Bird Hunting

by Captain Perry Wrinkle

One of my fondest memories is of Uncle Harold and my first year as a hunter. I really loved hunting. I had trailed along behind my father during hunting season, but was only allowed to carry my BB gun. It was October and I had stayed a couple of weekends with my grampy Fred. He let me use his 22 to hunt partridge across the road from his old farm house into the Flanders Pond Rd.

Fred was of a very conservative nature and 22 bullets were nearly 50 cents per box. So he would hand me two and tell me not to waste them. They came 50 in a box. I was allowed to hunt only the land across the road. It was about the size of a baseball field. I had scared up a few birds but they always flew beyond my boundary lines. Harold showed up one Saturday and I began coaxing him to take me hunting in the big woods where the birds always flew. It was raining pretty hard and he kept telling me “maybe later.”

We didn’t have television back then and I was always pacing around the house hoping. Gran always had beans on Saturday an’ plenty of biscuits. We had a generous helping of both for lunch. The rain had let up some. Finally at about 2 o’clock Harold looked at me and asked, “Do you really want to go hunting?” Do I. Do I. Do you want me to get your gun for you? No, said Harold, just get yours rigged up.

I got my little pack sack, my wool coat an’ knit cap on, man, was I ready. I even talked gramp into giving me 3 bullets. We started off up over the ridge into the big woods. He, sneaking along like an Indian an’ me crashing along behind. We had gone along for a few minutes when he motioned for me to come up to him. He pointed into the small fir trees an’ whispered, “see that bird?” I looked but no bird could I see. Suddenly up came Harold’s old model 12 Winchester, “Kabang.” There he said, “You see him now?” I answered “yes,” as the bird flopped around on the ground. “Well go pick him up,” says Harold.

I did a good job in that I stuffed him into my pack. We started along and again he stopped. I didn’t see that one either until he was flopping around full of bird shot. It was getting dusky so Harold headed back toward the house. We were almost back to the house when he stopped again. This time I saw the bird, took aim and fired. The bird thundered into the air and once again, “Kabang” down came the bird in a cloud of feathers. “Guess we got that one,” he said. “Yes”, I said, “we got that one.”

When we got in the house I took the three birds from the sack an’ put them on the sink. Gramp came into the kitchen and took a look. “You fellers done pretty good,” he said. I answered, “Oh yes, us fellers done real good.”

I produced the two shells I had left and handed them to him. He looked at the two shells, then looked at me an’ said, “At least you shot one of them.” I grinned and said, “well, maybe.” He looked at Harold and asked, “Is he a pretty good hunter?” “He is that,” replied Harold. “But he’s a lot better retriever.” I knew right then I still had a lot to learn.

(Written especially for Harold on his 90th birthday.)