Presence in the woods is everything. It’s not just about being physically there but truly aware, letting the mind settle, and being mentally present.

I found this out the hard way one morning last winter while hunting public land at Big Thicket National Preserve. The mist hung heavy as I made my way to the spot where I planned to do a sit. It was on a right-of-way (ROW) cutting through the dense trees and underbrush. I had a feeling it would be a good spot since several weeks earlier I had seen a couple of whitetail does cross the gravel road running parallel to the right-of-way, about 200 yards west. Having followed their path back through the trees and found a game trail cutting across the ROW, I picked a spot where sign was fresh, set up against a tree 40 or 50 yards off of the crossing, and settled in with my rifle. Due to the straight-wall restrictions of Big Thicket, my firearm of choice that day was a bolt action Ruger 77/357, chambered in .357 Magnum and loaded with 170-grain Federal Hammerdown.

After two hours of sitting, though, I had seen exactly nothing. I decided to get up and do some still-hunting/scouting further on down the ROW where I hadn't previously been. While moving slowly, I decided to count the seconds between trees to try to figure out how fast I was moving. I picked two trees, guessed the distance between and began counting. It took roughly two minutes to make it that far down the ROW. Once I had stopped counting, though, my mind was now looking for something new to do and my thoughts started wandering. Then, not half a minute after my counting exercise ended, a wild hog burst out the brush to my right and straight into the ROW, barely 20 yards ahead.

The hog and I both stopped immediately upon seeing each other - now locked in a silent standoff. It was quartering slightly away, but very nearly broadside - about as good a shot opportunity as I could have asked for. I remembered a story an older hunter had once shared with me when I was young about how he once startled a deer in the woods and painstakingly took two to three minutes to raise his .30-30 to his shoulder while the deer looked on so as not to startle it, eventually getting a shot off and taking the deer. Despite that memory sitting in the back of my mind and my good sense telling me to slow things down, I decided to try and beat the hog. I moved to shoulder my rifle, but the second the hog sensed movement, it took off and was deep into the brush on the other side of the ROW before I could even get the stock of the rifle into my shoulder.

Continuing on down the ROW, I realized presence isn't just waiting. It's about being mentally engaged with your surroundings and staying alert at all times, being ready to respond without forcing the outcome. The woods can surprise you, and if you're not fully in the moment, you might miss what's right in front of you.