Wildlife Wars: The Life and Times of a Fish and Game Warden

by Terry Grosz

  The last vestiges of daylight finally disappeared into the velvet dark routinely found in a temperate rain forest such as most of Humboldt County is, and with it came the circling of the herd in the tall salt grass around me. It was a great feeling being alive, being there in the field, and being trusted enough by the elk that they felt secure in gathering for the night close to the very type of animal trying to do them harm. Moments like that remain clearly fixed in my brain years after these events occurred. Darkness manifested itself now like a heavy, moisture-laden velvet cloak as I lay back against a large sand dune and waited for the anticipated evening’s fireworks. This was the ninth night I had lain in wait for the lad or lads illegally killing these magnificent animals, and tonight my gut feeling told me an event was in the offing.

  Around midnight a light fog drifted in and settled around my position. The degree of fog was not enough to deter anyone wanting to kill an elk; in fact, it would likely have just the opposite effect because the fog would provide a little more cover for the shooter, not to mention dampening the sound of the shooting. By two a.m. all was very quiet, and the inky darkness was so complete that I could put my hand in front of my face and feel its heat on my nose before I could see its outline.

  The elk had settled down and were now resting all around me. Their pungent smell, soft whistling calls, and sounds of rumination were my world for the moment. The stiffness from my damp soil “bed” was beginning to tell on me, but I remained still. I didn’t want to scare or arouse the sleeping elk; besides, what better decoys could one ask for when trying to trap an elk poacher? I thought as I tried to fight off the ever-present urge to sleep.

  About three-thirty, a pair of headlights swept into the area from the south side of the beach below my position. Without hesitation, they continued north along the dirt road that paralleled the bluffs along Gold Beach, past me and out of sight of my position. It was four a.m. before the headlights returned, and I suspected it was just some young couple out to take advantage of the darkness. The vehicle proceeded south along the dirt road before me, passed my position, and again drove out of sight. A large bull, nervous of the interruption at that time of the morning (probably because he had been shot at before), stood up, and in so doing awakened part of the herd. The animals’ activity was normal, and I continued to snuggle deeper in my warm coat until I saw the headlights slowly coming back north along the dirt road.

  This time I went into full alert! This car could very well contain my shooters. They could have gone north on the dirt road just to check out the other end to see if any game wardens were staking out the elk herd. After driving through the area where they wished to shoot and not finding anything that would cause them trouble, they had returned, or so I supposed. I was no longer cold but shook with anticipation of the moment that was likely to come. I didn’t have to wait long. When the vehicle was even with my elk herd, it stopped, and zip, out came the pencil-thin blue-white stream of a powerful spotlight. It swept the area where the herd had been sleeping, and instantly the elk were all on their feet. I should have realized the inherent danger at that moment, but my fixation on capturing the poachers blinded my common sense. The intoxicating effect of hunting your fellow human beings sometimes, just like real drugs, masks your sense of danger. That’s what happened to me that morning. The light continued to sweep over the elk herd, finally illuminating a large bull. The elk, uncomfortable with the light in his eyes, lowered his head and tried to move away from the offensive beam, only to have it follow him every step of the way.

  In the meantime I was lying on the ground in an attempt to stay concealed, stripping off my coat and trying to get ready to run these lads down on foot if they shot an animal and entered the field to claim their prize. What a prize they would get, I said to myself, all six-foot-four, 320 pounds of flying tackle from the local game warden! A six-by-seven (western count, that is, an animal with six antler tines on one side and seven on the other—thirteen points by the eastern-count method) bull raised his head, and boom went the report of a rifle. The orange ball of flame fairly leaped from the vehicle in the direction of the standing elk. A ka-thump told me they had hit the animal, and solidly. Before I could see what happened to the large bull who had just been shot, it happened!

  Being a rookie, I had not planned for the next few seconds’ worth of events, a danger I was about to learn the hard way. Elk exploded from the grass around me. They were crashing in every direction, trying to get away from the light and the sound of the rifle. A huge cow jumped right over me in her frantic effort to escape, her hoof taking the cap clean off my head like a bullet. Next I collided with a frantic calf trying to follow its mother, knocking me to the ground and stunning me for a moment. Finally understanding the exploding danger around me, I got up from the ground and ran for a dark form I recognized as a tree, hoping to use it as a shield. Another fleeing elk slammed into my side, sending me sailing through the air for about ten feet. I hit the ground, rolled, and came up running as my survival instinct told me to keep moving. Zip went another bullet in the direction I was running, and it wasn’t too damn far away, either! Those knotheads, I thought, the urge to kill has them shooting at anything and everything! I dove to the ground as another bullet zipped across my bow and again bounced up running, not wanting to be trampled by fear-crazed elk flying for their lives. Zip went another bullet, followed by a heavy thump as an elk running directly in front of me went down hard in a flurry of flying sand, grass, and pieces of driftwood.

  The pungent smell of “paunch” (escaping stomach gases) told me that animal was a goner. But not quite. Up she came, and out of fear and pain charged me. In the dim residual light of the spotlight as it swept the field in search of another quick victim, I saw her kick out at me with her front hooves. As I ducked, her hoof hit my right shoulder a glancing blow, knocking me into the red alder I had been running toward. Knocked sideways and off balance at a dead run, I sailed into the tree, hitting it at a damn high rate of speed. The impact knocked the wind out of me with a loud whoosh and sent me glancing off to one side into a large pile of driftwood. My shoulders hit a log, my head snapped back into another log, and then the lights went out!

  I came to at daylight and saw a small bird looking down at me from his perch on a driftwood log. Boy, my head hurt like there was no tomorrow, and my eyes wouldn’t focus for more than a moment at a time. Closing my eyes seemed to help, so I kept them closed while I moved my hand to the large knot on the back of my head, only to remove it quickly because of the pain even light touching caused. There was no blood on my hand, but considering the velocity with which I had hit that driftwood pile, I thanked my lucky stars my head wasn’t split open. I lay there for a few more moments, letting my eyes focus and getting up the courage to see if I could stand and walk. After a bit I could see that the pain wasn’t going away, so I rolled over and, using my arms to push off, staggered to my feet. Hanging on to a log end in the woodpile, I steadied myself so I could survey the field of battle and, with any luck, not fall. Some battle! The place was deserted. No bad guys, no elk, and one very sore and dizzy game warden were all that remained. The fog was drifting in, and I just let the cool, moist air bring me back to the state of a semi-functioning human being.

  Damn, my head hurt. Every step I took was hell, not to mention the fact that I could hardly lift my gun arm. At first I couldn’t remember why, but then it came back to me: the kick in the right shoulder from the wounded elk that had nearly taken my head off. I was lucky I had the sense and the grace of God (who loves fools, little children, and game wardens) to duck. After another thirty minutes or so of just getting adjusted to my painful world, I began to move slowly around the area. There was a large gut pile not fifteen feet from where I had lain next to the driftwood pile, all that remained of the cow who had kicked the stuffing out of me as she was beginning her dance with death. It was amazing that the lads had gutted that elk so close to where I was lying and had never seen me there among the tall grasses.
They were very cool customers if they had seen me and, realizing that I was out cold and not a threat at that time, continued to collect their ill-gotten gains in spite of my inert carcass.

  Further examination of the grassy resting area revealed another gut pile next to a small dead bull that had been deemed unworthy of collection. Not seeing anything else related to the previous night’s poaching damage, I gutted the small bull, propping open its legs so it would cool out, and then walked over to the dirt road to see if I could pick up any spent shell casings for evidence. My head was not as bad as it had been, but I still could not turn it too quickly or bend over without a lot of pain. I continued my search, but nothing remained except a set of vehicle tracks heading south and out of the park and some drops of blood on the sandy road, the only remaining trace of the night’s sad events.

  Realizing I was a spent unit on this case, I headed for my patrol vehicle and drove out to the state park headquarters. I informed the park rangers of where the elk was lying in the grass so they could collect it and donate the meat to a needy family. I didn’t tell them of the previous night’s events, first because I was not happy with my performance and second because I suspected everyone in the killing of the Gold Beach herd—and what better killer than one on the inside!

  * * *

  I caught a lot of poachers in that area during the following year but was never sure whether any of the men I apprehended were the lads from the night I had had to use my football skills to avoid being taken out by the animals I was trying to protect. I did learn an important trick of the trade: on all future stakeouts I stayed the hell away from the center of an elk herd. After that incident, I would set up across the road from the elk. That way, when the lads stopped their vehicle to shoot, I was on the opposite side from where they were looking and could move right up on them before they even realized I was there. Most of the time, when they shot I would be kneeling unseen just a few feet from the side of their vehicle and would let them go out into the field to retrieve their kill. When they returned, usually dragging an elk, guess who would be between them and their method of escape?

  Several times the sharper killers would shoot from the car, then drop off one poacher to gut the animal while another sped away in the vehicle to reduce the chance of detection and apprehension.

  That method was fun because it gave me a chance to stalk the lad in the field and, in every instance, walk right up on him just as his interest was totally absorbed in the gutting of his prey. It was even more fun having that lad, handcuffed, of course, call his buddy from the just-returned vehicle to come out and help him. More than once I scared the living hell out of the man coming from the vehicle when I rose out of the three-foot-high grass no more than two to three feet away as he approached.

  After several such successful poacher-apprehension ventures in the Gold Beach area, the illegal elk killing slowed, then stopped outright. In that period of my life I had learned several lessons that would serve me well throughout my career—and in the process had used up one of the lives allotted to me as a person and a game warden. I learned that many times the game you are trying to protect will not cooperate with you. In fact, sometimes it will try to kill you, not by intention but simply because the will and instinct to live is so strong. I accepted that fact because that instinct is what the world of wildlife is all about, namely, survival of the fittest. However, when operating in this wildlife-survival arena, one must also consider the human factor. Human beings are animals and many times act savagely like animals. But they are animals who have lost almost all of their basic wild instincts other than the instinct of the final act of killing. The loss of such senses often betrays poachers because those holding the “thin green line,” through instinct, training, practical experience, and their own partial reentry into the world of wildlife, turn out to be the better hunters. The good ones in our line of work are just like some domestic cats; they possess the genes of old, which allow for field survival and a fairly easy return to our wild nature. When one hones these skills as a conservation officer and learns to read the wild, it is just a matter of time until those who poach but don’t reclaim their heritage of wild skills will find themselves stalked by a far better-equipped human being bent on catching the most dangerous game.

  So, for those reading these lines who walk on the “dark side,” keep in mind that it is just a matter of time...

  Chapter Three

  Chili for Breakfast

  The sun was finally beginning to burn off the light fog that was lying over the sea west of Eureka, California. Lieutenant Ken Brown, a marine warden for the state of California, gave a glance seaward to acknowledge that fact, then busied himself with calibrating the patrol boat’s radar and pumping the bilges. I finished the deck chores and went below to stow our food and gear. The Rainbow, a thirty-five-foot twin-screw, gasoline-powered, navy-gray Fish and Game patrol boat stationed in Eureka, was to be our home for the next sixteen hours, or however long it took to get the job done. For Ken, the boat commander, a stint at sea was a joy. For me, the boarding officer, it was hell, pure and simple.

  I was a rookie game warden for the state of California, having been hired right out of college after graduating from Humboldt State College with a master’s degree in wildlife management. After sixteen weeks at a police academy, I had returned to the area where I had spent five of my seven years in college to start my career in wildlife law enforcement. Part of my duties consisted of filling in as a boarding officer on the state’s resident patrol boat, which was used to help keep the large Pacific North Coast commercial fishing industry in check. My job consisted of boarding commercial fishing boats at sea to make sure they stayed within established fishing limits, fished only during prescribed seasons, used legal gear, were properly licensed, and fished within the prescribed zones set aside for their particular commercial activity. I loved the work, the challenge, the danger, and even the sea. What I hated was the fact that I got motion sickness at the drop of a hat.

  Being afflicted with a weak inner ear meant nothing but misery every time I went to sea. In fact, I was so bad that every time I even started to work on our patrol boat in the marina, knowing we were going to sea shortly thereafter, I got seasick—not a little sick but major-broadcast puke-six-feet sick. As long as we were moving I was OK. But let us stop the boat, with all the pitching and yawing and loss of horizon, and I was one sick lad. Then throw into that situation my duties as a boarding officer, which really made my day complete. I had to jump from ship to ship at sea in order to be able to do a firsthand check of the boats and their crews for compliance with state conservation laws. Then I had to descend into the bilges of those ships to check their catches, breathing the smells of their greasy cooking, rotting sea products from the last catch left over in the bilge, and diesel fumes—and up would come everything I had inside me, including my gizzard! Then, with a sickness born in hell, I would have to jump from the commercial fishing vessel back onto the small, pitching deck of my patrol boat with legs made from the best rubber going. Damn, I’m getting woozy just thinking about those days.

  The Pacific Coast Squad of game wardens in which I worked included lots of World War II and Korean War veterans, and none of them, being such good friends and all, spared me advice on how to avoid seasickness. Many of them were ex-navy and had lots of ideas that were “sure-fire” stoppers of that affliction called motion sickness. Eat lots of bread or crackers before going out to sea; eat pickles before going out to sea; eat a big meal with lots of grease before going out to sea; don’t eat anything before going out to sea; and so it went. I followed their advice to a T, trying to avoid a misery that knows no bounds, and all I did was continue to puke my guts out on each and every trip. On one particular trip, when I believed for a moment that I had puked up my gizzard and watched my lips land on the stern, the seas were running fifty feet if they were running an inch. With no horizon and a slow speed to avoid beating the boat to pieces, all I did was lie on the stern and let the
sea water roll over me, not because I wanted to but because I was so sick I couldn’t even crawl! Good old Ken tried to keep the speed up and stay in the troughs of the waves to reduce the motion, but all to no avail.

  My motion sickness finally got so bad that I made arrangements to visit a hypnotist to see if he could do something for this malady. I had tried every kind of medicine known to humankind by that time and succeeded only in numbing my brain and everything else except that part of me that made me throw up. The hypnotist was my last stop. If hypnosis didn’t work, there was nothing to do but gut it out. But before I actually visited the hypnotist (an expensive treatment I really couldn’t afford), a revelation came to me from an old friend, Hank Merak, who had served on an LST (a landing ship tank, a round-bottomed vessel that pitched and yawed even at anchor in the harbor and hence became universally known as a “seasick special”) during the Korean War. Hank was a fellow officer from Willow Creek. We had served a lot of long hours together in the wildlife wars, and I knew he wouldn’t lie to me. Upon hearing about my problem, Hank said, “Hell, Tiny, try chili for breakfast— the hotter the better.” Well, a drowning man will grab even a spear if thrown to him. Hank told me the cook on his LST, when he knew a storm was coming, would cook up huge pots of the hottest chili known to humankind and make the crew eat it. Hank said the antidote worked so well that he never saw a man seasick on his ship, even during a typhoon off the coast of Japan. Needless to say, I was ready to try anything to stop feeling so rotten all the time when at sea; in addition, if I felt better I could do a better job as a boarding officer and maybe slow down some of the sea pirates fishing the waters off the north coast.