I have a story for you. It's long, and I don't have anything better to do, so I'll tell it.
When I was 16, I thought I'd catch one live. Beaver, that is. They'd come into our field from the river at night and eat the corn. I had caught groundhog, possums, and muskrats before, so I thought I might as well try. It seemed like the next logical step.
I had my heavy duty critter catcher, which was a 6 foot length of galvanized pipe, and a long piece of heavy cord run through it. Also in my arsenal was the biggest fish net I could find, my grandpa's striper fishing net. Oh, and a million candle power spotlight, which would later play a crucial role in the nights great event.
After much persuading and convincing, I finally was able to get my buddy, Jody, to join me. All he had to do was hold the light, I'd do the rest.
Well, long about midnight, after sitting in the pitch black dark, suffering from the bazillion mosquitos (the Off can ran out after half a spray), we heard some scuffling, scrunching, murmuring sounds from the well-worn trail we were sitting near.
The plan was to wait until the beaver got near the the corn, Jody would whip on the light, I'd dash in with the big net, do some scooping and drag my catch out in the open and attach the critter-gitter. Nice plan. Well thought out plan. Foolproof plan. Stupid plan.
Come to find out, beaver are not that amicable.
We sat in complete silence until we were confident the beaver was preoccupied by the succulent corn stalks. When we heard contented beaver sounds, which, incidentally sounded a lot like my grandpa (the one I pilfered the net from), I made my move.
Jody flipped on the light and I dashed in for the catch. Problem number one arose quickly, with numbers two, three, four and five close behind.
Jody had stayed in our original position. A position which placed my body directly in the way of the light beam. The only thing I saw was my own immense shadow.
I turned to tell him to move and he shined the light right in my face. You wouldn't think a million candle power light would cause temporary blindness, but it does.
All of this was happening while I was on the move, through heavy grass, with a long pole, and a huge net, and in the dark. As I turned back towards my foe, the unforeseen and most definitely unintended happened. In my state of temporary blindness, I stepped on the net. Then I tripped over my pole. Then I fell in the heavy grass. Then I landed on a rock right on my kneecap. It hurt. Then I sprained my wrist. It hurt, too. Then there was the beaver.
I had fallen right in the trail the beaver had been using. Surprisingly, beaver don't like a lot of commotion, so this one was hightailing it back to the river. I was in the way. As a side note, beaver growl.
So there I was. Sprawled out in the grass, a piercing pain in my wrist, my kneecap feeling like it had exploded, my foot tangled in the net, blind. So what do I do? Do I abandon my quest? Do I scamper to safety? Do I cradle my injured extremities? Nooo. I right myself and try to catch me a beaver.
I whomped and I whailed. I played whack-a-beaver with a busted net. I was making contact, but my scooping skills were somewhat lacking. The thing about beavers is they're surprisingly agile. They can hop and they can juke and they can jive. The thing about me is I'm persistent. Too a fault, apparently.
I managed to get the net tangled around some part of that beaver. What part, I'm not sure. Beaver grunts quickly turned to some pretty fearsome beaver teeth chomping. If you haven't heard that from 5 feet away, you haven't lived, my friend.
At this crucial moment, things suddenly got a lot darker. Literally. The battery died on the light. Bummer. Contrary to the popular belief at the time, I did have some semblance of common sense. I let go of the handle. The beaver clamored his way back to the river, big honking net in tow. He was making quite the ruckus until he managed to free himself.
It took a moment for the adrenaline to wear off. I sat in the dark, wondering if that all really just happened. Jody broke the silence. "Did you get him?" "Yeah, Jody, we're cuddling. Give us a moment."
Topic: beaver with bowfishing gear? (Read 609 times)
