Fifty Years a Hunter and Trapper: Autobiography, experiences and observations of Eldred Nathaniel Woodcock during his fifty years of hunting and trapping.Woodcock, E. N. (Eldred Nathaniel)
General
Fifty Years a Hunter and Trapper: Autobiography, experiences and observations of Eldred Nathaniel Woodcock during his fifty years of hunting and trapping.
Woodcock, E. N. (Eldred Nathaniel)
Hunting; Trapping
Smoky said, "Alright, but we will not get a darn thing while we are
gone if we go on Friday unless we get drowned, and there will have to
be more water in the creek than there is now or we won't get that
much."
I had already made application to the State Tourist Commissioner for
a permit to camp on state lands. It may be well to state here for the
benefit of those who wish to so camp in this state (Pennsylvania) that
the authorities will not give a permit to camp for a longer time than
14 days. In my case they were very obliging and made out the papers
for several applicants of 14 days each, so that it would only have
been necessary to have signed one of the applications and send it on
a few days before the previous application had expired.
[Illustration: WOODCOCK FISHING ON THE SINNAMAHONING.]
We were all ready to start Friday morning. Our route lay over the
mountains a distance of about 20 miles from the head waters of the
Allegheny to the head water of the west branch of the Susquehana
waters, known as the East Fork of the Sinnamahoning. We pitched our
tent just at the point where the Buffalo and Susquehana Railroad
begins to cross the divide, known as the Hogback, by means of several
switch backs. It is a splendid sight to see two or three trains
working their way up the mountain's side on a clear, frosty morning,
when the steam and smoke show so plain.
We did not get the tent in good shape for the first night, nor did we
get our bunk up, owing to its being so late when we got to our
camping ground. The first night in camp we had a sharp frost and in
the morning Smoky Jim's fever for camping had dropped fully one-half.
He complained that any one that would go into such a country to camp
should be reported for trespassing on the rights of the porcupine.
It took until the third day to get our camp in good shape. We built a
skeleton frame of small poles all over the tent, leaving a space of
about 18 inches between tent and frame, and thatched it good with
hemlock boughs. While we were working at the camp we had our bee bait
out, and the second day after we put out the bait no bees came to it.
Smoky laughed at me and said that a honey bee was too intelligent to
stop in a place like that, but Smoky was wrong. The next morning
after the sun had got well above the top of the hills, so as to warm
up things down in the valley, I heated a large stone quite hot and
burned some honey comb on it. It was not long before Smoky called out
to me and said that there was one fool of a bee. It was not long
before we had bees a-plenty. We paid no attention to them farther
than to keep plenty of bait out for them. Every bee hunter knows how
much steadier a bee flies after they have the bait well located.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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