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For Jonathan Wilkins, the trip he organized through his Black Duck Revival in Arkansas was not about guarding places, bragging rights, or restricting games. They want everyone to have a taste of hunting
Participants out of town on weekends.
We got up in the hours of yawning before dawn. Nevertheless, when we arrived at the scene at 5:00 in the morning, a group of local outdoor supplies suppliers had been there for an hour and only placed three thousand baits, which were intended to behave as a flock of riotous snow geese. We worked with them to complete the carefully planned setup, and spent another hour piercing the wire bait base into the semi-frozen soil until the mixture of white nylon stockings gently rippled between the flat plastic goose silhouettes. My only frame of reference is the relatively rare 60 floating sea ducks or a string of fierce wild ducks floating in the wood. Half of me think that the black duck revival Jonathan Wilkins told me the scope of the snow goose bait field. Exaggerate. Twelve hours later, I believe that I was struggling to find bait in the sticky corduroy in the field. Wilkins is a man who knows so much passion so deeply that when you first meet, you might think that he is also an exaggerated image. But the word "real" will appear repeatedly in almost any conversation with Wilkins, and it perfectly describes him and everything he has done with "Black Duck Revival".
Wilkins and a snow goose are in the bait field.
Hunting is a fading tradition. Since the arrival of the first Paleolithic humans, modern convenience, the disappearance of countless escapisms, and the perception of what it means to be a hunter have clearly limited the basic pursuits of the North American continent. These views on hunting are not unfounded. The latest U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service National Survey conducted in 2016 showed that 97% of American hunters are white, 90% are male, and 60% are over 45 years old. In view of this situation, Wilkins is a mixed-race graduate of a private liberal arts college with eclectic tattoos on his arms. He is unlikely to become an ambassador for a culture, and he is obviously atypical of this culture. member.
Wilkins grew up in St. Louis and did not grow up in the woods until he was 10 years old, and he was not even allowed to use water guns. One morning in 2010, when he was 27 years old, he climbed onto a deer rack in Arkansas with a compound bow and shot a whitetail that he nicknamed Bruce Springsteen because it was the boss of the forest. After he stopped shaking, he called a friend who introduced him to hunt and helped him find the deer. His friend agreed, and hurried to the wedding. The hunter is like that. That night, Wilkins ate venison and mashed potatoes with his wife Marian and his friends. He realized that hunting was “not insurmountable”, it provided a path to real life, and he was now required Offer to others. Therefore, six hunters from very different backgrounds gathered at his seasonal base in Brinkley, Arkansas. All but one of us are newbies to chasing snow geese.
Like everyone else at Brinkley this season, Jonathan Wilkins was born for waterfowl. Specifically, at 728 North New York Avenue, there is a simple black letter sign that reads: BLACK DUCK REVIVAL, BRINKLEY, AR, EST. 2018. Next door, there is a similar sign in the courtyard of a newly renovated house that says Black Duck Bungalow. Wilkins said that his choice of the name "Black Duck Revival" was a half-joking nod to the reality that he was a black man living in most of the white space, and acknowledged the history of the main building as a chapel. But the main meaning refers to his efforts to reawaken people, especially black Americans, in their interest in land and skills, so that they can be self-reliant.
Before Jonathan and Marian bought the building in 2017, the former Heartline Christian Fellowship church died due to the slow death of the town, and it had been vacant for three years. They demolished and rebuilt the interior by themselves; closed the current backyard fire pit, bar, and hunting education space with new fences; and painted it with a new layer of paint. Wilkins, who lives in Little Rock, initially regarded this space as a place to spend the night while hunting some of the best public waterfowl areas in the United States. But when he dismantled the walls and fixtures, he saw the skeleton of the building, and more importantly, he heard its heart and soul. Spiritual things will not be denied. This spirit has prompted Wilkins to create a unique welcome space, where a hunter who is not exactly like most people may welcome others who are also hindered by lack of experience, lack of access to the field, or lack of belonging. . Today, Black Duck Revival is a person who rejects the title of "Guide" as "hunting educator and facilitator" can help anyone who wants to understand the natural world and its place in it. As he said, this is where Wilkins strives to be "the best self." Empathetic. type. I want to hear people's opinions. I want to contribute to the expansion of human potential. This is an ambitious goal. I want to be respected and hope that people will see me as a person who is willing to grow, change and adapt. I want to be a thoughtful person and put goodness in the world. "
Wilkins and the participants arranged the last bait before sunrise.
Wilkins smiled and called himself a "humanities guy", which seemed to be a apt description, although it was difficult to draw Brinkley naturally. After graduating from university, he worked as a traveling musician, engaged in manual labor that supplemented his life, and then cultivated, raised and cooked high-end bar food for the famous Whitewater Tavern in Little Rock. The hunter will arrive in a few hours, and Wilkins is cooking while talking. He regards food as history, and there is a purpose behind his service to hunters. "Tomorrow night, we are going to eat my trapped raccoon," he said. "There is a tradition of African-American hunters eating nocturnal animals, because during slavery, they were allowed to hunt to supplement food because it was cheaper for landowners. But they could only hunt at night and wait for a day's work. After the end, so... possums and raccoons." Wilkins emphasized "work with heart" in all aspects of life. The flavor of braised raccoon with sweet potato tortellini decorated with crispy kale was purposefully traced back to the pre-war South. And West Africa.
The conversation with Wilkins has a specific rhythm and jargon. Words like "rad" appear with "erudition" and "structural inequality." "People" often appear, usually before a particularly thoughtful assertion. Sentences that begin with "Man, the thing is..." or "Man, what many people don't realize is..." If I ask people to listen and consider and let me be heard, then I have to tell others Offer the same things, and I offer grace in daily life." He stopped to make a fuss at the aromatic improvisation of okra and okra, using kale, mustard and radish greens with pork feet, turkey tail, ham, snow goose gizzards and Complementing each other, he turned to literature. "Man, maybe it sounds vulgar, but I have always liked Louis L'Amour. It was a Renaissance man! He panned for gold, boxed gold gloves, served in merchant ships-he sought knowledge! He eats books! I I like the page better. I mean, when you have the Library of Alexandria in your pocket, it might be stupid, but..." He turned around to cut the vegetables, then stopped, through a fan covered with color film Looking at Marianne’s ode to the history of stained glass from the window, he turned around and said, "I always think that the saddest thing is that you can only do one thing."
Jocelyn McNair assembled one of the decoys.
It is not an exaggeration to call Wilkins a Renaissance man in L'Amour style. In the process of preparing dinner, he provided an eloquent speech, which in itself is a kind of gumbo—the influence of Creole and West African cuisine is blended with racial justice, integrated into the history of hunting and fishing, He is dotted by the music legend Louis Jordan, who lives on the street. It is now the black duck revival, before the virtue of filling station honey bread with butter is completed. From beginning to end, Wilkins returned to the gospel of his self-reliance and our connection with nature. "I'm not saying that guided duck hunting will change lives, but being able to cook for people, clean drains, install taps or change locks-knowing how to do these things means you don't need money for others. Cooking, baking, Making things by hand is a self-sufficient art. There is a romance, beauty and intention to make things. It only breeds style and tenderness. I think tenderness is underestimated, especially in men." Gumbo stewed him to his satisfaction, Finish the chocolate icing, pour it on the freshly baked chocolate cake, look up at his COVID mask, and say, "Man, I like Bond."
Hunting snow geese is an immersive experience. At dawn, dark clouds weighed heavily on the horizon. The saturated soil resisted the rain for several days, turning everything into frozen mud. Wilkins suggested that all hunters bring wading, not for water, but to protect the ground from dampness and coldness. Before shooting the light for the first time, we put on a white zip-up Tyvek jumpsuit and lay in the socks and silhouettes at the top of our huge bait group. We are embedded in mud, nylon, neoprene and Tyvek bait. We are the bait. To the west, Yan Ming got up and rose up.
Even in a group of hunters, you will feel a little lonely when hunting snow geese, especially during protective hunting. This is a product of the 1999 Arctic Tundra Habitat Emergency Protection Act, which aims to reduce the ever-increasing snow, Ross and The number of blue geese is used to protect important waterfowl nesting habitats of other species. Regulation is relaxed; there are no baggage restrictions, and no ban on unplugged guns or electronic phones. You lie on the metal ramp, staring at the sky. Earplugs protect your hearing from adjacent shotguns and protect your sanity from hours of screaming and honking from speakers deployed around you. You can hear very little; you only see the gray sky above.
Each hunter lay face up on the slope.
Suddenly, a pair of spotted geese were conducting reconnaissance in the season of a week. With the indifference of the veterans returning from the war, they flew low and loudly. They poured air and fell towards us, and when they finally saw us, they both did a full-body double shot. Far above the spots and far beyond the range of #2 shooting, thousands of snow geese suddenly appeared in the meandering fractal Vs. The formations intersect, absorb each other, twist elegantly into one, and then split, repeating the process. They called, high and low, high and low, and continued to fight back against the speckled horn. Like the decoy, the scale of the formation that fills the sky is also difficult to understand. Then they left. More will come, but the marquee event happened after the first rays of light, when the geese left the habitat-this kind of event felt like seeing or hearing, similar to tension, a bit like expectation, but both neither. This is an overwhelming appreciation of being alive and aware, and here is a deep appreciation of the present. It is a gift given to hunters by Fengyue and the most important bird.
When a snow goose condescends to enter our shooting range, it feels almost anticlimactic. Gunshots sounded, and the bird doll fell. As soon as daybreak, Wilkins began to move to retrieve the fallen bird, and advised everyone to stand up and get rid of the damp. When not actively observing the sky, Wilkins' hunters are engaged in his passion for birds. He opened a course on the biology of snow geese: how they age, how they observe, how they inhabit, and what it takes to hunt them. The traditional view is that you must persuade only a few spotted geese in the flock to make a promise. When it snows, you must "finish the flock" and convince the first bird, all birds in the middle, and the last bird in flight that they should feed this piece of land 1,300 feet below them.
Sunrise over the bait field.
Despite the huge bait effort in the morning, they obviously didn't believe it. Wilkins suggested that we have breakfast and then return in the afternoon. When our caravan passed through the intersection of Arkansas farmland, we saw our purpose, albeit from our truck instead of descending on us like the Vengeful Valkyrie. Thousands of snow rise and settle, move, and feed in a choreographic vortex that only they understand. And calling, always calling. It feels like chasing a tornado.
Returning after eating steel-cut oats, yogurt and freshly baked cinnamon apples, we continue to observe the sky. Snow only cooperated moderately; three young pigeons joined our count, and then we started looking for three thousand bait. An hour later, a member of the clothing store pointed out, "Every one of you earns, that's for sure."
Not intimidated by the work and the cold and the glorious frustration of watching thousands of birds flying above us the day before, we returned home at 5:17 the next morning and happily arranged the bait under the light of the headlights . This day is very similar to the day before. We saw thousands of geese. Some collaborations, we add them to our shooting. But there is more to learn, and because the hunting speed is very slow, Wilkins suggested that we go back to clean up the birds.
Wilkins' focus on snow goose hunting partly reflects the current state of Arkansas hunting guides and partly reflects his understanding of the market. In a state often associated with legendary private duck camps and wealthy clients, Wilkins is a passionate advocate of public land. He is a board member of the Arkansas Chapter of Backcountry Hunters & Anglers, America's most important public land spokesperson. Guiding on public land in Arkansas is illegal, Wilkins said, even if you can enter private land, "Guiding ducks in Arkansas is a form of boxing." Nevertheless, he has already obtained the right to use private land. There he can offer traditional flooded wood duck, spotted and snow goose hunting, but he also leads "alternative" estuary fishing trips, running limb and small fishing lines for catfish while watching birds. He is both creative and dedicated, as reflected in the goose hunting and whole pig processing by culinary historian Adrian Miller and Culver-Stockton College History Professor Scott Giltner Combinations and pit barbecue clinics and other experiences. Missouri. "Specialization only works if you have a place to do it," Wilkins said. "Rather than putting all the eggs in one basket, it is more diversity. People enjoy themselves more and see cool things."
Waterfowl tattoo on Wilkins' arm.
Black Duck Revival’s single and double rooms can accommodate up to 12 people. These rooms are arranged around the front sanctuary and the central gathering, dining and cooking space of the Black Duck Bungalow, but Wilkins prefers to keep guests at 10 people or less To better allow for "active participants". Our team reflects this spirit. It brings something special to 728 North New York, which is more meaningful than good food and comfortable beds. Spending a few days at Black Duck Revival awakened what everyone exists: the pleasure of providing power. In the environment that Wilkins deliberately created, this commonality attracts and condenses diverse hunters from all over the United States. Rue Mapp is the founder and CEO of Outdoor Afro, a non-profit organization she founded from a blog to encourage more black Americans to spend time outdoors, a national network of nearly 50,000 participants . She is from Oakland, California and hunts at the Black Duck Revival because she said, "Authenticity is what people need now."
A flock of geese filled the sky.
In the evening, we gathered on the converted church benches for dinner. We do not look like fish and wildlife survey hunters-mixed men and women, rural and urban residents, three of us black and three whites. On an ordinary table and a common love for the wilderness, a difficult and enlightening dialogue took place, starting from previous hunting stories and game recipes, but with regard to breaking people’s misunderstandings about each other and the participation of non-traditional hunters The frank discussion of the obstacle ends. Black Duck Revival is a Viennese beer brewed by Legacy Wine and Spirits at Legacy Wine and Spirits in Little Rock with foraging acorns. It is easy to be eliminated because Jocelyn McNair is a gay who happens to be gay , Black and Pentecostal enthusiastic hunter, he said: "If hunting is a system that is more beneficial to minorities-if the system does not want you to participate in it-then there is no reason to be a part of it." But she also continued. With the same grace that Wilkins preached, she was willing to meet with her fellow hunters. "I am an officer, I am a veterinarian, I have deployed, I am a duck hunter wearing a sitka," she said. "If you need, you can put me in a box where you feel comfortable."
Wilkins sees the dialogue surrounding his dining table as the foundation of the black duck revival spirit. "Do you know any other hunting lodge where a black gay woman would feel comfortable coming in on the first night and putting her wife and children's Christmas cards on the refrigerator?" he said. "This is the table I want to build. It seems that many people are beginning to feel comfortable sitting there."
The hunting industry is drawing attention. Recruiting and retaining new hunters or awakening those currently dormant is vital to the survival of tradition and the industries it supports. Wilkins represents the path to emerging markets. "Man, look, when you see hunting and its changes, how people find organic and authentic food sources, and then think about how people create conflicts for their lives, such as creating a CrossFit version of life-hunting is real." Wilkins Realizing that the attention of the industry will bring "tokenization opportunities", he asked whether every opportunity was real to him. "When I try to force myself into a space that is not suitable for me, it will never work. As the hunting community and the industry pay more and more attention to me, they let me sit at a table. But this table is not for I built it. It was built for the people who were always there. I had to build my own table. It might be smaller, but it’s okay. Man, you know, one thing I really respect about the South is that the Southerners made themselves Dining table."
In the world of "pro-employee transactions" and "social media influencers," he paid the price for this autonomy. "I like "Black Duck Revival" very much, and I hope it will become the main content," he said. "But at the end of the season, I will mow the lawn, beautify the environment and do carpentry to make money."
After we went out the next morning, every hunter had at least one snow goose from which he could learn the lessons Wilkins wanted to teach. Our stomachs are filled with burritos, stuffed with fluffy eggs, sausages and peppers; fresh fruit; and blueberry muffins on top of hot cinnamon. Wilkins leads us to clean our geese.
He is passionate about sustainability and the use of whole birds to "rewrite the experience", and he condemns focusing on photographing limited birds. "Studies have shown that hunters’ satisfaction increases when restrictions are lowered. Now the term is popular and people focus on restrictions-it’s quantity, not experience." But if you conceptualize the whole animal as food, he Say, you no longer worry about "restrictions", because one snow goose is enough to feed a family of four. Wilkins peeled off the thin skin covering Snow Goose's chest and spread it out. "You can smoke wings. You can stew your thighs to make oil seals. The breast is a steak, as good as anything you eat, and it is tender under the breast. Callus, heart and liver are great for making sausages and making meat sauces. Or dirty rice." While talking, he stringed six goose hearts and placed them on an open flame. He lifted his foot. "Wash these and you can cook them into the richest food in your kitchen. You can make four high-quality, meaningful meals for your family with a rose or a snow or a spot. They are so cool. Go!" When we ate the flame-kissed heart and the rare goose breast, added salt and pepper, and turned them in the pan twice, we enthusiastically agreed.
Brinkley's main black duck revival building.
Leaving Black Duck Revival has a summer camp aspect. We arrived as hunters. Forty-eight hours later, we left as friends. Six distinct hunters exchanged hugs, emails and cell phone numbers. In the next few days, we emailed each other and posted pictures on social media, expressing the hope that the spirit that moved us all in Black Duck Revival will continue. This optimism may be the most important and lasting aspect of Jonathan Wilkins' pursuit of our common authenticity and self-reliance in the wild. Maybe hunting can change lives. "Don't slander or belittle what we are doing here," Jocelyn McNair said as we reviewed our time together. "Because a thousand micros can be a macro."
See Jonathan Wilkins' recipe for bourbon and butter goose breast.
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