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“We don’t know how lucky we are.” My dad’s words escaped me as I quelled the sudden urge to tangle my line and throw my pole overboard. MC and my brothers didn’t reply. They were too busy waiting for a fish to strike.

MEAT HUNTER’S CREED

I’M LARGELY GOVERNED BY my nobility paunch—the new and politically correct term for a belly—so naturally I’m a meat hunter. Given the opportunity, I shoot the tastiest-looking animal available, often the smaller buck or bull in the mix. My brothers like to say my lack of trophies has something to do with my skills as a hunter, which is 100 percent bullarky. The skill and wit of a man with as much nobility as I have should never be questioned. If Boone and Crockett had a record for the most passed-up trophies, I’m sure I’d be a contender. Take the 2014 opener for Sitka blacktails. I passed on a massive four-by-three buck to take a chunky fork-horn instead. A few moments later, my older brother, Luke, shot the mammoth.

“I could have shot the big deer, but he didn’t look as tasty,” I said after we gutted and propped the deer to cool.