Wow, that was fast

Wow.

That went fast.

It always does.

The five-week general big game season in Montana closed Sunday. Unless you plan to hunt the shoulder season for elk, you’re done for the year.

There’s often a feeling of relief when the season ends whether you used all your tags or not. No more getting up at zero dark thirty, trudging up and down mountains and coulees in search of something you may want to shoot.

Many hunters only get out for the opener, and then spend a lot of time driving around on the final weekend, frantically looking for critters to fill their freezers.

Others have been at it regularly since the season opened. They’re likely to be suffering from withdrawal by now, recurring dreams of missed shots making sleep difficult. They wake with a start hours before it’s time to get up, and lie in bed counting the days until next season.

The end is hard to take. Hunting clothes get washed and put away, rifles cleaned and oiled, and those old candy bars in the bottom of the day pack finally get tossed.

Then it’s time to clean out the truck. No need to keep the block management maps and receipts any longer. The rifle cartridges in the cup holder can probably go back in the box, and it’s time to clean out all the trash that was tossed over the seat for the last two months.

If you were successful, there’s blood to wash out of the pickup bed although you may want to wait until spring when it thaws and provides an olfactory reminder of the hunt.

I was sleeping in the back of my truck a few years ago while fishing the Bighorn in the spring when the elk blood I hadn’t washed out from the previous hunting season began to thaw. I kept waking up all night looking for a carcass before I remembered where I was.

Quitting cold turkey is the way to go. Don’t even leave the binoculars in the truck. In fact, park the truck and don’t drive it for a week or two. And by no means take a drive through your hunting territory just to see what showed up after the season closed. You really don’t want to know.

Try not to think about the season being over. Forget you’re a hunter. It will make it easier to endure the next 11 months.

Parker Heinlein is at [email protected].