I turn to trophy hunting in December.
Trading rifle and shotgun for an ax, I stalk the timber for a Christmas tree.
It’s a hunt I’ve taken part in since I was old enough to drive.
When I was a kid, my family always bought a tree, but by the time I was 16 I’d decided I could do better cutting my own. It was one of the few instances of my newfound independence that pleased Mom and Dad. My parents were happy to save a few bucks.
Conifers were relatively rare in the Southern Indiana countryside of my youth. Hardwoods filled the river bottoms, and everywhere else, it seemed, the land had been cleared for corn and soybeans.
Thank goodness for Mr. Peabody, made famous in a song about Muhlenberg County, Kentucky, after his Peabody Coal Co. “hauled it all away.”
The much-maligned practice of strip-mining provided my early Christmas trees. After the land had been turned upside down to reach veins of coal, the resulting spoil banks were planted with pines. Acres and acres of rolling land covered with conifers.
I’d walk the ridges, spot a likely trophy, and move in for closer inspection, eventually selecting a tree worthy of harvest.
The process used to take longer than it does now. I’d spot a tree, hike over to it, then realize it was 14-feet tall. I’d see another and think it was the perfect tree before closer inspection revealed it was actually two trees growing next to each other.
And as I grow older I’ve learned how to adjust the less-than-perfect tree. A shortage of branches on one side simply means the tree will stand closer to the wall. No branches on the bottom allows presents to be stacked higher.
But after nearly 40 years of cutting down my own Christmas trees maybe I just know what I want. Then again, my wife and I may have so many ornaments to hang that any imperfection is well hidden.
This year’s hunt took less than an hour. On an island in an ice-covered river flowing out of the Beartooth Mountains, I found a nice fir growing closely among a stand of dozens of its ilk.
A few strokes of the ax and I had the tree on the ground, tagged it with a Forest Service permit and dragged it back to the truck less than a mile away.
The tree is too tall as they often are, but a little off the top, a foot off the bottom and it will fit nicely in the living room.
For a couple of weeks the house will smell of evergreen, just like the mountains, and the backwoods of my youth.
May you all have a tree to enjoy this holiday season.
Merry Christmas.
Parker Heinlein is at pman@mtintouch.net