Electronic Deer.

I just played an online deer hunting game. A friend has sent a link that once clicked, a few moments later had deer running across the screen for me to “shoot” with my mouse. Did pretty good, especially the second time through, at least I thought it was pretty good until when the chance to post your score on the ledger board revealed that the high score was 8 or 9 times my score. I didn’t play again.

Electronic deer.

I haven’t played many of the hunting games that are popular for computers or the TV game stations. Probably for the same reason that I don’t like to watch most any kind of sports on TV, but in general enjoy watching them in person.

I do enjoy watching the occasional hunting show, but I always have more interest in what they don’t show than what they do. I’d like a “Google earth” view of where they placed the hunter in the woods. I’d like to see the animals paths across the country side. I’d like to learn about the bullet placement and performance (not at all likely to be shown) that may affect my choices down the road for what I would hunt with.

Electronic versions on hunting leave a person without anything tangible. No sweat, no racing heartbeat, no trophy on the wall, or meat in the freezer. The closest I get to enjoying some sort of electronic deer is the game camera.

As I have written here before, I keep a game camera going almost all summer and fall long. This year, the 4th such, was no exception and each week or so when it was about time to check the camera, I always looked forward to seeing what bucks had come and gone, and the other animals that might have been photographed.

My first year of regular camera use had over 21 different bucks being recorded. The second year wasn’t as many, and last was less than the others, though watching two of the bigger bucks grow up held my interest. This year was kind of bleak. Both in terms of number of deer seen, and size of perspective bucks. By the time fall rolled around, I can honestly say I wasn’t interested in trying for any specific buck that I had seen (this was the first time in four years I didn’t have my eye on a specific buck) and probably as such didn’t hunt as hard. I only hit the bow stand two or three times and didn’t poke any that I saw.

I did decide that a couple of the very smallest antlered bucks were going to be my quarry of choice and I would attempt to cull them from the breeding population. And so, when Saturday morning of the first shotgun season found me sitting up in a tree, a deer coming through the trees soon appeared to be one of the spike bucks I was watching for, it was a quick decision to fill my tag. I like to call him an “11” pointer as his two spikes look like the number “11”.

I’m really struggling with the idea that the game camera either adding something too my hunting experience, or is taking something away.

For 4 years, I’ve had a pretty good idea (barring a few transient wondering bucks) what was out there in the woods. Did that make the sitting in the woods, waiting for deer a more enjoyable experience, or was it more disappointing. Certainly, it created a “selection criteria” in my mind for both big and in this year little deer.

When I didn’t see or get to shoot a desired deer, there was certainly more disappointment at the end of the evening. On the other hand, two of the years I did shoot one of “the big ones” I had seen, and likely if not specifically searching for them, probably would not have done so.

I look forward to seeing the pictures enough that I don’t want to keep the camera in the box this next year. In fact, its still in the woods, taking pictures (hopefully) until the batteries run dry, or the card runs out of memory. I’ve seen enough interesting behavior that I want to continue the ongoing action.

Some of the pictures are really kind of pretty. There is a doe with new fallen snow covering her back, that in the flash of the camera, the snowflakes and the light have created a prism like effect turning them into a rainbow of colors. Its almost as if she was a Christmas deer.