In just a couple of days in Wisconsin we are going to celebrate one of the best traditions in our state’s history. No, not Jump Around at the Badger game and no, not a victory dance at Lambeau Field with a win over the 49ers, although I like the idea of both. I’m talking about the traditional nine-day deer gun season which starts on Saturday.  

The tradition which no one could have predicted back in 1851 was the first official gun season in Wisconsin. Another interesting note about that first season is that it started on July 1, and it closed on Jan. 31. For reference, the population of Wisconsin in 1851 was just over 300,000 people. Fast forward to the here and now and almost 450,000 deer licenses have been sold so far this fall.  

If you’re wondering what your chances are of bagging a deer this year, we can use last year’s numbers as a gauge assuming the harvest rate remains similar. Almost 174,000 deer were bagged last year so quick math tells me that each of us has a 39% chance to bring home some venison. If your goal is to bring home a buck, then that percentage drops down to 20%. (Apologies to my math teacher Mrs. Lewis who I doubted when she said how important math would be in my adult life.)

So much has changed over the years, even during my lifetime. Some changes are good and some not. One of the things that I miss is the registration station. That was the most popular place in town for nine days. It’s now a thing of the past but there was something special about driving to the registration station even if you didn’t have a deer in the back of the truck. It was a place to brag and show off and there was a direct correlation in how long you stayed at the station and how big your buck was.  

The registration station of my youth was a small Mom and Pop gas station/sporting goods store/outboard motor repair shop. It was the original super store especially when almost half of the town’s population could stand shoulder to shoulder by the minnow tanks which were across from the wooden Little League baseball bats. That was where my dad registered the biggest buck of his life. My pops loved to deer hunt and during those nine days of the gun season nothing trumped deer hunting, including Euchre. If you know my dad, you know the magnitude of that statement.  

After my dad registered his big buck and did a little bragging, the celebration moved to the local watering hole where the other half of the town’s population was. My brother Whammer drove the truck with the bruiser in the back with the tailgate down, of course. In a unique parking situation, parking across the street was perpendicular to the main drag, not parallel to it. Whammer started to back the truck into the space which meant that the tailgate and the huge buck were pointing away from the bar and the main drag, not towards it. My dad, in his usual warm, fuzzy, sensitive, and loving way to reprimand us, shouted something like: “TURN THE &#$  @#*% TRUCK AROUND!”

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