Farmers and Hunter-Gatherers

Let's roll the calendar back several thousand years, before humans developed civilizations and cities. The major preoccupation was survival. That required growing or finding food. Tribes that learned how to farm continued to hunt game and gather plants and fruits necessary for a healthy diet. Whether a child grew to become a farmer, hunter or gatherer was determined by ability, family and culture.

Mechanized farming in our highly developed civilization is done by a small fraction of the population. Today's farmers produce what our ancient ancestors farmed, hunted and gathered, and do it so well that the rest of us can barely comprehend how our ancient forebears lived. A better understanding can help increase our contest scores -- really! So let's push the analogy.

If you know anything of contests you will have made the connection by now. Farmers run and hunter-gatherers S & P (search and pounce). Little pistols can only do well as primarily hunter-gatherers, and will farm (run) when they can. Big guns are farmers, but will occasionally forage (or concurrently using SO2R) for multipliers. Those with stations between the extremes, or in assisted classes (including multi-ops), more equally balance their tactics.

Farming, hunting and gathering are hard work, just as they were in the distant past. A farmer is forever worrying about the weather (propagation), terrain (geography) and predators (frequency "theft"). Seed must be kept, stored and planted, the fields irrigated, weeds picked, predators dissuaded and the crop efficiently planted, harvested and processed. 

Runners must find and protect their frequency on prime spectrum (fertile land), have a signal and tactics that withstand or overcome external forces, attract hunter-gatherers, and periodically abandon the farm to hunt and gather multipliers. Since game will cross the farm from time to time or be attracted to the crop there is opportunistic hunting as recompense for staying put.

Hunter-gatherers are always on the move. You must move or you die since food sources are scattered, those with legs move around, and once you deplete an area you must find another. The old and infirm who cannot follow the tribe fare poorly. So, too, the S & P operator must keep moving. You may not die when you stop moving but your score will plateau. A seer among the tribe (DX cluster or skimmer) may tell you what and where but you must go forth to seek and take what you need.

Early farming societies were often prone to poor nutrition due to the reduced food variety. Early civilizations dependent on agriculture were vulnerable to more mobile invaders because they had to defend their land and crops. For example, the Mongols needed to keep moving as their herds (temporarily) exhausted what the fields could provide. No matter the strategy, survival was difficult and risky.

Contest operators who exclusively run or S & P will plateau and fail to achieve the top of the contest rankings. I know contest enthusiasts who are uncomfortable running because it is difficult for them to deal with multiple callers or their signals are too small to hold a run frequency for long. Others love to sit on a frequency all weekend and let the hordes, including multipliers, come to them. They enjoy being sought and the attention a big signal attracts and may dislike the work of spinning the dial and hunting.

Runners (farmers) rarely work other runners since neither moves around much. The S & P operator (hunter-gatherer) will never work other S & P operators since they can only call runners. Specialization reduces score potential. Expanding skills and pushing ourselves out of our comfort zone requires effort and, at least at first, may not be enjoyable. Many mistakes will be made before significant improvement is achieved. SO2R multiplies the discomfort and effort.

An alternative is to join a multi-op team. Those who prefer running get to run and those who prefer S & P get to hunt and gather QSOs and multipliers. Both are needed. Early in my contesting career I preferred S & P. Operating from VE3PCA in the early 1980s I liked to man the station overnight when the pickings were slim and scouring the bands to eke out whatever I could -- we were approaching the solar minimum and spotting nets didn't exist. When the high bands opened at sunrise, I ceded the station to the runners and get a few hours of sleep. Our small group included both farmers and hunter-gatherers.

I expect that most readers have by now decided that I've pushed the analogy too far! I'll switch gears and close the article with a related topic that is too small for an article of its own.

Chasing DX and hunting multipliers in a contest require similar tactics. It is a challenge to be heard in the pile ups so that you can quickly log the entity or multiplier and move on to the next. Consider the following quote from the 3830 comment by V47UM in this weekend's ARRL DX CW contest:

"successful callers were mostly about 50-100Hz up or down"

CW signals that are near zero beat with each other are difficult to distinguish. Although calling high or low can be an effective tactic, it can backfire. When too many call high or low they will zero beat each other and the tactic can fail. The reason is that you can't offset too much or you'll be outside the other station's receive filter. However, keep in mind that what you really want is to call where others are not. When the majority call high or low, calling on frequency makes you distinctive. Listen to what others are doing, find the hole, wherever it is, and call there.

Since my transition from QRP with small antennas to my present big signal, tactical calling has less value. I usually do better by zero beating or calling on the frequency of the last successful caller. Big guns have the advantage of brute force. 

In the coming days I will describe my experience in the ARRL DX CW contest. There were high and low moments, and there were lessons learned. A few are worth sharing.