribs.

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