Hunting Traditions and New Memories
Benji Sam credits most of his hunting experience from his father and niiyawen'enh Lenny Sam, pictured here, as he looks on as Benji hoists a buck and doe to hang in his garage. Photo from 2016.
By MASHKODE-BIZHIKGAHBAW, BENJI SAM
November stands as one of the biggest traditions in my life that means not only putting meat in the freezer, but also a rite of passage as a provider for my family and Ojibwe outdoorsman. My parents first brought me into the woods when I was around four years old. I remember my dad would make me bring my BB gun in case of squirrels, grouse, and other small game – but in hindsight, it was likely, so I felt the importance of safe firearm handling for the rest of my life. My mom, dad, and I used to climb 20 feet in the air on a few 2x4 pieces of wood notched between three trees swaying back and forth in the wind.
We have hunted, proudly, as a family since our tribal rights were officially recognized and upheld in 1997 as the first allowable hunt outside of State jurisdiction. My dad was lucky enough, with my mom hunting at his side, to harvest the first deer taken under the now protected Treaty of 1837. From that point forward, hunting was solidified in my life as not only a great hobby, a family pastime, and a way to feed ourselves and those around us, but more so a way of life.
When I was a kid, one of my favorite things was bringing deer meat to Elders in the area. A core teaching that we were taught was that when you have more to give, you owe more to your community. When I was young, we had a group of the Elders who helped my family throughout life who didn’t have children or grandchildren who hunted, and they were no longer able to get into the woods. It always feels like a way of giving back to the village that raised me when I can help place lean venison in the crockpots of our loved ones.
Those Elders used to speak of the importance of eating those foods that brought us life for generation after generation upon our Tribe’s arrival to the Mille Lacs region. Wild rice, maple syrup/sugar, deer meat, walleye, and many homegrown and harvested fruits, vegetables, herbs, and natural medicines are what kept our people well for thousands of years.
Fall always brought a beautiful change in temperature, wind direction, new moons rising, and deer movement which becomes more predictable. Our favorite ways to harvest deer were gathering in large groups to perform drives across tracts of land as far as western Wisconsin. I was always the youngest in the group and often was given the role of dragging deer out of the woods. Thinking back, what I wouldn’t give to gut and drag a deer out of the woods for some of the Elders we used to share the woods with. The laughs, struggles, camaraderie, jokes, and brotherhood from group hunting are something than cannot be replaced.
Today, most of my deer hunting is done in the same woods I grew up hunting in — setting up in the same trees that my parents did since the day we were first legally allowed to hunt under our own jurisdiction. Though the forest changes little year by year, the feeling of putting on the same hunting clothes I have had since I was a kid never changes. Every year we have a good laugh about me wearing the same tattered, three-sizes too-small, blaze orange vest that has never been washed into the woods. I also carry with me the same rifle my father carried in his time on this earth, and carrying on the tradition of bringing my family out into the woods reminds me of the importance of living how the old ones wanted us to.
This fall, I hope to help my oldest nephew create new core memories as he joins our hunting party in search of his first kill. I look forward to the day he is given the opportunity to make the decision to become an adult within our culture, when he begins to provide for his family as many of us have before him.
May we all find happiness, peace, and safe harvest this hunting season, and I hope you enjoy carrying on your own traditions this fall on the road to happy hunting.
From an exert in the 1997 Winter edition of the Mazina'igan: Mille Lacs band member David Sam harvested this forked-horn buck west of Lake Mille Lacs. His wife Mary (right) joined him on the historic deer hunt on November 8, 1997. (Photo by Charlie Otto Rasmussen, GLIFWC.)
Involving youth and exposing them to death in a healthy, constructive, and productive fashion can help grow the knowledge and wealth of our people — a wealth of understanding what it means to provide for your loved ones. Photo from fall of 2004.
