CHANGING THE CALENDAR

 

trees in the rain

 

An image of John Lennon just now ran across the movie screen inside my head. I recalled seeing a headline a week or so ago of his son by his first wife telling the world John Lennon was not a nice man at home, that the kid never saw any love in him. John wrote songs about love, but didn't live the love he wrote songs about. Therefore, he was a hypocrite. What does that have to do with anything? King David wrote the most beautiful songs about love ever, period. He was a rogue. John Newton, who wrote Amazing Grace, was a slave trader. I read in John Berryman's Dream Songs and see video of an interview with him, I don't see all his poems in him. I see just a man whose mind pieced together with words and rhythms some amazing compositions. I don't see suicide in his poems when I read them. I don't see suicide in Robert Lowell's poems either. How they ended their lives is as irrelevant to their art as the brand of tires on their cars. I felt a degree of sorrow for the kid who tried to be a star with his daddy's name and it didn't take. He sees his half-brother, Yoko's son, bathed in luxury, privilege and wealth as son of John Lennon. Julian was left out, never made it to stardom and evidently turned bitter. What a dreary old man he might be, "I'm the neglected son of John Lennon...he was a sorry-ass hypocrite," in the pub night after night.

 

 

 

The last two evenings being year's end and year's beginning, another turn around the sun, I decided to see my favorite movies. Last night's choice was Hero, a film by Chinese director Yimou Zhang. Hero is at the top of the list of the most beautiful films I've seen. This was the fifth or sixth viewing. It is billed an action movie starring Jet Li. The action is choreographed martial arts ballet in flowing clothes of colors that sound like a Chinese violin. It is an historical drama given a touch of fairy tale. Then today I chose to see another favorite film, King of Masks, a Chinese film by director Wu Tianming. A good Chinese story, a gentle roller coaster ride of the emotions, of an old man and a child he bought in the market to be his heir. He was the last to carry the traditional art of the mask, an entertainment of changing masks seemingly by magic. He needed an heir to pass his art form to and bought a little boy. Turns out he was cheated, the boy was a girl and he did not want a girl, the art could only be passed on to a boy. From there it goes round and round to a tear-jerker happy ending Chinese style. A story of everyday life realism with the sense of a fairy tale. Exquisitely beautiful photography in both films. 

 

 

 

Didn't do anything else to acknowledge the change of calendars. Haven't even put up the new calendar. Aimed to walk the dog today. Justin stopped by on his way to his deer stand and brought some hay up from the barn in his big pickup. He advised staying out of the woods today. Jan 1 is the last day of hunting season. Everybody was out. I said we'd stay on the road, in that case, and he advised blaze orange if I want to walk the road. Decided to let it go. Lead won't be flying in the woods from Saturday onward. A week ago, Justin killed the big bear living in this area. He estimated it 425 lbs, said the "cape" was 150 lbs. He wants to make a rug to hang on the wall. For a hunter, it's a good trophy. This was the bear he'd said earlier was going about in daylight. He said it means the bear was getting brave. A good one to cull from the sloth. I saw it on the back of his pickup within twenty minutes of being shot. I have a hard time with killing. I have no judgment of hunting. It's necessary, I know it, just don't care to participate in it. I also know my attitude about not killing is a minority of one. Justin knows I'm not a killer, he also knows I admire his skill with a bow and a gun. He brought the bear down with one shot. He said the bear came into view just as it turned dark, "A black bear is hard to see through a scope in the dark."

 

 

I've known Justin since he was a baby. We were friends in his childhood the same as I am friends with his baby, Vada. Vada is a feist, just like her daddy was. It's like the same kid, one a boy, one a girl. Vada is becoming a rowdy little kid. She and her daddy play rough and she loves it. It's in her horoscope. She got in trouble in pre-school; when she fights little kids her size, she hurts them. Her dance class had a recital a few weeks ago I'm sorry I missed. She ruled in it. Vada was the star performer and did it like she was born to the stage. Crystal told me after their trip to Disney World, Vada dressed up as Elsa was to walk behind Cinderella around a big circle of people clapping. Not Vada, Crystal said, Vada doesn't follow anybody. She walked around the circle holding Cinderella's hand. I would so love to see Vada grow up. She'll be out front in whatever she does. She is a balanced blend of her mommy and daddy. And her daddy will go crazy when he sees her drawn to rowdy boys. By the time she's in high school, she will have as many deer kills as the best of the boy hunters. She'll make all A's, be head cheerleader, play baseball and be homecoming queen.

 

 

photos by tj worthington

 

 

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MYSTERY IN THE DONKEY MEADOW

Something creepy has taken up close to the house. I think it is in a patch of ironweed just below the donkey shed. This morning Jack was running toward me from the other end of the meadow. He suddenly looked over to the ironweed patch and steered away, changed his direction, veered around making a half circle, watching it. He seemed spooked by whatever it was. I thought possibly the bear was in the meadow again licking the mineral block and crossed the creek through the stand of ironweed and Jack didn't see it go out the other end into the meadow the other side of the creek. The only thing I could think of. I didn't believe a bear would take up here. Or that anything would take up with donkeys. Jenny did not seem to be spooked like Jack was, but in Jenny's non-Alpha role she lets Jack take care of lookout duties. Later in the day, driving back to the house, a deer was in the road in front of the house. It ran down the road and jumped the fence into the meadow the donkeys don't go into, full of tall grass speckled with white and yellow wildflowers. She stood knee-deep in the grass watching me park. I turned off the motor and watched her for awhile. Such a beautiful being. The essence of grace. Big donkey ears standing up, tail switching, about the size of a donkey, only slimmer. I watched until she walked out of sight behind some trees. I suspected she got separated from her baby when I drove up. I looked around for the baby walking to the house. No baby. I wondered if the deer might have made a bed in the patch of ironweed, but didn't believe Jack could be spooked by a deer. I've an idea the donkeys know all the deer that pass through and around their meadow at night and drop in to lick the mineral block.

 

 

Later, I was about to get the writing started and Allan from the next house up the road came in. We talked for a few hours, hadn't had a visit in quite awhile. His dog Martha was with him. He left soon after the stars came out. We stood outside looking at the stars and night sky continuing our talking. Martha went running in the direction of the donkey shed. I thought she was going to go after a donkey and thought: You're on your own with the donkeys--you know they kick. I came back to the house and Allan called for her. About the time I reached the door I heard Martha from the direction of the ironweed patch barking, squealing, sounding like she was fighting something that was fighting back and winning. It sounded like it was hurting her. The barking and squealing went on and on. The tussle ended and Martha ran by me, a black streak in the night, toward Allan's car. Then I was spooked. I came in the house. I was thinking maybe a big coon, but a coon would not spook Jack. The donkeys probably know the coons of the area too. The animal world comes alive at night. I'm sure the donkeys know all the critters living on this mountain. While Allan and I were sitting in here talking, he was sitting beside the open door and said he heard something that sounded like a scream. That memory brought bobcat to mind. I can't see a bobcat taking up this close to a house. My mind went to small bear. A couple days ago I found some bear scat on the side of the road in a place with a 180 degree panorama. It was from a small bear. Bears mark that place every year. This is the smallest one I've seen there. I wondered if perhaps it could be a small bear Martha tangled with. A big bear could have destroyed her, a small bear too. Whatever it was, Martha sounded like it nailed her several times. A small bear stays in my mind, a young one looking for some place in his territory safe to sleep in from time to time. 

 

 

Jack would be spooked by a bear. It's the only animal around here solitary enough to take up below the donkey shed. It is a place free of my scent. It is close to the creek. In the middle of the ironweed patch is a patch of grass just big enough for a bed.  If it is a bear, my feeling is it' is passing through, checking out the place. The ironweed patch can be seen from the high place in the road where a small bear left its territorial marker. Possibly the bear sees the donkey meadow a part of its territory, wants to get to know it, found a good spot to curl up, out of sight, close to water, meadow patrolled by donkeys. Bear already knows about the mineral block. I know where the bear comes into the meadow and goes out. I'll make no effort to fix the fence so bear cannot get through. No need for that. A bear would only attack a donkey if starving so much it's ready to risk the consequences. I don't mind a bear licking the mineral block. The bear is my neighbor. It's no danger to the donkeys. If my little spot of ground is a comfortable place for it, all to the good. It's no danger to me. It's no danger to Caterpillar. If it is a bear, I wish it the best. I want my bear neighbors to know I am a peaceable human, not a threat, bear is welcome. Whatever it is, it's welcome here. I did not hear it making any sounds. I think it was only Martha I was hearing. Leads me all the more to suspect bear. Martha would not have taken on a big bear. Maybe in a few days I'll get some signs of whatever it is. Maybe in a few days it will be gone. My feeling was that Martha chose the moment to retreat. She was not winning the battle and she sounded scared, going by the tones in her squealing characterized by intense fear, while charging anyway. Martha was perhaps being territorial on my behalf. Or she may have just found something by scent and wanted to pursue it.

 

 

Whatever it is may explain why Jack and Jenny are staying at the far end of the meadow the last few days. If it's a bear, I don't believe it will take up there. It may stay a few days and nights, maybe. I don't see it staying on and on. If it is a comfortable place for my feral neighbor, welcome. I don't have garbage cans. I throw apple cores out the front door for the squirrels. I spread coffee grounds around the rhododendron. I don't know that it matters to the rhododendron, but it seems to me like coffee grounds are better to let seep into their own namesake, the ground, become earth again, than to take them to the landfill in a plastic bag for future anthropology students to unearth and catalogue. At certain times of the night when I open the door I hear a couple of scurrying possums. They have some power in their legs they can run with and they have hands at the ends of their legs. They walk on four hands, like a raccoon. Most of my experiential images of possums are seeing them in the road at night and avoiding them. Even in the day, they mope around in the road like they don't know which way to run, and the closer you get, the more frantic they become, they take off in any direction and sometimes the wrong direction. I tend to forget that possums do anything besides walk around on highways at night. Inviting the birds, the squirrels, the chipmunks, the crows, to supplement their diets here, letting the saplings that came up grow into trees, shelters and homes for my feral neighbors, the squirrels don't run from me anymore. The birds don't fly far. It's looking like I have made a comfortable place for some critter that can make Martha sound like she was being killed and run like for her life. Whatever it is, I'm glad it's there. It tells me my home is a safe haven for the four-leggeds and the winged. It won't do me any harm. It knows I live in the barn. I'm part of its territory, too.      

 

photos by tj worthington

 

 

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DONKEY MATES

jack in the sun

I think I saw a bear yesterday driving up Air Bellows Gap Road  near the bottom of the mountain. Just past the turn-off to Waterfall Road I saw what I took for the top of  black car ahead of me in the curve, seeing it through foliage at the side of the road. Around the curve, no car. It was a smooth movement. First thought was a big black cat. Only saw it half a second. I looked into the trees and saw nothing, knowing better than to look because the four-leggeds in the wild have a way of vanishing among trees. It mystified me thinking it was a car's roof, then no car. I saw a bobcat cross the road there, touched down in the center of the road, jumped in one bound up the bank into the trees and disappeared. It was light tan with black spots. I'd never heard of wild cats having spots. This was no big housecat. It was a full-sized bobcat, even seemed bigger than a bobcat. I've seen several deer cross the road there. Walking the road, I've seen bear tracks in that region of the road. I saw a blacksnake stretched across the road there, stopped, stepped out of the pickup, spoke to the snake and told it this is your lucky day. Somebody else would have run you over. The snake paid me no mind. I picked up a stick on the side of the road, cautious, knowing how fast blacksnakes are, and touched the tip of its tail. It went off like an arrow. Gone. One evening just after dark I saw eyes in the ditch there to the left. I looked. It was a feral cat with a broken back. I picked her up gently and sat her on the pickup's seat, took her home and made a bed for her in the cat carrier and closed her up for the night. The other cats would go to the cage door and look at her. It seemed like they understood the cat was not right. Next morning I drove her to the vet for them put her to sleep.

 

jack a-wallerin

 

Also yesterday, sitting here writing I saw Jack at the far end of the meadow rolling on his dust circle. I picked up the camera, crept outside, using a big white pine trunk to hide behind, set the camera, held it to the side of the tree and zoomed in on Jack. I've been wanting to get some pictures of him a-wallerin. It feels good to him. The dust is about keeping the parasites down. Every time I touch his back a cloud of dust arises. I brushed him once and first thing he did was wallow  in some dirt. He chose the spot for his dust circle. He dug up the grass with his hoof over time, making it a little bit bigger each time. Now he has the circle he needs in the place of his choice. I enjoy allowing them their donkey nature. The meadow is much cleaner now that the calf is not dropping cow pies where they sleep, where they eat, anywhere. Donkeys have piles they go to. They're particular, very particular. Donkey intelligence inspires my respect. Every day I connect with their consciousness during carrot time, awed by them. Jack is the same almost every day. He has an even temperament. Jenny is different almost every day. This last week she has been gentle daily, not aggressive toward Jack, though he was being aggressive toward her. They don't kick to hurt anymore. Their kicks amount to gestures, a form of talking. I like to observe their relationship. I stay away from trying to figure out what is behind donkey ways. They are like people who don't talk. They communicate by body language, sounds, eye contact. I like them to see my eyes when I talk to them. Jenny, who does not like to be touched, wants me to rub her cheek and forehead, her neck, her ears, only after I have given Jack some petting. My thinking is that Jack has been seized by a testosterone rush the last couple weeks. He'd go at Jenny and she kicked him every time he came near. He wearies of the kicking and starts biting her neck in earnest, taking hold of her by the nape of her neck and pulling her down. It subdues her. My guess is that Jenny's quiet nature this week has to do with Jack taking charge of her.  

jack a-wallerin

Though I tend to give most attention to Jenny due to her demanding it. Sometimes I feel like I don't give Jack enough attention, but he doesn't care. He likes the attention, but has no jealousy over Jenny getting my attention. This morning I bent down eye-to-eye with him talking. I saw in his eye and felt from him that we still have a special bond from the time before Jenny when we became friends. It has been awhile that Jenny has been with us. She occupies his mind. She is his focus. Sometimes he acts like he doesn't even see me. He's in a mental place with Jenny and I'm not included. Today he looked at me to say we are still friends, he has not forgotten the good times we had when I sat in the meadow last summer and talked to him while he grazed a circle around me. I felt that he was in a time of triumph with Jenny, had temporarily broken her will, had her under control, and he had a break from his obsession. Jenny was calm and he was calm. He doesn't always feel like he's in control. Jenny has her times when she subdues Jack. In the half a year they've been together, they have calmed way down with each other. I feel like what they're going through now is another phase in their process of getting used to each other. They are becoming mates. From not knowing each other at all to living together by surprise one day to learning each other without recourse. I like in Jenny that she has her own will. She commands Jack's respect. Jack has been totally smitten with love for Jenny from the first day. I can see in him a kind of reverence for Jenny. She is not in love with he, however. I see traces of affection between them sometimes. She is the ideal woman to Jack, a goddess. Remembering the day I saw Jack kiss Jenney and she did not recoil in alarm. They were facing each other, her head about half way up and his head down closer to the ground. He suddenly raised his head, touched his upper lip to hers, let his head back down. I saw her accept the kiss as such, telling me she does not dislike Jack kissing her.

jack wants a carrot

 

My feeling grows stronger that Jenny responds to Jack's affection. I've seen them play. That they play tells me they are comfortable with each other. I see over and over the findings of quantum physicists that an observer changes things. I've seen in all the four-leggeds I've known that they can get each other's attention and my attention by staring. Caterpillar's late sister Tapo would stand up and look in the window at me until she caught my eye. She learned that scratching the glass with a claw caught my attention quicker than staring. I suppose staring amounts to focusing consciousness on the other until consciousness connects. Given that consciousness IS, it stands to reason that electrons and protons are conscious. Being watched, we are aware of it. Some painters like to be watched while they paint. I can't stand it. I can't paint with somebody watching. Painting is a performance, but a private performance toward making an image, the image the result of the solitary performance. Caterpillar wants me to hold her. She sits on the floor beside me and meows. I picked her up, talked to her a bit and put her on my reading chair. Of course that's not what she wanted. So she stares at me until I see the disapproval in her eyes. Then she closes her eyes and turns her head like it doesn't matter, It's as good a place to take a nap as any. Jack and Jenny are focusing attention on each other at all times. They graze near each other. Even when they drift apart grazing, each knows where the other is. As soon as I step outside the door, Jenny will see me from wherever she is in the meadow. She starts walking toward me, Jack sees her in motion, sees me, then he starts walking. Seeing them walk at a distance is like watching African herd animals in a National Geographic video. I see Africa. They turn the meadow into an African plain.

jenny sez, carrot pleez

 

 

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ALARM IN THE DONKEY MEADOW

jenny

The donkeys were spooked this morning for one or more reasons I've been looking at in my head all day. I saw out the window they were quite a ways out into the meadow, looking the other way. Thought I'd put seeds in the birdfeeder first. Usually, when I step out the door Jack brays and starts a slow run to the gate to greet the ice cream man with morning carrots. This morning they didn't even look. I came back into the house, picked up three carrots for them and went back out the door. They stood out there and looked at me the way they look at somebody they've never seen before who walks into the meadow with me. I called to them by name. No response. They continued to look like they were wondering if they might do best to run the other way. I called Donkey Jack. No response. I held carrots up. Nothing. Jack eventually started walking toward me in a half circle, a very round about way, wary, looking, unsure. In the second part of the half circle he appeared to recognize me, but wasn't completely certain. He approached me warily, I held the piece of carrot to him, he took it with his lips and, for the first time, he seemed to recognize me. He smiled all over. Jenny came walking for her carrot after seeing Jack take the first plunge into the unknown. Jenny took her carrot, Jack wanted another and Jenny swung her head at him, he stepped back, I reached over to give the carrot to Jack, he took it and Jenny lunged at him again. She wanted another. She was sweet as pie with me. The calf came up from behind. I knew as well as the calf did that Jenny wasn't allowing it close enough for a carrot, so I tossed a chunk over Jenny's back to the ground in front of the calf. I gave Jenny and Jack the remaining couple of chunks.

 

jack

 

I unfastened the gate and carried the day's armload of hay into the meadow, Jenny on my left, Jack on my right. Today Jenny was not so much interested in snatching a swatch of hay to chew on following the ice cream man into the meadow. She wanted to keep Jack and the calf away from me. She didn't want them getting any of it. I walked out into the meadow with Jenny not far behind, actively keeping Jack and the calf behind her away from the ice cream man. The calf started a hop around dance, running and jumping, kicking backwards into the air like a donkey, calf gamboling. The calf doesn't have the quick mind of a donkey. When it gets excited like that, I watch out. It isn't as aware of its feet or its head as the donkeys are. I can trust them hopping around like that, but not the calf. I came straight to me, head down, dancing on the verge of out of control. I put the palm of my hand out and it stopped. Jenny darted at it and the calf jerked away and ran about twenty feet, turned and watched us, waiting for hay. Jenny and Jack are most demanding, not demanding of me, but demanding of the calf to remember, donkeys first, so I put their hay down first. It's nature rooted deeper than I can do anything about but observe their natural law.  Jack started pushing me sideways. I have learned this is his signal asking me to pet him. I ran my hand over his back and his rump, down his back legs, back to his back and his neck. Enough is enough. Not too much. I went off a ways and put some hay down for the calf and called to it, C'mon calf. Here it came running. It started grazing, Jenny left her hay and ran the calf off. I put the rest of the hay down someplace else for the calf, away from the donkeys. Jenny ran Jack away from his hay and he went to the hay she left. They go around like this first thing every day, but today had more aggression in it from everybody. It seemed like a nervous aggression. In a short time, Jenny and the calf were grazing from the same mound of hay, or Jenny and Jack were grazing together. It's only that first part that set's Jenny's jealousy into motion.

 

jenny

 

I noticed that a corner of the mineral block had been broken off. The donkeys chewed corners off it when I first put it in with them. As soon as they had the balance they needed they went to licking it daily and no more chewing. Every day they take their moment licking it. This was a big chunk broken off, and it's not on the ground. I've thought about coyotes in the night, but my ears are tuned to their shrill yipping such that I wake as soon as I hear it. I didn't wake, which tells me I may have slept through a coyote attack, but don't feel like that was it. Next thought was a bear. Just outside the upper gate a bear marks the road at a place where it can see a good landscape 180 degrees. It looks over the whole meadow. I have no doubt the bear has been in the meadow. This is its territory. I saw foot tracks in the snow last time it snowed that went down by the barn and back into the woods. The chunk missing from the mineral block, I can't help but think something with powerful jaws and a powerful need was chewing on it, licking not enough. I'm guessing that knowing the block is here, the bear will be back, if it was indeed a bear. I doubt bear and donkeys had a confrontation. The donkeys probably went to the far end of the field and the calf probably shuddered in the shed. Jack and Jenny are not confrontational with intruders, or so I believe I've observed. I'm guessing the bear will be back periodically and the donkeys will get used to it. They will stay away from the bear, the bear will not bother them and a peace will go between them. I don't mind the bear licking the mineral block. I imagine the deer have found it by now and lick on it at night when they dare to graze out in the open. The chunk chewed off the block is much bigger than the chunks Jack and Jenny chewed in the beginning. I may move the mineral block farther out into the meadow so four-leggeds passing through can have a lick without terrorizing the donkeys a little too close to their shed.

 

jenny with jack on her mind

 

I've convinced myself to satisfaction that it was very likely a bear. This may have been its first time in the meadow. I don't know anything about the night activities of the four-leggeds, except for the night pictures taken by a trail camera strapped to a tree in the woods across the road. The four-leggeds are as active as a shopping center in the woods at night. Coyotes, coywolves, bear, coons galore, squirrels. A friend wanted to put calves in the meadow, so I put two donkeys in, because the cattle farmers are now keeping a donkey or two with a herd of cattle to keep the coyotes away. I've only heard them in here once since Jenny has been in the meadow. My feeling is that Jenny being the Alpha donkey and having her streak of jealousy, she'll become possessive of the meadow in some way or another. She knows the night rhythms of the meadow as well as she knows the day. I sit here and stare out the window at the mineral block's missing corner, noting something big with a powerful need chewed off that much of it. It seems like the chunk would be about the size of a hard baseball. At the end of a long sleep, it more than likely needed a good bit of salt. I would imagine a bear crossing the far end of the meadow, but one coming up to about thirty feet from the gate and the donkey shelter would be penetrating a bit too far into donkey home territory for comfort. Chewing on their block must have disturbed them at least a little. The bear probably did take a leisurely walk around, smelling, surveying the land up close the bear knew from the road. It more than likely did not leave the meadow same way it arrived, it took its time, looking and sniffing, seeing if any new scents could be found. This is about as close as I'm going to get attempting to uncover why the donkeys and calf were so spooked. They are different every day, though this is the first time I've seen them like they were today.
 

jack

 

 

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THE WILDLIFE OF AIR BELLOWS

the bear

the bear and 2 coyotes--black coyote on right

bear and coyote

 

bear two nights before

These pictures were taken by a field camera triggered by motion, strapped to a tree. The place in the foreground  where the light is concentrated is the "bait pile," deer corn strewn over the ground and apples spread on the ground. The lore on coyotes says they don't eat apples. One of the pictures is a coyote with an apple in its mouth. It's the apples the coyotes are looking for here. The camera is about a tenth of a mile from my house on the other side of the road. I've been told bears were  in here, have seen traces, like at a rise in the road about half way between house and camera site a bear has been taking a dump on the road at the highest place that overlooks a great part of this valley between ridges. The camera recorded that the bear lay down comfortably in this place for two and a quarter hours. Coons, deer and coyotes passed through the pictures, the bear watching. I presume the bear knows the coyotes, the coons and the deer from nightly sightings. The bear is huge, estimated at 400+ pounds. From the standing picture, the bear looks pregnant to me, at least swollen up toward winter hibernation. I've become acquainted with this bear through the photographs. Since it appears comfortable here and has evidently been here several years, explaining the bear droppings on the place in the road that reappear from time to time, I feel like this is my bear sharing the mountain with me, my God-given neighbor.

 

coyote with apple in its mouth

 

ninja raccoon faces coyote intruder

 

coyote turns away

 

deer and raccoons

  

Most interesting to me, seeing this line of 500 images in the course of a couple of days and a nights, is seeing the critters living in the woods around here do not attack each other on sight. In a couple of the pictures, coons and coyotes face each other. In one of them the coon is standing on its back feet in a martial arts fighting stance (195). The coyote looks on with apprehension, body language saying, Looking for trouble I am not. Next frame (196) occurs in the same minute, the coyote showing its side, showing itself not a threat. Ninja Raccoon relaxes his stance. I believe, one-on-one, a coon could shred a coyote's face in a hurry. Two or more coyotes, I believe, could subdue a coon, but they'd have to be swift, which they are, and experienced, which they are, and work as a team, which they do. It appears the bait pile, like a watering hole, is a safe zone where it is collectively agreed, no killing at the communal kitchen. Until one of the deer feels for a split second the shaft of an arrow pierce the heart. My hunter friend, the only one with permission to hunt this part of the woods, is recording times the bucks pass through. The camera also gives him an idea of what is living in these woods. He had always been told coyotes don't eat apples. Turns out they do. It also turns out he is feeding the night critters of Air Bellows, day critters too. I'm feeding the birds here at the house and the donkeys with sunflower seeds and carrots. He's feeding everything else with corn and apples.

 

all four pictures the black coyote

 

 

 

 

 

I found several pictures of the black coyote, the one easily mistaken for wolf. I went looking at google images for wolves and coyotes. The long thin snout is coyote. A wolf's snout is more like a dog's. It looks like the black coyote travels on his own. Possibly he's the leader of the pack, top dog, scouting all the time, looking for something of interest. If it will take more than one, like maybe a lone calf in a meadow, he rounds up the pack and lays out his plan for attack. Don't get attached to any of the animals in these pictures. This plot of ground is no more than a slice of pepperoni on their whole pizza. They have an extensive range. Humans are looking to kill the deer and the coyotes as well as a bear. Humans don't kill the coons so much anymore, but going by the apparent understanding between the coon and the coyote, coons know that coyotes like raccoon meat. In the picture above, the back of the black coyote, notice his left front leg is missing, though its shadow is on the ground. His leg is raised carefully in slow motion, turning to the right to place his foot silently on dry leaves. Or maybe he's just trotting through, seeing what he can see, smelling the scent of every coyote, coon, squirrel, crow, turkey, deer, bear, human that had passed in and out of the communal kitchen, listening for any sound of footsteps on dry leaves. Whatever he is doing, he is doing it in full consciousness in the present moment. 

 

crow

 

turkey

 

squirrels

 

the reaper

 



While I was writing about the black coyote, three college-age girls came to the door and asked permission to park here and walk to the waterfalls. They'd been told the waterfalls are beautiful. Here I am, looking at these pictures for a few hours, writing about what I see, and three girls whose probable closest acquaintance with wildlife might be the cats they grew up with, I felt it important to advise them of what is in these woods. The bigger ones, the coyotes and the bears, are new to the area, the reason I don't go walking in the woods anymore. I advised them to step on twigs, talk a lot, make noise, let everything know a bunch of humans is passing through. I told them they won't see anything, because everything will see them first and go someplace else. I said none of these animals is looking to get you. They don't want to get you. They will leave you alone. If you see one, don't run. I said running means to them you want to play chase. You lose. Stand still like they do when they see one another. Show absence of aggression. My final advice, "Be wary. Don't worry." I came back to the house. I think they went back to the car and left. My hunter friends, who know what is going on in these woods, only go into the woods with a gun that has stopping power. Friend, who hunts here, walks into the woods in bow season, arrow in place. The only time he will require is the time it takes to pull back the string and let it go. I used to say nothing to city people visiting waterfalls about the possibility of running into a bear, coyote or wolf, but now that I know what is in these woods, I feel obliged to warn city people with no country experience about what they're getting into. Give them a chance to make a decision. It's no petting zoo.

 

 

 

 

 

the bear

 

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MAMA BEAR AND BABY BEAR AT AIR BELLOWS

morris louis, point of tranquility, 1960




Yesterday, Selma told me she'd heard of some people that went to the waterfall and saw bear tracks along the edge of the water below the fall, and baby bear prints with it. Also, they found a cave the bear is living in. Considering that the one who reported the paw prints is from a city and walking to the falls with a couple of little kids like a visit to the state park, it didn't have much credibility for me. Except it's not a state park. First thing I said, "There are no caves down there." Selma swore they said there was a cave. I said they might have seen a rock overhang they took for a cave. I could go with bear prints. They're rather unmistakable. Then I wasn't quite with baby bear prints. They might be coon, dog or bobcat getting a drink. I've seen a bear turd in the road several months ago and took it a bear was marking territory. It sounded an awful lot like drama.



This afternoon talking with Gary next door, source of the second-hand info Selma told me about. He said he got it from the young woman from Chattanooga with an SUV and kids, suburban soccer mom to be. I questioned the cave part to him. He described a place in the bank across the stream the bear had dug out, a kind of den. She had photographs he saw. She photographed the paw prints too, and he affirmed it was indeed small bear prints. We've known a bear was living in the woods across the road for some months. A bear alone doesn't bother me, but a bear with a cub tells me to stay out of the woods. I really do not want to scare mama bear. I don't want to come face to face with her. We talked about the bear for quite awhile and he convinced me there was something to the baby bear and the "cave." They have claws like cats, only much bigger, and big sharp teeth. I stay out of the ocean because I figure it is full of critters looking for something to eat. I'll stay out of the woods for awhile, until I hear somebody has killed the bear.



The last time we had a bear up here, somebody killed it. It's skeleton was found in the first holler the gravel road goes around as it starts up the mountain from the pavement's end on Brown Road. I'd seen several traces of it in the woods across the road and smelled it strongly in the air. It might have even been looking at me. But, as happens, it ended up dead. Now that word is out about this bear at the waterfall, I imagine somebody will go in looking for it just to kill it. A lot of people don't like having bears around. I'm sort of in the middle of the matter. Not interested in killing one, I really don't want them around if I have a choice. I know all that they say about black bears not being aggressive, so that part doesn't bother me. What bothers me is having the shit scared out of me so bad. I even wonder about putting up a small sign at the head of the trail that goes to the waterfall to let people know a bear is in the area. The people that come here in 4wheel drives of every variety with license tags from Away are from the suburbs of North Carolina and Florida cities, sometimes Maryland.



It's an hour romp in the natural world they see on nature tv, a petting zoo without bars. When I think about making a small sign to advise heads up, I imagine it stolen by one of the first half dozen people to see it. I wouldn't think like this except that the people I see park across the road heading for the waterfalls in multiples on foot, often with kids and indoor dogs, are so innocent of the natural world, so unaware of dangers that are everywhere, or can be, run about and holler like they're in their back yards at home. It's probably a good thing that they make a tremendous amount of noise walking through the woods, talking, laughing, shouting, stepping on sticks and breaking them, to warn the wild things that live in there the humans are coming. They get out of sight in a hurry, knowing that all a human has to do is see you and you're dead. The critters living in the woods are way more afraid of us than we are of them. Their fear makes them dangerous.



I think of ways to warn people going to the falls to be attentive, pay attention to what's around them. Then I remember times I've attempted to warn people of some of the hidden dangers in the mountains and got derided and laughed at every time. So I quit. They're on their own. Occasionally, someone I know will come to the door on the way to the falls to say hi. Them I will advise that a bear with a cub lives in the area and let them make the decision what to do. I honestly don't think there would be a problem, because suburbanites make so much noise the bear would see them without them seeing her and vacate the premises unseen, unheard. She would be more wary than they would be. The wariest they might be would be spooked.



While Gary and I were talking this afternoon, we talked a good bit about how helpless city people are in these mountains. They even want internet as fast here as it is in the city, which it's not. They drive down the middle of a gravel road and do not pull over to let you go by when you meet one. I can get by them with the right side tires riding the edge of the ditch and still miss their rear view mirror with mine. It scares the shit out of them when I'm going down the mountain and a gigantic SUV or Detroit van is coming up the mountain in the middle of the gravel road. I can read the space available to me pretty well by now. I don't even slow down, just go on by them laughing at the pellets in their under drawers. One of the many changes I've seen in 35 years is when meeting a car or pickup on a gravel road, it pulled over to the side and I pulled over to the side and we gave each other plenty of room, in years gone by. Now, it's almost never that I meet someone on a gravel road who pulls over to the side a little bit to make room. They never do. I think they freeze and don't know what to do.



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