by Doug Bahrenfuss

Every since I was young, my most enjoyable times are the hours I spend wondering through the timber, standing on a riverbank,tromping the cover for the elusive ring-necks, or maybe plinking squirrels from tall cottonwoods. I’ve come to realize that a person needs to be born with these traits. The people that don’t have these traits seem to look at you with a blank expression on their face when you make comments on how much the outdoors matter in a persons life.

The reason this has been brought to mind for me, I spend a lot of time driving through the countryside watching wildlife. One of my favorite rides took me past an old farm where the owner managed the land to promote wildlife habitat. He spent years planting nice rows of pine trees and honeysuckle, mixed with weedy cover, with corn food plots thrown in for good luck. It was beautiful, it was also common to drive past this farm in the winter and see 100 or more pheasants, along with bunches of rabbits and deer, every kind of wildlife known to the area. It wasn’t a large area, probably 30-40 acres, but animals were everywhere.

The man that went through all the work to give the animals cover to survive was born with the traits I mentioned, he loved watching the animals take advantage of his “ masterpiece.” But as we all know, time changes things, and the old boy had to sell his land because of health reasons. The land was never what a person would consider “good” farm ground, it would take a lot to make it capable of growing a crop, but not long ago I drove by the farm and my heart sunk, the beautiful pine trees and all the cover was pushed into huge piles, waiting for the match that would burn them to ashes. I wondered how the old boy that used to spend time watching all the animals must have felt. So who is to blame? The man that attracted all the wildlife to his land, only to have it destroyed, making all the animals scramble to find new cover to keep them alive?

I’ve lived in the Great Lakes area for over 25 years and the one thing I notice, that gets worse with each passing year, is how a million dollar home is more important than the 150-200 year old oak trees that stand in the way to build that home. So who’s to blame? The oak trees that were there when tribes of Indians roamed the area.

It’s also becoming a normal thing to see lots of deer strolling among these homes. I think back over 25 years and remember all of the areas of timber and farmland that have been taken over by development. The same people that destroy so much habitat seem to be the first to complain the deer are eating the flowers they planted around their mansions! So who’s to blame? The deer for trying to find something to eat in the concrete pasture that humans made for them?

As a final thought, everyone seems to be talking about global warming these days, when you see so many trees disappear, to be replaced by concrete and asphalt, my question is this—when the summer temp is 90-100 degrees, where would you rather be, in the shade of a giant oak tree, or standing in a black asphalt world?

SO WHO’S TO BLAME????