These Hunters' Deaths Hit Me Hard

Search and rescue volunteers are briefed before heading out.
(Conejos County Sheriff's Office)

The search for two missing bowhunters, Andrew Porter and Ian Stesko this past week in southwest Colorado really got under my skin. Obviously I did not know them. I have have messed around on the upper Los Pinos River drainage just a little, but they went in farther. 

Their bodies were discovered on September 18, 2025, and on the 22nd the Conejos County coroner declared that they had been killed by a lightning strike.

The bodies were found seven days after families of the hunters reported Porter and Stesko missing to Costilla County authorities on Sept. 11. Martin said the two hunters, both 25, were the first to be killed by lightning in the county that he’s investigated in his 20 years as coroner. 

The bodies were in good condition when Colorado Search and Rescue volunteers found them on Sept. 18, Martin said. They were discovered two miles from the Rio De Los Pinos trailhead on the Colorado side of the San Juan Wilderness area, according to Conejos County Sheriff Garth Crowther. 

Martin said the two hunters were in camouflage laying [sic] down in a lightly wooded area.

At first I wondered, as I am sure others did too, if they had succumbed to hypothermia. But what I read suggested that they had the latest high-tech gear and should be have been pretty well prepared for changing weather — which it was.

In my early 20s, I would have gone in with blue jeans with an Army-surplus poncho. I lucked out. And I did several backpack deer hunts, not quite at that altitude, but still in the mountains. My friend Ed and I picked one NW Colorado location off the map, and it turned out to be a reliably good one

"Ca-clunk Ca-clunk," he chanted as we hiked in "It's the deer factory!"  (That is what some wildlife biologists called the area.)

One year my dad came. He was the man who taught me backpacking, but he was now in his mid-sixties and had been living at sea level, so the packing in nearly flattened him. But once he recovered, he assessed the area and directed us: "This evening, you sit over there. You go up there higher." 

Bang. Bang.

Another year I was alone, and it snowed, about collapsing my cheap-o tent. But I walked out with meat.

The last time, M. was with me, not hunting herself, but just for the trip. I was not seeing the deer, and again, the weather was moving in. Hiking out in a couple inches of snow, coming down through an aspen grove, I saw a buck mule up ahead, slipping through the gray-white trunks. I leaned into one to get the pack's weight off my shoulders and brought up the Mauser. 

Still in the snow, we had to hike out, unload the packs and go back in for the meat. 

That reminded me of another of Ed's sayings, as we carried out meat an earlier year: "This is what primitive people do -- just carrying stuff from one place to another."

No doubt that is what Andrew and Ian had in mind to do.

The Sentimental Binocular(s)

 

Oshman's 7 x 35 um . . . optical instrument

I inherited this/these from my stepmother, Catharine. She was no outdoorswoman, but I can imagine her using them at Air Force Academy football games (she used to have season tickets). 

The label is Oshman's, a once-major Texas chain of sporting goods stores. Oshman's history tracks the collapse of brick-and-mortar retail stores: started by a Houston entrepreneur in 1933, the store spread to a number of Texas cities. In 1978 they bought the name of Abercombie & Fitch. Oshman's peaked in 1987 with "185 traditional stores, one Super Sports USA store, and 27 Abercrombie & Fitch stores." The Abercrombie & Fitch brand was sold off in 1988 to The Limited. No more safari-wear.

In 1991 the chain started contracting, and in 2001 it was bought out by Gart sporting goods, then folded into the Sports Authority chain. Sports Authority filed for bankruptcy and closed all its stores in 2016.

My stepmother's sister married a Houston "awl man," so maybe the sister-in-law bought them as a gift? 

A good serviceable binocular, they might have been made by (imported by) Bushnell in the 1960s. I still have the case, although as you can see, I replaced the strap with a homemade one. They are my truck-binoculars, or it sits on the porch table as a warm-weather "bird-ocular."

But the lenses picked up the little spots and dirt of time, and then, oops, I dropped them on a hardwood floor. Out of collimation!

The last time I needed such a repair, I went to an optics store in the Denver suburb of Englewood. It's long gone. So I went online and found Suddarth Optical Repair ("Binocular Repair since 1975") in bustling Henryetta, Oklahoma. 

I sent them in. Suddarth quoted $195 for repair and "complete rehabilitation." I know I could have bought some inexpensive 2025 Bushnell 7x35's for less, but this was for Catharine. So I gave Suddarth my credit card number.

Two weeks later they were back. So clear! So bright! So smooth the focusing wheel! I can look that evening grosbeak on the lower feeder right in the eye. Take that, entropy! We ain't dead yet.

So is it "binocular" or "binoculars"? What are its pronouns? For a short time in my early twenties I sold menswear, and I learned that some people inside the "rag trade" will talk about "a pant" whereas the average American says, for instance, "my khaki pants." (British usage is different.)

Likewise, when I was doing outdoor writing, I met optical-industry people who talked about "a binocular."  (Cory Suddarth, in his email, merely said, "Your glass arrived safely.")

Half a binocular is a monocular. Or is it it "Half of a pair of binoculars is a monocular"?

For what it's worth, Grok, Elon Musk's AI assistant, is in the plural camp:

Binoculars: This is the standard plural form, used when referring to the device as a pair of lenses (e.g., "I bought new binoculars"). The word derives from Latin "bi-" (two) and "oculus" (eye), emphasizing the dual-lens design. Since the device typically consists of two connected telescopes, the plural form is more common in everyday language and is considered correct for the physical object

Grok continues, "[saying 'binocular' as a noun] "may be considered a shorthand or error." Or maybe it's just optical-industry insider talk. Maybe that usage extends to independent repair shops.