Big woods editor
Nathan Kestler
Nathan cruises timber for a living, which means he walks Pennsylvania hardwoods on somebody else’s clock and then walks them again on his own.
Region
Northern Pennsylvania
Hunts
Whitetails, open hardwoods
Seasons afield
Twenty plus
Day job
Timber cruiser
On a shelf
His grandfather’s carbon steel knife
What is timber cruising?
Measuring standing trees to estimate what a stand is worth. It is a job made of grid lines, steep ground and paying attention.
He has cruised across most of the state’s northern tier. In a working week he might cover ten miles of ridge, and he sees deer sign constantly, in places no hunter would ever set a stand.
That is his advantage and he knows it. Most hunters see their woods for six weekends a year. He sees his for two hundred days.
How he hunts
Whitetails in open hardwoods, on the ground more often than in a tree, with no field edge to lean on.
Big woods hunting is a different problem from farm country. No obvious food source, no clean corridor, no way to pattern a single deer. What is left is terrain, and he has become very good at reading it.
He hunts public forest almost exclusively, gets in deeper than most people are willing to walk, and has made peace with dragging a deer a long way in the dark.
A tool is only as good as the person who dries it off. I learned that at fifteen, with steel wool and a lot of regret.
Nathan Kestler
On knives
His grandfather’s knife rusted in a damp sheath while Nathan was in high school. He has been careful ever since.
It got cleaned up eventually, badly, by a fifteen year old with steel wool. It still sits on a shelf where he can see it.
He is the one here most likely to talk about handle shape. When your hands are cold and wet at nine at night, three miles from the truck, that stops being a preference.
