The Sniper and the Ambusher

by LW Oakley

I hunted for years with a man who called his gun ‘my baby’ the way an old woman would affectionately refer to her pet cat or dog.

But he never took his gun out to show it to me, or offered to let me hold it and look down the barrel. He never spoke to me about his gun or told me why he chose it over all others. And he never once said to me that he loved his gun or why.

I only know two people who say and do things like that.

They also have names for their guns.

One calls his the ‘243’ and I call mine the ‘Ruger.’  They are different types of guns that have shaped distinct styles of hunting.

The owner of the ‘243’ hunts like a sniper and I ambush deer with the ‘Ruger.’

 A sniper has a scope on his rifle and kills from distances measured in hundreds of yards. Deer often never know he’s there especially after he pulls the trigger. I take aim with my naked eye and kill up close sometimes from a few feet away. I have shot deer that I have heard breathing. I have shot deer that have looked me in the eye a split second before I pulled the trigger.

 The sniper’s bullet is long and tapered like a missile and travels fast and far. I fire a bullet that is short and stubby and clips off small twigs and leaves without deflecting. But it doesn’t travel far because of its weight and blunt shape which are designed to maximize trauma to the body.

The sniper’s rifle is a bolt action and mine is a semi automatic. The bolt action is more accurate. The sniper shoots deer in the head and neck. I knew a sniper nicknamed ‘neck-shot’ because that’s how he killed deer. I aim at a larger target called the boiler room just behind the front shoulder where the heart and lungs and other vital organs are located. 

 The sniper likes to sit in the woods near the edge of a swamp where he can see a long way. I like to surprise deer at beaver dams where the woods narrow to a bottleneck.

One day the sniper and I were sitting within 40 yards of each other near a swamp. Through a strange chance of hunting neither of us knew the other was there. We approached our watches from opposite directions. I arrived first and sat just feet from a beaver dam where I was waiting and hoping for a deer.  

I heard the sniper walking slowly and quietly like an animal before stopping nearby. But I could not see him through the dense woods and I immediately thought that he was a deer.

I sat looking in his direction for what seemed like a half hour never once glancing over at the dam.  

Eventually I gave up looking his way and concentrated on the dam again while he was watching the other side of the swamp unseen and unknown to me. We sat perfectly still like that for almost two hours.  

When the buck emerged from the woods on the other side of the swamp I could see its antlers swaying and its body rocking and its white tail waving as it came down a ridge towards the dam. I had my rifle raised and pointed towards the dam. That’s when the sniper shot the buck through the neck.

After our adventure ended that day I realized that the sniper had wandered over to that place in the woods because he had been lost. A sniper relies on marksmanship to be successful and an ambusher depends on his knowledge of the woods. A sniper reaches out to deer with the long arm of his rifle. But an ambusher lets the lay of the land funnel deer within a few feet of his location.

One shared trait we rely on to be successful was on display that day we sat 40 yards apart unaware of each other. The sniper and the ambusher must remain quiet and still because detecting danger is what a deer does best.

I walked along the shoreline watching him with his deer.

I offered to carry his ‘243.’

But the sniper said, ‘No.’

He carried his rifle over his shoulder through the swamp.

He said, ‘the ‘243’ goes with me.’