Camo

Camo is really magical. The technology that has gone into it over the years has made it really effective. Here are a couple stories about how effective camo really is: One fall turkey season I was sitting up on the hillside. The road was about 15 feet below me. I was in full camo including gloves and face mask. A couple of guys on ATVs came humming along at a really slow rate. I could tell they were deer scouting by the way they were looking around and driving. I wasn't hiding and I wasn't in any ground cover. There were some pole sized ponderosa, but it wasn't thick forest. The first guy drove by me without a glance. The second guy drove slowly by me and looked at me for more than a few seconds. I was about to wave to him and say "hi" because I thought he saw me when he stuck his finger halfway up his nose to pick it. It was then that I realized he was looking right through me. Needless to say I let him slide by. I wouldn't want to bother someone when they're prospecting and I think this guy may have hit the mother lode. Another time I got to see the power of camo, my dad and I had stopped in the shade on a warm fall day to eat lunch. We were in an area with heavy cover, but we were in full view. Neither of us was trying to be stealthy, we were just eating lunch and talking. My dad had fallen asleep when a young doe walked up on the bench of the canyon we were in, about 20 yards below us. The wind must have been right because the doe looked to be completely at ease. She bedded down looking into the canyon. I sat and looked at her for the next fifteen minutes or so until my dad woke up. When we got up the movement startled her and she ran off. The coolest time I saw the effects of camo was when my dad and I had been scouting this canyon. I was really interested in this canyon and had gone ahead of my dad for twenty minutes or so. He had already headed back to the truck. After a while I went back to the truck too and when I got there, I didn't see where my dad had gone. I went to look inside the truck to see if he had leaned the seat back for a nap or something, when I heard his voice. He asked me something about what I had seen in the canyon. I proceeded to have a conversation with him for about three minutes without seeing where he was, so I'm like, "where the heck are you". He said, "I'm over here." I looked toward his voice but still couldn't see him. I looked harder and finally spotted his disembodied head floating in the forest. A fraction of a second after I saw his head, the outline of his body slowly traced into view like he had just appeared from a different dimension. His camo was just regular pants and shirt when that happened and he was standing in full view. With the L.L. Bean 3D suits I will sometimes lose sight of him, even when I know exactly where he is. Its kind of funny, because when someone is wearing camo in the city, it sticks out so much you might as well be wearing hunter orange.