In chapter 17 of Andrew Clements' A Week In the Woods, while Mr. Maxwell is starting off on the trail in pursuit of the missing Mark, we learn that Mr. Maxwell loves to hunt because he sees it as a chance to commune with nature.
Mr. Maxwell notes that his friends wonder how he "could be so concerned about [nature] conservation and still be a hunter" (p. 125). Mr. Maxwell explains that he sees himself as able to fully understand nature; he understands it in terms of science and in terms of its "day-to-day rhythms" (p. 125). He feels he is participating in those daily rhythms when he "hikes for two miles in the predawn silence" and waits, watching for a dear, "sometimes for five or six hours" (p. 125). As he watches, he feels he becomes part of the woods because he can "notice every motion, every change in wind direction, [and] every small sound" (p. 125).
In addition to seeing hunting as a means of becoming one with nature, he actually never kills what he hunts. Instead, he practices his skill of hunting with a bow and arrow by taking aim, but as he pulls back the bowstring, he makes a slight noise that scares off the deer. He philosophizes his hunting tactics in the following:
He didn't take the food nature offered him because he didn't truly need it. He only needed to know that the food was still there. (p. 126)
Hence, as a nature conservationist, he partakes in hunting experiences because hunting allows him to be with nature and to see that nature still exists as it should.
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