Post twenty one: The Dogs of Wing

     I have not mentioned dogs much up to this point, not because they were not a big part of my life at Wing, but because I wanted them to have their own chapter. We had no house dogs, mind you. Any dog of ours unlucky enough to stray indoors quickly caught a broom to help them back out. I understood that they lived or died on their own good luck, money was not spent on dogs if they got sick. But nevertheless, dogs were a big part of my Wing life.
     Contact with dogs came early in my memory. Spot was an aging, cancer-eaten long haired dog, nearing the end, faintly recalled in my early recollections. Not so faintly recalled is the rifle shot that ended his suffering existence.
     Snippy was a short haired, black, chunky feist. He was a dandy squirrel dog without a hunter. Harold, my older brother, his hunting partner, had gone off to college. Snippy spent his days, lying in the warm sun, dreaming of days gone by. On cold winter nights, he would jump up through the open crib door into the barn, work his way into the hayloft, and burrow in for the night. One very cold winter morning, with the temperature hovering near the single digits, I approached the barn. Then I saw him. Snippy lay, curled up in the snow, frozen solid. Above him was a closed, and latched, crib door.
     Next came Chubby. We never hit it off. He was my sister Barbara's dog. Very ill-tempered, he growled when I came around him, I picked at him, and our relationship deteriorated from there. Even as an old dog, most of his teeth gone, he would attack, gumming my shoes in a rage, if I ever came near his food bowl. Chubby often liked to spend his time visiting the neighborhood, and I assume he was unwelcome. Once, he came home with a tin can full of gravels tied to his tail. Dad finally got tired of his carousing and took him to a man who wanted a dog 5 miles away. The next morning, he was home, and stayed awhile this time. Chubby loved to chase cars, and his hobby eventually brought about his undoing.
     My very first dog of my own was Champ. I built Champ a house, painted his name over the door. We wrestled and played, getting closer daily. As Barbara Lou and I rode to the cucumber patch one morning, Champ followed. When we arrived, I said, “Let me out so I can watch after champ while you make the turn.” I was too late. Bumped and knocked off balance by a front wheel, the rear wheel ran over his snout. Champ got up, walked a few steps, looked at me, and I saw the light fade from his eyes. Slowly he fell. I raced to kneel beside Champ, my shaking hand feeling a faint heartbeat ebbing away. It was a long time before the memory of Champ began to fade.
     When I got Tooter, he was an 8 week old, part German shepherd pup. He had a black and white cross on his chest. I carried him, resting on my forearm, back to our farm. As Tooter grew, he learned quickly. He became my constant companion as we hunted, fished, and trapped – or just roamed the bottoms and mountains for the fun of it. He quickly learned to “stand,” “heel,” and “back up.” Once learned, he obeyed perfectly. If I needed help getting up a muddy creek bank after setting a trap, or looking for mink sign, I had only to say, “back up.” Tooter backed into position, waited until I grasped his tail, then pulled me up the bank. Tooter was a world class sprinter, by human standards. Using the “stand” command, I timed him at 7 seconds flat in the 100 yard dash, eclipsing the world record by two seconds or so. Tooter saved me more than once. One hot summer day, walking barefoot down an overgrown lane to fish at Lilly Pad Lake, Tooter was in the heel position. He suddenly stepped ahead of me, then jumped aside. Looking down, I saw a large Moccasin, coiled and fangs bared, lying where my next step would take me.
Tooter became a good squirrel dog, though not in the normal sense of the term. He did not trail squirrels, but ran, crashing through the underbrush, scaring any self-respecting squirrel into movement. His sharp eyes caught the flash of fur, and another squirrel was treed. We worked well as a team. While I waited quietly on one side of the tree, Tooter crashed to the other side to turn the squirrel. They were an important source of meat for my family. The only meat we ate was either salt pork, which got old after awhile, or meat that I hunted or fished for. More about Tooter in my next post.