I know that seems like a weird title but today I found out how shooting really is an act of Zen. I went for another shotgun lesson at Seattle Trap & Skeet Club today with ClayBrakn shooting instructor Frank Neumayer since I knew I needed to become a better shot before fall rolls around and I’m back out in the field after birds. On our last outing in March I sucked at clays but ended up doing OK on birds because my instincts took over.
Category Archives: Paleo
Portland Paleo
Another great trip to Portland full of incredible Paleo food yet again. This place amazes me, it is the only city I feel totally comfortable traveling to without worrying about what I can or can’t eat, it beats Seattle hands down for food options. In February we ate at The Imperial, the restaurant of Top Chef 3rd place finisher Doug Adams, which was one of the best meals I’ve ever eaten and at Cultured Caveman which was good old Paleo comfort food. This time we added a few other places to our list.
To dog or not to dog
This past few months we’ve been discussing whether or not to get a dog, specifically a bird dog. After my hunting excursion this spring I decided you kind of need a dog here, the terrain here is nothing like the marches through Iowa cornfields that I grew up hunting and a dog seems pretty essential. I also miss Isan and would like to have a dog companion around since I’m a bit more house bound than I’m used to being.
I decided to turn this into a whole research project so we began investigating breeds before settling in on a German Shorthair Pointer. This is a good bird dog, a good family dog and a very athletic dog perfect for hiking or trail running. Catherine ran into a client that has a GSP and absolutely loves the dog, it is their child. She gave us a bunch of resources and this began a search for breeders and trainers in the area plus a bunch of reading about dog training for a gun dog. Luckily the Pheasants Forever magazine this quarter was all about dogs so I got a bunch of resources from it. I located Sage Brush Gun Dogs in Ellensburg which raises and trains GSPs, I also know that our guide from Red’s just had pups too that are in the same line as Katie above. I just finished reading The Ultimate Guide to Bird Dog Training and Wing & Shot to get an idea of what would be involved with training one of these dogs, both excellent books that gives you a very sobering look at how much work and time is involved in developing a bird dog.
Hunting deer???
After I decided take up hunting again this year for birds the next thing that I had thought about was moving up to big mammals. I got quite a bit of venison and antelope from my friend Tom and it was excellent to say the least, made me want more. I also have to purchase a quarter beef and then some each year, a lamb and a whole pig to get me through the year in meat, it would be great to replace some of that with a deer, an antelope or even better an elk. Shooting birds, however, is much easier than shooting a large mammal and the prospect of taking a deer has forced me to do some reading and soul searching on the matter. The deadline is coming soon, if I want to try and hunt deer this fall I need to get my name in the draws next month in just a few weeks then I need to get myself geared up and ready to go.
Buddhism and Hunting
Thirty six years ago when I started practicing Zen Buddhism I gave up meat eating, hunting and fishing to become a “good Buddhist” vegetarian. I had an on and off thing with fishing, I stopped for years, picked it up again as exclusively a Catch & Release practice, stopped it again, then picked it back up again. I never picked up hunting or eating meat again until this last year. When forced out of my vegetarian diet by SIBO I decided that if I was going to eat meat then I was going to participate in the taking of that meat or fish so I began killing fish and recently, killing animals, for food.
Getting back into hunting
End of a good day, the dog is tired out.
When I first had to go from vegetarian to Paleo I made the decision that I was going to have to take responsibility for eating animals and do some of the killing of them myself. This started with fish last spring, when I began killing stocker trout for dinner. It was not an easy decision to make but I felt it was the right one. Re-reading The Paleo Manifesto this winter I got to the section on hunting and decided that now was the time to take the gathering of my own food a step further and get back into hunting for meat.
Blood on my mala
Y
ears ago I took the Buddhist precepts with the Kwan Um School of Zen and the first precept was pretty clear –
I vow to abstain from taking life.
The commentary on this precept states that:
Killing roots out our seeds of love and mercy. To kill another is to feast on one’s friends and relatives. Some day we shall be in one of the three painful realms in payment for our killing, for it is by bestowing life that we receive human life in return.