Dave's Hunt

"A Walk In The Woods With Willy"

by Dave Rogers

"O K  - get ready - move a little closer - GO - NOW - GO!" Willy shouted.  Well, it really wasn't a shout; it was more like a "do it now" command from a burly drill sergeant whose normal voice carried the authority of a four star general.  Ordinarily I would have had the temperament and attitude of a young unbroken mule.  No way - no how - it's just not gonna happen and that's all there is to it. I had heard a number of stories from Willy about some of his previous hunts and his clients that went on them.  To my way of thinking they all needed medication and lots of it.

Willy was insisting that I move in for the kill.  It was the same kind of insisting you heard from your Dad when he was about to turn loose of your bicycle for the fist time.  You remember the words "Just keep pedaling and steer straight . . . you can do it".  Willy had enough confidence for the both of you and he knew the predictable results from his years of experience. "You can do it!" said Willy.  And then I thought, "by George, I think I can.  OK legs, let's go."

Two feet from the hog I began to doubt my sanity.  Why in the world would anybody in their right mind walk up to a WILD hog and four dogs and then want to get down in the dirt with that wild bunch and plunge a seven-inch knife blade into the heart of the hog?   You see what I did not realize was that you can't kill a hog with a knife while you are standing up.   At least not make a swift clean kill where it counts, which is always the sportsman thing to do.  You have to get down to pig level and that is kinda low when a fellow stands 6' 2".  I can move quick enough when I'm on my feet, but when you are on your knees it is a different story.  Movement from that position is slow, awkward and clumsy.  I thought "I'm gonna be in big trouble if this monster gets loose. How far is the hospital?"

Let's see now, there were five snapping mouths with too many teeth to count - four flailing hooves, grunts, groans and growls - sticks, dirt and dog slobber going everywhere  - oh yes, and one hyperventilating hunter. I wondered if those suicidal dogs were going to turn on me for interfering with their job if I got too close.  After all, this was not the same bunch of meek and mild mannered dogs that had been walking with us for the last hour.  The dogs I remembered were happy tail wagging pups that wanted their ears scratched.  I don't know what was in that last puddle of water they drank from but these dogs were fearless and uninhibited.  They wanted the pig!

"NOW !" said Willy.  My knees buckled on his command and I landed in the soft dirt that had been churned up from the ongoing fight.  I know the noises of the fight were still going on yet I did not hear anything.  I was intensely focused on one thing - a clean kill without hurting a dog.  The hog turned a little to the right and the target materialized.  My hand moved on its own accord and found the spot.  I don't know if it was the gallons of adrenaline that was flowing throughout my body or the sharpness of the knife, but it went in a lot easier than I thought it should.   Then Willy coerced, "Wiggle the knife . . .  now pull it out and do it again."

This wild gallant creature gave up the fight and my hog lay down to die.  As I knelt there quivering and shaking, all I could think about was the hunt scene from the movie The Last of the Mohicans.  How or why that scene popped into my mind - I don't know, but it did. The movie opens with Hawkeye and his two Indian companions on a hunt - chasing a deer through the woods.  When they finally shot it, the three hunters gathered around the animal and honored it for its strength, speed and courage.  They respected the animal and its fight to escape.  I knew how those hunters felt. The chase, the fight and the struggle will be long remembered - thank you wild one - thank you Willy.

I first met Willy about four years ago while I was clearing some trees in a gully that would eventually become a "driveway" to the home site we were planning.  This driveway was going to follow a fence line for several hundred yards and then turn up a hill to a future house.  Now when I say the woods were thick - I really mean thick.  Whatever you are thinking now about dense woods - double it.  There was a wall of briars, bramble and those monster thorny trees we have in Texas.  Brer Rabbit would have protested and not want to go into this "briar patch" - remember that story?

I had just stopped to take a breather when this huge white pit bull comes walking out of that sticky picky jungle.  I looked at that dog and he looked at me.  Seconds later another dog materialized and then another one.  After a few quick moments, there were half a dozen dogs eyeing me. I did not like those odds at all and furthermore I did not know these dogs.  I reached for the equalizer that I kept in my waistband.  "O K" I thought, "Who wants to be first?"

I heard a stick break and looked up towards the thicket and saw the wall of briars moving.  A voice said "How yall doing?" I didn't respond for a moment or so because I did not see anyone to respond to.  The green wall moved again and a cowboy hat emerged with a salty wiry looking fellow under it.  With a big smile across his face he thrust out his hand and said I'm Forrest Morris! "  I stood there slack jawed and shook his hand.

He never said so, but I bet he was rolling and laughing inside from the expression on my face. I stood there trying to process what I had just witnessed. How could a fellow walk through that jungle the way he did - in a short sleeve shirt no less. Willy told me that he had hunted this land since he was 9 or 10 and he was scouting hogs - - was it O K with us if he hunted our land?  "WILD HOGS !  Of course you can hunt the wild hogs.  Nothing else - just hogs" I said.

Over the next few months and years I've had the privilege of getting to know Willy and his enthusiasm and passion for a hunt.  This fellow was born 125 years too late - today's environment  puts him out of his element.  Oh, he adapts, but you can tell it is the rough wild and challenging country he thrives on.  A hunt every day is not enough for Willy.  He knows and understands the wild and is comfortable and at ease in the thickest, roughest part of it.  He is a real tracker -- he sees "sign" the same way everybody else pays attention to traffic lights and stop signs.   Louis LAmuor didn't know it, but he wrote stories about Willy.

Thanks again Willy - I just might be hooked on these walks in the woods with
you.