It was a dark and stormy night. Okay, maybe it wasn't stormy but it was dark and pretty windy. Nothing my hunting partners and our well seasoned coon dogs hadn't hunted in many times before.

My friends Bruce Ordway, Gordy Gall and myself had gathered at Gordy's place in central Minnesota for another night of coon–hunting. We had hunted together many times before and I suppose between the three of us we had about fifty years of coonhunting experience. We all had seen our share of strange things happen in the woods but anybody who has been coonhunting more than a couples times knows you can never be sure what will happen after you cut the dogs loose. This night would be no exception. Here is what happened.

The dogs we were hunting were Grand Nite Champion Gall's Treeing Bud, Nite Champion Ordway's Bud and Grand Nite Champion Minnesota's Sonny Horn. We turned the dogs loose about a quarter mile north of Gordy's place into a regular old section of woods. It wasn't too long before they struck and treed a coon so we went to them. After leashing the dogs and looking at the coon, we decided to turn loose from there as we were in the middle of a pretty big section of woods. Now, there isn't an overabundance of coon in this area so a dog really has to cover some ground to find a coon to run. So, after half an hour when we still hadn't heard the dogs we weren't concerned. As I said at the beginning of this story it was very windy so we guessed the dogs might be treed but out of our hearing range. After another half an hour,Gordy's dog Bud checked in so we leashed him up and decided to go get our radio tracking equipment and find the other dogs.

It didn't take long to find what direction they were in but we were a little surprised at how far they seemed to be. We all jumped in Gordy's truck and headed their way. After driving a couples miles we finally located the dogs. They sounded like they were treed a few hundred yards into a pastured woods. Now this was a spot we never hunt so we weren't aware of what lay ahead of us, but the dogs were barking like they normally would so we just proceeded to the tree like normal. We never shoot the coons up at Gordy's so we didn't take a gun with. After walking a ways we could see the woods open up where the dogs were and then we realized they weren't treed. Instead, they had a coon bayed up on the edge of a small stock pond. Here is where things really started to happen.

We quickened our pace as we tried to assess the situation. As I previously said, we all had seen our dogs in many battles before, but when there is water involved it obviously can be much more dangerous. I know Sonny Horn had been in countless battles and actually been under water at least four times that I knew of. It is something we always try to avoid but that can be hard to do in the "Land of 10,000 Lakes" (and thousands of swamps). As we got closer to the dogs, Bruce anticipated trouble and dropped back to grab a big stick, so he and Gordy were a few steps behind me. The dogs and coon were on the inside point of this somewhat kidney–shaped pond with the dogs on the bank about two feet above the coon, which was about two feet away from the bank out in the water.

I didn't see many options on how to handle them so I decided to swoop in and grab them real quick before they got too brave. I was able to latch onto Sonny Horn but just missed Bruce's dog Bud. Most dogs become a little braver when their handlers get near and that is just what happened here. Bud jumped on that coon and the fight was on.

The battle quickly moved to the middle of the pond and from the start it seemed like this coon knew what he was doing. They would tangle for a bit, then separate, but the coon didn't try to get away. He would just lay there, floating on his back, waiting for the hound to make a move. It wasn't long and I could see Bud was in trouble. At the risk of having two dogs in trouble instead of one, I decided to turn Sonny loose as I felt this was Bud's only chance. Sonny was a strong swimmer and got to the action in no time, but when he kept swimming right on past Bud and the coon I couldn't believe it. He had never shied away from a coon under any circumstance so I couldn't explain why he didn't join the fracas. Maybe our lights blinded him.

By now Bud and the coon had moved back closer to shore. You couldn't tell what was coon and what was dog as they thrashed
and rolled around, now spending more time under water than above. Something had to be done. Knowing his dog would die if he didn't get help immediately, Bruce charged into the pond swinging his stick. He only took about three steps when he plunged into neck deep water. None of us suspected this pond would be that deep. So now Bruce was almost in danger of drowning and sure couldn't help his dog. This is where Gordy came in. Let me say something about Gordy. He is one of those guys you would like to have by your side if you had to walk down some dark alleys. So it didn't surprise me when, even though he can't swim, he jumped out into the pond and started grabbing fur. He didn't know if he had the coon or the dog, he just got a hold on something and was trying to drag them onto shore. By now Bruce had gotten himself out and came around and dragged Gordy and the now limp and lifeless Bud onto the bank. But the action wasn't over. At one point during all this I had run to the other side of the pond so I was too far away to help. I got back to their side just in time to see Sonny Horn come swimming over right towards the coon which had let go of Bud while being dragged to shore. The coon just layed there on his back, front paws held out ready to grab whatever grabbed him. Like I said earlier, this coon seemed to know what he was doing. Well, sure enough, Sonny swam right into that coon and now they were locked up rolling around in the water. Before anybody could say anything, Gordy jumped back in and grabbed Sonny by a hind log. Sonny was pulling Gordy out but Bruce grabbed Gordy again and we all kind of pulled each other up on shore. If Gordy hadn't gotten to them so fast I don't know what we would have done.

We quickly turned our attention to Bud. After a few seconds of stunned silence, I decided to try something. I held Bud up-side down to see if any water would drain out. Maybe not the smartest thing in the world to do but I didn't have any experience with drowned dogs. No water came out so I figured he's got to get some air. I don't have any formal training in CPR but that didn't stop me from trying.

I brushed some of the mud off his face, clamped my hands around his jowls, put my mouth over his nose and blew. Then I pumped his chest a couple of times and blew into his nose again. After the second or third breath I could feel him gasp, so we pumped his chest again and after a couple of more breaths he started breathing on his own. We sat there awhile until Bud came around. He was in pretty rough shape for a few days but in a couple weeks he was back to treeing coon.

There is nothing like coonhunting and the great outdoors for excitement.

You can't get that kind of adventure in a video game.