Outdoor Fun and Mischief – The Bow and Arrow

For some mysterious reason, my folks bought me a bow and arrows when I was about twelve years old. For all their concern about my safety it was a rather odd gift. Nevertheless, I loved the bow and eventually became a reasonably good shot. A few years later they bought me second more powerful bow, a fiberglass recurve hunting bow. One thing I could never figure out is why they refused to get me a target. I really wanted one to set up in the backyard, but they told me that the targets were too expensive, and they never bought one.

Archery targets came with a stand I could have set it up in a safe location in the back yard and shot to my heart’s content. But for some inexplicable reason this wasn’t even up for consideration. Well, talk about ways to encourage me to get into mischief! This was it.

Instead of shooting at a target, I took the bow into the woods and shot at everything that moved, birds, rabbits, squirrels, the box cars on the train going down the track, whatever. I didn’t usually hit the small animals I aimed at since they were fast and agile and usually scurried out of sight before I got a bead on them. But one afternoon I got lucky and nailed a small rabbit that had just emerged from the brush.

I didn’t kill the rabbit, but I hit it in the front paw and the arrow went through the paw and entered its body just in front of the hind leg. I went over to get a closer look and it was struggling to run but couldn’t move with the arrow rendering its front paw immobile. It was bleeding from its side where the arrow had penetrated its body. I stood there stupefied for a few moments not knowing what to do next. God, I wanted to reverse time and take that shot back. There was no alternative. The creature was suffering, and I didn’t want it to die a slow death, so I took out my knife and killed it quickly. Then buried it there in the field.

I’m not against the concept of hunting for survival and I would never preach to others about it one way or another, but from that day forward I never purposely killed another creature. I derived no pleasure or satisfaction from what I had done and never wanted to purposely do it again. I’ve never told that story to anyone for sixty years. When people I’ve met over the years talk to me about their hunting exploits, I always listen politely then quietly walk away. But it never has had any appeal for me.

Well I said I never purposely killed another creature from that day on, but I exaggerated. Fish, I’ve killed fish. But I always cooked and ate them. Even so, I have to say I never actually took pleasure in killing them. I do enjoy fishing though and eventually embraced the practice of catch and release.

I was fishing for trout in Alberta with a friend one afternoon. We were fishing from a canoe in one of Alberta’s crystal-clear mountain lakes and my friend Bob hooked a good size rainbow trout. After a long fight, Bob finally landed the fish and brought him into the canoe. He immediately began to gut and clean the fish and when finished he held the fish in his hand and reached over the side to wash it off in the clear water. He lost his grip and we both watched the fish slowly sink to the bottom of the lake. I said, “Bob, I’ve heard of catch and release before, but this is the first time I ever heard of catch, CLEAN and release!” We both had a good laugh over that, but we didn’t catch another one for the rest of the afternoon. The fish angels were not looking too kindly on us after that.