Being a ranger, I’m often torn between two extremes. I make my livelihood in the woods and meadows away from civilization. I act as a guide and a scout, but I also spend a lot of time hunting and fishing. I hunt and fish for my own food, and also to sell in town. While I see the woods as a resource, I also see it as one of the few places of true peace.

Man has not influenced the woods like he has the valleys, plans and hills. The woods are still wild and free. When I’m a week out in the woods, I forget that I’ve come there to harvest its bounty. I become part of the woods and feel like I should be protecting it, not be hunting it.

This last week I was high in the foothills. I had been tracking a herd of elk for three days. I knew I was catching up to them because the scat was getting fresher. Early in the morning I was making my way through some heavy underbrush when I caught site of movement ahead of me. I quickly put down my pack and strung my bow. I started forward again, looking for another glimpse of whatever I had seen.

There, up in front of me 40 yards, I saw a brown figure, hidden in the bushes. I notched an arrow and  drew back my bow. I was about to let the arrow fly when I stopped. A voice in the back of my head said, “What are you shooting at? Are you sure?” The voice was right, I didn’t know what it was. I released the tension on the bow and started to track my quarry again. I followed for another half an hour before I could truly identify what I was following. All that time I was thinking to myself, you dummy. Why didn’t you take the shot?

As I watched and prepared to to draw my bow again, a deer stepped out from the underbrush and into a small stream. Beside it was a two or three day old fawn. I unstrung my bow and headed back for my gear. If I had ignored the voice in my head, if I had looked at the woods as just a place to collect some meat, I would have killed that deer and as a result the new born fawn. I had spent a half hour being mad at myself for not just shooting. Afterwards I realized that I would have spent days feeling bad about shooting, if I had.

After I got my pack, I noticed the deer’s tracks in the mud and those of the fawn. I had been so anxious to kill that I hadn’t even seen the signs right in front of me. It took me another two days to catch up to the Elk. I picked out an older one that appeared to already be hurt. The meat probably wasn’t as good as one of the younger ones, but that didn’t really matter. What mattered was showing respect for the wild, honoring it, and being part of it.