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It happens every year around this time. Someone asks if I want to hunt pigs, or fish sturgeon, or if I want some elk or moose or somesuch. The answer is always a polite but firm “no.” While I like doing all these things, and I appreciate being thought of, the simple fact is that my freezers runneth over. Both of them. And I cannot justify killing something when I am in such a position.
I can thank my mom for this. She is a quintessentially thrifty Yankee from Massachusetts who instilled in all of her children a fierce rejection of waste. There is an old Depression-era quote that goes something like, “use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without.” I try to live by that. I have strong memories of mum forbidding me to eat more oranges or buy more books until I had finished those she’d bought me previously; then and now, I have always been a notable eater of citrus as well as a voracious reader.
Sometimes I still marvel at how I came to this hunting, angling and gathering life of mine. I remember distinctly a conversation I had with my friend Chris Niskanen, more than a decade ago. I’d posited that, even given state and federal possession limits, one could live off fish and game fairly easily. You’d just need to be ecumenical about what it was you hunted and ate. Niskie argued that fish, and game especially, wasn’t something to be hoarded. It was something to be enjoyed within the season, a marker for the passing of a year.
When I moved to California in 2004, I set out to prove my point. And I did. I haven’t bought meat or fish more than a handful of times — mostly stray octopuses and the rare chicken — since that date. A look at the recipes on Hunter Angler Gardener Cook will tell you what I eat: Venison, waterfowl, wild pigs, upland birds. Salmon, sturgeon, stripers, rockfish, lingcod. Shellfish, mushrooms, wild plants. It’s a good little life.
At first, I drew up overly complicated calculations about how many pounds of this or that Holly and I would need to collect to “make it through” a year — as if there were no supermarkets nearby. But within a couple years the calculus changed. Holly and I each became much better hunters, and our situation switched from one of scarcity to abundance, even over-abundance. We eat duck several times a week from October to January, and still we end the season with a full possession limit of duck, not to mention a couple dozen geese or so.
It was this ducky bounty that stirred a voice within me, a voice that spoke the word “enough.”
What is enough? It is a strange feeling when it first comes over you. It first manifested itself in me by a strong urge to not shoot marginal ducks, just to run up numbers. I didn’t need to shoot my limit of seven. A pair of pintail or mallards or fat wigeon would do. (It is important to note that this feeling normally doesn’t show itself until Christmas, a full two months into our season.) AÂ full freezer is physical evidence of this. It is a statement that says:Â You have succeeded in providing for yourself and your family. Now go do something else.
Initially, that something else is to process the meat and fish in various ways. That’s why I have entire sections on this website for smoking fish or making sausages and curing meat. But over the years I find myself eating less and less cured meat. Sure, I still like to eat it, but do I really need 50 pounds of salami? Does anyone?
I hear you. You’re asking me why I don’t share my bounty with the neighborhood, or with friends? I do. But just as I don’t hunt to feed coyotes, I don’t hunt to foist game and fish on my friends and neighbors. Sure, when the salmon run strong I am never at a loss for takers, but wild duck and venison can be challenging to cook for the uninitiated, so my takers are fewer. And as it happens, my block is loaded with hunters and anglers, so we all seem to find ourselves in the same boat.
Slowly, quietly, the answer seeps into me. Each year I hunt and fish I find myself calmer and more confident about my ability to have enough game and fish to suit my needs. I no longer feel the need to shoot limits of ducks every time I venture into the marsh, and I am finding myself taking less experienced hunters out more often, donating many of my birds to them at the end of the hunt. For me, there is always another day. For them, this might be their only time in the field.
In fishing season I often stop well short of a limit because I know I will not be able to eat what I catch before I have to freeze it — and, since I may well be fishing again in a few days, I might as well leave the fish alone. I’ve even gotten to this point with mushrooms. I could have picked ten times the weight of morels I harvested last season had I wanted to, and could have sold them to boot. But I didn’t. Foraging for money taints an experience that borders on the spiritual for me. It doesn’t mean I never do it, but I find myself doing it less and less as the years go by.
All of this leads me to my point: Find equilibrium. Know what you need from nature and take no more. I know many of you will disagree. You find great happiness in shooting 200Â ducks a year, or in shooting a half-dozen big game animals or catching scores of tuna or salmon. There is nothing wrong with any of this — if you, or a friend, or a neighbor eats it all. But mind your freezer. You killed everything in it, and it deserves your care and attention when it comes to finishing the task of hunting or fishing.
And just as a full freezer is a sign of success, the space created by eating it down week by week will feed your hunger to get back out there and enjoy what the new season offers. Niskie was right.
my father taught us fifty years ago, that there was no hunting without respecting and using the creatures you hunted. I still remember my brother glumly contemplating the tiny roast mousebird he’d shot with a pellet gun – Dad made him cook and eat it.. ha.
Thank you for the article. It has given me a new reason for gratitude. I’m such a lousy hunter and fisherman that I’ve never had the problem of a full freezer: so I’ve never had to limit my time fishing and hunting. Fortunately for me the time afield is my primary reward.
I completely agree with you, Hank. I catch and eat fish (bluegills, perch, crappies) frequently in the spring/summer in Michigan, and enjoy many great meals during that time, but I rarely freeze any fish filets. In the winter, we spend time at the Texas Gulf Coast, and I catch and eat my fill of black drum, seatrout, and redfish while I’m there, but I never haul any frozen filets back home. Doing it this way, I look forward to the great fresh fish meals every year in each place. I do (in most years) have quite a bit of venison in my freezer, which I enjoy eating through the winter months, but even that is usually long gone before the next deer season.
Have you ever thought of forming a loose coop/barter/food share with folks who procure different food than you? I know I share some of the fish I catch with an elderly couple who are always sending me home with homegrown produce or home cooked meals. I’m sure there are a lot of folks who would love to trade for some of your charcuterie.
Hey Hank,
I was thinking along the same lines. With Salmon season opening this weekend on the North Coast of California, I made lox of my last package of salmon. Also won’t go Abalone diving until my last piece of ab is eaten.
Thanks Hank, Very good thoughts for what we catch, shoot, gather and grow, and more broadly how we live. An old book by John Hersey–BLUES (the fish not the music) is a fune read relating to this stuff.
Here is how to help clear the freezers…
Me and a few of the guys in our hunt club are sponsoring a “Wild Game” dinner for 50 in a few weeks. Outer Banks Style Clam Chowder, Stuffed Quail with Wild Greens and Venison Osso Buco highlight the menu.
This summer it will be a “Triple Slider” dinner… Chicago style sliced Venison with Giardiniera, Beer simmered Duck with Balsamic roasted Onions, Smoked Wild Boar BBQ with Carolina style Slaw and Sauce.
Steve: I do something like that in August every year. It’s a good “freezer cleanse.” 😉
I appreciate your thoughtfulness and the sense of balance. I love this type of post which makes me pause and think. The photo at the end is beautiful!
Beautifully articulated, Hank. I agree that there is a point of equilibrium or balance that must come from taking too much as opposed to letting it fly, run or swim. You have eloquently put on paper the voice in my head as I hear that third shell punch into the breech – STOP! There comes a point in which enough is good. The freezer is full; my belly will be full; and my family will be well fed.
I enjoyed the read as always. See you in KY!
Excellent post, Hank!
Great column, Hank. My wife and I purchased at 25cf chest freezer just for meat and veggies. We have a large garden and by the end of the season, it is chock full of vegetables we eat on until the next growing season, as is the pantry. I’m changing it up this year because we ended up with too much of some things and not enough of others.
There’s duck, goose, pheasant I’ve shot and various packages of big game that comes from friends. We also purchase a half hog and half steer every year. I keep an eye on what we eat so that I can plan for the next hunting season. Although I’ll share things like goose pastrami and various duck and pork sausages with our friends, I don’t like to shoot more than we really need. Vacuum sealing really helps make sure that food doesn’t go to waste.
Providing for yourself as much as possible IS a “good little life” if you can live it but as you said more eloquently than I, we do have a responsibility not to waste the bounty we’ve been given.
Great post. This is my first year with a full freezer which had brought this frugal New Englander (Maine) to contemplate whether this is enough & has started the “what if’s” of what is too much. (Wife getting deer? each kid getting turkey & deer?). I hate waste & cringe at the instagram pics of huge piles of geese/ducks & 3 guys. Maybe they process & eat them all but seems unlikely.
Thanks, Hank. Beautifully written, and a good reminder.
Over the last 30 years Jeffrey and I have mostly learned how to get along. The one issue that has become an increasingly louder “heated discussion” is freezer space. Our electric bill is large all year round due to 2 refrigerators and two giant and aged upright freezers stuffed to the max with all things wild. As we waddle into the upper limits of middle aged, my appetite for massive quantities of wild things frozen has waned, mostly because it’s a really big time eater to properly maintain all this stuff, to eat it within its expiration date, and to give lots of it away to folks who invariably want detailed cooking instructions. Recently, several friends have approached us to go half in on things like cows and lamb and pigs. The only way this could happen is for us to buy ANOTHER FREEZER. No No No!!!!
This is a perfect article. Great advice. Jeffrey will read this, I promise!!!
Very well said. I am not a hunter, in fact a vegetarian, but I like your writing and philosophy on hunting. I was just thinking last night how happy I am that my freezers are getting empty as we have eaten the fruits and vegetables I put up last fall. The garden is just going in and we had enough frozen and canned food to get us through until harvesting begins again.
Perfectly said. Now I’m going to pull something out of my freezer for supper.
Our freezer hath runneth over, too. We’re not hunters, but have a bursting freezer and have resorted to cooking from the pantry & freezer until it is nearly empty. Tonight, wild pollock cooked in butter, en francais!
Great message, greatly written.
Love this. My husband and I haven’t quite reached that point yet, but we’ve only been at this a very short while. I only wish that more people could recognize the feeling of enough in more aspects of their lives. Our planet might be in a very different place.
Loved this piece.
Nice, Hank. I’m in a similar boat in that I just started hunting about five years ago and I’m finally figuring it out. I was fortunate to have the option to pass on using my doe tag this year because I tagged out on a buck, a black bear, and a few dozen ducks and geese. Trout and Turkey season start in a few weeks and it’s about time to get back out there 😉