Chapter Six:
First Partridge
In the fall of 1986 I was very eager to shoot my first partridge. I had accompanied my father on several partridge hunting trips, and we had gotten only one. You see, the ruffed grouse is a bird whose population rises and falls in cycles. I think it was at its lower point in 1985. In 1986, however, we saw many partridges. My dad and I had an extraordinary day on Thanksgiving Saturday of 1986, hunting partridges out by the farm. Partridge hunting was a very important activity to me as it gave me something to really think about and study, and through that activity I was able to learn a great deal about a great many things…. The year of 1986 was a pivotal year in that it was the year that I was introduced properly, and at once, to the wonders of the aspen parklands and the bush in general, in the fall and the untold joys, wonders, sustenance, and adventures that lie therein. This is the story of that one day where I was, in the course of several hours, made a life long lover and student of the bush, and all that she can teach, and provide. This is what I remember of the day….
The day before, Dad was out, working on a train and it was a Friday, right near the 10th of October. I went to school, dreaming and thinking about hunting, as usual. We had made a tentative plan to go out hunting, just for partridge, on Saturday, if Dad’s work schedule permitted. On Sunday, we were planning to go looking for geese, we called that activity spotting, and, then, on Monday morning, we would possibly hunt geese and then on Monday afternoon we would possibly go hunting partridge, again! I was so excited, and the whole month leading up to Thanksgiving weekend, I thought and dreamed about it constantly! It was setting up to be a weekend of non-stop excitement! I even looked forward with excitement to the upcoming Sunday, because the driving around spotting for geese and ducks was especially exciting, and additionally, there was a family gathering at the farm for Thanksgiving dinner, so I would get the opportunity to spend time with family and to eat turkey dinner, in between hunts…!
Dad got home from work on Saturday morning, and he went to bed. I busied myself with going outside and walking along the North Saskatchewan river, watching the geese and ducks fly up and down the river and listening excitedly to their calls. By that time, I was an accomplished goose caller,... But the main thing that morning was to let dad sleep. At around Noon, dad got up and proposed that we go out to the farm to see if we “couldn’t get a partridge!” At last,The hunt was on!
I was so excited! We packed up our stuff. I took a .22 caliber rifle, a Cooey Model 60, and dad took the Savage combination gun, (22. rimfire/20 gauge shotgun) and we drove out to the farm. We stopped in and said “Hello,” as was the custom, and then, after we had done the requisite visiting, we drove out across the fields to a spot near the river, on top of the hills. I had never been there before. We got out of the truck and quietly closed the doors. We loaded our guns. Then, dad went ahead and led the way down toward the river. When we got to a certain spot going down the grassy hills, dad turned and handed me his gun, and then he crossed over the barbed wire fence line into the bush. I passed him the guns and then I crossed over.
The bush was beautiful, and it was an ideal day, with golden yellow fall colors and the earthy smell of decomposing leaves. There were lots of little plants on the ground, here and there,... and many of the plants were dying from the frosty nights, so a lot of the undergrowth in the bush was decomposing. There were still white berries, buckbrush, rose bushes, and there were willows and poplar. We headed East along an old trail, the Green Lake trail, and the walking was actually pretty easy. The temperature was about 10 degrees celsius, the perfect temperature for walking in the bush.
We got headed down the old overgrown trail, going quite slowly, stopping every so often and just listening and looking. Dad walked ahead of me, and I stepped and stopped in unison with him. We came to a kind of clearing and you could see quite well in the bush, at that spot, up the river hill, away from the river and dad began to whisper to me…:
“This is a really likely spot for partridge,... these cranberries are,...–”
But suddenly, he was interrupted, (mid sentence!) by the eruption of wings against air, as not one, two, three,-- but four partridges took off, uphill and away from the river! I was speechlessly jubilant! We looked at each other! Dad smiled and said, “let’s go after them!” and we started off the trail and into the thicker bush.
Now, you need to understand something. Chasing partridges in the bush is not easy. Once they’re spooked, they’re extra cautious. To make matters worse, they then tend to hide in the thickest, thorniest cover they can find. I was constantly getting thorns in my fingers and getting slapped in the face by willow branches,... and walking wasn’t easy, and it was a rather tough and unpleasant job. You can try to sneak up on a partridge after you startle it, but they’re usually warily waiting and watching and, many times, when they land they’ll run a distance away and hide, making it harder to find them after they flush.
We tried to get a chance at those first four partridges, pursuing them up the river hill, flushing one of them again, but we couldn’t get a good chance to shoot and so we made our way back down to the trail. We were now paying closer attention, and make no mistake, that the mark of a successful hunter is his attentiveness. One must learn to walk at the appropriate speed for the conditions of the wind, and the terrain, and for the habits and nature of his target animal—. If there are many fallen leaves and there is no wind, the noise of every step will be very loud and then perhaps you will choose to hunt a different area or a different species or to use a different tactic like sitting and waiting at a strategic spot.
We walked a ways more, and there was another partridge, clucking nervously and walking behind a willow bush. Dad motioned for me to come up and take a shot. I did shoot, but my heart was beating so wildly that I couldn’t hold the rifle steady enough and I missed! I missed once, then twice, and then the partridge thundered up and out of sight! I was really upset. I knew I could hit targets with a .22 rifle, but I wanted it too badly. It was silly,..., but I told myself there would be more chances…, and fortunately there were….
A while later, another partridge burst up in flight, straight out from dad, as he was walking in front of me, as we headed East, and he raised the .20 gauge and fired, dropping the partridge in mid-flight! We had one…! I was so happy! I missed a few more chances and grew even more desperate! Then dad shot another partridge, again in the air, but I kept missing…. The sun was now on its way down, and I was worried I was going to get “skunked.” Dad got yet another partridge in flight, and I was very impressed,..., but perturbed, too,.... We were doing well, we had three partridges, in only a few hours, and we could have had many more,... This was a drastic change from the partridge hunts I had been on in previous years where I had seen nary a bird! I imagined the nice, white breast-meat sizzling in a frying pan, and my mouth watered. Partridge meat has a mild cranberry flavour to it…. But it was now getting toward evening…. Maybe I would never have what it took to shoot a partridge, and to be a hunter…. I was anxious to prove myself.
We were heading back West, toward the truck, and hadn’t seen any more partridges for a while, when at last, another “Patty” took a step on the dry leaves, exposing its mottled, brown feathered body. I took careful aim at the neck of my target and began to squeeze the trigger,..., I wasn’t that steady, as I didn’t have that confidence that was soon to come to me, but this time I had knelt down and rested my left elbow on my left knee and that gave me a great deal of stability for holding the rifle. I held my breath and then slowly began to exhale as I concentrated on holding the little rifle steady…, at the sound of the rifle shot, the partridge's wings began to flap violently but it didn’t fly up or really go anywhere, in fact, its head and neck were on the ground and it was kind of flying in one spot all over the ground, creating a great commotion amongst the dry and crunchy leaves, and there wasn't much of a wind, so it was quite a loud spectacle. “You got it!” Dad said….
I was so happy! I had finally gotten a partridge! I hugged my dad. I watched eagerly, the bird, as it flapped its wings and propelled itself across the leaves one foot one way and then a couple feet the other, and I worried that it would fly away, but dad assured me, that it was dead, but that the flapping and movement was a product of its nervous system. I walked up to the partridge and picked up the bird and it flapped its wings a few more times, and I was a little scared….
It was reality. The bird’s neck had been broken and it was dead but it still moved its wings,.... I felt a great array of emotions and dad and I talked for a couple minutes about life and death and emotions and morality, before we began to make our way back toward the truck. When we got to the fence line, crossed over, and made our way up the hill, we saw a nice whitetail buck (deer) and a few does just out to the West, about 75 meters away. They were standing on a side hill that slopes down toward the Shell River and the sun was shining down on their beige bodies and the buck’s antlers, and the deer reminded us of the deer season that was just around the corner. We looked at each other and then looked out again at the deer. They were a rare sight, to be out in the open like that…. It was the end of an epic day. I had shot my first partridge, and I felt jubilant! What else could I hunt? How skilled could I become at hunting? I was determined to try harder at shooting and hunting and to become much more calm and skilled when it came to shooting. On monday we went back out to the same spot and I shot two more partridges! I was feeling pretty confident about everything. Admittedly I did have obsessive thoughts and disempowering feelings and sensations, but for some reason, I was able to just love the bush and everything in it, and I devoted my consciousness to doing as much hunting as I could, and I rarely thought about anything that worried or troubled me. I was nearly 10 years old at the time, and in the fall of the next year I shot my first goose. It was a positive time, and I felt safe, and I was blessed with a loving father and a neurochemistry that allowed me to enjoy life, simply by pondering and reflecting on my favorite activity in the whole-wide- world—- hunting with my dad. I felt so safe and happy. How blessed I was!