Being a big buck bullet banger has never been a top priority to this writer but according to a non-reliable source from the wilds of North Hamilton County the shooting season has been opened in various categories on September 28, 2024 and will end on January 5, 2025.
The group includes Robin Hood, armed juvenile sharpshooters between the ages of 6-18, Revolutionary War veterans, and the rest of the legal (and illegal) deer killers with their Al Capone era Thompson machine guns.
According to the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency (TWRA) website, the rules and regulations are written in clear language so that no inadvertent slaying of does, fawns, or Crocodile Dundee impersonators will take place.
In a sense of precaution however it is necessary to reach out to the big game hunter from Moreland, Georgia to obtain his favorable outlook on the topic of deer hunting.
In “You Can’t Put No Boogie Woogie on the King of Rock and Roll” (1991- Villard Books), Lewis Grizzard (LG) cuts through the bureaucratic red tape and confidently informs the killing public of how to enjoy the sport of non-kings in “Grizzard’s Revised Rules of Hunting Down Deer and Blowing Them Away”:
Rule No. 1: If you kill a deer, you have to eat it. None of this trophy killing or shooting a deer for the sheer thrill of seeing it fall. We kill cows so that we can have hamburger, so killing a deer in order to have something good to eat, I think, is okay. An addendum to Rule No. 1 is you have to eat the entire deer if you kill it. Okay, you don't have to eat the pancreas or the large intestines, but whatever's edible, you've got to eat it all.
Addendum No. 2 to Rule No. 1 is you can't kill a second deer until you've eaten all your first one. If you kill a second deer, a game warden will be sent to your house to check out your freezer and make certain there was none of the first deer left. If you kill a second deer before you eat all the first one, you have to eat the pancreas of the second one, but you can prepare it any way you wish. I am a fair man.
Rule No. 2: You have to hunt in the nude. The deer aren't dressed, are they? All that camouflage is nothing but trickery, and should not be allowed if this thing is to be truly fair. I realize you might get a little nippy out there, and there's all those briars and barbed-wire fences, but, hey, this ain't no Easter egg hunt.
Rule No. 3: Forget Uzis and bazookas. You can have only one bullet when you go hunting. Barney had only one bullet and Andy didn't even carry a gun, and they kept Mayberry safe. Sorry, pal, you missed. Go home and get another bullet and you can try tomorrow.
Rule No. 4: If you do happen to shoot another person by mistake, it would be quite tacky to ask the family of the departed to allow you to have the head of the victim to put on the wall in the den. Except in Maine, where it's sort of expected.
Rule No. 5: You cannot at any time say you hunt deer because you (1) are doing the deer a favor by killing them because if you don't, there'll be too many deer and a lot of them will starve; or (2) it's your way of communing with nature. If you're worried about the deer starving, why not take some food into the woods and feed the poor things instead of killing them? And if all you want to do is commune with nature, get a pair of binoculars and go watch birds. That way if you spot a redheaded, three-toed, black-billed ratbird, there are no rules you have to eat the darn thing, as there are in deer hunting.
Rule No. 6: If you do not follow Rules 1 through 5, the next time you're in the woods, may Smokey the Bear eat you for your hat, which is what he's been doing to Boy Scouts for years.
(If you want to share a father-son experience before its too late start now as the land developers will soon eliminate the green foliage that provides food and shelter to Bambi and their kin!)
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If you have additional information about one of Mr. Summers' articles or have suggestions or ideas about a future Chattanooga area historical piece, please contact him at jsummers@summersfirm.com)
Jerry Summers