Diary of a rookie hunter: What I learned by not shooting a single duck

The first thing I really notice is the cat on a leash.

Daniel Schoonhoven is holding up a gorgeous, fluffy gray puss, the kind of cat who could have its own Instagram account a real stunner. He's explaining his cat has some leashed yard time every day.

The indoor/outdoor cat debate could be its own article. Cats who are allowed to roam have shorter lifespans and a negative effect on the local songbird population. Other folks claim cats are predators who don't get to satisfy their natural curiosity when trapped indoors.

Putting a cat on a leash for an hour or two each day seems to give cats the best of both worlds:they get to spend time outdoors in the natural world, but are prevented from wreaking havoc on the ecosystem.

I'm not a vet, biologistor cat ownerbut I always interpret a cat on a leash as a good sign.

You see, Daniel Schoonhoven is a friend of a friend, and he's offered to take me hunting. I'm a little nervous about it (hence my preoccupation with his cat).

I've wanted to write about hunting for some time, but didn't know how to start. The debates surrounding the topic are complicated; some argue hunting is unnecessary in a culture capable of farming animals, while others suggest it's cruel and promotes gun acceptance insociety.

There are counterpoints to those arguments. First, hunting can be an effective form of animal population control. In places without natural predators, animal populations can grow to the point where they destroy ecosystems, causing large numbers to starve.

Similarly, the hunters I've met tend to be great conservationists, using all parts of the animal and donating widely to conservation causes.

Daniel agrees with that last point.

"I think the more time someone spends in a natural environment, the greater the sense of appreciation and urge to preserve and protect that beauty," he tells me.

He points out that some of the world's most successful conservation efforts were founded by hunters: Ducks Unlimited, a wetlands conservation non-profit, being one of the best examples.

I should also stress that despite the debates, I've wanted to learn more about hunting for some time. Not trophy hunting I have no interest in mounting heads. Instead, I'm interested in hunting small game, like grouse, duck, and geese. I love the flavour of game meat: it's rich and interesting and complex.

I've also decided that if I'm going to eat meat, it has to be locally farmed or found in the wild. I want to be involved in the way I eat and, to me, that means at least learning something basic about hunting.

The basics

As we begin our hunting adventure, Daniel rattles off a list of gear. "A gun with a case, trigger lock, ammunition and cleaning kit some rubber boots, an article or two of bright orange clothing and a sharp knife are what I'd consider the bare essentials," he says.

He glances down at my running sneakers. "Maybe rubber boots are the most important thing," he adds. I nod and tell him that I am prepared to sacrifice my sneakers.

Daniel's also packed extra layers of clothing, a wilderness survival kit, a variety of snacks, binoculars andplastic bags (for dressing game).

We're going hunting for ducks, he tells me. It's later in the afternoon,and Daniel explains that we're about to trek around two different ponds.

The ducks land on that water around sunset to rest overnight. You're allowed to hunt for only 30 minutes after the sun has set any later and it's far too dark to safely use a gun.

He warns me we're probably not going to get anything. "You tend to have much better luck earlier in the season," he says."After that, they get a bit wary."

Born hunter?

As we hike, we chat for a minute about how hunting can seem a little inaccessible.

I've often felt if you weren't born into a family of hunters, it can be pretty impossible to learn. He agrees, but points out that the paperwork is very doable: a firearms safety course, then a hunting education course.

"Besides the courses, there is very little paperwork involved," he says. "You just need to provide basic information and certifications, and at the end of the season you submit information about what you harvested and observed. That data is used to aid in wildlife management."

I wonder aloud if the gear and the expense of starting up makes it a difficult hobby or lifestyle to pick up. "Not really," is Daniel's answer. A few hundred dollars, about the cost of picking up golf or skiing, is all you'd need, he explains.

We move further around the pond, and a small wooden structure catches my eye. It's a duck blind cobbled together by other hunters. It looks like a fort you'd build in the woods as a kid a little rickety, a little cosy. Ahead of us, three little ducks are floating on the water. Daniel signals us to stop, but then he says, "No. Those are just decoys."

We reverse and trek back the other way. Daniel's actually not great at shooting ducks. He's fairly new to it, and he's sharing stories about his near misses.

He has better luck with partridge.

Taste of the game

Partridge is one of those meats you probably won't come across very often, unless you know someone who can kill it for you.

Daniel describes it as the chicken of the woods.

"But it's more comparable to a free-range chicken than a factory-farmed one," he clarifies. When he cooks game, he keeps it fairly simple to bring out the subtle flavours.

"A few days ago, I put the whole partridge breast along with some chunked vegetables in a casserole dish," he recalls. "I used some olive oil, sprinkled over an herb-based spice blend, poured a half-cup of wine in the bottom for moisture, and roasted it in the oven."

I'm particularly curious about gizzards. I've always wanted to confit them in duck fat and see if they taste as rich as I imagine.

Daniel doesn't believe in wasting anything, but he doesn't touch gizzard anymore. "I'm a little burnt out on gizzards, but I don't waste them. I give it to a friend and he fries it up."

We're almost definitely scaring away birds by chatting, but I have a lot of questions. I ask about field dressing and how quickly you need to break the animal down.

"I field dress the animal as extensively as possible.It is very important to cool the meat [right away]," he says."Field dressing immediately helps with that."

A lesson in patience and perception

We're almost at our second spot now, and the sun is setting. Small trees and tall reeds create a natural duck bind and Daniel advises me to tuck inside and hide.

"Ducks actually have incredible eyesight, so hiding and wearing camouflage is important," he explains.

It's a little chilly and I'mregretting the whole sneaker thing. Daniel mentions that a lot of hunting is sitting and waiting. "Do you bring a book?" I ask. "No. I think the second you got absorbed into your book, the ducks would come and you'd miss your chance. You just sit and wait."

I'm really impressed by this. I feel as though and this is just conjecture hunting would probably help with your sense of concentration and focus. Daniel agrees. "It's really interesting what you can hear when there are no cars. No human noises. It's really peaceful."

The sun is setting, so we start calling the ducks. Nothing comes. I think I see a duck out of the corner of my eye on the other side of the pond. I borrow Daniel's binoculars to investigate, but it's just a rock. A few minutes later I think I see a duck again, but it's just a bigger rock. We hear a bird call out and I look to Daniel hopefully, but no luck. "It's just a songbird."

He tells me about a moose trip he recently undertook. His friend brought his sons and they all walked around the woods starting at 6 a.m., finding nothing. After getting back to the campsite, Daniel had a little nap in the sun and started snoring.

The youngest boy was convinced the noises were coming from a moose in the woods and kept telling their father he could hear one. "His dad had to keep telling him that it was just me. It's funny, but when you're hunting you do start thinking every noise is the thing you want it to be."

Daniel calls it an evening on our behalf. It's 30 minutes after sunset. We're not getting a duck.

I'm cold and a little desperate to warm my feet, but I'm not disappointed. I still had an adventure in the woods. As we head back, I ask Daniel if he wants to respond to any misconceptions around hunting or hunters.

"I think the big thing is debunking the idea that hunting is unethical or cruel," he says.

"From a sustainability perspective, wild meat grows in harmony with the natural environment. There's no fertilizers [or] pesticides, and you don't get the ecological damage of macro-scale land clearing."

Much like his leashed cat, Daniel seems to have found a middle ground about his philosophy on humaninterference with other species.

"I think hunters, fisherman, and gatherers spend so much time outdoors that we end up having really balanced perspectives on conservation," he says.

"We understand that sustainability and conservation are less likely to succeed with no human interaction but controlled human interaction is important."

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