'Lives of the Hunted,' by Ernest Thompson Seton.Ernest Seton (1860-1946) is my favorite naturalist. I first came across his work at the age of around seven years old when I paid the enormous sum of $15 at a flea market for an antique set of natural history volumes that included his work on mammals. $15 was a hell of a lot of money for a seven year old in 1985.
I am not a fan of wildly anthropomorphic stories about animals. Yet a strictly dry, scientific account of how an animal lives is not a very useful means for most people (children in particular) to understand a species. Seton walks this line well in 'Lives of the Hunted.' This is a collection of stories about animals' lives that hews very closely to Seton's serious understanding of them.
Seton ascribes motives and emotions to these animals that cannot possibly be proven. He received a lot of criticism from other scientists at the time for this but I consider Seton's characterizations to be fair literary license taken in the interest of greater popular understanding of animals. When I think about coyotes I still inevitably recall Seton's tale of 'Tito', a coyote who represents a shift that really did take place in terms of how western coyotes respond to human hunting pressure. 'Krag' the bighorn sheep is still my basic idea of what a wild American ram is and how it behaves. If I even hunt bighorn and find any success then half of the credit will be owed to Seton's story. A little bit of literary license goes a long way in helping the information to stick with the reader.
These stories were written in the late 1800's and first published as a single collection in 1901. Popular taste in writing styles have changed but the stories and the animals remain relevant. I come back to this and other similar books by Ernest Thompson Seton every few years and his work remains just as entertaining and informative as it ever was.
As a hunter, an outdoor writer, and a hunting instructor my philosophy is that the first duty of a new hunter (or an experienced hunter pursuing new prey) is to become a student of the animal. Don't start out studying tactics. Study the animal and understand how its motives and needs change throughout the year and in response to different environmental conditions. The world needs more writing like Seton's to help us to do this.
Amazon carries an e-book version for the Kindle which is absolutely free, though it does not appear to contain every story from the original edition of the book. A reprint edition of the entire book is also available. My own first edition in nearly perfect condition is not going anywhere for love or money.
[Photo copyright 2011 by Jackson Landers. All rights reserved]
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