Category: Cultural critique
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Those trophy hunters
Preamble regarding Cecil the lion; The saddest thing about the whole sordid affair is not a hunter with highly questionable ethics, who reportedly has been on the wrong side of game laws before. It is not an outfitter willing to bend and break the law, nor a method of hunting (baiting) which is in the…
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Bits and bobs
First of all, my article on baselayer technology and the excellent Rab Meco 120 and Kuiu Ultra Merino 125 shirts was recently published over at Rokslide. It is free to all, and I reckon most of you will find it interesting. Second, the most recent stage of the fight (which is the right word) to…
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Fruits and mercy
“For centuries, highways had been deceiving us. We were like that queen who determined to move among her subjects so that she might learn for herself whether or not they rejoiced in her reign. Her courtiers took advantage of her innocence to garland the road she traveled and set dancers in her path. Led forward…
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Bring bison back
Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks is currently soliciting public comments on Bison conservation and management, in what is the latest step in a protracted yet inexorable step towards reintroducing Bison into more parts of the Montana landscape. The debate promises to be a fierce one, for reasons I’ll summarize below, and the cultural stakes are…
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Thoughts for new hunters
This post is partly for Phillip, partly for other readers like him who are in the contemplation stage of hunting, and partly for my own reference as there will be some point in the near future when I’ll start to forget all the things I used to not know. Beginners mind is a perishable thing,…
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Dean Potter
It is probable that you know about Dean Potter’s death this past weekend; flying into a cliff while wingsuit flying in Yosemite. Like most attentive climbers in the 90s, I first heard the name Dean Potter in a tiny Wild Things ad in either Climbing or Rock and Ice, showing the above photo (or one…
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Trophy Country: the Thesis
“For all the grace and delight of hunting are rooted in this fact: that man, projected by his inevitable progress away from his ancestral proximity to animals, vegetable, and minerals -in sum, to nature- takes pleasure in the artificial return to it, the only occupation that permits him something like a vacation from the his…
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Those inscrutable bears
Griz postholing, Bob Marshall complex. A few weeks ago on Philip’s blog a comment-er admonished Mr. Werner for leaving food in his car while it was parked in the mountains of New England, contending that by doing so he was tempting the area black bears into becoming habituated to breaking into cars for food. I…
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My origin of hunting
Origins are important because they give context to our passions. I wish I could remember exactly where I first read about the Wilderness Classic, or first heard of Alpacka rafts, but I cannot. Both of those things happened in the last fifteen years, and both have shaped my life. As readers will know, hunting has…
Bedrock & Paradox 
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