A LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY LADIES
Spanning the generations, women have planted themselves here among the cactus and pine. They’ve forged unconventional paths west — hunting and harvesting stories worth remembering. Today, they are still heeding the call of their heritage, bravely shedding all that is frivolous as they head deeper into the backcountry. They pursue that which will outlive them, in faithful stewardship of the tender shoots of conservation.
This league of extraordinary women have been tested and tried in the high lonesome; blooming amidst the rugged terrain with tenacity and grace that has changed the landscape on which they reside. They are too many to name — those women who have led the way — but each month we aim to share their stories. These are Women of the West.
RACHEL AHTILA
BRITISH COLUMBIA
Born and raised in Kelowna, British Columbia, Rachel Ahtila was a “horse-crazy bush kid,” who forged a winding path to becoming one of the most well-known women in hunting. Although she wasn’t raised in a hunting community, her parents gave her a loose rein at the wise old age of 11. She then began traveling north for the summers to chase horses at a remote hunting lodge in the mountain valleys of the Muskwa-Kechika.
“I owe a great deal to John Devries and Garth Olafson. I wrangled for these two gentlemen when I was a kid,” said Rachel. “Bless their hearts for earnestly answering and showing me that a hunt is so much more than pulling the trigger.”
“As the years started to unfold, I began wrangling and tagging along on the early sheep hunts before school started in the fall — needless to say, I got the bug in a big way,” she explained. By 19,
