Everyone has heard the sayings about boys and their toys. Old guys are just boys with a little age on them. The need for toys part still remains.
A couple of friends hunting at my place had climbing tree stands. I had seen climbing stands in magazines before, but to actually see them in operation was really cool. That was a toy I needed. I ordered one immediately.
A tree stand gets a deer hunter above the usual line of sight of the deer. Even better, human scent is dispersed upward, if the wind is right, or if not, it is at least diluted enough to prevent pinpoint location by the hunted.
I have used fixed stands, which require steps mounted on a tree and some brave sole to climb up these steps using one hand to carry the stand and one hand to climb. At the appropriate height, both hands are required to attach the stand to the tree. At best, it is precarious. At worst, it is downright dangerous. Did I mention I have acrophobia?
The climbing tree stand consists of two pieces; the seat and the foot rest. Each piece has a cable that wraps around the tree. A person sits on the seat and slides the foot rest up with their legs. They then stand on the foot rest and slide the seat up. This process is repeated over and over again until a person is as high in the tree as they can stand to be. Downward force usually holds the pieces firmly leveraged against the tree so they do not suddenly go clattering to the ground. A safety harness is worn during climbing, hunting, and descending, especially by people with acrophobia or those that are prone to breaking bones when falling from tall trees.
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Saturday, I practiced with my new climbing deer stand and safety harness. It was a bit cumbersome at first, but I soon got the hang of it. Sunday morning, I would be on a major deer trail high up in a nice oak tree waiting for the "Big Buck".
Well before dawn, I hiked to the corner of the timber with the promising trail. Strapping the stand on the tree was a bit difficult in the darkness, but I finally got the cables attached.
The tree was a bit larger than I thought. The last notch on the stand was just enough to hook up. I thought it strange the safety harness would barely fit around the tree until I tried to climb the stand. The tree was just an inch or two too large. I unhooked the harness, climbed down and unclamped the stand.
Another nice oak tree was just up the ridge. Repeating the process in the darkness took me slightly less time since I had practice. It took even less time to determine, this tree was also too big. It was starting to get light in the east by the time I got everything unhooked from the oak tree. A hickory tree, about half the size of the oaks, was nearby. I was almost six feet up the hickory when my safety harness became caught in the rough bark. While fighting with it, I looked up to see a group of deer coming through the woods toward me. I stood up to pull my bow up from the ground when the seat part of my stand released itself and came crashing down on the foot section.
In the pre-dawn light, without a breeze blowing, even the smallest sound can be heard for great distances. Two halves of an aluminum tree stand slamming together make about as much noise as a head on collision between locomotives. The deer glanced only briefly toward me as they made a hasty retreat. Some toys may not be all they seem to be.
Walter Scott is an outdoors enthusiast and freelance writer from Bloomfield, Iowa.
