Tuesday, March 17, 2020

making deer strong again

Deer sketch, 2020
The deer we see in our yard are small.
For many generations, hunters have killed the biggest deer; they have mounted the largest racks on their home walls.  Their selection, unnatural, favors the small and the weaker deer.  I think this practice is going to change among our generation's young hunters.
In forestry there is a practice of worst-tree, single-tree selection.  You go in the woods, look around and take out enough low-grade trees to pay for getting them out.  You're not trying for a bonanza.  Every 15 or 20 years you do the same: take the worst, leave the best.  Every time you go back, the quality is better.  I read about this tree selection practice in Orion, Spring 2020, in a conversation between Wendell Berry and Tim DeChristopher.