Missing Michigan Deer Camp

Every November 15th my thoughts turn eastward towards Michigan and the opening day of firearm deer season. It’s probably one of the few days I can say I truly miss home. There are plenty of things about my home state I miss but aside from friends and family, I find most everything is better in Montana, hunting included. Sorry Michigan. No disrespect intended.

There are WAY more species to hunt in Montana. Hunting season is much longer in Montana and there are over 30 million acres of public land open to hunting not to mention another 7+ million acres of private land available to hunt through the block management program.

Montana is a hunters paradise. The only problem is that for me the hunting experience has much more to do with those with whom you hunt and the traditions of hunting camp than with the animals and the available acreage.

Don’t get me wrong. Hunting under the Big Sky amongst mountains as far as the eye can see is an amazing experience and I feel incredibly blessed to be able to do it. The rules and regulations can be overwhelming as can the sheer abundance of land. Four seasons in I’m still searching for a place to call my comfort zone. Some place not too far from home with plenty of animals and not too many people. It’s not a difficult place to find. Once again it’s not that there are too few options but rather that there are way too many. Hopefully one day I will find that perfect location.

What’s missing? Friends with whom to share the hunting experience. Sure I’ve been invited on hunts here with plenty of folks and everyone is very nice and very helpful. I’ve made some friends and had some great hunts and even managed to harvest a few animals but I miss Michigan Deer Camp.

I would look forward to those 3-5 days of hunting all year-long and though the land mass was much smaller and the animals were few and far between those days spent with friends and family in the north woods of Michigan were unlike any other annual event.

More than 15 years hunting the same piece of land with the same people brought about a familiarity with that land which I doubt I’ll ever replicate anywhere else. It’s a place I felt welcomed  year after year. It’s a place haunted by ghosts (in a good way), by the memories of those who used to walk those trails but who have passed on. It was a state of mind as much as it was an actual physical place and I’m longing to return.

This is all about the heritage and history of my hunting life. It’s about friends, some of whom I’ve known my entire life, and it’s about an annual escape from the everyday world that happened for several days every November in the woods of northern Michigan.

It’s no different in Montana. I’m sure there are hunt camps that date back generations and everyone reading this who hunts knows exactly what I’m talking about.

I still look forward to hunting every year though my enthusiasm has definitely begun to wane. It’s a drawback of being a transplant. Perhaps someday I will find something similar here but as of now the hunting is just about the hunting rather than about the hunt camp experience and everything that encompasses.

Good luck to all of those still afield in Montana and Michigan and everywhere else. Enjoy your time in the woods and especially your time around the stove or the table or wherever it is you come together and enjoy the magic of hunting camp.