He’s there, somewhere. Stately, with a pointed rack as wide as Wyoming. He’s shy, and hides well, blending into the brush and thickets in both color and antler. Yesterday he eased quietly from the prairie meadow into nearby thickets and low hanging oak branches, the leaves still clasp to the mother trees. This morning he was distant from the herd, and the black rim edging the white of its tail barely gave him away … through the trees, half a football field away, his eyes focused intently on my every move.

This morning, about a half football field away, the buck eyed me warily.

There are other whitetail bucks around. A younger, smaller one was near the big buck this morning. Much less shy and much closer. Another one darted across the “lake road” the other morning with beautiful antlers, but a thin body. Not bold and beautiful like the buck at the foot of the ravine near and within the state park. Not the one I’m hunting.

While I like venison, I’m not a hunter. I don’t even own a gun. My hunting is with my eyes and a camera.

Like my hunter friends, I suffer with buck fever. Mine is of a different variety. Mine derives from this quest to freeze this majesty into an image, and is far from being frozen in anticipation of a kill. My quest is to capture life, not to end it.

My quest is to capture life, not to end it.

My Listening Stones Farm is about three miles from Big Stone Lake State Park, and like the park, the abandoned groves between here and the park create nice edge for seemingly dozens of whitetail deer. Less than a year ago I came across this stately buck in the park. For the past several mornings and late afternoons I’ve driven to the park in search of the big bruiser. Long story short, I’m still looking for a decent shot. There my hunter friends and I share a commonality.

Often I hear there are too many deer. Maybe. Who am I to judge. I can, however, look back to my youth in the rolling hills of Missouri and remember when there were no deer. None. People look at me with marvel when I say this. It’s true. When I was a teenager in the 1950s the Missouri Department of Conservation backed a stock trailer into the woods near to my father’s farm and released a buck and a handful of does. There were a few witnesses, though no celebration that I can recall. A photograph of the release was in the Macon Chronicle Herald. Now Macon County is often recognized as one of the ten best deer hunting counties in the nation by the hook and bullet magazines. My nephew claims it is a rare venture into his fields when he doesn’t see a deer.

I do remember what it is like when there were no deer. Translated to mean no magic. No graceful leaps over fences and downed logs. No doe-eyed stares. No fawns. No animals of freedom and the wild.

So I do remember what it is like when there were no deer. Translated to mean no magic. No graceful leaps over fences and downed logs. No doe-eyed stares. No fawns. No animals of freedom and the wild.

Sometimes I smile when remembering the books on whitetail deer by Leonard Lee Rue III. It was like he owned a deer farm. An old friend now living in Maine, who was once a photographer for the New York Times, recently asked if I owned a deer farm because of my sharing images on social media. No, and it’s not something I would want. I’ve seen a few deer and elk farms with their 12 ft. high fences, and I find them as sad statements on our commerce. And, sometimes at my exhibits at art festivals someone will say, “You must live near deer.” The first time I was surprised, then I took inventory and realized that, yes, I did have a number of deer images. This seemed more natural than unique.

A younger, smaller one was near the big buck this morning. Much less shy and much closer.

Equally sad are the tales. A friend was telling of his dismay of listening to a hunter describe the beauty of a frosty  mountainous area where he was hunting, and of a bull elk that had appeared suddenly to bugle classically on a nearby ridge … just moments before he raised a high powered rifle and put a bullet through its chest from a thousand feet away. The hunter’s description was an understandable admiration, yet with a troubling conclusion. If the moment is so magical, why put a bullet through it? I’ve heard deer hunters tell similar stories. I mean no offense to hunters. I simply have no understanding of such reasoning; no more of an understanding than I have of safari hunters who pose proudly beside an elephant, lion or pathetically, a zebra they have shot.

My brief glimpses of the majestic buck down the hill has given me hope of another year of his survival. This was the first of the two weekends of deer season. Hunters drive slowly by the groves, including mine, eying the edge. Unlike the predator hunters, they exhibit sportsmanship and exit their pickups to stalk their prey.

Last December I captured my first image of the buck of my quest. I’m still looking for an image this fall.

Yet, the Boone and Crockett mentality in search of the trophy rack … the spread of ten to twelve antler points … like the buck of my quest so proudly wears, often proves fatal; an animal of freedom and the wild that will so shyly and covertly slip quietly into natural camouflage for simple survival.