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(continued) When we finally get to the top, I realize that the ranch house that I saw from a mile away, and the place where we will sleep for the next few hours, is a prefabricated mobile home. Although from the outside the tan-and-brown structure doesn’t look like much, once you get inside you can easily notice the years of work spent fixing it up into something quite nice and relaxing, something with character. We quickly put our things down and after Brock gives me a tour, we wind up in the family room where there are three large gun safes. Of the three safes, he picks the green one and pulls out a Remington 7-millimeter mag, wood stock, bolt-action rifle for me, and a Remington .243 for himself. He won’t show me what’s in the other safes. “You don’t want to know what’s inside those,” he says. “It’s better that way.” It’s now close to 1 a.m. and we place our guns by the door, as we try to get in a few hours of sleep before waking up at 4 to beat sunrise. Tonight’s only been part of the journey; tomorrow morning we are going for boar. The wild boar, or hog, is known by various names, but in California it is officially termed the “feral pig.” Wild boars are not native to the state. The modern-day California wild boar is a descendant of the better-known domestic swine that was brought here during the Homestead era by settling farmers. Over time they were allowed to roam freely throughout the land and eventually established their own breeding patterns in the wild. Generations of living under these conditions made for a long evolution into the animals we know today, which look much longer and rangier than regular farm-raised pigs, and have elongated, straightened snouts, larger shoulders, and straighter ears and tails. The boar is one ugly animal. It looks like a big snout with four legs jutting out from it. Its black hair, originally used in older times for toothbrush bristles, is coarse and uncomfortable to the touch. A mature boar, usually between 5 and 10 years old, has long, jagged tusks stemming from its mouth and up through the sides of its snout. It’s a mean animal that will defend itself aggressively if provoked, which means that if you’re going to try to kill one, you better make sure that you succeed. Chasing an angry, wounded boar into the brush comes with damaging consequences. At 4 a.m. on the ranch the sun has not yet risen. It’s freezing outside and the ground, thick and unusually resilient to the cold, is still a little muddy from the rain a few weeks back, clinging to our boots and squishing under our steps. We scramble to gear up and head out under the cover of darkness to make it into the field before “shooting light.” Hunting is illegal before dawn and after dusk because that is when most animals are out roaming. Violation of this offense is considered poaching. Our goal, however, is to “spotlight” a good group of boar, stalk them, and be ready to shoot by sunrise, or at least that’s how my hunt is supposed to go. We grab our guns and head for five large steel sheds that are equipped with everything we’ll need for our expedition. While Brock gasses up our World War II-looking Jeep, I fumble to put on the full camouflage jumpsuit that he’s tossed at my feet. The material is rough and stained with the blood and dirt of previous hunts. As I zip myself up, I think about the purpose of the camouflage. It’s like spots to a cheetah or stripes to a tiger; the goal is still the same, to make it easier for me to kill my prey. I look at myself and realize that I arrived here only hours ago, a city boy wearing expensive jeans and bearing no real idea of what this was going to feel like. When ready, we charge down the hill and onto the field that contains the airstrip below the house. We do this because Brock thinks that this is where we are most likely to spot boar loitering around the small pond at the end of the runway. Also, in years past, this is where Brock and his father have planted barley, a food source irresistible to boar and elk, in order to draw them out from the shrubbery where they conceal themselves. During the warmer seasons, boar tend to gather mostly in thick, treacherous brush, keeping cool in the shade and out of the open. It’s still winter though so we might be able to catch a break because the cool weather draws them out longer than normal. Regardless of the weather, the mature, full-bodied boar with large tusks is the rarest and most difficult to hunt, because with age they become more nocturnal and stay virtually invisible in the daytime. These are the trophy boars that seasoned hunters actively seek out as a testament to their skill and savvy. The downside, though, is that the larger boar’s meat is sinewy and hard to eat, which is why they are often given the name “sausage pigs.” The smaller and younger boar, however, are less cautious when moving about and often make mistakes, weaving in and out of the brush, allowing windows of opportunity to be caught with a hunter’s scope. This meat is more tender and tastier, too, so pigs of this size are said to be “eating-size pigs.” Brock tells me that this is the kind of boat we are hear for. No trophies. About an hour and a half later, and by now nearly seven miles away from the ranch house, we park ourselves in a small field dotted with cows and large clusters of willow trees. The early hour and time spent “glassing,” or searching with binoculars, fields upon fields of tall green grass and waves of thick oak trees has given way to boredom. There’s still no boar in sight. Spotting dozens of squirrels criss-crossing the field in front of us, Brock, with a crooked smile, suggests that I make my first kill. I should see how it feels, tame my emotions, and prepare for inevitability killing something much larger. I raise my rifle for the first time today. Each time I get a squirrel in my sights, I remember the practice that I had one afternoon in a small industrial-looking shooting range in Orange County. But that was only paper targets. Breathe slow, clear my thoughts, pull softly, and don’t rush. That’s all I have to do. With each squeeze of my finger the squirrels explode into an unrecognizable pile of blood, guts, and hair. The sun has started to come up as we continue slaughtering squirrel after squirrel, to the point where it has become more recreational than educational. I find it to be rather twisted but still slightly fascinating—thrilling, mesmerizing—at the same time. I remedy whatever guilt I have with the fact that these, I was told, were ground squirrels that if left to populate to heavily, they would eventually burrow in and collapse the dams that regulate the water level of the lake in the middle of the property. My fascination was short lived, though, and soon became too much for my conscience (and my stomach) to bear when I realized that the bloody landscape in front of us looked less like hunting and more like the aftermath of one of Quentin Tarantino’s gratuitous gore scenes. At this point we decided that we’ve had enough and head further north up to Buck’s peak. At 4,200 feet, it is the highest point on the ranch, and on a clear day, you could easily see all the way to the Sierras on one side and all the way out to the ocean from the other. It’s as if someone had crumpled up a piece of paper and then opened it back up again. Brock takes me to his favorite place. We descend to another set of mountain ridges called “Brock’s Bowl,” named by his father because of the formation of the landscape. We take one of the ridges back, heading toward the house again, determined that the day not end until there is a freezer full of meat.(continued on page 3) |
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