The Blind Leading the Blind

My husband was a West Virginian and hunting was a popular sport especially in the fall during deer season. He always said he liked to hunt, but he enjoyed being in the woods and out in nature more than the act of hunting. After we married, we lived in Delaware for fifteen years. Hunting there was similar to West Virginia except for the mountainous terrain. Delaware is flat as a fritter unless you’re near the northern border with Pennsylvania. We lived in the middle of the State. The similar parts of hunting were the deer, white-tailed, grayish-brown in the fall, long noses with white throats, average size between 150-300 pounds, and possessing an uncanny sense of smell.

Jim had several buddies who hunted with him but the one time he shot a deer, our young son was along for the adventure. After field stripping the animal, it had to be tagged and registered at the nearest wildlife office. After dark on the way there, they were in a minor traffic accident, luckily sustaining no injuries or damages except to the deer tag which was held in the deer’s ear by a huge safety pin. It was completely torn out. Since it was Jim’s first, he had the head saved for immortality by a taxidermist. The ripped ear always led to a re-telling of all the circumstances leading up to it.

When we moved to Florida in 1978, we were busy building our house and had few thoughts of hunting or fishing. Fishing was my favorite pastime. The Gainesville area boasts many streams and lakes, but alligators shone a red light on these possibilities so when our thoughts did turn to fishing, the towns of Cedar Key, Crystal River or Suwannee were our destinations. Because of the distance, we determined to be satisfied with reservations on guided boats, and this worked well.

But during the first fall after we were settled in our new home, Jim’s thoughts turned again to hunting. We knew nothing about how to hunt in Florida, but our Bronson relatives touted it to be the best. Jim went hunting with them one time. He never saw a deer, but he did see two rattlers which really dampened his spirit for tramping through the pine forests of Levy County. And traveling in trucks with dogs was not particularly appealing to him either. We didn’t give up. We decided to look for a wooded place of our own. Where would be better than next to a wildlife refuge? We found the perfect spot near Fanning Springs, a few acres for sale that abutted the Andrews Wildlife Management Area. The realtor set a date for the showing.

Joel gave us directions and soon we were bumping down old Old Fanning Road, a limerock base at that time. On the left it paralleled railroad tracks, an electric line, and several old upright concrete survey markers. On the right side of the road, lanes, trails, and wooden signs indicated residences somewhere behind the jungle of trees and vines that crept up to the scraped edge of sand. Large and small potholes slowed our forward motion to 20 M.P.H. Finally, we saw the sign, NW 166^th Place. The entrance and exit were separated by a huge pine tree, and unlike what we expected from the nice green highway street sign, the road in was little more than two sandy ruts with a grass-covered centerline. We were to drive all the way to the end of the “street” until we saw a Jim King Realty sign on the right. Our forward motion slowed to 5 M.P.H.

We had plenty of time to look around but not a whole lot to look at. On the right we noticed a hand-painted wooden sign nailed to a tree, Wheele’s Hideaway with a trail leading somewhere but no sign of human habitation. Encouraged by the electric line snaking through the trees on our right, we crept on. Sometimes the path became two, one going right, one going left, in order to miss gigantic trees. This was a road of convenience to wildlife and man. At the end we saw a barbed wire fence, the realtor’s sign on the right and a pile of oyster shells on the left, remnants of a possible picnic we thought. From numerous turn-arounds, an actual cul-de-sac had been formed. On the other side of the fence line we spotted some black and white cows and remembered the map showing a farm with the wildlife preserve running along the back edge of the property.

We parked near the sign hesitating to pull into any part of the overgrown trail. We could see oaks, hickories, magnolias, and of course pines plastered against the bluest of blue skies. Jim rolled down his window and the air smelled of heat. It was late August. Some of the trees were unknown to us, dwarfed and bent, not thriving due to the amount of undergrowth. We spotted mockingbirds, hawks and vultures. The screeching sounds of the hawks and the sight before us made us feel like we were in the Amazon Jungle.

But we were not daunted by how remote it was. That was what we wanted, and we bought the property. Jim already had a tractor so we started looking around for a bushhog to clear a path. This was not a problem either. We quickly found a used one and got both tractor and bushhog to the site. Then we discovered the real world of jungle clearing, not quite as much fun as we anticipated. And, in the meantime, we had seen some small deer running about and decided there was no way we would be killing those cute little things.

But the woods were quiet, they smelled great, and they were away from it all. We decided to go ahead, cut a path, and build a tree blind where we would sit and relax while watching the wildlife below.

The first problem was tree roots. There is a metal pin that connects the bushhog hitch to the tractor, and since tree roots are slightly immovable, when the “hog” got stuck on one, the pin snapped. Very soon, we were on a first-name basis with the tractor supply dealer in Trenton.

My job was to walk behind the bushhog at a little distance and clear the path of large sticks. You would think this was a pretty easy and safe job. The first problem is the noise and I soon found out the second problem. City slickers that we were, I did not know yellow jackets nested in holes in the ground. I never heard a buzz. Those stinging monsters were all over me before I knew what was happening. Of course, I ran which turned out to be the best thing I could have done. I jumped into the truck and slammed the door. Jim didn’t even miss me – for awhile – until he turned around and looked. We quit early that day. When I got home and counted, I had about thirty stings.

When we went back to continue our clearing, I decided to make some grapevine wreaths. After all, millions were hanging from the trees, free for the taking. I had my pruners handy and began yanking them down. What fun. I had two huge, beautiful wreaths intertwined with Spanish moss when my arms started itching a little, but I didn’t pay too much attention. After we got back home, I laid down for a nap. I was pooped. I woke up scratching. Chiggers. The medicine does not work. Showers and time is the only cure.

We didn’t give up though. We wanted to watch those wild animals. I’ll bet they were watching us and laughing their butts off.

Our next misadventure involved a squirrel hunter. I am just assuming he, or she, was a squirrel hunter, we never saw the person. But we did hear the whiz of the buckshot as it traveled just above our heads while we sat enjoying our lunch. We both ran for the truck that time. I guess somebody else thought it was good for hunting too.

After seeing snakes, turtles, a huge hornets’ nest on the side of a hickory, and almost running the tractor into a natural sink, we finally got our path cut and a tree blind built. We used it a few times but the only wildlife we saw was a mother sow and her piglets. They took their darn sweet time passing below our tree and finally getting far enough away for both us to dash to the truck. Oh, and I forgot to mention, never eat in a tree blind. Ants can find a dropped bread crumb from miles away.