Thirty-four years seems like a long time, time to forget and
wounds to heal. Some wounds never heal, some memories we never forget. Arthur
was my best friend and I miss him terribly, especially now as I grow older. He
would have been 70 years old this year on August 4. There would have been a
celebration. He loved life and he loved people. He made friends easily and he
had many friends. I miss his smile and his great sense of humor. I miss the
good times we could have had together.
Why did the calling of the geese remind me of my brother?
There is a song we used to sing together. It’s a German song: Wildgänse rauschen durch die Nacht,
which translates into: Wild geese are
flying in the night. There were other songs we played and sang, but this
song was one of our favorites. So when I hear the geese calling in the sky at
this time of year, I get melancholic for a while and remember my brother
Arthur, wishing he were still alive and he could hear the geese calling.
We didn’t have this many geese in 1979. I’m talking about
the Canada
geese. They’ve multiplied and have almost become a nuisance. They are
everywhere: In the parks, on the golf courses, in the retention ponds, on the
rivers, and even in the cemeteries. In some places you have to be careful where
you walk because of all the goose droppings. The flocks seem to be congregating
in the cities, where they breed and hang out, because when you go out into the
fields to hunt them, they are cautious and fly high. You can’t get near them.
They are smart birds and know where they are safe. Eventually, something will
have to be done to control their breeding. Some people will, of course, be
against that. Those people have no idea what impact over-breeding of one
species has on the ecosystem. The Snow geese, for instance, are estimated to be
at around 15 million now. They have destroyed a huge part of the coastline on
the Hudson Bay, because of their feeding
habits. Much of those areas have changed from a healthy marsh into a wasteland
where nothing grows. Many seabirds are threatened with extinction because of
the Snow geese.
When we were on our holiday we stayed at a place in Indian
Head, Saskatchewan.
That lady, a farmer’s wife, suggested I come hunting Snow geese in Saskatchewan. The Snow
geese are doing a lot of damage to the crops. They are in great numbers there.
Too many. We used to have more in Manitoba,
but for some reason they changed their flight path years ago and moved further
west. Snow geese taste better than Canada geese.
I know, many people don’t believe we should hunt and kill
animals, but they don’t seem to realize that hunting is part of life. Lions
hunt antelopes, Wolves hunt deer, cats hunt for mice, Hawks hunt sparrows, and
so on. Humans used to hunt to survive. Humans are carnivores. We eat vegetables
and meat. That is a fact. Obviously, we can’t go and hunt for most of our food
anymore, so we raise cattle, pigs, chickens, turkeys, and other food animals.
Those animals need to be killed so we can eat their meat. We love our steaks
and our roasts. We love chicken and hamburger. Hamburger meat doesn’t grow in a
vat someplace, it comes from a cow. We love turkeys for Thanksgiving, which is
just around the corner.
Some of us go hunting for deer, caribou, elk, moose, and
other animals, because we enjoy eating venison, and because we enjoy the
challenge of the hunt. We also enjoy the outdoors. People who condemn hunters,
but don’t mind eating steaks, a good roast, fried chicken, hot dogs, or
hamburgers, are, in my opinion, a little bit out of touch with reality. Humans
are predatory animals and it is in the genes. If we don’t kill an animal we
kill our fellow humans. Just watch TV and read the papers. The killing is all
around us. People get robbed, they get shot, they get stabbed, and the
wholesale killing in the wars we fight over religion, oil, and other insane
reasons, speak louder than words. It will be a long time, if ever, until the
lamb lies down with the lion without being eaten.
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