It’s true that the bright waxing moon in the cold winter sky shouldn’t evoke visions of vipers. Yet, go figure, a long persecuted New England snake is indeed this week’s unseasonable topic.

Snakes, in January? you ask, bemusedly scratching at your temple with your index finger.”

Yeah, snakes in January. Better still, Timber Rattlesnakes — those venomous vipers of colonial New England lore that once sent shivers up the spine of many a man, woman and child working around the wood pile or traipsing barefoot through the summer woods back in the day. Nowadays, you can still find this feared, misunderstood, endangered reptile locally around the talus slopes of Mounts Tom and Tekoa south and west of here. But when’s the last time you heard of a rattler sighting anywhere in Franklin County? Likely never, and for good reason. According to an information sheet published by MassWildlife’s Natural Heritage & Endangered Species Program (NHESP), rattlesnakes no longer exist in this county, which may or may not be true … probably not.

Common sense’ll tell you that a man could probably cross the path of a rattler if he went searching in remote pockets of local, stony mountains, even around the cliffs of the Sugarloafs north and south, or maybe rocky outcroppings and treacherous upland rock slides on Mt. Toby or high in our western hills — places like, a wild guess, the western slope of High Ridge overlooking foreboding Guinea Gulch and the beautiful Conway State Forest.

The indigenous people who greeted the first European explorers to New England were often adorned in clothing that displayed traces of our native rattlesnake, be it decorative skins worn like belts around the waist, bands for the arms or legs, or long, sharp, ominous fangs strung into a string of beads or onto clothing worn ceremonially or for formal wear. So, it’s a fact that this poisonous snake was here, and not uncommon, either, until Euro-Americans decided they were dastardly demons that must be extirpated, the sooner the better. Thus bounties were offered and the wanton destruction began, bringing about a rapid decline that now borders on extinction. Yes, much like the native folks who wore their skins and fangs with pride as symbols of the underworld, from the colonial perspective, the only good rattlesnake was a dead one, and killing them was encouraged.

So now, get a load of this — wild but true — there’s currently a MassWilfdlife proposal supported by respected wildlife biologist Tom French, Division of Fisheries and Wildlife assistant director for NHESP, to establish a wild population of Timber Rattlers on a large, unspecified Quabbin Reservoir island. Although the proposal has not yet been approved, it seems likely that it will be, given the NHESP responsibility to protect and enhance endangered species in the name of conservation. Plus there’s added incentive to rebuild our rattlesnake population now, before it diminishes even further: never before has there been a population decline close to that of the past 30 years. No question, it’s time to act.

I got wind of the proposal more than a month ago from a reliable North Quabbin Region source, who, frankly, I doubted a little bit. Yes, during a telephone conversation with always-affable Millers River Fisherman’s Association founder Peter Mallet of New Salem, this country character questioned the wisdom of stocking rattlesnakes on the Quabbin, remote island or not, and claimed that the North Quabbin Trails Association was up in arms about it.

“I know it sounds crazy,” Mallet gasped, “but this is real. I got it straight from a game warden. Don’t these people know rattlesnakes can swim?”

Well, in fact they do. French-generated information about the proposal furnished by MassWildlife Information and Education guru Marion Larson acknowledges that rattlesnakes are good swimmers but speculates that despite this ability, a small, isolated population would have no reason to leave a secluded, paradisiacal Quabbin island believed to have supported historic rattlesnake populations before reservoir flooding dramatically changed the landscape. Although that may well be true, it is far from absolute, especially if after many decades overpopulation stimulates forced migration in all directions.

Something gleaned from the short narrative written in favor of the Quabbin proposal that’s likely misleading is the declaration that “all of the documented bites from wild snakes since colonial times can be counted on one hand, and there have been no life-threatening encounters since colonial times on record.” Although this may be true, the words to focus on are “documented” and “on record,” both highly rhetorical. The question is: How many rattlesnake bites from the 17th and 18th centuries were “documented,” that is formally reported and recorded by town, county and/or state officials? The answer is likely few. And to claim that no one ever died from a snake bite is at best weak. Cursory research of the colonial period reveals many reports of rattlesnakes and a fear of snake bites to people and livestock alike.

Indians were experts at treating poisonous snake bites. The first move was to open the skin with a knife and suck the blood from the wound at the point where the fangs penetrated the body. Then they had wild-plant antidotes and salves or powders to counter the effects of whatever poison remained. But it is highly unlikely that no New England pioneers from the wilds of early uninhabited pockets of New England succumbed to snake bites. Though probably not prevalent, random death had to occur unless accompanied by Indian scouts or maybe equipped with a pouch of herbal remedies learned from them.

Because rattlesnakes are now an Endangered Species, it is absolutely illegal to kill them. The MassWildlife map pinpointing these snakes’ current range show them present in Berkshire, Hampshire and Hampden counties and south of Boston in the Blue Hills region. They can be identified by their triangular head and narrow neck but can vary in color from jet black to sulfur-yellow with black, brown, or rust-colored blotches separated by cross bands on the back and sides. What distinguishes the Timber Rattler from other rattlesnakes is their lack of stripes or bands on the head and face, and their solid black tails. Adults measure 3 to 5 feet in length, not a pretty sight to someone who comes upon one unexpectedly.

According to the NHESP information pamphlet, Timber Rattlers are most often found in mountainous terrain characterized by second-growth deciduous or coniferous forest, with step ledges, rock slides, and large rodent populations. They are sometimes found in pine barrens and wetlands, and may occasionally be found in fields and pastures.

Our warming climate could make the Northeast even more favorable habitat to Timber Rattlers, which hibernate in caves and stone crevices from mid-October to mid-April.

But is stocking them a good idea? The jury’s still out.

The email message, linked to another from before Thanksgiving and its prompt response, was sent by Laurie Banas from Hatfield by way of South Deerfield, where her Frontier classmates will remember her as Laurie Magelinski. She was just checking in to provide her final update on a memorable deer-hunting season.

In November, Ms. Banas had touched base to tell about an unusual bow-hunting occurrence that unfolded before her doubting eyes on the way to her tree stand. Out of the corner of her eye, she had caught movement entering an old, overgrown field, identified it as a wild-turkey flock and decided to “snuggle up against a tree” to watch. In the process of counting more than 30 birds — many of them young, frisky jakes “making quite a ruckus” by strutting, faux-sparring and taking short flight in a playful maturation ritual — she was surprised to find among them a bright blue anomaly. Yes, to her utter disbelief, accompanying the turkeys was, of all things, a peacock.

“Yup,” she wrote, “hard to believe. Had to look and look and look again. Sure enough, a peacock. Bright blue. No ornamental feathers, but the little dicky-doo thing atop his head. Thought I had seen most everything, but never a peacock thinking it was a turkey, and a very fancy one at that.”

Accompanying the note were photos taken and sent by her cell phone. Yes indeed, a lonely peacock roaming with a flock of turkeys. Banas declined to name the site, and who can blame her for protecting the location of a favorite deer stand?

Prior to that peculiar sighting, from reading between the lines, the archery deer season could have been summed up as uneventful, perhaps even bordering on boring. Which doesn’t mean she hadn’t had her moments. She had, after all, according to a postseason email, let fly and missed a nice 6-pointer and seen many does that kept her enthusiasm piqued. She thus kept carefully trudging to her secluded tree stand mornings and/or evenings in pursuit of an antlered buck and the cabin-fever-soothing venison such a kill deposits in her freezer. Then, lo, proving once again that perseverance pays, her fortunes changed dramatically during the shotgun deer season, which she put an end to in rapid fashion, putting a lot of the local boys to shame.

Yes, according to her most recent update, Ms. Banas bagged back-to-back bucks on Days 1 and 2 of the two-week shotgun season. Not only that, but there may have been a little karma involved, given that she was hunting one of her late dad’s favorite haunts.

“I always go to my dad’s old stomping grounds as a tribute to him — a way to reconnect with that space and time,” she wrote, referring to former part-time South Deerfield cop, Stanley Magelinski.

Well, this time Dad’s spirit must have been present in the fall wind to push deer toward her. At 8:30 a.m. Day 1, she killed a scrappy 5-point, 115-pound buck with a broken main antler beam, likely from fighting. Then, 24 hours later, at 8:45 the next morning in the same spot, she killed a 7-point, 110-pound buck to end her season in a flash. Perhaps she had prematurely ended the reign of twin 2- or 3-year-old buckaroos. Or maybe they were just random, unrelated young bucks passing the same stand nearly a day to the minute apart.

With rapid-fire success in the rear-view, Ms. Banas was confronted with the bleak reality that her season was over unless she was up for helping others hoping to fill their harvest tags. Nope, not her cup of tea running around the woods trying to move deer for others.

“Honestly, I am not into helping people drive deer,” she wrote, “so it was a boring December, for sure. But, all tagged out, I saw many more deer after that on back-road drives.”
Sounds like one of those years all deer hunters experience if they stay at it long enough. Some years you can’t see a flag. Others, well, no matter where you go, there are deer.

Luck of the draw.

Could conditions have been any more favorable for hunters allowed for the first time in more than a half-century to kill bears during the 12-day shotgun deer season?

Well, not likely, with weather bordering on surreal and the woods literally full of a wide variety of wild foods. In fact, many hunters who were in the woods to experience the first go-round last month may never in their lifetimes see a better scenario unfold. Then again, who knows? With the planet said to be warming at an alarming rate, Decembers and Christmases similar to those we just witnessed may indeed become more the rule than the exception. But let’s not go there. It’s become a political hot potato that can get hotter by the second, and pretty ugly.

According to MassWildlife Bear Project Leader Laura Conlee, the preliminary bear harvest during deer season was a respectable 53, including that humongous 498-pound bruin shot in Quabbin country by an Athol hunter and first suspected to be a state record. However, further checking by MassWildlife Information and Education guru Marion Larson revealed that a bigger bruin had indeed been taken, and not that long ago, either. The record beast weighing a whopping 541 pounds was killed just three years ago in Southwick. Bagged during the 2012 September season, that 15-year-old bear stands as the state record since records have been kept. Both massive bears were males that were weighed field-dressed. Estimates suggest both animals would have tipped the scales at between 600 and 700 pounds live weight — nothing a man would want to pester during weekend woodland travel.

How warm was it during the first shotgun deer season allowing bear hunting in recent memory? Well, try this on for size. There were reports of nightcrawler picking past Christmas, and open-water Barton Cove anglers were casting lures from bass boats in shirtsleeves on New Years Day. The reason the unseasonably mild, snowless deer season offered ideal late bear-hunting opportunity was that the warmth, coupled with an overabundance of nuts, fruits and berries, kept foraging bears active longer than cold, snowy years. Had there been deep snow, frigid temps and sparse mast crops, much of the food would have been gone early and many bears would have been denned up in their dormant winter hibernation stage when, contrary to prevailing wisdom, they are rarely totally out of commission but are for sure less active and available to hunters.

Although Conlee agrees with the assessment that conditions for bear hunting during the most-recent deer season were optimal, she is certain some bears will always be available during shotgun deer seasons. Thus she’s confident that hunters will continue to produce a consistent supplement to the bear harvest regardless of conditions. In the process, hunters will furnish a needed alternative method of keeping the annual bear harvest on the upswing and maybe even meet the goal of stabilizing the statewide population before it gets out of hand. Fact is that suburban bears are already causing issues east of here, and the problems will spill out to the hinterlands and multiply if the population keeps growing unchecked. The previous split, six-week bear seasons simply weren’t meeting harvest goals.

Bears most vulnerable to deer hunters over the long haul will, according to Conlee, be solitary wandering males, barren sows and mother sows with growing yearling cubs. Bears that fit that mould hold out as long as they can in search of food to build fat reserves for lean winter dormancy. Even during difficult winters, some bears will come out of their dens on mild days to search for food. Although Conlee said the preferred late-fall feed is high-protein acorns and beechnuts, they will also seek out apples, black cherries, berries, and large, hard nuts like butternuts, hickories and walnuts, which are more than deer can handle. She said bears have no problem crunching up the bigger, harder nuts, and actually seek out hickory and walnut or butternut groves with good yields.

Something interesting in the wake of our first simultaneous shotgun deer/bear season in many years is that the 2015 bear harvest will actually be less than that of 2014, when bears were not fair game to shotgun deer hunters and mast crops were spotty at best, not nearly as bountiful as this year. The incomplete 2015 harvest shows 175 bears killed during September and November, plus a preliminary 53 during deer season for a total of 228. That’s 12 fewer than the September/November 2014 record total 240. Hmmmm? So how did that occur?

One factor that could lead to higher numbers during mediocre mast years like 2014 could be that bears have fewer places to feed and are thus easier to pattern and predict. Such places would include silage cornfields and commercial orchards, both of which provide easy access and open sight lines for rifles. However, even though cultivated foods were a factor in that 2014 harvest, the numbers don’t bear out a majority of cornfield kills. In fact, Conlee reported that only 14 percent of the 2014 harvest came from cultivated food sources, compared to 68 percent from wild foods, 14 percent from swamps and 17 percent from softwoods. Apparently, a majority of the successful hunters had — as a result of diligent scouting, evaluation and intuitive planning — discovered productive wild-food pockets during a spotty year and their scouting paid dividends.

Conlee said bears can grow accustomed to eating corn and become pests by developing a preference for it, but she doesn’t believe that is typical behavior or even that it’s as common as prevailing wisdom would suggest. To the contrary, she said bears prefer variety and take whatever’s available in a given year, and may just focus on productive nut groves even when corn and orchard fruits are ripe, rampant and easy picking. Which doesn’t preclude orchard and cornfield damage during bountiful natural-feed years like 2015, when bears will still switch it up from time to time and take a little of everything in their travels. Still, if natural feed is abundant, with exceptions, Conlee thinks most bears will seek it out and not focus primarily on cornfields and commercial orchards. Plus, she said, wise old bears that have been pressured by farmers an/or hunters over the years quickly adapt and learn to feed on cornfields at night after legal hunting hours.

So now, following our first combined deer/bear season in generations, questions remain and will surely linger for many years to come. Eventually, though, we’ll know precisely what the new twist means in the big picture. Think of it: How could this season extension into deer season not aid the initiative to harvest more bears in an effort aimed at population control and reduction of potential human conflict?

Winter finally arrived this week, leaving a thin yet significant coating of a filthy, frozen disaster that’s nearly impossible to shovel. But why dwell on the negative? Wouldn’t you rather backtrack to the good days of the recent surreal past, when springlike weather was receiving love from lollygaggers and fitness freaks alike and, for the most part, hate from deer hunters patrolling warm, soft, snow-free woods?

So, here we go. …

It’s 6 p.m. and the shotgun deer season has been over for about an hour. The wireless phone, cradled in its charger within arm’s reach atop a Federal four-drawer cherry chest of drawers, rings and displays a familiar name on the caller ID. It’s an old hunting buddy and traveling companion. No media darling, he prefers anonymity. Thus, he’s always been “Killer” in this space.

An old backwoodsman and Buckland native, the man has successfully hunted and fished for just about everything in his 71 years of existence. Not only that, but he can even lay claim to rare membership in the rapidly dwindling fraternity of working men who once supplemented their annual income by trapping back in the days before leg-holds were outlawed in 1996. His lively tales of predawn awakenings to tend trap lines and pre-breakfast skinning, stretching and treating chores for the beaver, otter, mink, muskrat, fox, coyote and raccoon pelts he processed are fun indeed to absorb; likewise, the tales of carefully packing pelts for trips to fur auctions halfway across the state. Whether spun during back-road rambles or just sitting in front of a toasty, crackling winter fire for convivial chit-chat, they’re always worth a listen.

The reason for his call on this particular night was total astonishment. He had to talk to someone. You see, traveling earlier that day to a last hurrah of shotgun deer season in Conway with his stepson, and crossing east to west across Bardwells Ferry Bridge, the Fox-News devotee had run across a most surprising sight. Yes, after the appearance of a parked pickup on the Conway side had produced a glimmer of hope that other hunters were in the woods and may even move fleeing deer past him or his partner, his optimism had been quickly squashed. Why? Because, upon closer inspection, he spotted movement along the distant eastern Deerfield River bank far below. To his disbelief, there stood a vested angler wearing chest-waders submerged to the waist and, of all things, flycasting before 9 Dec. 12 morn.

“I remember thinking then that when you live as long as I have, you’re bound to see strange things,” he quipped, “but I gotta tell you I never dreamed I’d see someone flyfishing on the last day of shotgun deer season. Who knows? Maybe global warming is real.”

It doesn’t end there.

After making his rounds and working himself to a profuse sweat by circling, zigging and zagging through the woods in many directions trying and fill a harvest tag, the boys came away empty on that last day and Ole Killer was home by 3 p.m. Preparing something for supper out of carefully packaged foods from his bloated stand-up freezer, he went to the backyard for a moment and — lo — noticed something that surprised him as much if not more than his earlier Deerfield River sighting. Right there underfoot were unmistakable nightcrawler holes Pioneer Valley residents grow accustomed to seeing in rich summer soil, not during the typically frozen second week of December.

He first thought was that it must have been something else. But no! Inspection confirmed they were indeed nightcrawler holes. Go figure. Just the previous night, crawlers had obviously been out and available. And given the mild temperatures forecast for the approaching overnight, they would again soon be stretched out in the darkness on damp green grass.

Sure enough, when he later returned to the scene with a moss-filled Maxwell House coffee can, he had no problem picking a couple dozen fat, lively crawlers to store in the fridge for future ice-fishing adventures. Quite a day: a morning Deerfield River flyfisher followed by nighttime crawler picking in … uhm … mid-December. Is something wrong with that picture?

But wait. It gets better — this time maybe even traipsing into the realm of surreal.

Two weeks later, on the most recent Saturday past — yes, the day after Christmas — again that same white wireless phone cradled in its charger on the cherry chest of drawers rang within arm’s reach. It was the Killer with more news. No, not a hunting tale. Not quite, even though his stepson had pestered him that morning, chumming for a short hunt. Killer declined. The weather wasn’t right. Plus, he had other plans that precluded even a brief foot-free push.

Come nighttime, chores and a sumptuous family dinner behind him, the dedicated old ice fisherman decided to perform one more little mission before mixing a stiff drink and putting his feet up for the night. He went to the fridge, grabbed the Maxwell House coffee can full of crawlers, picked up a flashlight and headed to the damp, loamy, backyard lawn to pick some additional future ice-fishing bait. And yes, you betcha he snagged a couple dozen more crawlers in no time on the day after Christmas. In fact, it was described by him as easy pickings. Yes indeed — big, fat, juicy, lively buggers stretched out luxuriously for effortless collection on the green, dew-covered lawn. No lie. Here it was the day after Christmas and nightcrawler picking was probably better than it had been on the Fourth of July.

Problem is that now Ole Killer is perplexed. Something just ain’t right. Although still reluctant to doubt his favorite nightly-news feed that routinely harangues global warming as a liberal scheme, he says this recent string of events has really sent his wheels a spinnin’ to a shrill, unnerving scream. Shaking his head in confusion, he ponders the probabilities of first not seeing a deer during shotgun season, then at the same time finding a flyfisherman on the Deerfield River and later the same day, plus again two weeks later, he himself picking backyard crawlers.

Frankly, he’s not sure what to make of it. Could it be that he’s getting fed a line of baloney on his favorite news feed?

Well, as cartoon character “Muskie” used to comically quip on Saturday mornings back in the day, “It’s possi-bullllle.”

Bittersweet has pushed its yellow skin aside, adding a softer shade of red to the abundant Christmas berries populating our local wetlands. Both wild ornamental berries will, over time, be snipped here and there by human gatherers seeking materials for holiday wreaths to hang on front doors, and fall floral arrangements to place in vases, stoneware crocks or old, scarred walnut trenchers centered on dining-room tables.

Yes, the blotches of pleasant, uplifting colors just keep changing in this Indian summer weather so many Pioneer Valley folks eagerly anticipate annually — perfect for light yard work and soothing conversation, installation of storm windows, screen-door removal, bicycling along back roads, or hiking old, narrow trails through the high, colorful, soon to be barren upland hardwoods, where there’s just enough chill in a shady breeze to keep all comfortable.

But for the bird hunter, Indians summer can quickly devolve into Indian bummer, not in spite of the warm temperatures but because of them. For those accustomed to pounding dense, punishing cover through mucky, boggy tangles, it’s frankly too hot and uncomfortable for anyone wearing rugged old clothing standbys like Filson Tin Cloth bibs and jackets built for ultimate protection and comfort in temperatures of 50 degrees and below. Those attired in such protective garments made for brush-busting want no part of temperatures in the 60s, never mind 70s. Quite the contrary, who in their right mind would choose to follow fit, aggressive gun dogs through thick, thorny coverts wearing heavy canvas apparel. And forget shorts and T-shirts, which would in no time leave a man’s arms and legs tattered and torn to shreds.

Likewise, gun dogs, even those in tip-top shape, spirited, athletic types born for stamina and determination, perform much better and last longer under cool temperatures and gray skies. Get them out in warm, sunny conditions like we’ve had this week and you had better hunt well-watered coverts, where exhausted, overheated animals can submerge themselves in cool-down slurping streams with refreshing water to replenish what seems like their unlimited, boundless energy under ideal, cool conditions.

An option for warm weather can always be early-morning hunts while it’s still cool or even downright cold before the sun rises high enough for warmth. But the problem with that solution is that experienced wing shooters much prefer mid-morning or midday hunting, which gives pheasant and grouse time to leave their overnight roosts and deposit enticing scent, old and new, that keeps dogs jacked up while trailing scent through feeding areas, which are this year ubiquitous, bountiful crops of wild seeds and berries in marshes high, low and in between.

That is not to suggest that bird hunters are alone among hunting brethren with their cool-weather preferences. It is no different for bear hunters, who took to the woods for the second segment of the three-way split-season this year, or even the archery deer hunters, both of whom will have to check daily for ticks burrowed into warm, moist, hidden regions of their bodies, and may even get pestered by misquotes and other similar airborne pests buzzing about in extended unseasonable warmth. That’s not to mention the clothing factor. Most bowhunting and November bear-hunting clothing trends toward at least lightly insulated pants, shirts or jackets. When wearing such clothing and walking through the woods to a stand or even still-hunting from blind to blind, a hunter can work up undesirable sweat, never good when the prey has a good nose.

Plus, who wants to harvest large, heavy animals in summer temperatures? Dragging large carcasses out of the woods can be unpleasant indeed on warm days. Plus, the warm temperatures complicating the drag also mandate immediate butchering for anyone who doesn’t have access to a walk-in cooler to prevent meat from spoiling overnight. Again, short-sleeve shirts and Bermuda shorts, even camo versions for deer hunters, don’t cut it for many reason. First, the bug and pricker factor. Plus, bare arms and legs are a dead giveaway when hunting something that requires camo concealment. And that doesn’t even address the cold factor before the sun rises high enough to warm the environment. Yes, it can get mighty chilly around sunrise and sunset, when most hunters prefer being settled into their stands for some time.

The good news is that splendid fall weather similar to what we’re experiencing this week can provide hunter respite, a short window of pleasant weather perfect for catching up on seasonal chores that must be completed before winter. There will be more than enough cool and outright cold days better suited for hunting before the seasons end.

You just gotta go with the flow, fellas. Hunt when the weather’s right, which leaves many options excluding heat.

—

Not so much as a word on the street or in the coffee shops yet about big deer taken by local bowhunters. The peak rut can’t be far off, so anyone who’s got a good tale to share can send it to the email address listed below or call 413-772-0474.

—

It’s early afternoon and the home phone rings. It’s a friend with an unusual question. He says he doesn’t agree with turning his clock back in the fall for Daylight Savings Time, which gives him an extra hour in the morning and subtracts one in the evening.

“Wouldn’t you rather have an extra hour after work,” he inquired. “I’ve spoken to a lot of people, including hunters, and all of them would rather have the extra hour in the evening for chores or hobbies. So why do we keep pushing our clocks back every fall? It’s stupid.”

Hmmmm?

Seems to make sense on a number of levels.

Bird season in the Happy Valley is glorious yet short for those who love it.

With it comes cold mornings — windshield scrapers always at the ready — and crisp, cool afternoons; sometimes sunny, sometimes gray, some wet and soggy days, others dry and crunchy, some windy and blustery, others still as a walk-in freezer locker.

An early-season bonus is the brilliant backdrop colored with broad splashes of distant orange sugarbush, ridge-top coppertone oak groves and always the pale yellow alders and poplars of the bottomland marsh being hunted, the mellow yellow complemented nicely by a drab brown underbody of post-frost goldenrod and ragweed cover lipped by cattail patches concealing hidden hummocks that can drop a man on his face in a flash.

Veterans know enough to be wary of cattails for reasons other than the cumbersome hummocks. Often along the border of such cattail stands are found deep, muddy channels that are barely discernible though impossible to cross afoot. One wrong forward step will instantly sink a man over his waist, never a pleasant predicament.

Plus there’s always the presence of hidden head-high prickers of various types, especially bull briars, which can stop a man dead in his tracks, literally, necessitating immediate reassessment before backing out of a dense thorny tangle in search of a kinder-gentler route.

Some hunters carry pruning shears to clear their paths. Others fear that if they do carry such a tool, it’s likely they’ll eventually puncture a car seat or expensive leather sofa at home. Thus they choose instead to plow through thorny tangles by raising their shotguns overhead and bulldozing through them wearing heavy Tin Cloth bibs and jackets, sleeved upper arms shielding their face from long, sharp thorns that can produce deep, bloody scratches.

Then again, such bullish moves always invite face-first falls most often broken by bent elbows extended with hands and forearms turned up to protect the shotgun. The silhouette embedded immediately afterward in the soft turf prominently displays two deep, conical dimples and the outline of a body that has temporarily matted down thick brush.

Such defensive landings from unexpected tumbles don’t save faces and necks from ugly abrasions and blood, which come with the territory in thick swamps where wary game birds lurk. Yes, it’s true that such unwelcome surprises are as inevitable as flushing riled-up ring-necked roosters for anyone who regularly hunts punishing cover through black unforgiving muck.

Gun dogs? Well, it’s even more challenging for them, even though they’re built for swamp-busting. Their tongues more often than not get sliced open, producing profuse bleeding that splashes customary crimson streaks and stains back onto their shoulders and sides. Though they don’t seem to mind the blood even a little bit, enthusiastic, all-out chases through flooded, beaver-infested wetlands present potentially more serious injuries when puncture wounds along the underbelly and rib cage are inflicted by sharp, pointed, spear-like stumps of small alders and poplars left by beavers’ handiwork. The shiny black wetland colonizers fill the gaps between sticks with mud as filler/waterproofing for their dams and huts.

These swampland beaver spikes left behind protrude straight upward from muck and standing water, and can puncture dogs’ feet and torso alike. And the danger is that such wounds bring with them a high vulnerability to bacterial infection from giardia, always present in such soupy beaver habitat. Unless treated in a timely fashion by thorough washing and subsequent application of an antibiotic salve, there’s a good chance that a serious abscess will form, eventually requiring costly veterinary intervention. And if you choose to save money and let the infection run its course (usually a mistake), be prepared for a systemic infection known in medical jargon as “going septic,” a dreadful diagnosis no one ever wants to hear for man or beast.

Another veterinary problem gun-dog owners can encounter, particularly early in the season after the first hard frosts, is tick-delivered Lyme disease that can result from a bite in habitat frequented by deer. For this reason, it’s a must to treat such dogs with monthly doses of topical medicine that covers the animals’ entire body after hand-depositing a head-to-tail application of drops along the length of the backbone. If on the day after application you find ticks embedded on your animal’s face or neck (the most common places to find them) and think the expensive medication isn’t working, fear not. The medicine kills ticks for a month after application. If you don’t believe it, pull them off and expect to find them dead and dried to a crusty brown. Mission accomplished. Lyme disease is said to require a 72-hour incubation period.

With all the negatives behind us, how about a positive or two? We’re talking about things like dogs making game, wildly wagging their tails, jumping, bounding, narrowing their quarter tighter and tighter, all jacked up for the flush and retrieve. Experienced hunters recognize just from the furious sound of a brush-busting dog that their invisible pet is hot on scent. At that point, it’s always advisable to stay close, position your hands right, raise your gun to a half-ready position from which it’ll be easy shoulder, and at all times keep your front foot pointed in the direction of the dog.

Eventually comes the best sound to emanate from such an exercise — that “cuck-cuck-cuck-cuck” of a scolding, flushing ring-necked rooster trying to fly to safety. The next sounds are a deafening roar or two, then a simple “fetch it up” command from hunter to loyal pet.

Honestly, it gets no better, very similar to taking a cut and hitting a baseball on the sweet spot. Talk about excitement and anticipation. It’s all there in brilliant, vivid fall colors, an added bonus indeed before the deep freeze of barren winter.

High enthusiasm and low expectations hovered over the dense, thorny, tangled, frost-browned wetland below, splashed with bright sunlight in cool air, the backdrop an infinite blue sky framed at the base by brilliant fall color from a deep, foreboding wooded swamp far back on the eastern perimeter.

Opening day of pheasant season? No. Too busy. Too crowded. It was, instead, late morning on the first Monday, Day 2, when the prospect of a random flush is possible but not particularly likely following the all-out opening-day circus of eager hunters, who just can’t resist despite chaotic overflow crowds. To each his or her own.

Remember the old bumper sticker that used to be sold at outdoor-shows reading, “A bad day of fishing is better than a good day at work.”? Well, that applies to bird hunting, too. Especially after paths have been broken through tangled marsh for old, battered legs, and the air temps have dropped below 50. Then even robust activity can transpire without profuse, uncomfortable sweating. In fact, a veteran who knows the game and plays it right can petty-much avoid sweating on cool, windy, tailor-made days for aggressive bird hunting.

Parked on the small earthen ramp that can handle two vehicles at a heavily hunted site was a red Subaru wagon cluttered inside with plastic pails and boxes and other stuff that didn’t suggest hunting. Not bird-hunting, anyway. Plus the person who parked there seemed oblivious to hunting season, hoarding both available parking places, which seemed a bit inconsiderate even though it wasn’t a real inconvenience. There’s always more than enough room to pull over along the quiet country road situated at the base of western uplands known to have been called Sunkist Mountains.

Not 50 yards into the overgrown, thorny field, the car’s owner appeared clothed in drab colors that answered the hunting question. Nope. Not a hunter. Just a young lady scholar carrying a tall, thin, calibrated, tube-like olive staff she carried upright for a walking stick that served the dual purpose of a measuring stick when needed.

A rod? No. Three meters, which made it more than two meters shy of a rod, a 16.5-foot unit of measure used by land surveyors for vertical and horizontal measurement alike. Using it at the time for a long walking staff, the young woman said she had previously used it for measurements pertaining to a UMass grad-school project assessing activity of migrating song birds passing through the Pioneer Valley twice annually — once heading north for mating and nesting, again this time of year on their return to winter refuge in the sunny South. The casual conversation meandered from plants to birds to animals to deep history and deep ecology and Indian trails before she continued on her merry way back to the car. She would not be back this fall but still had to revisit Montague Plains.

That perchance wetland meeting in the rear view, man and dogs busted through pucker brush for less than an hour, the dogs quartering and covering what seemed like every inch of the marshy field’s north half. All that work and not so much as a flush, false start or upward twitch of the shotgun; just a furious scouring of dense, seed-dusty cover for pheasants or woodcock or maybe even a stray partridge, where they were once plentiful, today rare.

Call it a dry run. A good yet unproductive romp for all.

Future trips will be far more fruitful once stocked birds accumulate, acclimate and learn how to temporarily escape hunting pressure in the dense, impenetrable alder swamp flooded by beavers.

When these feathered transplants decide to fly into the huntable field to feed on seeds, berries, hayfield grasses and insects at the wrong time, they stand a good chance of falling to a passing hunter. If not, there’s a good chance that a fox, coyote, fisher cat or bird of prey will eventually snag them here and there until all have vanished.

Call it put-and-take hunting at its finest. Fun while it lasts, but a far cry from hunting wild birds.

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Speaking of pheasant hunting, disturbing news from New Hampshire, which stocks about a quarter of the birds this state does each fall.

Hunter Christopher A. Moulton of Boscowen, N.H., was shot by an unidentified hunter Friday morning at the Sanbornton (N.H.) Flood Control Area pheasant-hunting site, suffering minor injuries that did not require hospital attention. Nonetheless, state officials were alarmed enough to implement an emergency measure mandating closure of all pheasant-stocking sites from 7 a.m. to noon on Wednesday and today, the final two stocking days of the season.

The measure resulted from what New Hampshire Fish & Game Executive Director Glenn Normandeau called unsafe shooting taking place while state stocking crews were in the process of releasing pheasants.

“We are taking this emergency action to protect Fish & Game personnel and members of the public participating in the pheasant hunt,” said Normandeau. “It is unfortunate that the actions of a few unsportsmanlike and unsafe individuals have made this measure necessary. It does not reflect on the vast majority of safe and responsible hunters.”

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The archery deer season opened Monday, presenting bowhunters with the daunting task of predicting deer feeding patterns on a landscape that’s full of natural feeds, such as nuts, fruits and berries, all of which are plentiful this year. Add to that agricultural foods such as corn, hayfields and winter squash, and it’s anyone’s guess where deer will choose to feed on any given day. Still, there appears to be no shortage of whitetails, so it just comes down to being in the right place at the right time. … Simultaneously, the fall turkey season is also underway, also opening on Monday. Despite the fact that gobblers and hens are fair game in the fall, this season never draws hunting pressure to rival the more popular spring hunt. The fall hunt is a different game, which most hunters seem to find less alluring than the spring, bearded-turkeys-only hunt during the mating season. Fall hunters either sit quiet in woods where they know there are big flocks of birds to bushwhack, or walk through the woods to break up a flock and draw a bird back to the gun with regrouping calls, including the kee-kee run, which is more useful and popular among hunters in the fall than spring.

As our own archery deer season approaches (Oct. 19), hints of what to expect from a northern border state.

Bowhunters’ take thus far, after the first New Hampshire Fish & Game polling of checking stations, shows a 10 percent decline from last year. The explanation from Granite State deer biologists is that deer are tough to pattern during this, the early season due to an abundance of wild food in the woods, which shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone who patrols local wild lands. Fruits, berries and nuts, known in biologist jargon as soft- and hard-mast crops, are plentiful this fall after what people who follow such things identify as a great (that is, dry) spring for natural pollination. Thus, in places where oak and beech groves exist, there are many acorns and beechnuts underfoot and available to meandering, foraging deer. The same can be said of wild apples and berries of many varieties, all of them important deer foods when plentiful. Add to that the many cornfields and hayfields available not far away from wild foods and, yes indeed, a man or woman sitting patiently in a tree stand waiting for deer to appear could be faced with a long, tedious, at times seemingly pointless wait.

The recent early-season New Hampshire survey showed a total of 1,109 deer killed by bowhunters through Sept. 27, compared to 1,230 at the same point last year. Obviously, that could all change quickly once the rutting season begins and dominant bucks are more interested in breeding than feeding. That’s when they become more vulnerable to hunters than any other time of year. And hunters who are adept at antler rattling and setting out phony doe-in-estrus scent trails can dramatically increase their chances of felling a nice buck.

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No word or preliminary bear-harvests from Massachusetts yet, but with the New Hampshire bear season underway since last month, the first numbers have been released and they too show a decrease from a year ago and from the five-year average at this incomplete point of the season.

Through Oct. 1, Granite State bear hunters had harvested 424 animals. The breakdown by sex shows that harvest comprised of 266 males and 158 females. Bait hunters have had the most success, taking 318 bears (201 males, 117 females), while still-hunters and stalkers have taken 99 (61 males, 38 females) and houndsmen have killed the remaining seven (four males, three females).

Some Massachusetts hunters have clamored for legalization of bait-hunting here as a way of increasing a harvest that needs help. But so far the requests have fallen on deaf ears, though baiting remains a viable alteration in a state that annually falls below the targeted stabilization harvest of approximately 12 to 14 percent of the statewide population.

This year’s New Hampshire harvest is lagging 15 percent below the five-year average of 502 kills by this point of the season. Also, this year’s incomplete number is 29 percent below last year’s pace. Officials figure this year’s total will be closer to the 2013 harvest of 570.

Again, a big reason for the decline is the rich hard- and soft-mast crops available, making patterning the hunters’ prey difficult. For bears, add to the hard-mast formula the big, hard-shelled nuts like hickory, walnuts and butternuts, which they can crunch up and devour.

Of course, the baiting segment, which can overcome the negative abundant natural-food factor to a point, is over, and even when it was fair game, not everyone likes to go that route. Not only that, but even those who do hunt over bait can run into problems when bears ignore their Dunkin-Donut smorgasbords for more desirable wild foods.

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The annual fall Franklin County League of Sportsmen’s Clubs turkey shoots are fast approaching, running from 9 a.m. to noon on Sundays beginning Oct. 25 and continuing through Nov. 22.

No other local turkey shoot offers so many enticing options. The choices at the East Deerfield facility include: Turkey Shoot (15-shooter line, $2 per shot), Rabbit Shoot ($2 for three shots), 100-Yard Blackpowder Shoot ($1.50 per shot), and 100-Yard Slug Shoot ($1.50 per shot).

Shooters must bring their own shotguns for the Turkey Shoot, but appropriate firearms are on hand for the other three shoots. No outside ammo is allowed for any reason. All minors must be accompanied by an adult.

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An interesting, cutting-edge read for gundog, and particularly retriever trainers — “Absolutely Positively Gundog Training: Positive Training For Your Retriever Gundog” — arrived in the mail last week from Robert Milner, a fellow member of the Outdoor Writers Association of America.

It’s never too late to learn new tricks in the world of gun-dog training, and this veteran of the game brings it to a new level by relying on none other than Harvard psychologist B. F. Skinner for new twists relevant to dog handling.

Milner gives tips on observing and selecting gundogs from a litter or kennel and shoots down trusted, overused methods of rule by force and intimidation. He says dogs have been bred for millennia to want to please. Thus there is no reason to be overbearing in the disciplinary arena. That’s where the word positive comes in. Milner is a believer that the trainer is only teaching a dog to do what it instinctually wants to do — please the handler, not run wild doing its own thing.

The author’s observations will either reinforce local handlers’ beliefs and practices or perhaps introduce something new and exciting that’ll show immediate improvements against old ways that have produced bad habits, if not embarrassing behaviors by sensitive dogs that do not react well to harsh punishment and loud, intimidating commands.

According to Milner, there’s no need for intimidation. The name of the game is gentle handling and hunting behind an animal consistently displaying joie d’ vivre while scouring dense coverts for wary game birds.

Milner’s book isn’t expensive and can be purchased from many online sources.

It’s October and the surreal blood moon has passed, signaling fall’s hunts and harvests.

But first, fishing, a harvest of sorts, and specifically trout fishing, which should improve dramatically on selected local waters this week and next.

Why, you ask?

Oh, that’s easy. The annual fall-stocking program is underway. So, no, those state trucks you’ve spotted lugging splashy silver tanks with their small rear motors purring aren’t out on joyrides or returning from the garage or transporting trout from one hatchery to another. They’re freshening up selected lakes, streams and ponds with fresh, foot-or-longer rainbow and brown trout from MassWildlife’s hatcheries at Montague, Sunderland, Belchertown and Sandwich.

A total of 74,100 fish — 66,100 rainbows and 8,000 browns — have been allotted for this round of statewide stocking, during which each of the five wildlife districts will divvy them up equally. Computed, that means they’ll all receive a total of 14,820 fish, including 13,220 rainbows and 1,600 browns.

The stocking crews always await the September/October transition before embarking on road trips. Prior to that, the streams are typically too low and too warm to risk stocking a cold-water species like trout. Plus, trout can have fatal issues when carted around in mobile metal tanks during hot summer temperatures.

By this time of year, trout fishing has typically dwindled down to a trickle, with only the diehards, most of them skilled anglers, still out on the streams, fly rod in hand, or trolling in boats on deep lakes, where trout retreat to the deepest, darkest, coldest depths to ride out warm summer water temperatures. That doesn’t mean you can’t take lake and pond trout on the surface during the height of summer, because you can if you fish early and late, understand the hatches and know the location of spring holes supplying fresh sources of cold, clear water. Even deep-water trolling can produce consistent results, but not the continuous action of spring ice-out fishing, which takes place when famished winter trout are feeding voraciously within 3 feet of the surface. Come summertime, the same fish lie deep and anglers must be more patient and knowledgeable to produce consistent success.

The same can be said of summer stream fishing, unless working rainstorms that quickly raise the water level and color the stream a silty brown as food from the ground, tree branches and bushes is washed in, drawing even the biggest, most secretive trout out from their deep secluded lairs — fortresses often located on river bends, protected by overhanging roots, large stones or ledge, fallen trees, undercut banks and/or all of the above at a single site.

Local rivers ticketed for stocking this week or next include the Deerfield from Florida to Deerfield, the Millers from Athol to Montague, and the Green from Colrain to Greenfield. As for lakes and ponds, look for action at old standbys like Lake Wyola in Shutesbury, Cranberry Pond in Sunderland and Lake Mattawa in Orange. For some reason, isolated Warwick seems to get the best of it with no fewer than four impoundments stocked: Moore’s, Forestry Camp and Sheomet ponds and Laurel Lake. For those who enjoy fishing North Amherst’s Puffers Pond — hint-hint — you may want to take a trip there, too.

There’s nothing like the cool weather and colorful backdrop of fall to make trout fishing enjoyable. So don’t be afraid to take advantage of fall stocking, even is you are more of a spring and early-summer devotee.

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Grey squirrel season opened last week, and the three-week September bear season is behind us, ending Saturday. Don’t hold your breath waiting for harvest numbers. The spring turkey harvest has yet to be announced by MassWildlife. Coming soon is open season on woodcock (Wednesday) and ducks and geese (Central, Oct. 13, Berkshire, Oct. 12). Another important date to remember is Oct. 17, when the season opens for pheasant, ruffed grouse, cottontail rabbit, snowshoe hare, and coyote. The wild-turkey and archery-deer seasons commence on Oct. 19. Farther down the road is the second, three-week segment of black-bear season, which runs from Nov. 2 through Nov. 21.

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Speaking of squirrel hunting, it seems to be a lost art these days, but was quite popular in days past. The favorite weapon locally seemed to be the old Stevens .22-.410 over/under. The top barrel was chambered for .22 caliber long rifle, the bottom took .410 gauge, providing the hunter options of discharging a pattern at running, jumping, airborne squirrels or pinpoint, open-sight accuracy for a stationary target standing on its hind legs eating on a limb. The trick was to sit quiet against a large tree or stonewall, settle and blend in, and wait for the squirrels to start rummaging around above and at ground level. Then, with activity rampant, start picking away to fill the game bag.

Squirrel pie was a New England favorite, with many lard-crusted homemade recipes. But cut-up, butter-sauteed squirrel pieces in an iron skillet worked well, too, often prepared with onions, peppers and garlic, then a little dab of apple cider at the end, just before reducing the heat to a simmer and covering. The hind quarters, loins and shoulders were all tasty and tender and worked well on a bed of rice with fresh-picked wild mushrooms on the side.

The hunt was ideal for sharpening the shooter’s eye for approaching big-game hunts. Plus squirrels got hunters into the oaks and hickory groves in September for early deer and/or bear scouting. These days, with turkeys back in the picture, it would work for scouting fall flocks as well.