RE: Why do you hunt?
I like to cook, and game meat makes a spendid meal. I like to hunt to provide excellent viandes to my table.
I also like to hunt because it connects me to an ancient, noble, and universal human endeavor -- hunting animals, to kill them, thereafter to eat them. Believe me, there is a strong sense I feel of being connected with the pre-historic people's when I detect some feature of my hunting ground -- for example a natural funnel -- which is going to tend to direct deer, thereby providing me with an excellent ambush opportunity. There is an exhilerating sense of the light going on and realizing that I have an advantage suddenly on the deer which heretofore were inscrutible and outside of my reach. Surely people 10,000 years ago felt that same rush of delight when they perceived similar funnels. Yes, my weapon -- a modern powerful rifle -- is way more powerful than their weapons, but we confront the same problems. Also, if you solve the problem well enough this obviates the need for a weapon to strike from 250 yards away -- 15 yards is plenty in some hunts, and that is close enough for bow and arrow and/or for a spear.
Of course I too like getting out in the woods. The hunting gives me a feeling of being integrated into the woods in a way I don't feel while simply hiking. I'm an outsider hiking -- a bystander, an observer only. When hunting I see things differently, the time references are different, I am an active part of the environment -- a predator seeking prey. This is more satisfying and deep an experience of the woods than just hiking (not to denigrate hiking).