For the first time, Bryan Lobel can honestly answer in the affirmative when he’s asked the question eventually posed to pretty much every guy who lives in the wooded wilds of Central Washington:
Do you hunt?
“Yeah, I feel like I can answer yes to that now,” said Lobel, 39, a Leavenworth resident. “But I feel like I’ll be learning hunting for the next 30 years. There’s that much to it. It’s a lifetime pursuit.”
That kind of enthusiasm and desire to keep learning is a strong validation of a new focus of the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife’s Hunter Education division.
Lobel participated in a hands-on, how-to, turkey-hunting clinic unlike anything done by the WDFW before. Since the hunter-ed program’s 2013 move from the enforcement division to wildlife, there’s a new emphasis on providing such clinics, beyond mere hunter-education classes.
“We’re charting new waters,” said David Whipple, who oversees the WDFW hunter education program. “We’ve put some goals out there to do more of these sorts of how-to clinics.
“Hunter license sales and hunter numbers have declined nationwide, and we’re taking a hard look at ways to improve hunter recruitment and retention. We’re starting to develop these hunter clinics and opportunities that go beyond basic hunter ed, to get people interested and then get into the outdoors so they can enjoy it.”
Lobel, an urban planning consultant who had only in the last year began delving into hunting, was looking for just such an opportunity. He had done a little deer hunting during this fall’s modern firearm season, albeit unsuccessfully, and wanted to get better at the whole hunting process.
And, as it turned out, Lobel had to be quick. The WDFW announced its Nov. 14 turkey-hunting clinic on Nov. 6; within three days, the 25-student class had filled up. Lobel was one of the 25.
The clinic involved a four-hour classroom session, highlighted by in-depth turkey-hunting tips, calling and strategy from Yakima-based enforcement Capt. Rich Mann, an experienced turkey hunter.
“We also had some birds there so we were able to demonstrate how to field-dress a bird,” said Aaron Garcia, the Yakima region’s hunter-ed field coordinator who facilitated the clinic. “Then we took the participants out to a shooting range, helped them sight in and pattern their shotguns.”
The students who could fit it into their schedule were invited to participate in last Saturday’s damage control hunt on several private rural properties near Spokane where wild turkeys are in such abundance that they become a significant nuisance for landowners.
Lobel and a Wenatchee hunter he met at the clinic, Vern Stofleth, were paired with a WDFW-assigned hunting mentor, Joey McCanna, for the damage-control hunt.
Because of the lateness of the year, the turkeys weren’t as wary of hunters, but that didn’t mean the process was easy. The hardest part for Lobel was two hours of frigid waiting in 14-degree temperatures, trying to remain still so as not to be seen or heard by any turkeys in the area.
“We were just frozen in place, but I couldn’t stay still,” Lobel said. “I kept moving my feet to get blood back into my feet. But Vern, who’s done a lot more hunting than I have, he didn’t move an inch.
“As I go out with these guys, the level of knowledge they have for having been doing it for years is pretty remarkable — the way they walk in the field, the way they carry themselves, the way they watch and listen.”
And while both Lobel and Stofleth came away with a turkey, Lobel came away with much more than that. The experience stoked his desire to become a better hunter, while giving him a clearer understanding of what kind of a challenge that would be.
“I learned more in those two days than I could have in five years of trying to figure it out myself,” he said. “I feel like I’ll be learning hunting for the next 30 years. There’s that much to it, and it’s a lifetime pursuit.
“I’m definitely not there yet. It’s pretty humbling, just to realize how much I don’t know and how much I have to learn. I’m so glad they’re doing these clinics.”
There will be many more such clinics to come, Garcia said. Clinics focusing on hunting waterfowl, deer and elk are in the works; a pheasant hunt with an associated hunt involved, similar in many ways to the turkey-hunting clinic Lobel took, is being planned for December.
