Hunting for raccoons: Part two

People who have been involved in raccoon hunting for a long time recall the days before dog boxes in the back of pickup trucks. Dogs were carried to the woods in the trunk of the family car, and instead of lighting the path with head lamps, a heavy kerosene lantern was carried by the hunter.

The woods

My husband, Doug, and his brother Rod both recall the strong desire to go to the woods with their father from a very young age and the unwelcome rush of genuine tears when the reply was, “Not tonight.”

The woods and the dog held all the adventure they dreamed of, and staying home felt like torturous punishment. There was nothing to do at home, and no place they would rather be than in the woods, listening to their dog hit a trail and tree a coon.

Learning

They were learning more than they realized in those night hunts: their sense of direction and a mindfulness of landmarks is deep in their bones, and they can name every tree.

“Go past that ash tree where the path splits for the second time and you’ll see an old beech den tree, then jut off to the north,” my hubby is known to say in giving directions while working a dog deep in the woods.

I sometimes think he’s just trying to lose me, and many times it has worked quite well.

Though the competitive drive was there, the sport has little to do with bagging numbers. In the end, it is the joy of spending time in the woods, listening to a dog pick up a track; it is building life-long friendships with like-minded people, and reveling in the peacefulness even on a brightly moonlit night when there was not much chance of treeing a thing.

The woods teaches us how animals live and where they live, the seasons in which offspring are born and how they move, according to tracks revealed to those who keep their eyes open to them.

A fellow learns there is truth in the adage that still waters run deep, and to search for the rapids in order to cross over in shallow water.

Missing sleep

As soon as they were old enough, the Sutherland boys learned to go to bed early, get up in the middle of the night and head for the woods.

“We knew we had to come home in time to get ready for the school bus. It didn’t matter if we were tired — heck, you could always sleep at school!” my brother-in-law says with a laugh.

They would hurry home at the end of their school day, do any necessary homework and help with chores before eating their evening meal. Before lying down to catch a few winks, they would gather hunting gear so no time would be wasted in waking up and heading out with the dog sometime just past the midnight hour.

The woods had a magnetic pull, and there was the trap line to be checked, the catch brought home and put up. And it goes without saying, there was nothing else they would rather be doing.