Elk Hunt
“Find-de-elk.”
She cocks her head and waits for me to repeat the words, needing confirmation before her excitement boils over into leaps and bounds, prancing around the living room like a pronghorn in a springtime meadow. Having her complete attention, I stare at her for a moment and then just above a whisper:
“Find-de-elk.”
The dance begins, accompanied by soft whimpers as she eyes the sliding glass door, the exit way to miles of pine forest with its untold scents and sounds. She darts through like one of those greyhounds at the starting gate, pent-up adrenaline exploding off the porch and through the yard.
We stride past stately conifers fragranced with vanilla pine, gnarled oaks with their arthritic fingers spreading spookily in isolated patches, lichen-encrusted outcrops dotting the floor like islands in a sea of fallen pine needles, tassled eared squirrels and jackrabbits scampering up trees and into thickets, a landscape that overwhelms the senses with every wandering step.
We head southwest, following the afternoon sun. She runs, lopes, stops, always with nose to the ground, picking up the game scents that crisscross our path. Her short, creamed-coffee coat blends in with the surroundings and attests to her name: Java. She is a huntress, able to locate the bull elk that roam these woods, their burgeoning bodies hidden as we look for them through stout pine trunks and twisted thickets.
She stops suddenly, head raised, eyes staring off to the west. I follow her gaze to a lone bull a hundred yards away. He sees us, all of his senses tuned in our direction. The great rack atop his head held motionless like two barren branches from a gambel oak. I move forward slowly, deliberately.
I notice three other bulls blending in the shadows of the surrounding pines. One is bedded down, the other two stand like stiff sentries taking in my every step, and all but ignoring Java as she picks her way toward them, zigzagging around fallen trees, sniffing the air. Fore reasons I can’t fathom, she never startles them. In fact, her presence seems to reassure them that I mean no harm. I know they’ll allow her to get as close as she wants while remaining wary of me.
I proceed less directly now, veering left, then right, stopping behind a wide trunk, able to see the sprawling antlers, but out of the sight of their watchful eyes. They allow me to continue my approach, and I advance a few steps whenever their attention returns to feeding.
I can smell them now. The rich barn odor hangs in the still air reminding me of the animal stalls at the state fair. Raised a city boy, the smell of fresh manure and animal musk calls forth the imagined tranquility of open spaces, free of traffic jams and the pungent exhaust that clouds the highways. These are magnificent beasts. The lead bull’s rack towers above him like two enormous candelabras spreading almost as wide as my arms can reach. Raising his head high to sniff the wind, the points nearly touch his mottled brown rump.
I lean against a pine and observe them for a while. They graze somewhat warily, casting an occasional eye in my direction, but otherwise secure with the seventy feet of forest between us. The scene is surreal in a sense, watching wild elk as if I’m an equal in the forest, able to join them like a resident creature.
I decide to test my acceptance and so I step closer. But now I have crossed an invisible line and raised the tension of the small herd like a Wall Street lawyer at a farmer’s luncheon. The big bull turns and strides away, a signal for the others to follow, and so they snake their way through the maze of trunks and branches.
They march a short distance before stopping to observe my movements and reassert their private domain. I feel grateful, not wanting to be left behind like a clumsy intruder who failed to appreciate the grandeur of this moment.
I silently thank the big bull, but decide I have overstayed my welcome and so I retrace my steps. Java comes up behind me and nuzzles against my knee. I scratch her ears, then whisper those words yet again.
“Find-de-elk.”
Off she runs, ever hopeful to find a few more on the way home.