Oh, deer. (Photo by QUOI Media Group.)
I am not a hunter. I don’t (and will not) own a gun and, though I’ve toyed with the idea of bow hunting in the past, my aim really stinks. Even so, the deer population where I live does need to be thinned, since we’ve taken their natural predators away.
And I sure do appreciate a good venison steak.
Here in Nebraska does are not in short supply — in fact, many hunters are after a trophy buck and the state has to push hunters to shoot their female counterparts. Having many more does than bucks is not only bad for the raw population numbers — because one buck can sire many offspring in a season — it’s also bad for the genetics of the wild herd. This year, the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission was giving out plenty of “antlerless” deer permits, and our neighbor said if he was able to shoot an extra deer, he could give us some of the meat.
The opening day of deer season arrived, and by noon my neighbor had bagged a huge doe. Many laborious hours later, he had steaks and ground meat waiting in the freezer for h... Read more
