The Bear Horn

As I've previously mentioned in: Bears Make Strange Fireside Guests, my husband Bruce and I enjoy backwoods camping. Our little 1976 CJ-7 Jeep has taken us to places few other humans have ever seen...mostly because they don't want to but also because these remote and isolated places are very difficult to get to.

Because we are seasoned campers, trackers, and fond viewers of nature, we always, always take the necessary precautions when we venture into the remote wilderness. By necessary precautions I mean a handgun, rifle, various knives, and hatchets...oh and a first-aid kit. The first aid-kit is there mainly in case we do harm to our own bodies with the handgun, rile, various knives, and hatchets.

Our most important precaution is a survival tool my husband invented, call "The Bear Horn". This handy little gadget is a devise that remotely activates the horn on the Jeep. It's really quite ingenious. One end of a long wire is attached to the Jeeps battery. The other end has a big red button mounted on a short piece of wood. When the big red button is pressed, the horn on the Jeep sounds. At night we string the wire from the Jeep into our tent. If we are ever attacked by a savage Grizzly Bear or a hungry Mountain Lion all we have to do is reach over take hold of "The Bear Horn" and depress the button. The horn on the Jeep responds by beeping loudly and the animal either dies from sudden heart failure or flees in utter terror.

Even though we've never had to actually use it, Bruce always, without fail, consistently, rigs "The Bear Horn" and as a precaution he double checks to make sure it is functioning properly. He never fails. Never!

So, here's what happened one fateful night deep in the backwoods of Northern Montana near the Canadian border.

We had enjoyed a long day of hiking and photographing the surrounding area and when nightfall came we were both beat, so we snuggled deep in our sleeping bags and immediately fell asleep.

Now here is an interesting phenomenon between Bruce and I. I sleep very light throughout the night. I can hear a pin drop or an acorn fall from a tree half a mile away. However, as soon the first hint of daylight begins to break I sleep like a rock. Bruce is just the opposite. He sleeps solid and sound though the night but at the first hint of dawn he sleeps very light.

So on this night, as always I slept light and heard every pine needle fall...but by the dawns early light I slipped deep into sleep. Suddenly I felt a sharp jab in the middle of my back. As I fought for consciousness, there was a brief pause and then another sharper jab to my back. I tried to ask Bruce what he thought he was doing but he roughly clamped one hand over my mouth and in a high-pitched shrieking whisper he hissed "Bear!" Before I could react Bruce wrenched my head around to show me the silhouette of a very large bear reflecting on the side of our tent.

Bears are big. No doubt about it, but when you are laying flat on the ground looking up at ones shadow I have to tell you it is heart attack time! Bruce still had one hand over my mouth and I now noticed he had the other one over his own mouth as well. Through his cold clammy clamped hand I manged to mumble " Bear Horn!" He shook his head and hissed though his teeth "I forgot to set it up last night!"

I reached up and I pulled his hand away from my mouth.."OK "I said in a hissing whisper.." Don't panic. The guns! where's the guns ?" Bruce shook his head and Hissed back "In the jeep with the horn." In a faint voice I squeaked "Knives? hatchet? fingernail clippers?" All Bruce could do was shake his head. We had no way to defend ourselves.

We watched in stunned silence as the bear put one very large paw on the side of the tent about 12 inches from Bruce's face. It pushed gently and apprehensively. We were helpless. We knew we were about to become bear breakfast, and there was nothing we could do about it. We were stupidly trapped in our tent.

Now, we are not novice campers, although we would have been hard pressed to prove it on that fateful trip. We also know a few rules about bears encounters, even though it's always anybody's guess as to whether or not the bears know the rules and abide by them.

Rule 1 is that if you encounter a black bear make noise and scare it off (Ok, that sometimes works. Sometimes it doesn't) Rule 2 is that if you happen upon a Grizzly don't make noise because screaming and yelling only makes them mad...very very mad. So our dilemma here was that we hadn't studied bear silhouettes and therefore couldn't tell if we were dealing with a Black bear or a Grizzly. Then again, you have to seriously ask yourself; If you are about to be eaten by a bear...does it really matter which it is?

The bear switched paws and one again pressed tentatively against the wall of the tent. Apparently it had never seen a big dome shaped object in the middle of its territory before and it was curious. Then it lowered it's paw and pushed hard into the tent with its big nose, sniffed and snorted loudly.

In a flash and without thinking Bruce recoiled his arm, made a fist and smashed it directly into the bears nose. Oh My God! It was the last thing I expected Bruce to do... apparently it was the last thing the bear expected as well because it withdrew a several steps, and let out a deafening roar then fell silent. So very very silent.

We grabbed hold of each other in a tight hug and waited. Nothing happened. Several heartbeats passed and still nothing. Slowly Bruce got to his knees and crawled to the door of the tent. He reached up and quietly inched the door zipper down. "Holy Shit" he hissed through clinched teeth "Grizzly sow!" then with a sharp intake he added "and 2... maybe 3 cubs"

For another minute he didn't say anything more so I whispered "What's happening? What are they doing? Why aren't we dead?" He turned and looked at me..all the color had drained from his face and said "She's taking them away...down the trail we walked yesterday." I got to my knees and joined him peeking out the doorway. Amazingly we saw the back end of 3 bears trotting down the pathway away from our camp.

And now..Part 2: God's Great Sense of Humor!

When our hearts began beating normally and we were totally convinced the bears were long gone we shouted prayers of thanks and popped open a thermos of hot coffee. We were in complete and total awe that we had survived an encounter with a grizzly sow and her cubs... even after Bruce punched her in the nose with all his might. By all accounts we both should be dead. Apparently the sow had never encountered humans or a tent and was totally confused by it all.

But never let it be said that God doesn't have a sense of humor.

Even though I knew the Grizzly sow and her cubs were long gone, I still chose to sit with my back snug against a large Pine tree for protection. As I sipped coffee my thoughts drifted to the part where Bruce punched the sow in the nose. Just thinking about it set my nerves on edge.

Suddenly and silently a very large pine cone broke loose from somewhere high above and fell hitting me squarely on top of my head. It happened so silently and quickly that I didn't realize it was only a Pine Cone. I thought the Grizzly had returned! I let out a blood curdling, heart stopping scream, whirled around and punched the tree as hard as I could. Bruce laughed hysterically and said "Doesn't God have a great sense of humor?" Yeah, right!

Going Whole Hog

This is somewhat of a primer on how to break into the hog business, or more accurately how not to become a hog farmer. Oh, and let me assure you no animals were harmed during this episode of my life.

It all started a couple of years ago when I went to a livestock auction to pick up a few hen turkeys... and yes, I do know how to tell the difference between a hog and a turkey. However, things turned a bit sideways when by chance I bumped into a neighbor, Fred Carter, who has a cattle ranch a few miles up the road from us. Fred was at the auction looking for a weanling pig to raise for...well, you know.

Fred and I got to talking about the sad state of affairs the American meat industry has gotten itself into, what with all the recalls of tainted products happening every few months. One thing led to another and he said he wanted... and yet didn't want, to raise his own pork. He said he just didn't have the time to put into the effort.

Somehow at the end of our conversation he had smoothly talked me into buying a little weanling pig. The deal was that I would raise it until it was old enough to ...well you know. In exchange he said he'd give me a side of beef.

At the time that sounded like a good deal, but before long things got complicated. Most of the complication revolved around Walter (Yes.. I foolishly named the cute little porker.) That little guy took to me like a Golden Retriever puppy. Every time he caught sight of me on the ranch he squealed and came running with joy.

I really tried to ignore his delightful personality. Really I did. As time passed however, and the more grew, the more his personality grew, and the more he grew on me. Fred stopped by from time to time to ask how close we were to ...well you know what. I'd always say something like "You know Fred, that little guy just doesn't seem to be filling out right."

Six months passed and Fred finally got suspicious and asked to take a look at Walter. He concluded that about another month and it would be time for ...well, you know what. I silently thought that maybe I'd put Walter on a strict diet, but the truth was that Walter ate everything in sight. Grass, bugs, tree bark, acorns, horse feed, cat food, dog food, cattle food, even wild bird seed. No way was he going on a diet.

Another couple of months passed and little Walter has blossomed from the tiny 10 pound weanling piglet to roughly 110 pounds and stood nearly 2 feet tall. His tusks began to develop and even though he was sweet as sugar water, he was looking a bit menacing. To make matters worse he developed a smile that looked like a vicious snarl. Apparently it is customary to have boar hogs tusks removed if you plan on keeping them for pet or breeders. Who knew he would be around so long? I never dreamed he would be ..ok, I'll say it... a pet.

Fred came by again when Walter was 9-10 months old and said "Look here, if you don't take care of matters soon he won't be good for anything but sausage." I nodded and said "One more month Fred..just one more month."

So I was able to play the "just one more month" into 3 more months and Walter grew and grew. He weighed close to 250 pounds and was now about 3 feet tall and roughly 4 feet long. His alarming long tusks curled back and upward toward his ears. To outsiders he was totally scary. To me he was just little Walter.

Finally Fred got the idea that Walter was not going to become...well you know. So he came up with a plan B. He suggested that I go back to the auction and buy a sow and breed her to Walter and then give him a piglet and HE would raise it...our deal would still stand but the exchange was reduced to 1/4 of a beef in exchange for the piglet.

That sounded reasonable so the next time the livestock auction was held I hooked up the horse trailer, grabbed a fist full of cash and headed out. There were some nice sows offered, but I held my bids until I thought I had the hang of bidding. Finally the Auctioneer announced that they were bringing in the final lot of sows. I panicked and bid, and bid and bid. In the end, I thought it a bit seep to pay $500.00 for a sow, but hey...Walter deserved the best.

After paying and collecting my ticket stub, I raced out to the stockyard to claim Freida (yes I had already picked out a name for her.) The stock-men said for me to back my trailer up to the pen and they'd load for me. Great!

Once in place, I opened the tailgate on the trailer and they started herding them in. (Yes, I said them.) "Wait I yelled" pointing to one particularly nice looking black and white sow, " I just bought that one." One of the men looked at my stub again and said "No ma'am you bought yourself a lot of 7 nice sows." SEVEN? SEVEN? I looked frantically around and started yelling "Anyone interested in buying some sows really cheap?" No one did.

So there you have it. I drove 7 sows home to Walter. He was happy. My husband was not. But after we both settled down we decided that it might work out ok. We'd sell the piglets and the sows in the spring. Not such a big deal.

Well it tuned out to be a big deal. Do you have any idea how much 7 large pregnant sows and one humorously large boar can eat? Yikes! We tried to keep focused on how much money the piglets would bring in and we figured it would all balance out.

Spring came and Walter had grown even more. He was now nearly 400 pound, close to 3 1/2 feet tall, and over 5 feet long. His tusks had grown to roughly 14 inches. There wasn't a grown man in the county that would come within 50 feet of him, including our local vet. He was still sweet little Walter but you couldn't convince anyone of that.

Something else that came in the spring... piglets! Alice was the first to farrow, she had 9 adorable little grunting piglets. Hooray 9 ! count them 9! Next it was Felicia's turn. She had 7 ...GREAT 7! That made 16 healthy piglets to sell. We were excited beyond belief. Next Tina proudly produced 10 ... Wow, now we had 26 piglets. Just count that money!

Well I will spare you the blow by blow birthing of 49 squealing, grunting piglets, but I'm here to tell you it can be, and truly was overwhelming! With the barn and pasture overflowing with bouncing piggies, we began to understand why hog farmers take their broods to the auction. Seriously 49 piglets. Just try to imagine the sounds and the feed bill. Wow..who knew!

In the end, Fred got his piglet. We tried to give him 48 more, but he just laughed and got into his truck with 1 squealing weanling pig under his arm. We advertised for 4-H kids to come and get them for free....pleeeeese! Not many did, but then again, there are not 49 4-H kids in this county that want to raise hogs for the fair. In the end we made trip after trip to the auction until we sold all the sows and their broods.

Walter? I'm sure you are wondering what happened to Walter. Well the old boy is still alive and well. On one of the trips to the auction I got to talking to an old hog farmer who had just lost her boar. When I told her about Walter she said she'd like to come and take a look. When she saw him she let out a few choice adjectives , but when the shock of seeing a hippopotamus sized boar with menacing tusks smiling at her wore off, she fell in love with him... and he with her. (or maybe he smelled the sows on her. Maybe he was upset with me for selling off his ladies. I guess I'll never know.) She said "Hi big boy how hard will it be to coax you into my trailer?" He grunted softly and walked right up into her trailer and off they went.

I miss Walter, but from time to time I stop by "Helen's Happy Hog Hollow" and say hello. He acts like he remembers me. He still gives a squeal and runs over to see me. We exchange a few grunts and then he wanders off to his harem, and I swear he's laughing.