Okay, so I did not really try to call the pheasants during my first upland bird hunt, but I thought about it!

​In October, my husband, father-in-law, and brother-in-law went on our first pheasant hunt at Rocky Mountain Roosters (“RMR”). We drove seven hours over multiple mountain passes to arrive at our campground. When we left our house, it was 60 degrees and sunny; by the time we arrived at the campground, it was 15 degrees with 20 mile per hour winds. The plan was to shoot skeet at RMR that afternoon so we could get acquainted with the location and practice shooting.

​The weather had not improved by the time we arrived at RMR. Also, I did not bring any gloves for the hunt because I thought it was going to be 60 degrees and sunny.

​To shoot, we stood on a big wooden bridge that overlooked the skeet field, about ten feet off the ground. That did not help the wind situation at all. We took turns shooting and felt pretty good leaving RMR.

We went directly to Big R to buy appropriate winter clothes. Armed with new gloves and wool socks, I was ready to hunt! We woke up early the next morning and went back to RMR. We met our guide, Lee, and his two great dogs.

I had never hunted with a guide or with dogs. I was really nervous. The thought of accidently shooting a dog was absolutely terrifying. We started walking through the reeds and ravines looking for birds.

​My brother-in-law shot a pheasant within minutes of starting the hunt. It flew out of a bush right in front of him and he nailed it. It was his first kill ever!

We continued hiking through the field and I took a shot at a bird. Luckily, Lee was standing next to me. He suggested that I might want to shoulder the gun before shooting next time. I got so excited about the bird that I did not have the gun in the right position. Duly noted, Lee. I will start shouldering the gun.
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Throughout the morning, my husband and brother-in-law shot many pheasants and chukar. I took quite a few shots and then circled up with Lee. I told him that I had shot at a lot of birds in my life, but never killed one. He wisely pointed out that I should not be shooting “at” the bird, but instead in front of it. Right, Lee, good advice. I will start shooting in front of the bird. 

About halfway through the morning hunt, I shot my first pheasant! I was beyond excited. As a good guide, Lee had been carrying all our birds for us. But, I insisted that he put the bird into my (brand new) hunting vest. It had a special little pouch in the back for the dead birds and I absolutely was going to use it.

​After a little hesitation, Lee agreed to put the bird in my pouch. He then walked away to help someone else and I panicked a bit. The bird was flapping in my pouch. I thought it was going to fly away.
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So, here I am in the field yelling “Lee, the bird is alive! Help! It is going to fly out!” He came back over and assured me that it was dead and just twitching. Great, Lee, you are right again.

​After the hunt, we processed all the birds ourselves at RMR. There were feathers everywhere, but we left with about 15 processed birds. We have not cooked any yet but stay tuned.

​This was my first hunt where I killed an animal. It was really exciting, and I cannot wait to eat an animal that I killed myself. It is self-sufficiency at its best, even if Lee was a key component!

I live in a small town in the Rocky Mountains, many miles away from the nearest ocean. Needless to say, the options for buying fresh fish are limited. For the past two years, we have purchased fresh Alaskan salmon from Jake’s Alaskan Seafood Co. Jake is a local guy that fishes in Alaska every summer and brings his fish back to the Rocky Mountains.
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The fish that he brings back is absolutely amazing. As a result of purchasing bulk salmon two years in a row, we currently have quite a lot of salmon. We have been grilling it and it is delicious. But we were looking for other ways to cook the fish.

A few weeks ago, we decided to dust off our charcoal smoker and try to smoke some of Jake’s salmon. We do not have a fancy Traeger; we smoke our fish the old-fashioned way with charcoal.

We brined the salmon in 1 quart of cool water, 1/3 cup of kosher salt, and 1 cup of brown sugar. We submerged the salmon in the brine for at least 2 hours. Then, we removed the salmon and thoroughly dried it with paper towels. We placed the salmon on a rack to allow it to dry a bit more.

Then, my husband started the charcoal smoker with a huge propane torch. (I guess we are a bit impatient.) He filled a bowl inside the smoker with cedar kindling that we had cut from our property and added water. Within a few minutes, the smoker was ready for the salmon.
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We used soy sauce, honey, and red chile to create a marinade for the salmon. We placed the salmon onto the wire racks and basted it with the marinade. We then closed the lid to allow the smoking to begin. We kept the front door of the smoker slightly ajar to ensure the charcoal did not go out. 

Every hour, we opened the lid and basted the salmon. After 2-3 hours, we removed the salmon and it was perfect. It is smoky and delicious.

It was so good that we had to vacuum seal half of it to ensure that we did not eat it all in a day.
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Smoking the salmon has opened up a whole new way for us to enjoy Jake’s catch. Living in the mountains, you have to be creative in how you source your food (like buying in bulk from a local fisherman) and how you prepare it so you do not tire of the same food. 

With COVID, I may be turning into a hoarder. Okay, any time that I watch the news I declare that we need to buy an entire cow to stock the freezers and I have an uncontrollable urge to can any food that is in my kitchen.

Every year, I buy at least 40 pounds of tomatoes from the farmer’s market to can. Last year, I canned 80 pounds, which turned out to be quite a lot of tomatoes. Each fall, I visit the same women in the back corner of the local farmer’s market. They have a notebook where I write down my name, phone number, and what produce I want to order in bulk.

This year, my husband and I ventured to the farmer’s market with our masks on and I went to place my order. Overwhelmed with the crowd and mask, my husband decided to wait outside the market. I placed my order for tomatoes as usual, but then I think I blacked out (okay, not really). I saw that other people were ordering half bushels of green beans. Not to be outdone, I ordered an entire bushel of green beans. I walked away beaming with pride that I would have plenty of green beans.

Then I met back up with my husband. I declared that I had managed to pre-order a hoarder’s quantity of green beans. He was shocked that I would order a bushel and asked me if I knew how many green beans were in a bushel. I responded that I did not. I also did not ask how much a bushel of green beans would cost. Details, details…
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It turns out, a bushel is 40 pounds of green beans. My household consists of two people. Forty pounds of green beans is a massive amount. Also, I spent $80 on green beans, which is a pretty considerable amount for produce.

Once I picked up the 40 pounds of green beans, I panicked. I posted on Facebook that I had green beans for sale! A friend graciously took 10 pounds off my hands. I then canned the remaining 30 pounds. I made about 28 pints and 7 quarts of green beans. I followed the advice of the women from the farmer’s market and canned it with just water and salt.

Honestly, the green beans are delicious. They are thick and meaty. We are eating at least one jar a week and we are not sick of it at all.
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Maybe I will order a bushel and a half next year!

How to Can Green Beans

To can green beans, follow my instructions on how to can found here: https://www.kettleandcanyon.com/blog/canning-101

To prep the beans, wash the beans, cut off the ends, and cut the beans into your desired length. Place the beans in the jar and add boiling water. I used ½ teaspoon of salt per pint and 1 teaspoon of salt per quart. At my elevation, I processed the means at 15 psi for 20 minute for pints and 25 for quarts.

Happy canning!

I never expected to hunt anything, let alone a goose. But, when I did not draw the big game tags that I wanted, my husband and I switched gears. We bought shot guns and started teaching ourselves to bird hunt.

We started with goose. I thought it would be a simple task. Just walk around the lake, look for birds, and shoot them. Sounds easy, right? That is 100% not what happened. We started in full force when early goose season began in September. It was a short season – only 9 days. But, those 9 days felt really long; we were hunting for hours every day.

The weather was unseasonably warm. It was 90 degrees on most of our goose hunts. When I considered bird hunting, I envisioned tweed jackets and the leaves changing. Instead, I had 90 degrees, no water, sun burns, and absolute exhaustion. There were no knee-high brown leather boots and martinis after the hunt.

I learned that there are a few ways to hunt geese. Many people use a blind and sit quietly for hours. They use decoys and calls to lure the birds to them. After our Texas boar hunt in a blind, we decided to try a different method. We decided to “jump shoot.” Essentially, we hid in the bushes behind chamisas, or in the reeds, and would creep up on the birds. Once they started to fly, we would shoot them.
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During one hunt, we implemented a plan to launch a canoe onto a lake, tie our guns around our waists, paddle over to the birds, and shoot from the canoe. We got to the lake and saw a huge flock of geese. We hopped out of the truck and got our guns ready. It felt like our plan was fool proof.

My husband pulled out paracord that he had cut so that we could tie the guns to our waists in case the canoe capsizes. Well, I wore shorts without belt loops. Unimpressed, my husband found a small eyelet in my shorts and ran the paracord through the hole to secure my gun to my shorts.

We then carried the canoe, paddles, life vests, and guns down a really steep boat ramp. By the time we got to the bottom of the ramp, I already had blisters on my hands.

We launched the canoe and started paddling toward the geese. We paddled for a really, really long time. The lake was completely massive and we were exhausted. I did not pack any water or snacks, which is pretty much my main job while hunting.

Once we got near the geese, we realized that they were finicky and going to fly away from us before we could get into range. We then re-evaluated our plan. It was decided that I would get out and hike behind the geese and my husband would take the canoe around to the other side of the flock.

With this new plan, we were able to take a few shots at the geese, but did not hit any. By the end of the hike, I was completely exhausted, dehydrated, and a bit deflated. Also, we were on the opposite side of the lake from our truck. I started to walk out into the lake toward the canoe (and my husband) and immediately started sinking in the mud.

I was wearing shorts with boots and sinking fast in the thick mud. I was up to my knees in water and could not get my boots free from the mud. I fell over a few times into the water, but luckily held my shotgun over my head (remember, it was tied to my shorts). As I was struggling in the mud, I started to panic. I felt like I was not going to be able to get my feet free or that I was going to lose my boot. My husband was standing 15 feet away from me with the canoe watching this debacle. My eyes started to fill with tears and I declared that I was about to cry.
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He calmed me down quickly, talking me through how to free my boot from the thick lake mud. I was able to break free from the mud and get back into the canoe. We paddled across the larger-than-expected lake, carried all of our gear back up the steep boat ramp, and left goose-less. 

As we debriefed about our goose hunting adventure, I thought about how extremely difficult the hunt was for me. I was exhausted, sun burned, and embarrassed that I had nearly cried because I was stuck in the mud. Reflecting on the experience, I know that I would have lost all composure if I was presented with that situation ten years ago. But, I am a little older, calmer, and more determined than I once was and I am ready for the next goose season.

I also firmly believe that there is no crying in goose hunting.