Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters The Greatest hunter,

Teddy Roosevelt, the original big stick.

When it comes to hunting with superb guys and sharing a campfire with wonderful folks, it would be almost impossible to beat our own Johnny B and John Haviland.

And my late brother-at-arms, Chub Eastman.

Fantastic hunters, all.

Blessings,

Steve

comerade;
Top of the morning to you sir, I trust the summer has been going well for you folks out east and that you've been getting a reprieve from the last few years of fire season as we are this summer.

As I've mentioned often here before, I grew up in a land which no longer exists in that pretty much everyone I knew was a hunter or at very least had firearms about and shot things.

My late father and long gone favorite Uncle Frank would go on an annual moose hunt into "the bush" in east central Saskatchewan every fall and the family joke is that I was conceived when Dad returned one year, albeit without a moose.

Uncle Frank used to tease him and say, "You can't say you didn't get anything that year Fred - look at Dwayne here!" and then they'd both laugh and laugh - much to the embarrassment of any of the female members of the family present.

Since I'm the youngest, my siblings tell me that as early as 3, I began to want to go along on the annual hunts with them and though my brother who is 9 years older than me did go a couple times, he's never been a hunter, though he did hunt for a few years - if that makes any sense?

So for me hunting was something that was as natural and normal as milking the cow, feeding the chickens and pigs or shoveling snow for half the year - nearly everybody in Saskatchewan did that and so did I!

As far as specific hunting mentors however, I'd have to say that a cousin of mine from Medicine Hat showed me the light on careful sighting in your arm of choice, whitetail techniques and the use of good optics.

Writers who influenced me? Goodness sir if you could see my library - and I'll note I need to build more shelves or start selling books - that's a tough one. In the spirit of full disclosure, before I typed this response I slithered back downstairs and with a pen wrote down the authors I've got entire books from which include:
- Olaus Murie
- Russell Thornberry - a Texan who I believe is still in Alberta
- Michael Crammond - a BC writer who wasn't that bad actually - if you ever get out this way I'd lend you the books - but they're hard to find hard covers that I lucked into from way back in the day.
- Peter Hathaway Capstick - I know it likely wasn't him always, but my goodness I enjoy his story telling!
- Wayne Van Zwoll - underrated in my view, with an understandable, lucid manner of conveying information
- Jack O'Connor
- Skeeter Skelton - not exactly a lot of hunting, but a great story teller all the same
- Ortega y Gasset
- Robert Ruark - my liver and kidneys ache just reading his safari book....
- Jim Zumbo
- Zane Grey - one can tell he liked to fish more than hunt, but still an interesting sound bite of the times
- Clyde Ormand
- Elmer Keith - again entertaining style, but I got the impression he wasn't easy to be around at all times.
- Lawrence Koller
- John Barsness - I believe I've got everything in print that's still available from John
- Eileen Clarke - while not exactly hunting per se, her two books "Slice of the Wild" and "Sausage Season" are what I recommend to beginning hunters more often than any other book - but that's almost another thread....

Overall I'd say for sure John's writing has had the greatest impact on how I hunt and attempt to pass that knowledge on to other hunters when I'm either teaching a Hunter Safety Course or plain old mentoring/discussing the subject with them. A big part of that for me however is that John writes in a language which I understand - he's from Montana and as you know western Canada and the western states have much in common in the way we communicate and articulate our thoughts.

That and John has been gracious enough to answer many of my queries over the years either through email or PM's here - something I have always been grateful for.

My goodness I see I've typed a whole bunch and perhaps not adequately answered your question, but I hope so somewhat at least.

Finally comerade, at my stage of life now, I'm hoping that at some point in the future if there's still hunting and forums such as this exist in whatever form, when the question comes up someone will be able to say that a little bald guy with a big mustache from OK Falls was helpful for them when they started hunting.

If that happens, then I'll have accomplished what I'm endeavoring to do, you know?

All the best to you folks for the rest of the summer sir, may the fire season miss us altogether and good luck on your hunts this fall.

Dwayne

[quote=PennDog]Little Stick right here on the fire......there’s not even a close second. [quote]

Shirley, you jest !!


Jerry

My family hunted but upland game was their passion. Deer, eh, yeah, my dad would buy a tag and sometimes he'd even go.

I began chasing deer in my youth with a bow because back then you couldn't rifle deer hunt until you were 14 years old. So the books I had and read over and over as a preteen were by Fred Bear and Chuck Adams. Later I read about Larry Benoit's exploits and dreamed of tracking big bucks in the snowy woods of the north.

Herb Klein or Elgin Gates

Sealious and Sir Samuel Baker.

My brother's best friend has hunted the world over and has a very impressive collection of trophy mounts. He has the money and time to hunt the very best trophy areas every year. You might think he was a great hunter if you visited his home and saw all his trophy mounts but I have deer hunted with him here many times and he is no great shakes at all. In fact, I would be hard pressed to say he is any better than average.

Thanks, Dwayne!

W.D.M Bell then Corbett

Not shocked...I’ve had a few “Great Hunters” show up that quickly dispelled any truth to their actual skills from rifle handling, to shooting, to being in condition for the hunt ahead...Last years member-hunter who joined me not one of the above.

I did get a helluva laugh out of one hunter from Michigan who told me not to drop him off alone in the dark because the woods scared him...LMAO 😎

Well put , God Bless Dwayne.

As a contemporary of mine was also a half assed relation.My age, and at the time we were in our early 20's.
We hunted together and he managed to put together the finances for a run down guide/ outfitting business. Robert built it up to a world class outfit and most of us worked for him in these early days- some of my greatest memories.
As time went on he would travel to hunt in our off season and was killed by a Cape Buffalo.
Sad to this day but the irony in it was clear ,because he had killed many Grizzlies for clients ( took many chances)and would always say and I quote" Someday ,I'm gonna get it"
He got it by pushing his uncle out of the way of a wounded buff while hunting antelope in Africa. His Uncle lived.
He had taken his favorite uncle with him.
He was the most observant hunter I have ever seen. Quite a guy.

Frank Billum who was one of the old traditional chiefs of the Ahtna Athabaskans was one of the best hunters that I have encountered. He didn't need much and would get a big moosk every year. His 30-30 was state of the art and he would dote on it like a favorite child or pet. He kept it in a very nice beaded moose-leather case. I once got up enough courage to ask him why he put so much love into a levergun that had an effective range of 125 yards. He said it was because it was a hell of a lot better than the muzzleloader he had before or the bows and arrows that he started with.

comerade;
Thanks for the reply sir.

Interesting to know you were related to Bob - I recall very well when he was killed - my goodness though that was 2004 or so wasn't it?

I want to say it was after the Vaseaux Fire - we got evacuated for that one and were in the middle of a big house reno - anyway that was '03 and I thought Bob was killed after that, but I can't recall exactly when.

While I'd certainly heard of him and know a few folks that met him, I don't believe I did, though we might have been at a BCWF meeting together or something and not met.

Thanks again for the reply and all the best to you folks as we head into fall.

Dwayne

AGREED X2 YES Carlos Hathcock with maybe FRED BEAR 2ND ? these 2 did it without braggin .

Lots of great hunters listed. And no argument from me on any of them.

The greatest hunter I've ever known was a little female Brittany Spaniel named Mandy. Came to me fully trained because she didn't get along with toddlers and our friends, the folks who owned her, had two of them. In her eleven year career with me, she taught me more about bird hunting than I ever imagined. She had no quit and the heart of a lion. She was always ready to hunt, even when she got to where her legs wouldn't carry her for more than an hour. She'd hunt to exhaustion and do it all over again the next day if I'd let her. She'd retrieve a quail or a goose as big as her. She had no love for doves though. She'd go out and show me where they were but wouldn't pick them up. She taught me that her nose was far better than any method of perception I had and often found birds in cover so scant I'd swear no self respecting bird would ever use.

I know everyone is talking about people who influenced them, but little Mandy had as much impact on me as a hunter as any person I've ever known.

Geronimo.....

I have two uncles who taught me much about bringing home meat. Spent time hunting with them all through my childhood, and we never came home empty handed. Ducks, geese, deer, turkey, squirrels, rabbits, doves, quail, fish, and coons. Coyotes for practice and fun. One of these men was/is a commercial fisherman as well, and a fine cook to boot. Hunting is of little utility if you fail to turn the bounty into a tasty meal. My philosophy was shaped by these two men, and thus I am and have always been a meat hunter. We fished and hunted always for the table, and the one uncle fed his family and shared copiously with the rest of us for some lean financial years.

One of the best days of my life was the day everyone was at my grandmother’s house for Christmas, and she chose me to go out and get us some rabbits for the dinner. Not daring to disappoint, I took my only rifle, a Winchester 94 in 45 Colt, with a handful of my cast loads and brought back a limit of head shot rabbits in just under 2 hours. Grandpa asked what I used, and just smiled when I told him. The BBQ rabbit was delicious as always, but being seen as competent to get the meat on short notice in that family was a high honor, one that still gives me pleasure.

Growing up, Jack O'Connor is who I wanted to be as a hunter, but maybe more agreeable. Maybe because he hunted my kind of country--open, broken, wild, western. Coues in the Canelos, mule deer on the Kaibab, or jack rabbit in the Tortolitas, and he carried that same eye for the hunt around the world. It made me want to go. If he had hunted back east with his six buckets of corn and his slug gun--no thanks.

Greatest hunter is maybe an Eskimo in the Arctic winter. In no hurry, surviving with a rifle way too small. Or maybe he is a Tracker in Africa who can see sign that's not there. Maybe a fictional mountain man--hunting, trapping, trading--all the while, someone is trying to lift your hair. My thought would be Jim Corbett. His powers of observation, the physical toughness, and to get it done alone, in the dark, against the greatest hunters nature has.