Am I crazy or would you agree... solitude v success

[th88]

older I get, more i seek solitude. but im not going to an area devoid of game to get the solitude.

 

[Irrelevant]

Have you considered hunting somewhere else?

Nope... That's never crossed my mind

 

[Big Sky Guy]

Sounds like you’re at a similar stage/mindset to me and many others. Generally, I would rather not see any of my target game or people than to see a bunch of game and people. There are some caveats and area, access and ability to get away from folks may change this a little. I also don’t let seeing folks at the parking spot/trailhead discourage me like it use it as 9/10 times they have completely different plans than I do.

During the late elk seasons, similar to ice fishing, I’m a bit more social and find great joy in helping others succeed (twice I have run into two different complete strangers and we “teamed” up and both killed cows that day). Perhaps if those guys had been complete dicks my view would be different lol. The game is either extremely bountiful or non existent so that’s probably the difference versus searching for an antlered animal that I would be excited about. If I’m still hunting that late I’ve already gotten my solitude experience and am just seeking meat.

 

[texwest44]

Modest idea: I would hunt to a place with a lower success rates in exchange for a less crowding. I would swap some odds of success for having fewer people hunting the same space. Is this illogical? What's the threshold?

I've been wondering about this for years! It seems intuitive to always be dynamic in where to hunt, right? Animals move, conditions change, spots get burnt (literally and figuratively), etc. Considering animals often try avoid human activity in the wild, being in places without very many people just seems to make sense.

Then I came to Montana, where people hunt the same drainage and fish the same hole nearly religiously. Seemed kinda strange at first, but then realized that something had to be going on, because it was so consistent. A lot of the old timers I would talk to had their spot they would go to every year, and the ones who knew each other knew those spots, and it was territorial in a friendly way. Same with fishing - if you're familiar with fishing around Helena, people treat the Causeway and Hauser Dam powerhouse like they have ancestral fishing rights there, and if there is someone there, they will sit and wait for them to leave.

And that was the thought that sort of flipped it for me. They aren't stubborn, necessarily, nor are they just lacking in creativity. They hunt that drainage for elk every season and they exclusively fish that hole because it's a part of the culture. You put work in to find a productive place, or you inherit it from family, and it's 'yours'. You may share it with others, sure, but the very close relationship they've built with that certain place for hunting or fishing becomes unshakeable.

It has a sort of indigenous aspect that I appreciate. They've built a reciprocal relationship with that spot, and in return for their blood, sweat, tears, and stewardship, they have productive and reliable access to fish and wildlife and maybe even some kind of spiritual satisfaction. That seems agreeable enough.

Where I live and hunt now has great animals and virtually no pressure, so I'm pretty happy with sort of always being on the move, but even I've noticed that my roaming area has gotten a lot smaller than it used to be, and I basically stick to the same 3 or 4 areas these days. Maybe that's the next entry on that preposterous hunter stages list: become so connected with the land and wildlife that even the suggestion of hunting somewhere else is just plain ridiculous.