The View

1/20/2016

The Lay of the Land

By Lyn Messersmith

The View

I’ve not watched the TV show called The View, only bits of it that were replayed elsewhere. To me, there’s nothing funny about ladies (a term I use loosely) talking trash. Maybe I’ve just been on the wrong end of snarky humor too many times.

I’d rather laugh at the antics of Ma Nature’s kids. The pheasant that hangs out under our bird feeder, waiting for blackbirds to strew some seed on the ground for him, and the black tomcat that pretends to challenge the pheasant and then walks on by looking the other way, as if to say, “Just kidding”. Kittens that chase Mamma Cat’s tail for entertainment, while she endures the foolishness with a bored expression. A kitten that’s literally out on a limb which will barely hold him, and puzzled about how to remedy the dilemma.

It’s interesting what creatures of habit they are. Dusk finds the pheasant population lined out for the swamp, where they spend the night, Dawn will bring them out, right to a certain corner of the yard, where they feed till sometime after sunup. Afternoon has them in the driveway, or on the road, and sometimes we have to stop and wait for them to move out of the way before we can continue our journey.

Maggie goes out somewhere in the neighborhood of 2 am. She is certain that something is out there which needs chasing away, but too cowardly to pursue it beyond the porch. Back indoors after a few barks, she gets on the bed and does her best to crowd us out. Of an evening, she waits for me to get out of the shower and settle down with a book before demanding to go out and bark. Mama Cat will come in when Maggie goes out, and tries to find an inconspicuous place to nap, in hopes that we’ll forget her at bedtime.

A herd of a hundred odd antelope can be found most afternoons on a neighbor’s field. But by summer they will have evaporated. Do they migrate to Wyoming?

One time last summer we returned from an outing pretty late. As usual, we both were on deer watch, having learned the hard way what happens to people who forget to be. I warned of something in the road ahead, too low to be a deer. Cougar? We’ve had some sightings, but always in daylight.

Puzzled. For all the world, it resembled the sea monsters portrayed in books—a long body that stretched all the way across the highway, humping along in a hurry. We screeched to a stop just in time to see the tail disappearing into a field and identify raccoons. There must have been fifteen or twenty; two or three families traveling together with parents in the lead and bringing up the rear. Someone’s cornfield was going to look a lot different come daylight.

There’s occasional evidence of man’s intervention too. Roadkill. A coyote hung on a fence, or scarecrow in a field. Some of the scenarios make sense, others not so much. Animals sometimes turn up in places they aren’t supposed to inhabit. Our neighbors had a family of wolverines in their meadow several summers ago. They don’t live on the prairie, everyone knows that. But these did. I guess, like people, four-leggeds tend to get themselves in weird situations, either by chance or poor choices.

Ever see a dead lizard or snake on a fence post? Likely left by a bird of prey; chances are he didn’t climb up there for the view. A friend tells of finding a turtle on a fence post, and I know of at least one snapping turtle that ended up in a rural mailbox. You have to wonder how they liked the view from there. One thing is certain. Neither of them got there by themselves.