"Killing Animals Helped Me Make Peace With Death" by Nicole Qualtieri

[TOGIE]

solid read.

there needs to be more like this in hunting literature.

 

[FairWeather]

Ugh, poets.

I’ve tried to get through this article, but I just can’t stop rolling my eyes. The spirituality woo-woo-ness of it all is too much for me to stomach.

 

[howl]

So this fella I know hits a deer. It's over there flopping around and bleating on the side of the road. He hops out, looks at the deer and decides to stop its suffering. He grabs a knife out of the glove box and slits said deer's throat. The deer continues to flop, but now it's gurgling. Being a carpenter, he falls back on what he knows. He goes to his toolbox, retrieves a hammer and proceeds to beat the deer to death.

 

[Gerald Martin]

So this fella I know hits a deer. It's over there flopping around and bleating on the side of the road. He hops out, looks at the deer and decides to stop its suffering. He grabs a knife out of the glove box and slits said deer's throat. The deer continues to flop, but now it's gurgling. Being a carpenter, he falls back on what he knows. He goes to his toolbox, retrieves a hammer and proceeds to beat the deer to death.

It was either that or watch it try to hobble across the field on the stumps of two broken back legs. I still feel sick about it after 15 years. The brutality was from necessity of ending it as soon as possible, not because of being callous.

I know you weren’t referring to me and in my situation it was a hammer and then the knife because that was all there was to work with. It was still horrible and I hope I don’t have to ever do it that way again.

 

[howl]

"STOP <whack> SUFFERING <whomp> RIGHT <crunch> NOW!" .... <stab>

I'm dying over here. Just thought I'd do a blow by blow for greater comedic impact. I retold that one at the supper table tonight. Gets me every time. The boy-child laughed so hard he pooped himself. Granted, he has the flu and for some reason ate half a jar of pickles today, but still. Good story.

Anyhow, if you deflate both lungs with a knife they don't last very long.

 

[NKQualtieri]

YOU GUYS. I'm dead. Not really but you get the metaphor.

Thank you for all of the kind comments, for the eye rolls (well-deserved, I roll my eyes at myself all the time), and for taking the time to engage, agree, and disagree with this piece wherever you see fit. I think the point of good writing is to be challenging. And if you want to shit on poetic language, more power to you. I can be equally bitchy and acerbic, and I think both are talents LMAO

That's a piece I've been trying to write for years. It finally hit the place where I wanted it to be. Outside bought the piece, then rejected it when they read it. That seems to be the way of the information beast these days. No SEO? No dough.

The catharsis for me of sharing that piece was a big letting go. Twenty-five years is a long time to miss and grieve for someone. It's ongoing, but man, it was nice to get that story into the world.

Anyway, it's a gift to read all of this. I can take it on the chin as well as let my head grow to a size in which none of my hats fit. Please keep responding, critiquing, and pushing this kind of writing wherever you find it. I have recruited four other outdoor journalists and we're building our own publication at the moment under The Westrn brand.

I hope people critique it as much as they love it. Indifference is really the only thing that I try to avoid. I think, at this juncture, we need to have more difficult conversations and reckonings with ourselves that end with respect.

Thanks again. Really a gift to read each response <3

 

[NKQualtieri]

I'll add that not all of our pieces are going to be so poetic in nature.

Our first published piece of long-read journalism is "The Extreme Sport of Wolverine Research" by Katie Hill. You all might know Katie from her exceptional work covering CWD and her time on staff at both MeatEater and Outdoor Life.

We have stories incoming about working on Western films, eating horses, legally hunting mountain goats in Grand Teton National Park, the CO Wildlife Commission shitshow, sustainability in hunting gear, and much more.

Should be fun!

Also, I'm trying to get Randy to put together a collection of his many hunting stories he's written here into a book, so if you could be so kind as to share any stories with me I created a separate thread here!

 

[gouch]

I just read your story. I enjoyed it. Although your relationship with death is greatly different than my own, I appreciate the way you express yours. Your relationship with hunting, however, seems to be very close to mine.

 

[NKQualtieri]

I just read your story. I enjoyed it. Although your relationship with death is greatly different than my own, I appreciate the way you express yours. Your relationship with hunting, however, seems to be very close to mine.

Thank you for taking the time! <3

 

[MNElkNut]

Somebody once told me that everyone deals with death in their own way and to respect that. It was good advice then and still is now. Reading this affirmed that for me.

Hunting is conservation. This is more complicated the more you drill down. On the macro level, it is a tool used for wildlife management, so in my opinion, on the whole, yes, it is steeped in conservation (provided all laws and regs are followed). But how about on the individual hunter level? For some, I would say very little. For the person who is only in it for the kill. To, "get my buck". Immediately thereafter, hunting is forgotten until next year. Conservation is never considered. The only sliver of conservation is abiding by the regulations and serving as the point of the management tool.

But for many, hunting is the driver of conservation. I often think, did I harvest more animals or did I provide for more animals this past year? Did my conservation efforts result in a net gain or did my take make it a net loss? I think I am comfortably in the net gain camp and that makes me feel good, but it also makes me want to do more. One thing I struggle with is why others don't see conservation like me. Why is it so hard to get a young adult hunter to buy a $10 raffle ticket to benefit conservation, but will trip all over themselves to buy a Bladder-Buster sized soft drink 2 minutes later for $12? Why do hunters want to criticize the many great conservation organizations but not give of their time to help make them better?

I could write more, but I have to go soon to work a fundraiser. For conservation. I doubt I would do it if I wasn't a hunter!

 

[shrapnel]

I don’t get all philosophical about death and hunting. I hunt and fish because I like to hunt and fish…

 

[NKQualtieri]

I don’t get all philosophical about death and hunting. I hunt and fish because I like to hunt and fish…

I never asked anyone to get philosophical. This is a story about my experience with losing my dad to cancer when I was 15, then being able to understand that death isn't always a black cloud that takes something away from me. Hunting let me see that engaging with death could rewrite that story. That's all.

 

[NKQualtieri]

Somebody once told me that everyone deals with death in their own way and to respect that. It was good advice then and still is now. Reading this affirmed that for me.

Hunting is conservation. This is more complicated the more you drill down. On the macro level, it is a tool used for wildlife management, so in my opinion, on the whole, yes, it is steeped in conservation (provided all laws and regs are followed). But how about on the individual hunter level? For some, I would say very little. For the person who is only in it for the kill. To, "get my buck". Immediately thereafter, hunting is forgotten until next year. Conservation is never considered. The only sliver of conservation is abiding by the regulations and serving as the point of the management tool.

But for many, hunting is the driver of conservation. I often think, did I harvest more animals or did I provide for more animals this past year? Did my conservation efforts result in a net gain or did my take make it a net loss? I think I am comfortably in the net gain camp and that makes me feel good, but it also makes me want to do more. One thing I struggle with is why others don't see conservation like me. Why is it so hard to get a young adult hunter to buy a $10 raffle ticket to benefit conservation, but will trip all over themselves to buy a Bladder-Buster sized soft drink 2 minutes later for $12? Why do hunters want to criticize the many great conservation organizations but not give of their time to help make them better?

I could write more, but I have to go soon to work a fundraiser. For conservation. I doubt I would do it if I wasn't a hunter!

I love that you're a conservationist. So am I! Conservation is part and parcel of the engine that allows us to see forward for ecosystems, wildlife, and our connecting force between the two.

For ten years, I've seen my work in outdoor media as something that creates advocates, not new hunters. Though I have proof that I've somehow done both in that work. Really, if someone reads my writing, I want it to be accessible first and foremost. I explain beginner-level things in my writing, because I never think I'm writing for experts.

Imho 'hunting is conservation' is a frustration. No one beyond the in-crowd understands what it means. It's isolationist rhetoric for back-patting, which is fine if you're not focused on creating the type of people who will go to the ballot box with a more educated understanding of wildlife management. That's my whole goal with my new publication. Educating, inviting non-hunters in to the stories, creating echoes that reach out over the greater public rather than bouncing around the choir hall.

And anyway, here's a secret: the point of calling it into question in the story is to create cognitive dissonance and conversation within the chamber. It makes us all think about our attachments to words. Language is fun, and I am grateful for all the work you do to make these ecosystems work. Promise.