The Wild 
Game Dinner
By Alan Liere	

My wild game dinner was a success again this spring with more than 90 in attendance. To be invited, guests either had to have hunted, fished or shot skeet, trap or sporting clays with me—unless they were related, in which case they merely had to have NOT asked me to babysit during hunting season. 
My guests and I were disappointed the lone African bird specimen I had mounted on my trip to Africa arrived in poor shape with its wings in the bottom of the crate. As I must assume, the taxidermist in Johannesburg had intended wings to be part of the finished mount, I suspect some kind of flesh-eating beetle or grease worm got to it. This doesn’t say much about the professionalism of the taxidermist, however. I’ve mounted a few birds myself, and even I know that removing grease from the skin is extremely important. Now, my South African shelduck looks rather like an extinct flightless bird—a Dodo, I think—that I once saw in an encyclopedia.
Not counting the cost for airfare and the safari, that lone duck cost me around two grand when I factor in permits, transport to the shop in Johannesburg, taxidermy charges, shipping to Seattle, and overland trucking to my home. Granted, the trip to Africa was one of the great adventures of my life, but I went there hoping to add to my collection of mounted waterfowl memories and my disappointment is immense.
Probably, I should have brought the skin home and mounted it myself because the mallard I did last year is holding up very nicely. When I accidentally pulled the head off while trying to work the skin over the skull, I didn’t think I’d be able to salvage it, but except for an almost-inquisitive cocking of the head, it looks pretty good. If I had to do it again, I’d leave the mouth closed and forget about the artificial tongue, though, because every time I look at that bird, it seems to be saying “Bbbllleck!”
Despite the disappointment of some of my guests at not getting to see how beautiful a shelduck is, the diversified buffet and fine company was adequate compensation for most. We didn’t have anything terribly exotic this year, as Mike didn’t get out after rattlesnakes and Bob didn’t get the cougar he hoped to. Fried cougar tastes very much like fried pheasant, but it is ever so much easier to eat if you don’t know what it is. 
I think my buddy, Stan, was the only one who had to resort to road kill to make a contribution this year. He brought some hamburgery-type concoction he called Michelin Meatloaf. He said it was venison, but there were some in attendance who wondered if Stan hadn’t found himself a badger. Stan is single and not much of a cook, so we forgave him, especially 
considering the freak accident on his first and only hunt of the year. 
He is the only man I know who has had his spleen ruptured by a dead goose. It seems kind of funny now, but when that thing slammed into his back as he stood in the blind in Canada, no one was laughing. To make things even worse, when Stan ate the goose two months later, he broke a tooth on a piece of shot. The good news for Stan was that he made quite an impression on Tillie Shick at the wild game feed, and I’m pretty sure they have become an “item.” 
After eating, we always line up along the back of the yard and shoot clay pigeons in a loser-out competition that gets rather spirited and can last an hour or better. Because Stan wasn’t shooting, he went for a walk down by the creek and had a prolonged encounter with a skunk. The reason it was prolonged was because a couple days before, Stan sprained his ankle playing ping pong and he was on crutches. As he observed, “If I didn’t have bad luck, I wouldn’t have any luck at all.” 
 I can’t imagine that he thought no one would notice a semi-naked man on crutches churning through the lower pasture and up the hill to the house, but Stan got sprayed so badly he’d shucked everything but his tee-shirt. While he was trying to get me to unlock the back door, Tillie left the shooting event and came around the house. It didn’t take her any time at all to invite Stan to her place up the hill, saying she had a sure-fire remedy for getting rid of the essence of skunk. 
I haven’t talked with Stan in over a week now, but as I said, he must be doing okay. Tillie swung by the other morning to use my reloader and she says she and Stan have been shooting clays at her place this week. She says the baking soda and hydrogen peroxide odor-eliminator she uses on her dogs has worked very well on Stan, too, and he seems to enjoy the application. I knew his bad luck couldn’t hold.