Whether we live in the country, or in the city, the critters we share life with are not far from our doorsteps. Often that’s a happy thing. We enjoy the fascination that animals provide, and many of us go all out to assure that we have animals with us. I had a little dog several years ago who was a particular delight. When we would come in home from the grocery, he would carry on a celebration, like our coming in home was just the happiest, greatest thing! He would come greet us, then he would run all the way to the far end of the house, and here he came at top speed to surprise and greet us again. Then he would do it all over again, just in case we didn’t get the idea the first time. We called him Winchester, from the ’70s song “Winchester Cathedral.”

But Winchester learned to climb chain-link fences.

When we lived in Searcy, I would come home and find him in the neighbor’s lawn. I would speak to him sternly, telling him he shouldn’t have climbed that fence. He would come to me all low and humble, saying “I’m sorry, I won’t ever do it again!” I would reach over and bring him home, and the next time he would do it again. I had to build a special pen.

Growing up on the farm, we had critters all around, tame ones, wild ones, thefriendly partner ones, the nuisance ones and the downright mean enemy ones. Most of our cows on the farm were pets when we kids were growing up.

Many of them would come to us to have their heads rubbed and petted. I didn’t ever learn all of the moo language, but you can get some of it. For example, when a cow bawls, full out, with an anxious tone, it usually means she can’t find her calf or that she is missing the other cows she is supposed to be with. A regular moo may be just a remark about how nice the day is. Then there is the low “murr..” a little like a groan, that means the mama cow is comforting her baby calf and telling the little one she is the prettiest calf in the whole herd.

Chickens don’t seem to be as smart as cows, but they have their ways of telling you what is going on. When you go into the henhouse and the old hens are singing and clucking, it means that life is hunkie dorrie. But if you hear squawking and screeching, it is an alarm going off.

There may be a fox or a coyote in the henhouse, or a black snake has come to have an egg for supper. It isinteresting, too, how chickens react when a hawk flies over. They scurry for cover to hide from the threat from the skies, hoping the old predator won’t see them or hear them.

I didn’t used to think of squirrels as smart. When I was young, the squirrels mostly stayed in the woods, collected nuts and chattered in the trees as we walked under. In our later years, now, we live in town and my wife likes to feed the birds. When you feed the birds, it is like calling the squirrels to dessert.

Most birds love black sunflower seed, and squirrels do too. In fact, the squirrels will go to great lengths to dine at your bird feeders. I have seen squirrels hang by a back leg, holding on with one toenail, head down, dining on sunflower seeds from the bird feeder. They usually can figure out a way to get through whatever barrier you set up to keep them away. The only bird feeder I have seen that can beat a squirrel is one that closes off all openings when the squirrel’s weight bears down.

We had a variety of birds around the farmstead and the fields.

The sparrows seemed like pests because they roosted in the rafters of the barn, over the hay, and we thought they shouldn’t oughta do that. We were always pleased to see meadow larks, bluebirdsand redbirds, wrens and finches and yellow canaries. When I was a little boy, I remember how things got stirred up if a flock of crows came visiting our cornfield. My dad, who was an uncommonly calm man, got right agitated when the crows were in the corn. He would get out the shotgun and fire a blast over the field to run them off. I never saw him shoot them, he just made a big noise to scare them.

The hayfields were a place for all kinds of insects and critters. A grasshopper is an interesting thing, and not bad to have around if he doesn’t bring a million friends with him. In hordes, the grasshoppers become public enemy number one. We always had lots of butterflies, honey bees, a bumblebee here and there, crickets and beetles, lizards and salamanders, thousandlegs and earthworms. We tended to think of earthworms as fishing worms, good bait for fishing in Otter Creek, but not as good as crawdad tails. It was later that I learned how important the earthworms are for soil building.

◊◊◊

Jerry Nichols, a native of Pea Ridge, is a retired Methodist minister with a passion for history. He is vice president of the Pea Ridge Historical Society. He can be contacted by e-mail at [email protected], or call 621-1621.

Community, Pages 5 on 04/21/2010