By Ryan C. Dearing

The other day as I was packing for the 500 mile trip to hunt with my friend, Jake for the weekend, I couldn’t help but ask myself, why do I do it? You see, hunting with Jake almost never goes smoothly. Our trips together usually include a variety of hardships such as getting lost, bad food, camping out in blizzard conditions, forgetting the ammo on the kitchen table, endless death marches, nearly killing ourselves on slippery roads and very often not many birds to show for it. So why would I drive all night through unknown lands with no promise of birds on the other side? Because, just like the gun that shoots true and the bird dog that never breaks point, good friends are hard to come by.