Baker's Branch

  Some of the field sports carry way too much drama. Deer hunting is one of them. I like saying that because it’s true, and, of course, we’re right in the middle of the “Big Deer Season” right now. Sometimes we need to back it off a couple notches, if you catch my drift. Hunter success on deer in Oklahoma the last time I checked is somewhere close, but still below, 50 percent. Hunter success on squirrels? Hoooo, boy. If you count success as one squirrel headed for the pan, and I do, then the success ratio is somewhere pretty close to 100 percent. “Eat more squirrels,” the deer would probably say.  The daily limit on squirrels is 10, either fox or gray species, with 20 allowed in possession. That’s a lot of meat, in case you haven’t bagged up any squirrels lately and have forgotten how quickly 10 bushytails will overfill a gallon Ziploc bag.  The squirrel season is the longest annual hunting season in Oklahoma, lasting from May 15 through the following January 31. Even so,...

  I was digging for treasure. I knew where it was. Way down in there. I found it, too. All the way to the bottom.  Pam came out into the garage and looked over my shoulder. “Well?”, she asked.  “Look at this!” I said, holding up my prize for examination. “And more! Two tenderloins and four sirloins. Not a bit of freezer burn anywhere. Like new, even if a year old. Man! I’m charcoaling them tomorrow.”  Maybe yours doesn’t, but our freezer holds treasure from year to year that escapes being eaten, and we eat game and fish out here on The Branch a lot. If you aren’t careful, it escapes to the bottom of the freezer (somehow) uneaten, in perfectly good condition, hidden covertly by new “draftees”.  You must dig for treasure. He who seeks, finds.  I already had a new deer from the recent muzzleloading season, with the prospect of more to come during the high power season. I wasn’t just searching for treasure, but more room as well. You’d think our freezer, a twen...

  During deer season, Brian Loveland of Sand Springs and I eat home cooked meals in a 12 x 14 wall tent. Well, the tent is our home for the duration of the season, and that's where we cook our meals. I really think that TV cook, Emeril, would fit in, in our camp. He's about the only yankee I've ever thought might be able to get his brain wrapped around redneck ways. It's just a feeling. I could be wrong about that, but you watch him throw handfuls of this, and handfuls of that, into a pot and yell, "Bam!" when he does it, and you get a sense of something redneck a slick, New York TV producer can't cover up. Like I said, I could be wrong about that. Certainly, in a good, downhome deer camp, you should not expect to find any measuring spoons, or measuring cups. Meat thermometers? Croutons? A little lemon zest? White wine? Good grief. Call your mommy, will 'ya? All of our food up on the wild Arkansas River is heart horrible, and fried the same as Grandma ...

  I love deer meat as much as the next man or woman, but as I’ve aged (yes, I have) camp itself has become even more important to me. If the wind doesn’t blow right, for my stand, or if rain is drumming the tent roof when I hear the alarm go off at five, I’ll sleep in. Just not as mad at ‘em as I used to be. Getting up to a fresh cup of hot coffee in driving rain, or swirling snow, is never unpleasant, but it’s even better when you know you don’t have to go; when you smell bacon frying, and the toughest decision of the day is whether the eggs need to be over easy, or scrambled. Will there be one cup of coffee, or two? So and so got a bigger buck than anybody has seen around here in years? Well, good for him. Pass that apple butter, would you please? Hey, these biscuits are still hot. Pass the butter. The last free place in this country, never mind the world, is deer camp. Turn your cell phone off, you fool. Brian Loveland got to ours up on the Big Bend of the Arkansas before me thi...