I do not watch Formula I racing to see motorcars disintegrate in somersaulting, fiery crashes, and I do not hunt to kill. I am fairly confident that I am among the overwhelming majority of hunters in the United States who do not need to take wild game to survive. Consequently, if the ultimate aim of hunting is solely to obtain food, an argument exists that there is no true need for me to hunt at all. Yet, I do experience a need to hunt and I am a hunter. I have been doing it off and on since I was old enough to carry and safely shoot a shotgun, am now fifty-six, and have no intention of ever stopping, health permitting. But for as long as I hunt I will continue to believe that it is not about the kill.

Do not misunderstand. I take game as well as my meager abilities permit. My personal passion is a stubborn and often frustrating pursuit of a few select upland gamebirds found in the western United States. The hierarchy of my ardor is, in descending order, the chukar, mountain quail, scaled quail, pheasant, Gambel's and valley quail. Even though I do everything possible to stack the deck in my favor, I know at least five times out of ten I will be left befuddled, empty-handed, and plain out-smarted by a creature sporting a brain far smaller than mine. I accept that I will fail far more times than I succeed. Humility and occasional embarrassment constantly shadow me as an upland bird hunter.

While I so love to hunt, no incongruity exists when I say I do not hunt to kill. Death is an inextricable part of life. But a death no more defines the sum of a person's life than a kill defines hunting or a hunter. From my perspective, the fundamental explanation of what many would see as a paradox lies in the experience of hunting. But that simple phrase, "the experience," embraces a world of complex and mildly confusing interaction of man with himself, with his hunting companions, and with nature.

Some, very recently me, occasionally will lose the love of the experience itself. There is a progression from love to obsession that is so gradual and subtle there is no realization of the mutation. I began to believe that the weight of birds filling my vest was the measure of a hunt's success. Hunting became a competition with nature and virtually the only thing that mattered was the final score. Don Quixote was an amateur compared to me.

On the final day of the chukar season two years ago the change in my attitude became evident. When it surfaced as a display of anger after a rather disappointing hunt I was surprised and embarrassed with myself. It took a true friend and a good hunting partner to tell me a few days later, "Vic, we're not hunting for the same reasons any more." Privately I initially disagreed. However, the more I thought about my hunting during the season and my simmering frustration when the windmills failed to fall before me the more I began to believe that there was indeed something missing.

It took me a few weeks to sort it out. I came to the simple conclusion that I had lost touch with the total experience of hunting. Having identified the "illness," I began an introspective search for a remedy. Fortunately it came rather quickly. The cure was locked securely in my memory. I began thinking back to the things that initially fired and over the years sustained my love of hunting.

Many of us literally fell in step behind our fathers. I was so young I have only a blurred memory of an early breakfast, a long drive in darkness, and then a walk into the desert in search of Gambel's quail. My sister, Christine, and I followed my father. Mom stayed by the car with our infant brother. I recall two birds flushing and Dad bringing them to ground with two shots from his Model 12. Chris and I became his bird dogs. It was a simple beginning of a lifelong passion.

Shotguns are a wonderful part of hunting. Many cherish and use theirs for years. I seem to buy and sell them more often than I change the oil in my truck's engine. It is a weakness of occasional concern. I like the notion of trying a new gun just to see if it fits the activity. More sensible people, however, will hunt with a single gun all their life, as did my father. Do you remember the first one you shot? Bet you do. The weight of it as it was put to shoulder, maybe a little unsteady, expecting but still surprised and perhaps stunned at the power generated when the trigger is pulled for the first time.

Dad gave me my first gun when I was fifteen years old, buying it at Pachmeyer's when it was still located on Grand Avenue just a few blocks from downtown Los Angeles. Model 870 Remington, 12 gauge. Dad was pretty sure I was going to wear the bluing off within a month I cleaned it so often. Hoppe's No.9 became my cologne of choice. My present passion is the Winchester Model 42, one of the loveliest little guns ever to fill the hands of a bird hunter. I have owned several over the years but have vowed never to part with the skeet-choked field grade model I now use so often. The action is sure and smooth and the gun itself is pleasing to the eye. There is nothing more satisfying than taking a limit of dove on opening day with a Model 42. Shooting it is a lovely way to develop patience and a healthy measure of humbleness.

Have you every stopped while hunting and devoted a few moments to simply looking at what surrounds you? I do most of my hunting in the Mojave Desert of southern California. No one so far as I know has made a fortune from selling picture postcards of the area. But there is beauty there on a small and large scale.

One of my favorite places to hunt is a broad canyon on the east side of the San Bernardino Mountains in southern California. I think about it often not because of the birds I have found there, but for its unique beauty. It is a major drainage out of the San Bernardino Mountains into the western Mojave Desert. No one would want to be caught there during a flash flood. When the water roars through that canyon bottom, the entire floor is transformed to where it is almost unrecognizable. Boulders the size of trash cans are rearranged by a seemingly whimsical power, placing them just the right distance apart to make driving through the canyon in your four-wheel drive an exercise of equal parts patience and daring.

Much of the main canyon is open and littered with cactus, salt-cedar trees, and other varieties of low-lying vegetation. It is typical Gambel's habitat but mountain quail run the very same territory. It is one of only two locations I have found them living so closely together. The birds take full advantage of the steep canyon slopes that are covered with bushes and rocks of various ankle-snapping sizes. The birds are usually found on the canyon floor but head straight uphill either on the run or on the wing. It is especially challenging when snow and ice cover the rocks. No sane person would chase a bird that weighs no more than ten ounces into such a treacherous environment. We never hesitate to do exactly that.

Farther into the canyon as the elevation begins to increase the flora changes. Piñon pines are found and the cactus is less sparse, practically nonexistent. In little arroyos off of the main canyon one finds areas that look to have been professionally landscaped they seem so well arranged. Nature is nothing if not efficient. There are small, dry streambeds no more than a few feet wide with deep, sandy bottoms running raggedly back and forth but always descending through monstrous boulders or granite ledges. On even the hottest days you can stop in a shady area, scoop away a shallow layer of sand until it is cool, sit down, take some water from a canteen and be instantly refreshed by the overwhelming quiet. You share your water with your dog and just watch as the rate of her panting subsides and her excitement begins to wind down as she too rests for a while. But she refuses to relax. Her head remains up and she is alert for anything. When you even look like you are ready to resume the hunt she is up and gone before you can move rise to your feet. The instinctual drive never ceases to amaze you.

Very often you will see where a seed has found a protected niche among the rocks and a pine has sprouted, fighting to live and somehow succeeding where it appears to have no business prospering at all. You doubt that a tree can grow out of a rock, then wonder how long it can do it. The graceful presence of a small but aged piñon pine is made the more striking by the contrast of its weathered, rusty-brown bark and green needles against the encompassing white-gray of rock and decomposing granite. Looking high into the mountains you can see that they begin to grow more plentiful, finally giving way to more statuesque varieties of pine, finally becoming forest. But I like those few Piñon pines that grow solitary in the canyon among the boulders, as if they are striking out on their own to explore and push into a new frontier. There, alone, they stand apart and show me a will to survive in an environment where nature has decreed there is no margin for error and where everything counts. Nature's patience and perseverance is seen everywhere.

Not far from this canyon are the Ord and West Ord Mountains. The Ords would provide some of the best chukar hunting in the world but for one missing component: Reliable rain. Remaining a hopeless optimist I go there year in and year out, not minding that on some days I never see or hear a bird, much less get a shot at one. In contrast to the small, contained areas of beauty found in Rattlesnake, the lure of the Ords is on a macro scale where sweeping vistas of brown, gray, and purple can capture and hold your attention if you take but a moment to give them a chance. A few natural springs manage to survive even the driest years and they are the keys to one of the most enjoyable aspects of these mountains, the bighorn sheep.

Their brown-washed, somewhat splotchy hide is but another example of nature's blueprint for survival. I wonder how many bighorns have been within my eyesight and missed over the years. But once I knew they were there I began to look harder, hoping that something might move them to make the identification easier. Once it was my dog that got a nice ram with a full curl nervous enough to run. I noticed the movement far below me. My first thought was that my dog would kill herself before she ever came close to catching that animal. The ram loped over treacherous terrain with an effortless grace that amazed me. It seemed to have no regard for where it placed its feet. His head was up, surveying ahead and side to side as he ran diagonally, then up the slope through rocks of all sizes. I was so impressed I grinned as I watched it. Luckily my dog lost the trail and stopped, or just got discouraged, well below me. But the ram continued to loop around below me, going out of sight forty or fifty yards below when it disappeared behind the rocks. Suddenly, it appeared above me and close in to my left not more than twenty yards away. We saw each other instantly and just as instantly we both froze. It had been running I judged at least three to four hundred yards, the last hundred or so uphill. Yet it stood there staring at me seeming not to be breathing at all. Its physical stamina was yet another component of nature's blueprint made obvious and which exacerbated by envy.

I cannot recall how long we stood there looking at each other. Again I regretted not carrying a small camera in my vest, though I suspected any movement would have put the ram to flight. I looked away briefly and when I returned to the ram it was gone. No, it was still there, standing just as still and exactly where I left it. No wonder I had never seen them before.

When thinking back to memorable experiences I never fail to recall a hunt on the Snake River several years ago in southeastern Washington. The river there was surrounded by mile after mile of wheat fields. The Snake in that area ran through a deep, very wide gorge and we camped within a hundred yards of the river. The weather was a little too warm and there was not the barest mention of a breeze to speak of. The river was black-green with depth and seemed dead still, more like an eel-shaped lake than a major river. When you looked into the water you could not tell if you were looking to a depth of twenty feet or twenty inches. It was very wide and absolutely quiet. The natural acoustics of the gorge made it possible to hear clearly anyone speaking on the opposite bank. When an aluminum-hull jet boat came up the river I heard it minutes before I saw it.

We would spread out and find a place before dawn to glass for deer, then come in for lunch and do some pheasant hunting, then return to glassing for deer near sunset. In two days of hunting mule deer and pheasant I never had the hint of a shot at either. However, it only took about sixty seconds for a little episode to play itself out to make that hunt one of the most enjoyable I have experienced.

Late in the morning I sat alone very near the top of a slope glassing for mule dear. I saw a few immature does. I only had a buck tag naturally. About 10:00 a.m. I set everything aside for a moment and dug into my pack for water and a snack to stop the growling in my stomach. I sat there and nibbled leisurely as only a person with no need to rush for anyone or anything can afford to do. The sun was high enough in a clear sky that not many shadows were left to interrupt the sloping terrain. I could see as far as my eyes would allow and while looking northeast two distant airborne specks caught my eye. They flew low and straight down the middle of the river gorge and I could soon discern that they were Canada geese. It was not the hunter in me that riveted my attention but their single-minded doggedness in flight. These were not ambling tourists. There was purpose in their flight.

The geese flew west down the river then veered south toward me. They began to gain altitude to escape the gorge. I became much more interested in them as I realized that if their course did not change again they would come very close to where I was sitting. My excitement and pleasure expanded with every second they drew closer. Steadily on they came and soon I could see them clearly. I admired the powerful rhythm of their wing beat that appeared so compact and efficient, and the way they kept a close, tandem formation. The steady, unrelenting power of their flight gave the impression they could circumnavigate the earth without landing if they had a reason to do it. In a few seconds the geese rose with indifferent nonchalance from twenty or thirty feet from the surface of the river to my three or four hundred-foot elevation. The gaze of both was fixed straight ahead and it gave them a determined look. They flew machine-like directly over my hiding place no more than thirty feet above. I could clearly hear every movement of four powerful wings beating against the air as they rose up past me. Then they disappeared over a ridge. I was smiling in admiration when I lost sight of them. While this was but a brief episode of no more than sixty seconds in my life I will remember it for a lifetime. For the next day and a half I spent as much time looking for another set of Canada geese as deer, hoping that chance would bring them as close again. It never happened.

I think too about some of the more humorous events that have overtaken me while hunting. Most did not seem that funny at the time. I am not referring to the easy shots I have missed. You know, the ones that a one-armed man with a slingshot could have made, but I somehow managed to miss with three shots. For instance, stopping to talk with my hunting partner to figure out where the birds might be, only to have one launch from under my feet. Better yet, having a valley quail flush wild in front of you and as you raise your gun another flushes from the same location but goes in a different direction. You foolishly refocus on the second bird because it is closer, only to see it disappear over a ledge. You look for the first bird again and by the time you find it - out of range. While you are trying to figure out the most efficient way to kick yourself squarely in the butt, a third bird flushes and heads for another part of the compass. By now you are spinning around like a weather vane at the mercy of a tornado and just about as useful. When you find you are no longer laughing at yourself when these episodes occur, it is time to start thinking back.

I had no idea what I was getting into when I decided I wanted a dog. A good friend had a German Shorthaired Pointer and for that reason alone settled on that breed. On the recommendation of another friend I took a puppy from Bob and Sandy Deitering in Fort Huachuca, Arizona. They had parts of two litters on the ground when I drove down to settle on a dog. They were running around with stubby legs and fat bellies, doing more falling and rolling than running it seemed. A pigeon decided to land several feet away. One of the pups instantly stopped and stared at it. "I'll take her," I said.

Read as much as I could, then latched onto as much experience as I could find walking around. Wally Wallace and, more so, Clint Shafer helped me immensely. I will forever be indebted to their patience with me. The fun I have had with that dog of mine would fill a book. And what has given me almost as much pleasure, despite a few minor disasters, is hunting with friends who also have dogs.

Two years ago Mike Martinez, Barbara Allard, and I traveled to southern Arizona to hunt Gambel's and scaled quail. Mike has a Shorthair that is one of the most stylish pointers I have ever seen. Barb has an English Pointer that is an excellent hunting dog. We managed only to find a few Gambel's but we had some fun in our disappointment. In a range of short, sparsely vegetated hills we were hunting down a covey of Gambel's quail my dog Tocchet and I had busted up. Barb shot a bird and her Pointer Vive retrieved it. I had last seen Tocchet disappearing over the top of a nearby hill and was heading that way when Mike's GSP went on point. I stopped where I was while Mike went to the most likely location of the bird. Mike, Barb, and I naturally had our attention on Mike's dog, Mulder, and the impending flush. Apparently so too did Barb's dog, for when she came within eyesight of Mike's dog on point she stopped to honor it, still holding in her mouth the Gambel's quail she was retrieving for Barb. Very impressive, and very cool. The bird that Mike's dog had pointed finally flushed and went right in front of me for an easy shot. Then I wondered about my dog. Where was she?

I went in the direction I last saw her. I came over the hump of a small hill and on the opposite slope of yet another hill saw her locked solidly on point. Given the time we had spent taking the bird and then getting to where my dog was I estimated that she had been on point for about five minutes. I wanted to ignore the bird and run over to hug that dog. She would have resented the distraction. She was there to do a job, to fulfill her singular desire in life, which was to find birds. She had to be steady because I only got within thirty yards of that bird before it flushed. I got one shot off with my Model 42 and was just not precise enough at the distance to bring it to ground. I could have cared less. I was too happy being silently smug about what a wonderfully staunch point Tocchet rendered that bird.

The good days do not erase the bad ones. But I have come to believe they make them better. Again, good experience in hunting has nothing to do with the volume of your daily take. It can be a single difficult shot, or a nice bit of dog work. In 1998 I was hunting in the Falcon Valley in Arizona with Clint Shafer. There were Gambel's all over the place and we were having a ball from the activity. We didn't even mind when we would have to stop to pull cholla spines out of our dogs, and it stopped us often. Both of our dogs were excited and gushing with energy. The land was flat except for sandy flat streambeds that were lined with desert trees. They crisscrossed the entire valley and the Gambel's loved the protection they provided. When something approaches from one side of the wash, simply flush in the opposite direction. The trees provided an effective protective barrier. As we approached one wide, dry, streambed we heard a covey of birds flush away from us the other side of the streambed. Because of the treeline we never saw a single bird; just heard them. So we crossed the streambed to the other side and up a gentle slope to where it became level. We had lost sight of our dogs and decided to stop and decide what to do. Five seconds later a bird flushed and so caught us by surprise neither of us even had time to put gun to shoulder. While we laughed at ourselves it happened again. So we looked at each other and then laughed again. Then it happened again. Over a span of about two minutes no less than five birds got up and bolted but we were so busy laughing at ourselves not a single shot was fired.

Much of hunting is anticipation. It may be long term, like thinking about where to go as the next hunting season approaches. Making plans, inviting your best friends, calling ahead to reserve rooms at the most convenient motel. Then it is the day before the first hunt. You begin to dig things out of the garage. Somehow your dog knows what you are doing and she begins to whine nervously and run around while still managing to keep you in sight every second, hoping that you will scoop her up and leave right now! The alarm is set but you keep waking to check the clock to ensure you did not oversleep. After resetting the clock's alarm for the tenth time you are convinced, but you still cannot sleep soundly. As opposed to when the alarm rudely jolts you from slumber for another day at the office and you have to will yourself awake, this morning's alarm is like a rhapsody. You have hardly slept but you are refreshed, energy personified. The anticipation continues to build.

Breakfast at your favorite hole-in-the wall is business-like. Calories are important to the task that lies ahead. Taste is a bonus. The presence and companionship of your hunting partners is pure necessity. You save a couple pieces of bacon for your dog.

You finally arrive at your destination. Everyone's vests slide on, filled with food, water, shells, and other perceived necessities. Where IS my hunting license?! The dogs are released from their kennels and as usual we bark as the males seek out the tires of our trucks. And we thought we were excited. We admire them for the thousandth time, never taking for granted their enthusiasm and love for what they were born to do. Again, the anticipation overrides everything.

And finally we begin. It is just light. Chilly, but most of us go lightly clad for it will be hot enough. Sweat will soon erase any lingering memory of the morning's frigid air. The air is crisp and sound travels efficiently. The noise of dogs' paws hitting the ground remind you of a herd of horses it seems so loud. But soon they disperse, as do the hunters. You keep an eye on your dog, hoping to see her go on point right away. You are not surprised when it does not happen immediately. Before long you hear but do not see the flush of a valley quail. Then from some distance away one of your partners yells out gleefully and proudly, "point!" You turn in the direction of the voice, again in anticipation. You hear a single shot and then you hear the marvelous sound of a large covey rising simultaneously. Birds are now darting in every direction and you hope that one will come within range. Your anticipation turns to disappointment, but only momentarily for you set off in the direction of the covey.

The birds will not go far and you and your dog set off in pursuit. Once you arrive where you believe you have the best chance of finding small groups or singles, your dog proves its worth. You will yourself and her to have the patience to check virtually every bush. I call it taking inventory. She is excited because she knows what to expect. Her anticipation is as great, or more so, as your own. There! She's on point, going magically from full out to instant dead stop. It never ceases to amaze you. Talk about anticipation: Your gun is up and your finger is on the safety, ready to flick it off any second. You move toward your dog. Her point is so steady and her gaze so intent you know exactly where the bird is. She does not seem to be breathing at all. How is that even remotely possible? You are ten yards away when you hear the bush rustle and you know that the bird is struggling against it to get into the air. A second later it explodes low and fast, not more than six or seven feet above the ground, heading straight away. The safety is disengaged as the gun comes up. You want that first bird so dearly you aim a little; and miss cleanly. But what a wonderful experience, much of it driven by anticipation. You continue with your inventory. The day passes into memory, and you into renewed anticipation as the cycle is repeated.

I like companionship when I hunt. And it is far more than a safety factor. With good friends you achieve together and you fail together. There is something about the camaraderie that makes the former more enjoyable and the latter far less significant. You laugh with your friends, at each other, at yourself. You are generous in your encouragement and sparing with your criticism. You get almost as much satisfaction as the shooter when a particularly difficult shot is made. The dinner talk at the end of a day about our successes and disappointments is nearly as important as the hunting itself.

The partnership of one or both of my Shorthaired Pointers is nearly as important as the companionship of my friends. These dogs have two goals in life: Find birds and please me. I am not sure of the priority but I could not be more pleased and proud of both. There is no doubt that if I allowed it to happen they would literally destroy themselves hunting for me. When I miss a shooting opportunity from a good point I am more disappointed for the dog than me.

I never seriously thought about dogs as athletes. Then I watched my first dog run up the side of a mountain two or three hundred yards ahead of me, scrambling and leaping across rocks and boulders varying in size from softballs to Cadillacs. Something caught her attention three hundred yards below her and off she goes to investigate. When her hunting curiosity was satisfied she made the climb back to where she had been. All of this was at the same speed - full afterburner - and while I had managed to elevate my position a measly twenty yard - if that. And she would do this and similar feats for as long as I would permit it. Thank God for both of us I have had the good sense to call her in and make her rest with me. Astounding stamina, unbelievable desire, and probably too independent-minded for her own good. I often ponder whether I will ever find another as wonderful. The first hunting dog I owned, and trained, and it turned out to be one of the best I have ever seen. Talk about luck.

No true hunting dog owner can resist the temptation to talk up his or her dog and I am compelled to relate a little story about my first dog, Tocchet, that occurred on the opening day of quail season last year. I went to a good area for valley quail that Barbara Allard and I had discovered by pure luck about two years before. On this day, however, I was hunting with Mike Martinez and his young son. The previous year my male GSP, Coffey, and I had flushed no less than seven coveys of birds in a very tight area in a single day early in the season. Last season on opening day, Tocchet and I found but one, though it was of significant size. The drought had really taken a toll on the quail population.

We found the covey when it flushed wildly up a slope and over the top of a hill. We were in the bottom of a fairly steep-sided wash. I was on the "wrong" side as usual but Mike got off a shot with the covey flush and brought down a bird that his dog found and retrieved. All Tocchet and I could do was cross through the heavy brush and follow up on the birds.

The other side of the hill was more of the same, though the terrain was much more level and therefore very easily hunted by the slowpoke humans in the party. Mike's dog gave him a nice point. When the bird flushed and the shot was missed Mike and his son saw it land some distance away and went in pursuit. Tocchet and I remained in the area and I was soon very happy we did. We began our inventory of nearly everything that a bird could use for cover and in the space of an hour of patient hunting Tocchet pointed eight birds and we bagged seven of them. Every one of her points was rock solid and many were just splendid to behold. I was more pleased about Tocchet's prowess than my shooting, which was uncommonly good that morning. We had taken enough birds out of this covey so Tocchet and I headed for Mike and our trucks. But the best part of this story is the postscript.

Mike and his son left before I did. I cleaned our birds, packed up and left before noon. On the way down the hill I ran into a game warden. He checked the birds and my hunting license and we talked about the morning's activity. He was surprised to see how many birds I had because of the several hunters he contacted that morning there was not one bird taken among them, and two or three of the hunters had dogs. I just pointed to Tocchet and said, "they may have had dogs, but they needed her."

It is obvious that many of the things I experience as a hunter could still be enjoyed without taking a single bird. A camera could easily replace my shotgun. There are many who would prefer that I do just that; people I have never met and who do not know me, just my "kind." I will never convince them that hunting is acceptable and conversely they will never persuade me that it is wrong. Like abortion, the death penalty, and a few other hot-button issues of our day, hunting is a question that will not be resolved to the satisfaction of those who enjoy the activity and those who oppose it. There is such a core value dichotomy of belief that any mutually satisfactory resolution is impossible. Either the activity continues or it is brought to an end.

I sometimes wonder why a person believes it is imperative to impose his or her values on another. As for hunting, those who oppose it would tell us it is morally wrong. But that conclusion is pure judgement; nothing more than personal opinion run amuck and nothing more supports it. I respectfully submit that my opinion carries as much weight and is equally valid. I argue that history, which is replete with necessity and sport hunting, disproves any moral incompatibility whatsoever. And why should my opinion be any less valid or be afforded less weight? On this issue, like so many others, there simply is no real "right" or "wrong." I accept their right to disagree with me but I frankly resent their attempt to dictate how I conduct my life and to deny to me the gratification I derive from an experience that is lawful. Those who seek to stop hunting aim to impose a value system that reflects their personal moral preferences on a law-abiding segment of the population. I submit that it is unhealthy and the epitome of an arrogance that is ultimately destructive of human self will and diversity of belief. Make no mistake: Once the issue of hunting has been resolved to their satisfaction, they will move to the next issue, and then the next, to create rightness as they choose to arbitrarily define it. The resulting moral homogenization will bind us tightly within their social straightjacket that will ultimately strangle all us to our death. I simply refuse to fall into another's lock-step vision of the world.

And now to return to the proposition posed at the beginning of this writing, that absent a need to live off the game, there is no need to hunt at all. But for me there is. And the need is strong. I require the interaction of my dog, and of those men and women who join me in the love of the activity. I relish the challenge though I try to keep it from becoming the sole focus of my hunting experience. Lastly, I need the experience to share in a part of nature, and death always will be a part of nature. Man, even in our highly mechanized and digitally dominated world, will remain an important part of nature. Sadly, those who do not hunt will never understand, but those who judge me critically must at least understand this: I do not hunt to kill.