The Great Chipmunk Hunt of "56"

I was in my tenth year in 1956 and on my way to spend the summer at my Grandmother's Farm; my own private 400 acre wilderness Eden for the next three months. This year was particularly wonderful because I was being allowed to bring my trusty Daisy B-B gun with because it had been deemed that I had shown great personal responsibilty regarding safe gun handling throughout the past year. I was like a great white hunter on my way to safari in Africa!

My summer home was situated not far from a fairly nice sized inland lake and the outlet river that emptied it flowed past the Farm house and bordered the remaining acreage. I would have access to fishing, hunting, hiking, and a host of other woods experiences. I full well intended to make a dent in the small rodent population that inhabited the lush oak and maple groves that surrounded the house. Some of those trees were over a hundred years old and had been spared when my great grandfather, August, had cleared the land for his new home. The acorn crop was abundant and so were the chipmunks that lived in the grove and sometimes invaded the house.

I had already been schooled in what was to be fair game this summer so I wouldn't be shooting any of Grandma's pets. I was mainly out for the extremely dangerous "chipmunk", but I had a mixed bag ticket so game of oppotrtunity was possible. I had the blood of my Viking and Germanic ancestors flowing in my veins so I was out to show my prowess as a new gun toting hunter. It was of little consequence that I had never killed anything before but I had been reading Argosy, True and Field & Stream so I was ready for adventure and slaying large numbers of "varmits" was my game.

As with all plans well laid in advance, my summer was a big misadventure. First, it was a requirement of my being allowed to spend the summer that I help out with all the chores Grandma had lined up for the summer. I was allowed to hunt only after the days work was done. Some days this was noon, others were rain days that had to be spent indoors helping learn the duties of a chef's helper when the baking of those delicious desserts was done, but there were days that were designated "Free" days for me to roam free. In retrospect, the free days outnumbered the work days by three to one or more, Grandma was not out to dampen my summer experience.

My dreams of ambushing the wily chipmunk were dashed because the chipmunk is a communal rodent so that when I had a bead on an unsuspecting target his friends would set off the alarm and he was down his hole before I could shoot. I passed almost the whole summer without a "kill" on chipmunks and was getting pretty desparate.I decided to resort to the "Bait Pile" tactic, as dreadfully unsportsmanlike as it was, I was at my wit's end! I set up bait at several holes where I had a commanding view of the area and hid to await my future as a successful killer of game.

I missed several shots when, quite by accident, I hit an unwary target! Wow! I was at first surprised, then elated, then something I hadn't expected, a feeling in my gut that I maybe hadn't done something so great. As I picked up my trophy I began to think that killing a small rodent like I had just done to sate my bloodlust was not the right thing. I took the lifeless rodent to my Grandmother and she must have sensed my inner turmoil. She told me that there were many reasons why people hunted, some for food, some for sport, but she said "To hunt simply for the joy of killing something is not hunting!" I thought long and hard on this and realized that the true spirit of hunting, at least for me, wasn't just the killing but the whole act from start to finish, the preparation, the stalk, the shot, and yes, the kill, but not for the lust of killing but only because it is part of the whole experience.

I have followed this tenet all my remaining years and have never felt pressured to fill a tag simply to kill something. It may not be the philosphy that everyone follows but it works for me and I have never regretted it.

Chris