Women with deer in their sights

A camo-clad pair of hunters slipped into the woods near Yaphank, New York, on Long Island, one Sunday this winter to position themselves before sunset, when white-tailed deer are most active. One carried pink arrows, and the other had a purple bow.

But the tree stand they planned to climb into was missing. It happens — the hunter’s equivalent of a stolen bike. So Jacqueline Molina and Marissa Estatio went on foot that day, walking through the gray woods.

Stalking through the forest was how Molina got her first buck, in November. The ground was wet, so she moved through the woods quietly, and suddenly saw the six-point buck. She froze, waiting for a clear shot, and when she took it, he ran. She found him in a thicket of vines and thorns. “He had passed,” she recalled. “It was very emotional.”

It’s a scene that is more and more common on this part of Long Island, where women are taking to the woods in part to deal with an exploding deer population.

Women, in fact, are the fastest-growing demographic in hunting; they now account for as much as 15% of hunters nationwide, according to a study from the Fish and Wildlife Service. In New York state, as in the rest of the country, the number of first-time adult male hunters declined by over 30% over the past 15 years, while the number of women hunting for the first time increased at roughly the same rate.

For Long Island, this spike in hunting by women comes at a time of need.

“Obviously there is a problem with deer overpopulation on Long Island,” state Assemblyman Fred Thiele said in a recent interview. “I’ve been in two deer-related accidents in three years, so I can speak personally to that one.”

The State Department of Environmental Conservation announced that 53,000 women in New York got licenses to hunt in 2018, and the agency would step up to encourage this growing group with a program to recruit and train women hunters called BOW, Becoming an Outdoor Woman.

“We wanted to offer the same classes that everyone gets in New York state, with an all-women atmosphere,” said Katrina Talbot, a wildlife biologist with the department. “No judgment for asking questions, no competition, and shooting experience with women mentors.”

Brittany Dell, who works for the department on Long Island, is one of the women who teaches other women to hunt, the kind of hands-on instruction that was traditionally passed down from father to son. At 29, she has been a hunter for more than 15 years.

“The last deer I took was a 3-1/2-year-old buck of around 200 pounds, and I was all by myself,” she said. “So after I field-dressed it, I was dragging it to the car and a trooper stopped. I guess he was surprised to see a woman dragging this mature buck to her car. It was pretty liberating to do that. He did help me get it into the trunk.” For some time, the only Long Island deer story involving a woman was the tale of Maria Caccese. Thirty-five years ago, she was honored at the annual hunters banquet on Shelter Island for bagging the biggest buck of the year. Her speech was short: “Thank you very much. I shot it from my kitchen window in my pajamas.”

Everyone knew that Caccese’s husband shot that deer, and that she agreed to hunt with him only so he could use the extra tag to fill the family’s freezer with venison.

Things are different in the McBride household.

Cara McBride was a 38-year-old mother of two when she began hunting three years ago. Married to a farmer’s son in rural Cutchogue, she took a bow and arrow and climbed into a tree stand when her 3-acre pumpkin patch was ruined by marauding deer.

Since then, she has taken seven deer, and the chest freezer in the kitchen behind a sliding barn door is full of backstraps, tenderloins and a smoky venison kielbasa. McBride and her husband do their own butchering, and they use most every part. Her photographs of deer hang on every wall. The décor of their home would have to be described as modern antler.

McBride fell hard for deer hunting, which has become a meditative practice for her.

“I go by myself, drop the kids off at school, go to the grocery store, go to the tree stand,” she said. “I like sitting in the morning when my patience is fresh. It feels so good to be in the woods. It’s even better when I get to see a deer.”

There is probably no better place to see a deer than on Shelter Island, a 12-square-mile island in Peconic Bay between the North Fork and the South Fork of Long Island, reachable only by ferry, or in the case of deer, by swimming.

According to Beau Payne, the animal control officer on the island, the fall rut is when all hell breaks loose. With the wintertime human population down to 2,300, close to 1,200 deer wander into roadways, causing about a third of all vehicle accidents. The town’s Deer and Tick Committee has considered nonlethal measures, such as relocation and birth control, but the only practical way to deal with the population has been to encourage more people to hunt. Last year’s efforts culled more than 400 deer from the herd.

Part of the success of the Shelter Island hunt is its venison donation program, which ensures that the meat of any deer taken won’t go to waste. The program provides a walk-in cooler where hunters can store field-dressed deer for up to three days; venison butchers; and a freezer at the recycling center for the distribution of meat.

Jackie Arthur, herself a deer hunter, is paid by the town of Shelter Island to break down hundreds of field-dressed carcasses into roasts and steaks for free distribution to the community.

Arthur recently stood under a tarp in a light rain in her backyard, trimming fat from a doe (fat accounts for the gamy flavor of venison) as she described her evolution as a hunter. She grew up in a nonhunting family and didn’t even taste venison until she had dinner with the family of her fiancé, Max Pelletier, a Shelter Islander who taught her how to butcher as his father taught him.

“Backstraps are the most popular cut,” she said, carving one from the hanging carcass. “Tender meat, perfect to grill.” It was meticulous work. Last year, the town distributed 3,100 pounds of venison to anyone who cared to come get it.

“I’ve gotten really good at it; I’m pretty proud of myself,” she said. “I had never even thought of shooting an animal, let alone cutting one up.” “One of my best friends lives in Brooklyn, and when she heard I was doing this, she was upset,” Arthur added. “I showed her what I was doing and explained the donation program. She got it, she understood. I don’t push this on anyone; I just try to explain my side and why I do it.”

If there’s a single spot on Shelter Island to reliably find hunters not in the field, it is probably the town fitness center next to the school gym. Hunting requires real stamina, especially those who use a bow, so many work out.

That’s where, two years ago, Emily Kraus met her fiancé, Evan Kraus, who taught her bowhunting. A graduate of the University of North Carolina with a degree in exercise and sports science, she never gave hunting a thought. But by the time of her wedding last October, she had taken her first deer.

“There is a right and wrong way to hunt,” she said. “I could not have had a better first experience. It was a doe, it was a clean shot, the best possible, clean and ethical. Because I am also an animal lover.”

Kraus prefers to hunt with bow and arrow over shotgun because the season is longer. It’s also a better workout. Like most of the hunters she knows, she hunts for food and particularly enjoys introducing friends to grilled venison tenderloin, a revelation to people outside of local hunting culture who think deer are mainly taken for trophies.

“I do know men who are out there for the trophy, for that huge rack,” Kraus said. “I’m out there to provide meat.”

Another denizen of the town fitness center is Julia Weisenberg, who grew up on Shelter Island and spent a lot of time in the woods with her outdoorsman father.

“My mom did archery in college,” Weisenberg said. “I always kept it in the back of my mind, and in 2017 I got my bowhunting license.”

After enrolling in one of the all-female Shelter Island hunting courses, Weisenberg began taking target practice at Smith Point Archery. One day she noticed an archer with pink arrows who was a very good shot, Molina. They became friends, and when Molina took her six-point buck in November, they celebrated together.

Deer are most active at sunrise and sunset, so hunting them involves being in the woods in the dark. When Molina’s mother heard she was hunting in remote woods, she gave her daughter a container of Mace for protection (against humans), although Molina thought she was already pretty intimidating with a hunting knife and bow.

“I don’t know how a female hunter should look,” she said. “It’s a male-dominated sport, but I’m very girly.”

Deer hunting is often a solo activity, but women who hunt find one another. Estatio and Molina met on Facebook, where both learned to scroll past negative comments from hunters who were skeptical about their posts in a deer hunting group.

“We became friends when I posted the picture of the deer that I got this year, and Jacqueline commented positively on it,” Estatio said.

Like most hunters, Estatio finds that much of the appeal is just being quiet in the woods.

“I love that time to decompress and forget about everything else,” she said. “On Long Island, we live such a fast-paced life. You can’t even drive somewhere without dealing with traffic and frustration. Sitting in a tree lets you disconnect from that.”