By Sharon Resnick
It started in the swamps of southern Georgia almost 40 years ago.
Back then there was no such thing as store-bought camouflage outfits
for an eight-year-old, so her grandmother bought the material and made her one. Her dad
would place her on a stump in the swamp and come back for her later. Local physician Julia
Heinz remembers her first hunting trips well.
"I enjoyed watching the coming of the dawn and the going of the
day," she said. "I loved the grays, the moss, the wildness, the serenity and
energy that came from the ancient cypress trees.
"I also felt horribly sorry for the ducks when they died. But even
then I was able to justify that it takes life to sustain life."
Heinz also remembers being much colder hunting in Georgia than
she’s ever been in Alaska. "Wearing cotton socks and hiking through marshes in
the dark was hugely cold," she said.
Heinz returns to Georgia each year to hunt ducks with her dad and his
friends. Though she has two older brothers, they were always less interested in hunting
than she and don’t hunt at all now. Heinz and hunting partner Kimberley Strong of
Klukwan harvested one of the first moose taken during the recent Haines hunt.
Betsy Van Burgh, a health educator for the Wise Woman program, grew up
eating wild meat in Maine because her dad was a hunter. Though she fished with him as a
child, she didn’t take up hunting until she was on her own in college.
"I just liked being out in the woods, being quiet and
listening," she said. "You just try to be in tune with the animals around
you."
Like Heinz, Van Burgh not only enjoys hunting, but also believes wild
meat is healthier than store-bought because it isn’t injected with antibiotics or
hormones and has less fat. She doesn’t buy meat. "But if someone serves it to
me, I don’t push it aside," she said.
Between the ages of 20 and 40, Heinz was a vegetarian for
"environmental reasons." She not only opposed the destruction of grasslands and
the deforestation involved in raising animals for market, but also the cruel ways in which
those animals are treated.
"At least in the wild, the animals are able to have a life before
they are killed," she said.
But eating meat makes it easier now when she is a guest in someone
else’s house and doesn’t have to worry about "offending anyone by my
rules."
And yet, it’s difficult for her each time she kills an animal, be
it a goat, moose, deer or duck. "There’s always remorse afterward," she
said. "I wonder: ‘Why is the hunted dead and the hunter alive?’"
Heinz said she’s learned much about hunting from the
"pleasant men" she has hunted with in Haines. She credits Mark Edwards with
teaching her a lot about river boating.
"Whenever I get in a difficult situation on the river, I would
know I could handle it because I went to the Mark Edwards school of river boating,"
she said. "I would watch him go into places that seemed impossible and then I would
just follow him."
Heinz’s first boat in Haines – a patched up 12-foot rowboat
– limited her access to hunting areas. But once she traded that boat for a plate of
sushi and moved up to bigger and more powerful boats, she’s able to go far up the
Chilkat River – a place she finds magical.
Though her boats have become more sophisticated, Heinz prefers the
simplicity and quietness of bow hunting to guns.
She was interested in bow hunting as a youth, but none of the bows were
the right size. Now, compound bows, which require less strength and have a shorter draw
length, make bow hunting more accessible to women, she said. "I like the challenge of
getting closer to the animal."
To be accurate with a bow requires Heinz to be within 30 to 40 yards of
a moose or goat, as opposed to 200 yards with a rifle. But even with a rifle, she prefers
to be 30 to 40 yards away just to be positive it’s an animal that’s legal to
kill.
"It’s a huge responsibility to kill and not just wound an
animal," she said.
Van Burgh bow hunted years ago. "Like sailing, it’s so
quiet," she said. "But it’s also difficult."
Because she hunts for the meat and has a better chance of getting it
with a gun, right now she’s not interested in using a bow, Van Burgh said.
Neither is she willing to kill a wolf in order to improve her chances
of putting more moose meat on her own table, she said. She also believes it’s
important that the moose population is healthy. Otherwise, she’s not interested in
hunting.
Local artist Kerry Cohen joined a hunt with Van Burgh, Heinz and Strong
this fall.
Cohen, who has a brown belt in karate, said going on this moose hunt
was one of the most courageous things she’s ever done.
"I’ve been charged (by moose) several times," she said.
"I have an uncanny sense of where they are.
"I was nodding toward one I saw and at the same time looking for a
tree to climb. And then Kimberley starts calling it. I couldn’t believe she was
trying to get that huge animal to come closer to us.
"It was intense for me to go out with three fearless women in an
area infested with moose. There were moose signs everywhere. (The moose) had been digging
holes and peeing in them. I didn’t know about all the mating rituals. At Mud Bay they
just walk through our yards."
Heinz said she welcomes the opportunity to have other women join her in
hunting because many of them haven’t had the experience or access to hunting.
Is an all-women hunt different from an all-man hunt?
"I want to say ‘no,’ in general," Van Burgh said.
"Everyone has their own style. Some of us sit and call the animals; others walk and
walk and walk until they find one.
"It might be different in that no matter what you’re doing,
women tend to relate to women differently than men relate to men. Maybe we tend to rely
more on each other and it’s all just a bit more mellow."
