My Hunting Spot is Ruined
I've been struggling to find a way to tell this story. It's a personal one, and a simple one - but I believe it cuts to the heart of what it means to do this work with integrity. That is reason enough to try.
Good work is guided by experiential learning. Not the "experience" you chart on a resume - that is a record of where you've been. I'm talking about the lived reality that comes with being a true practitioner of what you advocate. As a geographer, I've always made a point of leading a personal life that is genuinely correlated with my area of practice. For me, that means being in nature; respecting the relationality of things; and finding community among people who do the same.
Every fall, I venture to the woods with my two dogs in pursuit of Ruffed Grouse. It has required me to become something of an amateur Grouse researcher, in service of a household that has always pushed hard for self-reliance. While the dogs help considerably, success depends on careful attention to habitat characteristics, forage, age, sex, weather, and historical patterns. My goal is efficiency - to avoid spending more time and resources than what's required to furnish my table with a commercially produced chicken.
This surgical approach has led me to some of the finest Grouse habitats imaginable. Like any good hunter, I won't divulge the specifics on the internet, but I can say that the best spots strike a careful balance of proximity to home, walkability, forage abundance, and cover from predators. The very finest have looping trails that intersect two or more ecosites (which are top secret) and catch frequent drainages. This has a practical purpose for the dogs, who get a change of olfactory scenery, don't cover the same ground twice, and get to have a drink every once in a while.
As I was wrapping up my season last fall, I began to notice the ominous presence of pink and orange ribbons throughout one of my most cherished spots. Having spent a good portion of my career in the forest sector, I recognised them immediately: my hunting spot was about to change forever. A quick look at BC's Forest Operations Map confirmed it - over 430 hectares of marginally viable timber was about to hit the deck. I stared at the screen in disbelief as my stomach started to churn.
As a solitary hunter, there was nothing I could do to prevent it - nor would it have been my place to try. The blocks had been developed by the local First Nation at a time when timber supply had reached a crisis point; their decision was both understandable and sovereign. I would have to find a way to move on, which in practical terms meant heading further down the road, into country that would take years to learn.
This is where the story becomes something larger than my inconvenience. Professionally, I represent the rights and interests of those who truly live off the land. For most First Nations, the desecration of hunting grounds is a routine affair - except that simply moving further down the road isn't always an option. In remote Indigenous communities, the ability to hunt rests first on quality habitat and a healthy abundance of country food species. It then requires the intergenerational knowledge of where the animals are, how they behave, and what to do after the shot. Finally, you need the tools to make it happen - and because quality hunting opportunities are consistently being pushed further from communities, that increasingly means access to a pickup truck and the finances to keep it fuelled. For all of these reasons, loss of a hunting spot is often mourned like the loss of a family member.
The hard part of telling this story is making sure it doesn't read as an attempt to equate my inconvenience with the profound and often generational loss experienced by Indigenous hunters. That is not my intent. What I want to return to is the concept of experiential learning, and how it can inform a better community of practice around natural resource development. To properly understand and manage for the concerns raised by First Nations, you need to have lived some part of that life - and if you haven't, you need to find someone who has. As decision-making becomes increasingly mediated by algorithms and predictive models, we risk losing sight of what is actually at stake on the ground. Corporate responsibility is about more than feeling good about the decisions you make. It should also put a little mud on your boots.
Yesterday was September 1st - the unofficial start of resident hunting season. I visited my little Grouse spot for the first time since it was logged, and I stood there for a while before I did anything else. Here I trained my first bird dog, bringing him from an unruly pup to a driven and disciplined hunter. In that process, I learned more about myself than I ever bargained for. When I go back to those moments now, I picture the way the sun would streak through the trees on our evening hunts, and how I could only ever see the top of his head as he worked down the trail ahead of me. I can smell the forest floor. I can hear the distant calls of the Elk that shared that place with us. Most importantly, when I recall those memories, I see a time that shaped me - not just as a professional, but as a person.
Sitting with all of this hurts. I will find another spot - that much is certain - but the wound is still fresh, and I am taking the time to honour this place before I do.
That said, there is a silver lining - and it has antlers. Elk are among the first beneficiaries of a fresh cutblock, and those I heard calling from the treeline on our evening hunts are already ranging freely through an open landscape; their world, paradoxically, has grown. As my household's appetite for big game deepens alongside my years in the field, I find myself standing at the threshold of a new chapter - one that will ask the same things of me that this place always did: early mornings, careful attention, and a willingness to be taught. The land does not stop teaching. It only changes what it has to say.
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