Javelina

The four-wheel-drive vehicle has left the security of Interstate 17 for the muddy ruts of the Tonto National Forest, and the hunters have nervously forded the swollen Agua Fria River, where a rancher's cardboard sign warns that it costs "$100 to get towed out." Now, with the sun rising over Hutch Mesa, driver Dave Daughtry says: "This looks like it ought to be the javelina locker room. If we don't find something here, I'll be surprised." Daughtry's confidence is encouraging.

The four-wheel-drive vehicle has left the security of Interstate 17 for the muddy ruts of the Tonto National Forest, and the hunters have nervously forded the swollen Agua Fria River, where a rancher's cardboard sign warns that it costs "$100 to get towed out." Now, with the sun rising over Hutch Mesa, driver Dave Daughtry says: "This looks like it ought to be the javelina locker room. If we don't find something here, I'll be surprised." Daughtry's confidence is encouraging.

The black duck is in decline, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is asking hunters to do something about it--stop shooting the species. The black duck population is believed to be less than half what it was in 1955, and if the decline continues, the species may be removed from the list of game birds that can be hunted.

Judy Stern's voice still trembles when she talks about the night in October when a mountain lion showed up in her back yard. "I was sitting on the patio doing my banking statement when I looked up, and there he was, half in and half out of my swimming pool," says Stern, who divides her time between Tucson and Buffalo, N.Y. "It was right in front of me, and I never heard a sound. It was just there, drinking out of the pool and watching me. . . .

Each year, Don Greek sends out a general invitation asking hunting enthusiasts to join him for a few days of bagging elk or deer in Colorado or javelina in Arizona. One particular year, Greek, who owns a local civil engineering firm, asked an old college classmate, Walter W. (Bill) Knitz, if he'd like to go on one of the trips.

San Diego's long-range sportfishing fleet has a new long-ranger, Bill Poole's 90-foot Polaris Supreme, launched last week. The half-dozen or so long-range boats take anglers as far as the Revillagigedo Islands, 400 miles south of Baja California's tip, and Costa Rica's Clipperton Island, in search of 300-pound-plus yellowfin tuna. It's the only such sport fishery in the United States.

OWEN WILSON may be the only Oscar-nominated screenwriter who's never owned a computer. He's not going to take the plunge now at the advanced age of 37 because he's afraid he'd get addicted to computer games. "If I got one at this point, I'm very susceptible to getting super into it," he drawls over turkey burgers in a joint in Venice. "I'll look at these ads for these war games they have, and they look so cool." He elongates the word for effect. "I feel I could really lose myself."

Oregon November: Oregon Bounty is a monthlong celebration of the tastes of the state. Every weekend of November and the day after Thanksgiving, more than 60 wineries will feature free samples of state cheeses, hazelnuts and pears in their tasting rooms; some charge a nominal fee for wine tasting. Seventy-five hotels and inns across the state are offering Oregon Bounty packages and special rates, and nearly that many restaurants will be highlighting it on their menus.

The Department of Fish and Game announced this week that it has stocked several urban lakes in the Los Angeles area with brooder-size channel catfish--about five pounds each. About 90 cats each were stocked May 29 in Legg Lakes in El Monte, Harbor Lake in Harbor City, Santa Fe Reservoir in Irwindale, Echo Park Lake and Lincoln Park Lake in Lincoln Heights. The stockings are part of the DFG's urban fishing program.

In the strangest of settings, the subject was pigs. In the midst of a civic and civil luncheon Friday afternoon on the aircraft carrier USS Ranger, the subject was pigs. Or hogs. Or both. This was an affair to honor the football players from Arizona State and Arkansas, who will gather for the Holiday Bowl Sunday afternoon at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium. But the subject was pork.

For the first time since the early years of the 20th Century, pronghorn antelope are again roaming free in the Antelope Valley area. Fifty-five pronghorns, part of a group of 114 live-trapped in Modoc County last week, were trucked to Kern County's Tejon Ranch and released at a site near the edge of the Antelope Valley where, as recently as the 1880s, they roamed by the thousands. The only significant pronghorn habitat remaining in California is the northeastern corner of the state.