Pennsylvania Game News - October 2011 - 50

tells it, and a long history hard-wired in its brain of what to do when it gets certain messages. Deer smarts also come from everwatchful eyes and ears and always-readyto-spring-away muscle tension. Deer have the kind of smarts that animals must have when something is always trying to eat them. Their species has developed its own brand of intelligence to avoid being a menu item. Deer are prey animals. People, for all their will-eat-anything habits, show a lot of the body shape and behavior tendencies of predators, according to anthropologists. I think that’s why a deer’s mind seems so foreign to us. What are we supposed to make of a bird’s smarts, such as wild turkey’s? A lovestruck strutting gobbler, fast in the throes of its reproductive imperative, should not be so keenly aware that it runs at our slightest movement. Or flees even when we don’t move. I had a gobbler “hammering” at me and approaching fast upslope. My shotgun was up and ready, my eye in the dot-aiming scope, my finger just having to push the safety off and move forward an inch to the trigger. As soon as he popped over the top and I saw the beard, I’d shoot. The distance was about 20 yards. Yet I never got to see even his whole head. The white of the forehead appeared and one eye, then he

ducked, shut up and was gone. How did he know he shouldn’t take another step; that he should immediately abandon his expectation of a daybreak tryst with a hen? I was camouflaged all but my boots, and he shouldn’t have been spooked by dull-brown leather. My camo had been chosen to blend with the gray tree bark I was sitting against and the emerging green leaves. After I unloaded my shotgun at home, I looked at it from the turkey’s perspective. I could see the aiming dot scope’s front lens was reddish in certain lights. That was out of the ordinary in the woods, but the lens was small and stationary. How could the gobbler know it was something to be afraid of? Wildlife’s smarts don’t require them to get a definitive identification and explanation. Hanging around to get that, like we curious humans might, could and probably would get them killed. So they just leave. Once in a while, though, we are able to become sufficiently attuned to wildlife’s way of being smart that our hunt is successful. Or maybe it’s that we get lucky and the game makes a mistake. Another possibility is that the particular game animal that filled our bag or our tag was a dumb one. There are all kinds of smarts, and we shouldn’t be so sure that ours are the best. 

Books in Brief
(Not available from the Game Commission)

Shooter’S BiBle, Guide to rifle BalliSticS, by Wayne Van Zwoll, Skyhorse Publishing, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018, www. skyhorsepublishing.com, soft cover, 216 pages, $19.95. The author brings decades of experience and a compelling, informal writing style to this comprehensive, fully-illustrated guide. Until you know what affects a bullet, you can’t control its path. With this book you’ll learn not only why bullets behave the way they do, but how you can make them hit exactly where you want. This book contains a fascinating history of firearms — from the discovery of gunpowder to rifling, metallic cartridges and optical sights. Extensive ballistics tables let readers compare favorite cartridges and loads, and show the effects of bullet shape in downrange energy and arc.
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http://www.skyhorsepublishing.com http://www.skyhorsepublishing.com

Pennsylvania Game News - October 2011

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Pennsylvania Game News - October 2011