Early Wild and Free Days Afield - Remembering Times Past Hunting for Quail

 Walking down, inside the draw, bordered on opposite sides by plowed fields that stretched to the edge of Oklahoma's Verdigris River. I kept my eye on and kept pace with my old hunting and fishing partner Ralph as he walked the upper edge and more difficult path of the draw to my right. A typical chilly day it was but all the walking kept us warm. His dog Dooley, a liver and white Brittany Spaniel, worked the cover in front of my path angling ever-so-often toward Ralph only to circle around again toward the middle. By this time we had already jumped one good covey of quail which had spread out across the draw. As we walked on, Dooley would lock onto point where we would flush a single here, then a double there. As we moved toward the far end of the draw, Dooley once again got real birdy and spun to his right and lunged into a clump of cover. A single bird rose almost straight up, then arched through the alders. I swung my Stevens 16 gauge double barrel shotgun leading the missile of a bird as it raced away. I fired and the bird crumpled. As I sauntered over to where the bird had fallen, Dooley met me there. He lifted the bird in his mouth then dropped it where I knelt low to retrieve it. Oddly enough, the bird was a Woodcock, a somewhat rare game bird to be found that far west, but more common in that part of Oklahoma. It was my first and possibly most enjoyable time I ever shot one of those birds.

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That must have been somewhere around 1978 or so, and I was just starting to learn how to quail hunt. Ralph, always the patient outdoorsman, spent many a day allowing me to tag along with him and Dooley as they visited and revisited his favorite old quail hunting locations. Those days, as it turned out, became some of the best wild and free days afield I ever experienced. He and I managed to spend a great number of days afield either hunting or fishing and each one contributed their own memorable rewards to the legacy of those days. Quail hunting contributed as much if not more to that legacy.

Ralph locked onto me and my good friend Rocky, and my brother Ken back then and seemingly enjoyed our company as much as we enjoyed his. Those quail hunts often turned into epic adventures. Like the time we drove the hour and half from Tulsa, picking up Rocky and my brother and his dog, a beautiful English Setter named Lady, along the way, to a public hunting area on Eufaula Lake, a place called Hichita. If I recall correctly it was either New Years Day or maybe the day after and brother was it ever cold. A mighty winter cold front had crashed into the state bringing with it some snow, strong winds, sub-zero temperatures, and the potential for a wonderful day afield. It was perhaps the single coldest day I ever hunted. Wind chills were well below zero.

There were several draws that dissected the fields with crop stubble still standing in them and we would spread out on either side of a draw and work our way down allowing the dogs to do their thing. Before long they were getting into birds and in spite of the cold, the shooting became hot and fast. We ended up walking across on the frozen fields wanting to connect up with another draw. The wind was blowing so hard, the falling snow flew sideways and its bitter bite cut through us like needles. Even so, toward the end of the hike across the field, the dogs once again got into the birds. Man-o-man was it ever fun. I'll never forget that day and oddly enough, wish I could do it all over again.

Hitchita became a fertile quail hunting area for us and on one such hunt later that season, we jumped one of the largest covey's I've ever seen. I swear, and I am not exaggerating, there might have been upward to 75 or maybe more birds in that rise. They looked like a cloud of smoke when they got up. It happened so suddenly none of us even got a shot off. We were so stunned by the numbers, we simply could not react fast enough.

Another similar covey rise happened out at the Okmulgee WMA not too far from Hitchita and not too long after.. Rocky and I were stomping around in there, he just on the inside of the treeline, with me walking just outside of it. We had no dogs on this outing, just us trying to walk up something. Within a few dozen yards, he stepped into another one of those huge covey rises, one very similar to the previously described rise. Neither one of us shot a single bird out of that rise, they just disappeared into the cover.

Most of the time, our covey rises were more typical with 8 or 10 birds getting up, sometimes even fewer. One time I took my brothers dog Lady over to an area we simply called 'Out at Morris'.  It was a place that covered maybe 40 acres or so with a couple of ponds where we did a lot of dove hunting and we often jumped several covey's of quail in there. Lady and I were working along a fence row where the cover was a little heavier. Out away from the fence row, the cover remained somewhat sparse with not much depth or thickness to it. After a while, Lady spun around and locked up on point. Problem was, she was pointing at an area where I swear the cover could not have been more than and inch or two high and it was pretty open as well. I looked at where she was pointing and could see nothing and I got kind of irritated with her and urged her quit to false pointing and to get going again. She would not budge. So to prove to her there were no birds in there, I sauntered over kicking at the dirt as I grumbled to myself and low and behold, a covey of about 8 birds got up, one of them hitting my leg as it made its get away. I never even got off a shot. Lady on the other hand, sauntered over wagging her tail obviously irritated with me for not believing her.

The quail hunting in Oklahoma from what I understand has taken a bit of a downturn over the years. It is still one of the best places to do such things, but land use practices, habitat loss, and other factors have caused the quail populations to fall somewhat. The odd thing is, a lot of folks want to blame the hunter for the decline. Truth is, if not for hunters, there might not be any quail at all for it is their purchase of firearms, licenses, and ammunition that provides the vast majority of funds necessary to the restoration of habitat. Most people do not realize that 80% of the quail population will die off each year regardless if they are hunted or not. What hunters harvest is simply that which will be lost anyway. Hunters as a rule are some of the best conservationist you can find and wildlife in general has benefited a great deal as a result.

About 22 years ago, I up and moved my family to Kentucky. Now Kentucky offers a great deal of outdoor opportunity, but it's Kentucky and quail hunting over here is simply not the same. Oh, there are quail here to be sure, but they are isolated and spotty and unless you have access to the areas where there are birds, the odds of ever having any kind of hot and heavy quail hunting action run rather slim. I haven't been quail hunting in 22 years as a result...and I sure do miss it.

The wild and free days afield of Oklahoma quail hunting are long ago behind me, but the memories of those days are as fresh and vivid as the days in which they lived. Remembering times past hunting for quail, well, sometimes it makes me feel a bit melancholy, but I am grateful for having had the opportunity to live out those days so long a go now.    

The Fascinating Art Form Called Black and White

 Some years ago I discovered the black and white world of Ansel Adams and I have been fascinated by black and white photography ever since. He defined what a black and white photograph should be and refined his technique to such a degree, his iconic images still stand the test of time even today. A good many modern photographers mimic his style, myself included, simply because his images defined the genres. The nature and flavor of a well-made black and white image stands apart from all other forms of photographic art. I love black and white and will often go out of my way to shoot for black and white.

Ansel once said, 'You do not take a photograph. You make a photograph.' Those words are so true especially when it comes to black and white. I have several photographer friends who are excellent photographers but they tend to shy away from creating black and white images. They have their reasons for doing so and I certainly respect their ideas and their work. 

Black and white to me though is the ultimate when it comes to creative photography. It must stand on its own merits where color will often bolster or support a creative color image, black and white must prove itself through the use of composition, story, contrast, shape, form, and impact. 

Although my photography background began in black and white, I rarely shoot in-camera black and white anymore. Instead I will capture a color image that I intend to convert to black and white.

 Capturing an image that is suitable for that kind of conversion takes an ability to see beyond our visual range. We see the world in color and knowing what actually works as a black and white image based on the color image becomes the challenge for not all images translate well into black and white. I look for certain elements. Things like dark blue sky with lots of texture created by clouds, or soft and subtle light produced by fog or mist. Snow scenes work well in black and white. Even portraits can obtain a powerful impact when turned into a black and white. 

Ansel Adams spent countless hours refining his darkroom technique doing mechanically in the darkroom what we can do digitally on our computers. Even so, I approach the conversion process almost the same for each image varying only in degree and placement of technique. Once I convert the image, I'll look more closely and study what is there, then begin to refine the image by selectively adding a bit of brightness or contrast to a specific area. The idea is to create an illusion of depth by enhancing key elements that need a little more attention drawn to it. 

Ansel Adams did this mostly by dodging and burning allowing more light to burn in a spot or restricting the exposure in another. He took meticulous notes on how he created each image and stored those processing notes with the negatives. I mostly just wing it until I get the results I want.

 Sometimes I simply sit back and say, "Wow!" when I compare the final B&W image with the original color one. I know I have completed the black and white conversion process when the image perfectly illustrates the powerful emotion the moment of light triggered when I made the shot.

Shooting for black and white is a fascinating art form, one where the photographer artist shares more about what he felt than what he saw. Black and white brings out a different kind and different level of emotion than a color image. It is more provocative and impactful simply because it uses the blacks and it uses the whites in ways our eyes cannot see until the image itself is created. 

Close Encounters

 The two mile hike into the heart of the 38,000 acre Tallgrass Prairie Preserve in Northern Oklahoma proved a more difficult hike than I anticipated. The weather had turned warm and breezy as it so often does across the Sooner state as time travels deeper into the summer months. The prairie, contrary to popular belief, is not flat or smooth. it can be quite rugged. This particular hike into a distant arroyo was characterised by uneven, undulating, ground covered with large jagged outcroppings and loose rocks that rolled under foot with almost every step. A twisted ankle or knee was a real possibility, not to mention a very good likelihood of encountering a rattlesnake or copperhead. As it turned out, running across a snake proved to be a non-issue. On the other hand, a couple hundred head of unseen wild American bison, or buffalo as most people call them, almost turned into a disaster.

The Tallgrass Prairie Preserve is one of if not my favorite location to explore. Explore is the operative word. Just driving through it doesn't do justice to the experience. You must move away from the dirt road and enter into its realm to experience it up close. Doing so opens up a world almost lost, a world where you are taken back to an ancient time. This particular day was not my first foray into this magical ocean of tall grasses. On previous hikes I had discovered a wonderful stoney arroyo that cut deep across the landscape almost splitting that section into two units. It proved to be a great location for photography.

I had pulled my Jeep off the dusty road and parked along a sort of wide spot that I supposed was considered to be a pullout. A couple hundred yards from there a shallow hill rolled to a smooth rounded top and just on the other side about half way down the slope was a rocky outcropping. From there the landscape angled down toward the distant arroyo. A good 45 minutes or so later found me angling across that stoney stretch and I worked my way deeper into the prairie and away from my point of entry.

I must have spent several hours hiking around in there and decided it was time to meander back toward my Jeep. My way out took a different route than my way in circling around that large shallow hill. Along the way I stepped into a dry creek bed that cut through the landscape. From the bottom of that creek bed I could not see very far over the edge and eventually determined I had traveled far enough to where I could now cut across and over to where I would intersect the road and then eventually back to my Jeep. When I approached the top edge of the creek bed, I noticed that a hundred or more bison had meandered in and effectively cut off my planned exit route. I stepped back into the creek bed and worked my way another hundred or so yards further down. Thinking I had moved far enough away from the herd, I stepped out of the creek bed and up into the edge of the prairie. This proved premature as I had miscalculated the size of the herd which spread across a larger area than I realized. When I stepped out, two very large, very mature, and very agitated bull bison stood about 50 yards or so from me. Behind them another hundred or so bison moved through the tall grass. My action startled the two bulls, and they broke into a dead run which triggered a stampede from the rest of the herd. Their first steps were directly toward me...and I had absolutely nowhere to hide. I was totally exposed. All I could have done was to have jumped back into the creek bed and curled up along the edge hoping they would move around me. As it turned out, before I made the jump, the herd turned away from me and ran off in another direction. The two bulls stopped about 75 yards out, turned, snorted and pawed the ground, displaying their disapproval of my presence within their domain.

Eventually, I made my way out and back to the Jeep, but not after my heart rate slowed to a more normal speed as the adrenalin slowly dissipated.

Close encounters with nature in the field can provide some exciting if not down right dangerous moments. A good many times over the years I have encountered unexpected circumstances most of them were rather harmless in nature, but a few proved to be something that offered a bit more of a challenge, like the time I was camping on the top of a ridge in Eastern Oklahoma along Flint Creek. It was the time I carelessly tossed a few fish bone scraps a few yards from where I had made my sleeping-under-the-stars camp. Later that night several skunks wandered in checking out the free fish bone meal scraps and two of them came within a foot or so from my head. Needless to say, I did not want to spook them and simply lay there hoping they would eventually move off. They did, but, that close encounter was one in which I dodged a rather pungent bullet.

Some of my close encounters were actually planned and hoped for. Just behind my home here in Kentucky are a good number of acres where wheat and corn are raised. The fields in the fall and winter attract a good number of deer. I'll often setup a makeshift ground blind in anticipation of capturing some interesting photographs of those deer. I've had many of them come within a few yards of me. Being that close to such an amazing wild animal and capturing them with my camera is truly a wonderful encounter.

I've had coyotes trot into my camp late in the night to begin to dig around and paw at the edge of my tent. I've actually slapped ones snout as he tried to jam it through side of the tent. Luckily he ran off.

Internet Photo

One of the more unusual close encounters happened when I was bow hunting for deer again back in Oklahoma on a very cold, single digit morning late in the deer season. I was about to freeze as I sat on top a small, hand built stand that leaned four feet or so off the ground, against a tree. It was still mostly dark, but I could barely see and hear squirrels moving around on the ground in the woods to my left. Being fully camouflaged with my face covered by a scarf, the only thing visible were my eyes. As I shivered in that morning cold air, I kept slowly turning my head left and right hoping to detect a deer nearby. As I twist my head back to the neutral position, through the darkness I saw two broad wings swooping silently through the air toward me. Barely three feet from my face, a giant owl, probably a Barred Owl, suddenly realized I was not something he could eat, and he swerved off to my left at the last second. It happened so fast I barely had time to react. I suppose, in the darkness and with me being full camouflaged, the owl could only see the white area around my eyes and face moving and he might have thought it was a squirrel working his way along a tree trunk.

Being out in nature can produce a lot of close encounters. Experiencing such things becomes part of the experience and collectively becomes part of your personal outdoor lore. I can't imagine an outdoor life without close encounters, well, things of that nature add a great deal of spice to life.