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| The death of the coyote |
| More than likely, if Mortimer had been around, there would have been no coyote problem. But he was on loan to a neighbor in Ford County, over 10 miles away. The neighbor, actually a shirt-tail relative of the Koontz's, had no emergency back-up dog, so Mortimer was helping out while their dog recovered from injuries incurred when it ran into a scythe hidden in tall grass. It was the summer of 1948. It had been a sparse year for the Koontz's - first the wheat crop had failed, then the alfalfa had mostly burned up in the sun, and now Grandma's chickens were disappearing. The farm's chickens and turkeys were important in feeding the large family. Grandma was determined to get to the bottom of the mystery of why chickens and eggs continued to disappear. One afternoon, she had a talk with Uncle Loren, the youngest of the Koontz children. "Loren," she said, "something is stealing one or two chickens from the hen house every night. Tonight, I want you to stand guard and see if you can find out what is happening. I think a coyote is getting them." Uncle Loren was eager to help, and at 15 years old, he could handle a firearm as well as any man. At dusk, he went to the hen house, where he had set up a cot just inside the doorway earlier in the afternoon. The hen house chicken roosts were simple wooden frames made like small bleachers, low at the front, rising to near the roof at the back. Some had nests for the egg-layers, and some had just a narrow lath for sleeping. As daylight faded, chickens began to take up their positions on the roosts. As it got darker and darker, Uncle Loren sat on his cot waiting in the shadows with his 4-10 guage shotgun. Nothing happened, and Uncle Loren was getting sleepy. It was now so dark that he could not see his hand in front of him. He finally succumbed to sleep. Sometime after midnight, Uncle Loren awakened with a start. "What the..?" he thought, then remembered where he was. He felt for his shotgun. Yep, still there. By now, the full moon was up. It was quite bright outside, and he could see out the hen house door. Well, he thought, this whole thing was a waste of time, and besides, the cot was uncomfortable. He decided to spend the remainder of the night in the house, in his own bed. Before he could move, he sensed something just beyond the doorway. A second later, a shadow in the shape of a coyote's head appeared on the ground just outside the doorway. A moment later, the hairs on the back of Uncle Loren's neck stood up as the Coyote stepped into the hen house. As the coyote's eyes adjusted to the low interior light, Uncle Loren slowly and silently brought his shotgun into position. The coyote was just getting ready to snatch the nearest chicken. Just then, the old shotgun made a soft click. Oh no! The coyote was alerted! Too late! BLAM!! The huge blast tore a hole in the night silence. The chickens opened their eyes for a moment, saw that it was not light yet, and went back to sleep. The coyote lay dead, his head blown half away. Word must have been slow getting around the coyote community because about one month later, Mortimer had another encounter with a coyote. (See Mortimer's disguise) Meanwhile, eggs continued to mysteriously disappear............ |
| Unpublished work � 2002 Carl M. Fox |