The Twilight Zone
An Editorial  - by Steve Brandle

On the original TV series, “The Twilight Zone,” there was an episode where a man died and ended up in what he thought was heaven. He came to his senses, after his death, in a tavern filled with beautiful women and he was the only available man. “This truly must be heaven”, he thought to himself. The giggly young girls flirted with him and then he moved to the pool table for a game. Playing the first game of eight ball, all by himself, he cleared the table without missing and then sank the eight ball with a triple bank shot. Now, totally convinced he’d died and gone to heaven, he racked the balls for another go at the table. As he put the triangle rack back in it’s place, another fellow entered the bar and challenged him to a game.

With a smirk on his face the new angel eagerly agreed to play the stranger and promptly cleaned his clock; again without missing a shot. This went on for several games before it struck the winner as odd. He then tried to intentionally miss a shot and couldn’t. In fact the harder he tried to throw the game, the balls went in the pockets in even more ridiculous ways. There was no challenge to anything he did in this place. He walked over to the dart board and threw three bulls eyes. All the women wanted to be with him. The final scene showed him glancing at the laughing stranger he’d beat at the pool table who now sported a set of devil horns.

In my opinion, some of the sportsmen in Michigan desire to visit “The Twilight Zone” where limits of master angler size fish are caught almost every trip out and record book bucks are taken on a yearly basis. And if these goals cannot be achieved, we must aggressively alter and enhance the habitat to bring us closer to these desired results. Can this be right?

“Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground-everything that has the breath of life in it-I give every green plant for food.” And it was so. God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning-the sixth day. Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all of their vast array. (Genesis 1, verses 29 – 31.)

All of us have a theory of how the world came about. I believe the above words are a small portion the truth. I’ll never judge you if you don’t agree. The point is, “nature” is perfect in it’s approach to managing all of the plants and animals in our world and has been doing it much longer than anyone alive today. As experts, we have a lot to learn.

How long did “nature” know how to allow birds to fly before we understood it ourselves? In the past few centuries, man replaced predators and disease as a curb for animal population control. And when we don’t act to control, why are we saddened when animals perish because of famine and sickness? Man and nature’s method of perfection is so different. Compared to nature, we are still in the “trial and error” stage when it comes to enhancing wildlife populations. The course we set in our attempts to “manage” nature should always allow us to make corrections or start over without despair.

And here is how some of us seek to visit the Twilight Zone. “If only everybody would do this and this, we could find utopia”. “By properly managing the fisheries in this state, all of us could catch a master angler fish at least once in awhile”. “By properly managing the deer herd, a Boone & Crockett buck would be ours if only we pass on the younger deer and could wait for the opportunity for the mature one to pass in front of us”. “If it wasn’t for the commercial fisherman, the average Joe could catch a limit of huge perch in the Great Lakes any time he wished”. “The DNR has taken all of the fun out of hunting and fishing because there’s too many regulations on what, how, when, why, how many and what type of resource I can harvest”. “The State of Michigan needs to improve the habitat for every one of those natural resources I want to harvest; when and if I decide to do it”. “I’m going to buy a piece of land and manage it to it’s fullest potential for wildlife production.” Nature, is perfect in it’s management of the world’s resources, we are not.

Mankind, as a whole, is determined to mange the world to his interest. Some  sportsmen have the desire to micro-manage the wildlife to peak numbers and highest quality possible. There is also a group that believes that through simple resource conservation these goals will be accomplished, naturally. There is a difference.

For example, the majority of deer hunters in Michigan prefer to see a lot of deer in the woods and if a legal buck is spotted, they want the chance to harvest it. This same group of hunters will take a doe only if they want to. Our deer season is set to please this majority and the present condition of the herd is a direct result. Nature is providing us what we deserve. It’s only when man tries to over manage the deer and ignore the ecology that bad things happen.

A huge number of deer allows us to see many in the woods on opening day. The huge numbers also depleted the environment, in parts of the state, which is partially controlled in nature by disease, predators, and famine. Killing almost 90% of 1-1/2 year old bucks every year and passing on does has produced a buck to doe ratio that is so far off from a natural herds make up, there are parts of the state where all of the does are not bred each season. Where antler less hunting is encouraged by the state, (northeast lower peninsula) button bucks are being taken and this just adds to the lack of bucks. So now, along with replacing predators, man is becoming a “super disease” bent on exterminating unwanted deer.               

If we could achieve the perfect environment where we have the opportunity to harvest all that we want or to take a giant specimen of any given species, have we succeeded or would it be the Twilight Zone game of eight ball? Perfection just isn’t that important to me. What is important to me is that we work with nature instead of twisting it to satisfy our selfish desires.

Passion and strong emotions are very good qualities. The only time these qualities become harmful are when we ignore common sense. In the outdoor world, these qualities may win a battle, but lose the war. QDM and “flies only” fishing, for example, are skirmishes in the outdoor realm. The act of harvesting fish and animals is a war against those that would take this right away from us. All of us need to be able to tell the difference and recognize our true enemies.