I get Buck Fever, and I like it

The words 'buck fever' bring to mind one of the most common hunting images. It never varies, and usually brings a smile.

The soft-footed deer hunter, whether he's a freckled boy in overalls or a city guy dressed in a red cap and high boots, sees his first deer. He raises his gun and tries to shoot. But the gun swings in crazy arcs. His sights simply don't line up. He can't breathe, his heart is pounding. The deer, knowing in some mysterious way that his would-be killer is a novice, stands still and looks with amusement at the latest victim of buck fever. Finally, the hunter desperately pulls the trigger. The gun roars and the buck runs away unharmed.

And then, as this piece of folklore goes, the hunter is cured of buck fever. The next time he sees a buck, he knocks him down with cleanliness and speed.

To all of this my answer is, “Bunk!”

As a chronic sufferer of buck fever, quail fever and ram fever, I speak from deep and bitter experience. I'm no novice as a hunter. I have bears, lions, antelope, mule deer, whitetails, coyotes and bobcats, not to mention many species of game birds. I live in Arizona, one of the best game states in the country, and I make it a point to go hunting in northern Mexico every year.

I should certainly be immune to the disease, but I'm not. Moreover, I am not alone in my misery. I know other hunters, with even more experience than mine, who suffer just as much.

Strangely enough, I am not ashamed of my weakness, for it is my belief that the sharper the hunter, the more he respects and admires the game he seeks. The more likely he is to succumb to an attack of buck fever at some point. When a man no longer feels his heart leap at the sight of noble game, when he can shoot a fine buck as calmly as he would buy a steak at the butcher's shop, he no longer gets the pleasure of hunting that he should get. . He is full and wants to stop and go golfing or bowling.

Some game species give me a worse attack of the disease than others. They're invariably the ones I'm most excited to pack. If hunting certain animals or birds never breaks a sweat, I am indifferent to them.

Take ducks or quails, for example. I'm a good duckshot. I can make a high-flying canvasback tumble sweetly, and I can hit fast, bouncing teals and mallards efficiently. I became a duck hunter at the age of twelve, and for years they put me in mental decline. However, now they don't. If I hit one, it's okay. When I miss him, I feel the same way. As a result, I rarely hunt ducks. The old sensation is gone.

On the other hand, I am a fan of quail, and just an indifferent quail shot. The first bird of the day always makes me panic. The sight of a group of desert quail fills me with an insane, superhuman strength. I can spend hours racing wildly between cholla and other cacti. I miss easy shots and make difficult shots. A bag of six birds fills my heart with blissful joy. Yes, I like to hunt quail because it gives me a fever. I hope I'm never immune.

On the other hand, doves and white wings only excite me slightly. I enjoy hunting them, but I would pass up the greatest dove convention in history to get to a group of foxy little desert quail.

A new species will almost always give avid hunters buck fever. This also applies to an unusual trophy of a well-known species.

A few years ago I took a seasoned whitetail hunter, who was also a hit, to Arizona's famous Kaibab Forest to hunt for mule deer. On the first day he just broke down when he saw the big antlers on that beautiful buck. He missed fairly easy shots on five nice animals, and if he had been younger I believe he would have cried. It was a pitiful spectacle, but not amusing to me, as I had suffered too often from the same disease.

But the next day he pulled himself together somehow. He killed the first good buck that jumped up, hitting him three times in four shots as he ran through a canyon more than 200 yards away.

A well-known guide from my acquaintances saw literally hundreds of animals killed. Yet the sight of a beautiful trophy is still too much for him. One time, when I was hunting with him, we saw an extra fine buck across the canyon, and he tore my binocular case to pieces and took out the glasses.

There are many factors that predispose the hunter to buck fever. Some men are constitutionally uptight and over-the-top, and they are the chronic victims. Special fear of a certain trophy also causes many attacks. An absolutely unexpected encounter with game will ruin many a person.

Last November I was in northern Arizona hunting a particular deer. I wanted an exceptional head, otherwise I wouldn't play. In three days of hard work I had seen several regular heads and many small heads. Late in the afternoon I stopped at the top of a high hill, sat down, lit a cigarette and cursed my luck. It was the last day of my hunt. Instead of shooting one of the measly two- and three-pointers I'd seen, I'd go back empty-handed. I threw away my cigarette and stood up, ready to go back to camp and call it a day.

At that moment the very buck I was looking for jumped out from under a cedar where he had been lying. He had a long beam and a huge spread, and looked as big as a horse. My blood pressure rose about 100 percent and I started shaking. My first shot went over his back. Luckily my second broke a front leg. He went downstairs, got up and started running. I was so helpless – and such an idiot with buck fever – that if he had been an ordinary buck he could have gotten away injured. But his large antlers were so heavy that he fell down with every third step.

Instead of sitting down and shooting him again, as any rational being would have done, I started running after him down the hill. I ran like a mountain goat, except mountain goats don't fall down and skin their noses. When I got within 100 yards of the buck, I shot him twice, missing him by yards. The buck ran away again and I followed gamely.

Then I realized I was embarrassing myself, sat down and let him run. In a few moments. I got myself under control. I took careful aim, pulled the trigger and killed him.

The buck turned out to be a seven-pointer, an old guy with a main beam of eight inches and a spread of thirty-two inches. It was a nice trophy, but I almost lost it because of that old devil, buck fever.

A great need can also reduce a normally calm and thoughtful hunter to a babbling imbecile. Once I was forced to lie down in the forest at night. I woke up in the morning, hungry as the proverbial bear, and started looking for something I could devour. The more I looked, the hungrier I became. Finally I saw an innocent and unsuspecting mountain cottontail. It took me several seconds to calm myself down enough to shoot him.

On the other hand, I know many people who almost never get buck fever when hunting certain species. My wife killed the first buck she ever saw, and I have yet to see her get excited about any deer, no matter how nice a trophy it is. She once killed a big six-pointer while I was still messing with my safety. That's the kind of deer shot she is.

But even though she is an avid quail hunter, she suffers from quail fever even more than I do. She likes to eat quail, and every time she comes across one, she sees it tantalizingly browned on a piece of toast. . On her first quail hunt. she almost burned a box of grenades without connecting, but she's still a good pigeon shot. She is doing better now, but the sight of a quail still sends her into a mild panic.

Sometimes the predatory instinct or fever takes over. However, there are times when that isn't the case, and I save my most shameful performance for last. A few seasons ago I went to Sonora for a sheep hunt. My companions and I rose before dawn, prepared breakfast, and just as it began to dawn we set out. They were to climb one end of the high mountain range and hunt, while a Mexican and I were to drive to the other end, climb up, and meet them in mid-afternoon.

I wasn't expecting any game, and besides, I didn't want to shoot any lowland animals, since both the desert mule deer and the antelope had shed their horns at that point. Half asleep, I sat next to the driver, my gun in the case and unloaded.

Suddenly the Mexican shouted: 'Look, a very big ram. To shoot!”

I opened my eyes in surprise. Crossing the road in front of the car was the largest bighorn ram I had ever seen. His large, dark horns curled all over, and they were so heavy that his head bobbed from side to side as he ran. Of all things! A mountain sheep crossing the road in a lowland desert in front of a car.

Did I calmly get out of the car, load my gun and kill that sheep? I didn't!

The Mexican just stepped on the brakes as I stood up. I fell forward and hit my head on the windshield. Then I got out of the car and, with shaking hands, yanked the gun out of the case while at the same time searching for cartridges. The sheep got further and further away and I became more and more wild

Finally I got some grenades in Springfield. Wildly, stupidly, foolishly, I fired twice as the ram ran through the brush. Every time I missed, plus I knew I didn't have the sights aligned when I fired.

Needless to say, the ram escaped. My hands were shaking as if I had a fever, and my shaking knees could barely support my weight.

No, I didn't get a ram on that trip. The only other one I saw was 550 yards away – too far to shoot. For the next two days my Mexican looked at me with cold and bitter contempt. I was a punk and a clumsy guy, and he had no use for me.

If I had been expecting that damn sheep, I firmly believe I could have caught him. But he had made the psychological leap over me. He gave me ram fever and escaped.

I look forward to the thirty years of hunting I have left in my carcass, knowing that I will always suffer from the disease. Every now and then the buck fever will lay me down, fool me, make me shoot wildly and fruitlessly. Yet I am not ashamed of it. The very uncertainty of the attacks adds spice to the game, and if I ever fail to succumb for a year, I know I have lost my edge. Once I'm done, I'll dust off my golf clubs and sell my guns.

This story, “I Get Buck Fever… And Like It,” appeared in the August 1936 issue Outdoor living.