Hunting, Mennonite Style! - 3/22/07

Some of you will be horrified at this posting and others will say, “What’s the big deal?”

Most of us grow up in the Western World where wildlife is generally seen on TV and in zoos. At my mom’s house, in the city, I grew up thinking raccoons were “nuisances” who got into our garbage. At my dad’s house, raccoons were furry, territorial animals who challenged our cats for their food and ate plums off our trees. At my Grandmom’s house, raccoons were fuzzy, clever animals we left food out for and watched, with big smiles and giggles as they took our dinner scraps and carefully washed each piece of food before eating it or sharing it with their young.

In Belize, raccoons are nasty, dirty animals who live in the rice fields and destroy the farmer’s crops. They are mean, they are not afraid of dogs or of people, and they will bite, scratch, and attack. In a 3rd World Country, without PETA and the WWF, people are left to themselves to defend their farms and cattle from wild animals. Here in Blue Creek it is always “Open Season” on crocodiles, alligators, cougars, and raccoons who threaten their livelihood.

So, one evening my friend, Susy, called me and said, “We’re going hunting! Wanna come?” I said, “What are you hunting?” “Raccoons, gators, whatever we find in the rice fields.” “Sure,” I said, “What about the girls?” (Referring to their 2 -and 4-year olds.) “They’re coming too! Get ready, we’ll come get you!” So, since Nathan had a meeting and I had no plans that evening, I jumped into Paul and Susy's truck and sped off to help save the young rice buds from the terrible creatures that would seek to eat and destroy them before they could mature to become yummy meals of Belizean rice & beans.

So, I get in the truck and Megan (the 4-year-old) says, “We’re going hunting Melissa, daddy’s going to kill a gator and I am going to jump in the water and kill it too!” ….Alright, Megan….wow, so this is what it’s like to grow up in Belize….If a probation kid talked like this I would assume it was indicative of some terrible childhood trauma, order a psych evaluation and get ready for a long battle with mental health professionals, the Court, and irresponsible parents….But here, it’s just called “family time!” Megan was very excited and Kate was also in great spirits. They posed for the camera and were silly little giggly girls in all their glory!

Our mission was to seek and destroy any and all animals posing a threat to the rice fields. The girls, Susy, Megan, Kate and I, were in the truck, driving and navigating. The boys, Paul and Corney, Susy’s husband and lil bro, and faithful Rusty, were standing in the back of the truck with the guns, ammo, spotlights and all the other “many” stuff.

After about 5 mintues of driving around, Susy stopped the truck and yelled to Paul, “Do you see it!?” Paul said “yup!” and the girls immediately covered their ears. I was completed confused….see what? What are we doing? Why did we stop? Then Megan yelled, COVER YOUR EARS MELISSA IT’S LOUD!” ..What’s loud….BANG ”Aaaah!” …oh that…You see, when you’re sitting in a metal truck and a man is in the back of that same metal truck with a loaded gun, when he shoots that gun, Megan’s right, it’s LOUD! So, with one nasty man-eating-rice-crop-destroying crocodile down, we continued our crusade.

Next, it was Rusty’s turn to shine as we spotted several raccoons in the middle of the rice field. Paul and Rusty jumped out of the truck and ran to confront the enemy on the front lines. You could hear the raccoons from the truck and we could also tell when Rusty was injured because he let out a classic hound dog yelp/howl. After about 10 minutes of screaming raccoons and howling dog, Paul comes into view with 2 raccoons. One is an older, bigger one which is near dead and which Paul quickly puts out of its misery. The other is a juvenile, not full-grown, but not a baby either. He holds it up for the girls to see and I think it looks kinda cute. Of course Megan immediately says, “Don’t kill it daddy, let’s keep it!” It was very cute, silently hanging there by its tail, until Paul tried to touch it. Then, it spat and let out a nasty hiss that scared the girls and reminded met that, although cute, raccoons are nasty little wild animals. In the end, Paul wouldn’t kill it, he said it was too young to kill. He thought it was old enough to survive on its own, so I am sure they will just end up killing it on their next hunting trip. I’m not really sure which option is the more humane. But again, this is all new to me, I’ve never had to defend my livelihood against a troop of wildlife. There aren’t a lot of mountain lions rallying to pick of my probation kids….and somehow if there were I don’t think I would fight them….Of course I’m kidding.

Anyway, throughout the night, they killed 2 crocodiles and 3 or 4 raccoons. I guess that’s what you call a successful hunt. I don’t think it did a whole lot to save the rice, but I am sure that every little bit helps. The girls seemed to have fun, the dog had a blast, the men got to hold guns and shoot stuff and Susy and I got to keep each other company in the truck and tell the guys what good hunters they were. So, in the end, everyone but the animals were winners. And no matter what you think now, when you see my crocodile tooth necklace, you’re going to think it’s pretty cool.