8
S moke S ignals
JANUARY 1, 2017
Tribal Elder bags first elk after 56 years of hunting
By Brent Merrill
Smoke Signals staff writer
A holiday present came a little
early this year for Tribal Elder
Martina “Tina” Gilbert when she
took down an elk in early December
after decades of coming up short
while hunting with her family.
Gilbert, 74, has harvested many
deer in her years of hunting, but
had never been successful in har-
vesting an elk until now.
Gilbert said she has been hunting
since she was 18. She went hunt-
ing for elk with her nephew, Jesse
“Pee Wee” Robertson, when she
finally got her shot and made the
most of it.
Gilbert is the daughter of Juanita
John and the granddaughter of Leo
Norwest. She got a chance to hunt
for elk because of the additional op-
portunity provided to Tribal mem-
bers through the Tribe’s Hunting
Tags Program.
“I’ve been hunting for 56 years,
going on 57,” said Gilbert, who
began hunting when she married
Russell “Pete” Gilbert. “We were
in Coos Bay and Creswell and then
we moved over to Silver Crescent in
’89 and we hunted over there. We
used to go to Steens (Mountain) a
lot. And then we moved to Silver
Lake and we hunted there.”
Hunting season 2016 was the sec-
ond year of the Tribal Hunting Tags
Program that gives Tribal member
hunters additional hunting oppor-
tunities for game on Reservation
lands.
The tags are available to mem-
bers because of the work being
done on an ongoing basis for the
Tribe’s Fish and Wildlife Man-
agement Plan, which was adopted
by Tribal Council and the Oregon
Department of Fish and Wildlife in
September 2014.
The agreement gives the Tribe
the authority to administer and
delegate its own hunts.
“She came in and she was all
excited and told us the story and
was just running on adrenalin,”
said Wildlife Biologist Lindsay Be-
longa of the moment she saw the
elk in the back of the family’s truck
outside the Natural Resources De-
partment building off Hebo Road.
“She was very, very excited about
the whole situation. I’m very happy
and proud of her.”
Belonga said that the hunts have
been successful and that the addi-
tional tags and hunting opportu-
AMERICAN INDIAN TEACHER PROGRAM
Submitted photo
Tribal Elder Martina “Tina” Gilbert harvested her first elk in early December
after decades of coming up short while hunting with her family. She received
the opportunity thanks to the Tribe’s additional hunting tags issued for
Reservation lands.
nities are doing exactly what they
were designed to do – bring about
successful hunts.
In 2015, 46 additional tags were
made available to Tribal members
who hunted during two black-tailed
deer seasons and two Roosevelt
elk seasons. The Tribal hunts
took place a few days before the
state-administered open season
hunts.
Belonga said four animals – two
deer and two elk – were harvested
in 2015. Results for this season are
still being gathered.
Belonga said the opportunity to
hunt for members has now come
full circle and that the filling of
tags is exactly what was hoped for
when Tribal staff negotiated these
opportunities with the state.
Gilbert, who said she usually
hunts with her sister, Ida, these
days except for on this day Ida
was suffering from a cold, took off
about 7:45 a.m. with her nephew.
She said the first two places they
looked were already occupied by
hunters, but that the third stop was
the charm.
“There was snow all over and
nobody had been in there,” said
Gilbert. “So we went up through
there and, shoot, we hadn’t went a
mile and a half when Pee Wee said
‘There they are, Auntie. Get out of
the car’ and I said ‘I am’.”
Gilbert said she took a stance in
front of the car.
“I spotted him right off – the
spike,” said Gilbert. “I kept my eye
on him after I shot him.
“I took off where the elk went
and I spotted the blood. Then I
kept tracking and more blood. So
we tracked him and got onto him
and he was laying down.”
Gilbert, who also filled a tag
during the regular hunting season
this year when she harvested a
buck, said they needed help get-
ting such a large animal down
the mountain and they recruited
assistance from family members
who came and helped.
“We got him out within two hours
and had him in the pickup,” said
Gilbert. “It was exciting. I’m 74
years old now and it is the first elk
I ever got in my life.”
Gilbert uses a specially cut-down
version of a .264 Winchester Mag-
num when she hunts and she said
she has had that gun for years. “I
rely on that gun,” she said.
Gilbert’s success is precisely what
Fish and Wildlife Program Manag-
er Kelly Dirksen dreamed of when
he directed his staff to start work-
ing on the Hunting Tags Program
years ago.
“It is exactly what we hoped for,”
said Dirksen. “We were always
looking for ways to provide a dis-
tinct benefit to the membership
that didn’t also just go to everybody.
Lindsay has worked hard at getting
those tags and the season orga-
nized, and this one is just a great
story. I think she had mentioned
that she had been hunting for 50
some years before she got this elk.
She got it under the Tribal tag so
for us that is really thrilling.”
Tribal Council Chairman Reyn
Leno, himself an avid hunter, said
he is happy for Gilbert and her
family, and even happier for the
larger Tribal family.
“I always say for every Tribal
member out there – even though
you may not hunt or you might not
fish – recovering the sovereignty
piece of it is very important and this
is the reason why,” said Leno. “I
always say it completed the circle.
We’re back. When you see this it
really makes it worthwhile. That’s
what it means to me.”
Despite her success and taking
down her first elk in over five
decades of trying, and despite im-
pressing everyone who has heard
the story from family members to
members of Tribal Council – she did
not impress her hunting partner
that day.
Gilbert, who was preparing the
elk meat to be distributed through-
out the community and within her
family, said Pee Wee reminded her
that right next to the spike she shot
was the herd’s big bull elk. She
laughed and said she never saw
the bull.
“Pee Wee said, ‘Well didn’t you
see the big bull on the side?’ and
I said ‘Heaven’s no’ I was shaking
bad enough with the spike – if I
had seen him I probably would
have shot in the air,” Gilbert said,
laughing.