Legendary whitetail hunter Larry Benoit, of Duxbury VT, is dead at 89. he exemplified the Yankee blue- collar woodsman- hunter, and despite it being a how- to, his How to Bag the Biggest Buck of Your Life, a delightful read as well as a practical manual, would have made my book of books if not for the strict 100 book limit, and willbe in any future addition (yes, ADdition)…
He even got an obit in the NYT, respectful if weirdly tone- deaf about rural America:
“Today, trophy buck hunting has elements of competitive sport, some of
them high-tech. Some hunters use video cameras to learn the traveling
and behavior patterns of deer, and, after a kill, many have antlers
officially measured; “trophy racks,” they are called.” Yes, that they are quaintly called…
Benoit’s own style was forthright and colloquial; there is a feeling of him sitting down and talking effortlessly with his collaborator Peter Miller:
“…. if you aren’t in shape to dog a mountain buck and follow him for 15
miles, then walk out of the woods and be ready to do it the next day,
and maybe the day after, and maybe for a week, then just be an armchair
buck hunter. Don’t go out in the woods and kill yourself.”
If you must learn deer hunting from a book you could do a lot worse than to read and meditate on this one. HT “Lucas Machias”.