Interesting Differences

Sun rise, morning of...

So I had an interesting experience recently at one of my normal stomping grounds, above the spillway at Lake Nockamixon.  I was enjoying myself, fishing away, watching the sun come up, when I noticed a few pheasant hunters walking through the knee high brush less than 50 yards from me, across a small expanse of water.  We were on the same side of the lake but there is a little bay-like area that was between us.  They were walking back and forth, not necessarily along the waters edge but definitely following its lines for a good 20 minutes while I stood watching, and fishing.  They had fired off a few shots at targets unseen by me and I couldn't tell if they had hit anything or not, and though it did seem like they were shooting a bit more than needed I'm not a hunter so I gave them the benefit of the doubt and mentally congratulated them on their prowess.  I guess they eventually decided to try another area because they started walking back the way they had first come which happened to be directly in front of where I had been, still fishing, since they first appeared.

This is where things could have escalated from the mediocre retelling that it is to a 6 o'clock news headline.  A pheasant decided it was time to reveal itself and flew out of the brush to my right, which happened to be almost directly in front of the hunters.  Apparently pheasants are the devil because this one found it a good idea to fly directly between the hunters and myself.  Furthermore one of the hunters thought it would be a great idea to swing around as fast as can be and shoot at this pheasant that was now flying over the open water.  As all of this was happening I was preforming my "hit the deck" move that I learned from every action movie ever as a viable bullet dodger.  Lying in the dirt, feeling the bark and leaves rain down upon my head, I glanced up and watched as the pheasant calmly flew away.  So much for hunting prowess.  After an expletive along the lines of "Holy Sh!t, I'm fishing here." and regaining my feet in front of the dumbfounded looking faces that greeted me, the almost loss of my head was consoled by the shooter saying "Sorry, I didn't see you there."  I didn't really know how to respond and I guess the hunter knew there wasn't much I could say to that because he followed up with, "Well, your on state game land and your not wearing orange."

Here is the interesting difference mentioned in the title.  According to his logic it would seem he believes it to be my fault that he shot a me while I, after my initial outburst, was just happy that my tackle wasn't now collateral damage.  I am not certain if this assaulting gentleman hunter is also a fellow angler or not but I don't know if that argument would have held up if the end result of our encounter wasn't just dirt on my pants and leaves in my hair.  Not to mention that I don't need to wear orange while fishing.  Nor was I sneaking through the woods, nor camouflaged, nor a pheasant.  I guess I would have chalked this whole situation up to great luck on my part if this arguably poor hunter would have shown a bit more concern or maybe was slightly more apologetic.  Instead I got a gruffly mumbled, "Sorry, I would never shoot in someones direction." and his buddy dragging him off.  I guess "never" came pretty quick.

I did catch a large bluegill on my next cast, so I got that going for me...