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Local News

New Year's Day hunting tradition is 29, going on 30

Four Hastings area men meet every New Year’s Day, go hunting on a 192-acre property of a friend, and hunt rabbit and squirrel.

 

Dar Leaf, Barry County sheriff, Michael Gutierrez, a truck driver, Shawn Wernette, a respiratory technician at Spectrum Health Pennock Hospital and Don Tietz, a corrections deputy from the sheriff’s office, now retired, who comes up from Tennessee every year, were the original group.

 

The routine never varies. Everyone meets at Ritchie’s in Hastings at 7:30 a.m. for breakfast. They head out to Horace Hull’s place, go rabbit hunting (Mike and Shawn have beagles) for several hours, go back to Hull’s “Man Cave,” catch a bowl game on TV and usually eat pizza from Good Times Pizza in Nashville.

 

Hull, a friend who was on the Sheriff’s Posse, has been their host every New Year’s Day. The men met through Mike Mosteller, another posse member, who now lives in North Carolina.

The four became fast friends back in the day and found out they all like to hunt.

 

“Someone,” Leaf doesn’t recall who, said they should meet on New Year's Day in 1990 to do some hunting. They did and enjoyed it so much they decided to do it again the next New Year’s Day, and have done it every year since.

 

"t’s changing now, Leaf said. “The kids are going with us now; it’s more a family thing…” The group is not at all exclusive, the men’s sons come with them some times, a niece hunted with them once, and the friend’s friends show up occasionally as the tradition continues, and that’s fine with everyone. 

 

They had been meeting on New Year’s Day for all this time when this year, someone asked, “How long have we been doing this?” and the answer was 29 years. What does he expect at year 30?  “That’s kind of cool, doing it for 30 years; we’ll probably have some T-shirts made up,” he said. “It’s a big thing for us, kind of a kick-off for the new year. We keep in touch during the year; no one mention’s New Year’s Day. We all know where we’re going and what we’ll be doing.”

 

Why does the event endure?  “That’s simple; it’s fun. It’s 192 acres of outside, you get to be outdoors, away from the TV, enjoy nature, a river runs through there; it’s awesome. You get to listen to the beagles track rabbits, and just enjoy the camaraderie.  It’s Barry County at its best.”

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