I took a hike today I always like snooping around back in the mts after a fresh snowfall. I was coming down over through some laurel and walked right up to within a couple feet of a squirrel . He quick zipped up a small tree and went in a hole about 6' off the ground and then started cussing up a storm. I figured he went in a hole and found out it didn't go anywhere.

Naturally I had to investigate, sure enough there he was tucked up in but I could see his tail. That's more than any country boy can resist so I got a hold of the end of it and gave him a little tug..Lol..he really cussed up a storm then. I thought about pulling him out but decided to just let the poor boy be.

There was a time when there is no way I could have walked away without having a little fun.

I continued on and it set me to thinking about our self proclaimed modern ethics ect...

No doubt they come from a modern, fat, dumb and happy lifestyle where we'd rather slap down hard earned cash for a shopping cart full of grocery's that someone else provided instead of secure it on our own.

I imagine the early native American Indians secured food anyway they could. Dig them out, smoke them out, grab em by the tail and pull them out, run them over cliffs, trap them and kill them anyway they could.

Young or old it was all the same, doe with fawns? that's food. ducks and geese on the water? food. Animals in dens? food.

Somehow we've developed this notion that its only proper to kill with a certain type of weapon, in a certain manner, and of a certain age and quality.

funny how that works.....kept my mind pondering some of the deeper thoughts for a while....predator and prey ? or just a casual visitor playing some game for enjoyment?

Never did come to a real conclusion, I came across a set of tracks, and began trailing...and that was the end of any further modern thought and philosophy.

Good post Shade.

It was a different time but it was also just everyday life for them...nothing amazing to the people of that day. They just did what they had to do to survive. Ethics isn't an applicable term when you either eat what you kill or gather, or starve. I have no desire to have to do that, but if I had grown up in that era, I likely would have thought nothing of it. You would just do it.

Today we have the luxury of romantic nostalgia but few would ever want to be in the position of that time in reality. Call it spoiled, or easy life, or whatever you like...my ancestors and yours worked hard to gain a way of life that we enjoy now. We also have the luxury to stroll the deep woods and pretend we could do it to, but it's nice to come home, have a cup of coffee and do a couple steaks on the grill on the porch. Well, at least as it applies to me.

If anything happens to grid will we be able to live off lands that's been poisoned already our waters, ground and animals.

You being high up in Mts rather than the low lands have a better chance to survive maybe.

I've noticed trends in my gardens that the yields are less and its not because of poor soil either. I do everything I can to preserve it and rotate as I should.

It just seems hopeless what the bureaucrats are doing.

Enjoy the wilderness as you can with time and health..

My highlight was a deer this morning standing there on the other side of my fence watching me watch my dog I just left her out in yard all snow covered. I wonder will this deer make it to next season or get hit by a car or something else?

Time will tell all things both good and bad but will we survive the time ourselves.

For many of us its just a matter of time that seems to get quicker with each day.

This is not doom or gloom its just my observance.

Thank God we have a better place to go when this isn't our home cause we are just passing through.

I wanted to go walking around this morning with dog but forget it can barely walk and hurt my foot last night now that has to get looked at as well when nurse comes this week so I don't loose a toe.

Those who can get out and do this please do because some of us can't right now.

Enjoy every minute of it. Thanks for sharing.

That's funny grabbing the squirrels tail. :^) Last fall while deer hunting I had a chipmunk under my stool. I thought about trying to grab him. But that would've been bad for me. The more time you spend in the woods the more you'll experience special moments that.

Nothing crazier than a skirrel. I always make sure that they are down for the count before picking them up. The only way I really enjoy grabbing one is by the hind leg and that is after he is fried.

P.S.---just read Riverwolf's post. One time I dropped a big fox squirrel with a flintlock fowler while I was rabbit hunting. It was thrashing around in the brush as I reloaded and I told my old beagle Sam to get it. Sam was a great rabbit dog, but like most beagles never listened---until this time. He picked that squirrel up and headed right to me with it chirping the whole time. Another guy with us, braver than me grabbed it around the neck before anything bad (except from the squirrel's point of view) could occur. I did a little stump shooting today and noticed the squirrels were really chasing. As I usually see this in mid-January around here I wonder if this means that we are in for a late spring.

One of my hunting associates back in the 70's had a pheasant come back to life in the game holder of his hunting coat. Danged if that didn't create some creative dance.

Had a fox squirrel I shot with a 22 chew up my hand he was in a log I figured he was dead & I was wrong. RYMANCAT as far as your garden goes try adding some micronutrients Zink- boron sulfer manganese iron. There is a lot of produce grown in my area & all the produce farmers use these nutrients. Hope you feel better almost time to get in the garden

lol..I don't know squirrel talk, but it sure sounded like cussing to me.!

Every person on this planet is descended from a race of Hunter Gatherers and warriors, that lived in a cruel dangerous world where only the physically and mentally strong and fierce survived. And we are the by-product of 10,000 years of dumbing down from that due to the Agrarian Revolution and modern civilization.

One of the last times I went hunting involved two squirrels. I was out with my bow, just trying to walk quietly through some older woods. I was just enjoying the woods, not seriously hunting. I fnally stopped walking and leaned up against a big old Oak. After awhile and everything forgot I was there, all of a sudden there was this loud noise above me, way up in that Oak. Two fairly large squirrels were chasing each other up and around the upper portion of that Oak. What a racket they made, tearing off pieces of bark as they chased each other! Finally they were coming down the trunk. They were going around and around, coming down, head first like they do, coming closer to me. When they were about 10 ft above me, I backed up away from that tree and drew back an arrow. Then the squirrel closest to me came flying around that tree, stopped cold when he saw me. He raised his head and looked me in the eyes and he sort of closed his eyes like he knew what I was going to do. When he did that, I just couldn’t do it. I could have pinned him to that Oak, but it wasn’t going to happen that day.

To clean my old wood duck boxes I had to lift the roof. Well let me tell you there is nothing funny a fat man on an 8 foot ladder with a hand full of mama squirrel. Needless to say when I fell off the ladder the only thing hurt was my pride. Now all the wood duck boxes have a side door for spring clean out. John

Without advancement we would never have had Snickers bars.

Box Call back when I trapped in mid Seventies one rainy miserable morning I walked across a plowed field for about a 1/2 mile to reach a giant weed patch that was full of coons and Grey fox, well that morning I caught 4 huge coons in snares and all but 3 were already dead.. I shot the live one between the eyes and stuck him and another in my hunting coat and tied the other 2 together and put them over my shoulder, in the meantime it had started pouring down rain so I started across the field head down. Well about halfway across I thought I heard a growling noise and in a few more steps my coat was trying to climb up my back growling, you never seen anyone shuck a coat off as fast as I did.. coon poked his head out and I shot him again, made for a real lively morning.

Or Moose Tracks

A friend of mine is scared to death of squirrels. One time I set up a treestand for him for an evening hunt. When it was time to go out, I dropped him off and went to my spot. After dark, I went to pick him up and he was not at the drop off spot. I drove several 2 tracks, and after a while I saw him walking down the road. As I pulled up to him, I started chewing him out for not waiting at the place he was supposed to be. He then told me he had not hunted in the treestand, but had gone to another stand and sat on the ground. I said, Why, after I went to all the trouble of setting up the stand, did you go somewhere else? He said, When I was walking to the stand, I saw a squirrel climb the tree that the stand was in. I said, So what! He said he wouldn’t be able to sit still knowing that the squirrel might climb back down the tree! Unbelievable!

MP

Which came first the refrigerator or the grocery store

Can't remember what I was hunting deer or squirrel but had a chipmunk on a stump 10 feet from me barking dweeep dweeep dweeep for what seamed like along time & Just as I was thinking it was time for him to go a redtailed hawk flew past me & snatched him up. I always felt guilty for his demise. Nature is tough

ever notice hunters and trappers always have the best story's ?

My father in law had a flying squirrel (their nocturnal) land on his face while sitting up against a tree in the pre-dawn.

We used to throw our catch on the cellar steps, then skin them in the evening after school, one evening we were skinning and my buddy looks up from his and says "boy" how many coon and possum did we have this morning? did a quick count, yup we are missing a grinner!...lol...and the hunt was on, found him back under my dads work bench. lord if he woulda got upstairs my mom would have skinned us!

Over the years I've caught quite a few animals alive by pinning them down and grabbing them behind the head, always makes for a good story.

That boy and I were both avid bowhunters, he shot a 38# recurve I shot a 50# was hard for us to get to school in the fall sometimes. We had about a 1/2 mile walk to the bus stop and a young boy was prone to get the call of the wild in that distance.

We'd duck into the woods till my mom left for work, then skidaddle home and get our bows. Hooked school one day and went bowhunting, walking down the road toward home that afternoon I had my bow propped over my shoulder, looked on down the road toward the house and there stood mom with her hands on her hips... I said....oooooooh Lord...I could tell by her posture and look on her face that I was in for one. Turns out the school called her at work.

Now let me tell you brethren, there isn't nothing more fearful than a loving, caring, mother that gets called home from work because her boy skipped school to go bowhunting.

All I know is thank God for understanding hunting fathers, that just kinda rub their chin and say..i reckon he could be doing worse.

One thing is for certain back then I'd have probably made a better injun than I do now...I've gotten a little soft and a little more ethical aint no way I'd have walked away back then and left that old squirrel in that tree cussing me like that. terrible thing what a little culture can do to a man.

When I was in my early 20's, I went to the dark side and hunted with a compound for 2 years. One day I shot a squirrel with a field point. The arrow went in behind the short ribs and equal part were sticking out both sides. The critter tried to go in a hole at the base of a tree and of course couldn't with an aluminum tube sticking out wider than the hole. I reasoned I could just grab the squirrel in front of the hind legs with my right hand, pull the arrow out with my left as I pulled the limb rat out of the hole and whop it up side of a tree.

Worked great at least until I extracted said rodent from the hole. Before I could complete the swing, the squirrel had doubled back on my arm and was chewing on my insulated overalls I turned him loose, but he didn't turn me loose. We danced around the side of that hill for a while with me doing my best to shake him off. I finally got him flung off before he got all the way through my coveralls and down to skin level.

Last squirrel I ever used a field point on.

Grabbed a squirrel off the side of a tree when I was 8 years old in 3rd grade as he circled away from my buddy during recess at school.

Had no intention of holding on to him, swung him and flung him as far as I could.

Later in life as a twenty some year old coon hunter. I had just picked up a big Treeing Walker coon hound from a guy and had him on a one week trial to decide if I wanted to buy him or not.

On the way home a coon ran across the road in front of us. It was plowed farm field on both sides of the road so we pulled over and cut the hound loose on the coon. He quickly treed the coon in a fencerow about two hundred yards off the road . We didn't have a gun with us so my buddy climbs the tree and shakes the coon out to the dog. Well, there are two kinds of hounds. Those that kill and those that don't. Turned out this Dog had no kill in him at all.

He treed the coon again twenty yards down the fence row and my buddy shook him out again and this time I had a bright idea.I had brought a burlap bag with me to carry the coon out so I decided to catch him in the air and stick him in the bag.

Well I caught him in the air all right and he balled up on my fist and bit me through my pinky finger, the first time. He bit me on my stomach the second time as I tried to knock him off my pinky. He bit me on the thigh the third time as I banged him on my leg and he bit me one more time on my hand as I stood on him to get him off me.

You may be wondering what the hound was doing at this point as I'm engaged in an all out war with this coon. Well I will tell you, he is sitting on the ground just looking up at me as if to say,"Now you know why I didn't grab him, stupid"

So I finally get the old boy stuffed in the sack, alive and ornery. Toss him in the back of the truck and drive back to the fellas house and give him back his dog. Tell him I won't be needing him in my kennel and head home.

In the morning I take a closer look at my bites. The belly is a couple of puncture holes,nothing some perozide and triple antibotic ointment won't handle. The hand was same as the belly, another set of punctures top and bottom. The thigh he caught one tooth in and kinda tore a flap open,nothing too bad there either.

Then comes the pinky, when I had gotten home the night before I put a cotton ball on each side of my pinky and used electrial tape to wrap it up to stop the bleeding. A closer inspection reveals he has bitten through the second knuckle,from side to side. If I squeeze it I can see straight in one side and out the other.

I decide to go to my doctor and have him stitch it up. When I get to the office the doctor is out but he has a fellow taking his place for the day. The new doctor comes in and he is a foreigner and speaks very broken english. So he asks me what the problem is an I explain the whole story.

The chasing the coon, the treeing and shakin and stuffing and taping to stop the bleeding, the whole story. And he says to me "IS THIS SOMETHING YOU AMERICANS DO OFTEN". Sixteen stitches later and I laugh out loud and tell him no, not often , the last time I caught a critter with my hands I was 8 years old and smart enough to swing him and fling him.

GOOD DAY

Squirrels make a living chewing up big, hard, Hickory and Walnuts. There ain't no way I'm grabbing one bare handed. Good story though Shade. Lol

I speak squirrel, and pretty much 90% of what they say is cursing.

I'd have paid $20 Dan to see your Dad with that coon on his shoulder. That was funny stuff. Jim

The best squirrel dog I ever owned, had a squirrel get him by the lip when he was a pup. He wanted to shake his head but couldnt; he didn't know what to do but whimper. But when he finally did get loose, he had a hatred for those tree rats and boy did we have some times in the mountains. I think he was glad to see a dead squirrel. Hahaha.

As the old saying goes,,Ethics are a product of modern sport hunting..

Many Native people did exhibit some ethics in hunting,such as certain seasons for certain species..It would just make sense,to further the species,,but if times were tough,im sure those rules,would be suspended..Ive seen evidence of it..A couple quivers,,1 of a fawn with spots and another very young bear cub,,both with evidence,they were arrow killed..It is reported,that buff hunting Natives were very fond of Calf meat..

Two years ago I finally got to try out a trick my dad told me about retrieving squirrels. My son shot one that ran into a hole at the base of a tree. Dad always said you get a green stick with a v at the end and plunge it into the hole and spin it around until you grab the squirrels tail. I thought he was pulling my leg but it worked. Once I felt resistance I yanked hard on the stick and out came one REALLY unhappy grey. CHAZ

I had a blue healer once that could catch them and eat them whole before they ever made it back up the tree. No kidding, she was fast.

I was bedfast when I was young I had the flu so bad, high fever ect....My mother had my little brother check my trapline for me.

I was around 13 yrs old at the time so he must have been 10.

It was raining mixed with freezing rain one morning and he was out checking my traps, mom had fixed me a bed downstairs because I was so sick. I was laying in bed when all of a sudden here comes my little brother running on the porch, just a wailing and bawling and making like the devil had a hold of him. My mom heard it and went running and met him at the kitchen door. There he stood soak and wet, muddy and all bloody.

He was a screamin and bawlin " It bit me"...mom says what bit you!..he says "It bit me".."it bit" me"...'I dunno something bit me"...just all worked up a bawlin and hardly taking a breath.

mom looked at me and said steve you gotta go find what bit him! So I got dressed and slogged down across the fields, I can still remember it well, I was going across a plowed field, and I was so sick I felt like I was going to pass out.

Went from trap to trap finding nothing, then I was coming down a fencerow and saw his coat on the ground. I went over and there was a squirrel in a trap with his coat on it. I killed the squirrel and headed back.

Turns out the poor boy with kindness in his heart decided to let it out and free it. Put his coat over it and the dang little bugger came out the sleeve of his coat and clamped down on his thumb!!! Lol We still talk and laugh about it to this day.

Back in August, my daughter son-in-law and Grandson came to live in my household. We now have a total of 6 people living here. This is the first year I have filled all of my Deer tags specifically for food.

One thing is certain, those five deer aren't going to feed us through next October when deer season opens again. We will be doing some hog hunting to add meat to the freezer.

The ethics of feeding the family surpasses any and all self-imposed ethics Society holds (including Leather Wall ethics).

Hey, that gives me an awesome idea for an awesome country song to make me rich!

"I've got a squirrel by the tail it's plain see, won't be much when he gets through with me"

What do ya think, sound like a hit??

I've caught a bunch of baby hogs.....and could have caught a young elk calf a few years ago in Wyo as it just held there counting on its camo to hide it.

A full grown animal? I grabbed a blacktail by the antler I thought was dead- shot in the antler...and came very alive when I grabbed him....THAT was a rodeo I will never forget. You wouldn't think an 80# deer would have that kind of fight in him.

I've caught many full grown hogs by the back leg when I was doing hog depredation with dogs years ago....but of course the dogs did all of the work corralling them....no way you will run down a full sized hog as they are a s fast as any animal on the planet for 20 feet.

I think the most amazing thing I've seen was a group of African Tribesmen that essentially run their prey into the ground over a 5,10,15 mile span until they over heat then get right up on them10 feet away and spear em.

South Farm - I've heard worse.

I was helping my brother run his trapline just after I got home from over seas. He was trappin beaver and otter early in the spring so we still had snow and ice to deal with. any way we found an otter track running a creek headed down stream. Brother said lets head him off so we did. Next morning we had a nice big otter. Just watchin him trying to knock it in the head with the ax handle was a riot. He was soaked. since I had never seen an otter up close so I picked it up to look it over that is when I found out it wasn't dead just knocked out. thank goodness there was a tree right handy cause somebody might have got hurt Brother thought it was hilarious.

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