As a boy growing up on the Fox River in Illinois my father taught me that all one needed to survive in the wild existed in plenty if one knew where to look.

There were mulberries, strawberries and raspberries, walnuts and butternuts. Wild asparagus was Growing there as was watercress, gooseberries and wild grapes.

Pheasant, duck and goose thrived aplenty as did rabbits and squirrels, turtles and of coarse frogs for that delicacy, frog legs.

Fish? I should say there were fish. Catfish, bass, bluegills and bullheads, as well as pike, carp and redhorse for fish patties. Oh yes, and we ate crawdad tails, it takes a lot of crawdad tails to make a meal but it was worth the labor because they were just like little fresh water lobsters.

And oh yes, there was wild honey for the taking.

One of the things we always enjoyed in the spring of the year were the morels, the most delicious mushroom in all the world.

The morel is, of all mushrooms, the easiest to identify due to its sponge like appearance.

Mama would fry up a big batch of morel mushrooms for supper along with some fried smallmouth bass crisped to a golden brown with a salad of wild greens spiced with watercress. That would be followed by a big wedge of whatever pie was in season, perhaps rhubarb with a honey glazed crust.

Now I want you to know, that was a meal to remember.

I told you all of that so I could tell you about the time I was gathering morels on one of the many small islands near our island home on the Fox River.

I was walking along through tall grass when I stepped over a log and landed right smack dab on a big old snake.

For a moment there I couldn’t breathe but that didn’t keep me from moving plenty fast. I should say I jumped backwards to the top of that log a lot faster than it takes to tell about it.

Snakes have never bothered me but coming on that big fellow the way I did and considering his size and all I must admit to some surprise and perhaps just a tad of fright ’cause that snake was heart stopping big.

After a few minutes when my breathing and my heart settled down I realized that the snake was a harmless bull snake but it was big, even for a bull snake and I guessed it to be all of ten feet long at the time.

Two things surprised me about that snake. One was that bull snakes were rarely seen on the islands preferring the high lands on the mainland and the other thing was that it hadn’t moved? Even with my rudely stepping on it the way I had the snake just lay there, not any movement other than a nervous little twitching of the tip of it’s tail.

And then I realized that the snake was dead.

But what had killed it?

What had happened in that quiet spot on that little island?

I could see that the snake had bled from several slight wounds, none serious enough to kill such a formidable adversary but then I looked closer at its head and there I saw the cause of its death.

Something had bitten through the snakes head, probably piercing the brain.

I carefully glanced over the battle ground. That a battle had taken place was evident by the crushed grass and there, in a small spot of black earth, just as sure as if the animal had signed its name was a single, small footprint. It was then that I noticed something else, a pungent musky odor, unmistakable to anyone who has smelled it once, mink!

From what I could see the mink had approached the log from the small end. It had leaped to the log and loped its length as it had probably done many times in the past for mink are creatures of habit, routinely retracing their tracks every few days.

That day a surprise awaited the mink for when it leaped off the log it probably landed on top of that old bull snake just as I had, surprising the both of them.

Reading the sign it was obvious the snake had thrown three coils of its powerful body around the mink but the mink, desperate, fighting for its life, had lunged, carrying the two of them rolling across a large anthill which had been crushed in the struggle.

Hundreds of carpenter ants were frantically working to repair the damage but there, still quite obvious and easy to read were the three grooves made by the snake’s body.

This was an unequal struggle, sure to end in the mink serving as a meal except for one thing, the mink was a scrapper and not about to say quit.

Lunging, fighting for its life, the mink had obviously, with waning strength, bitten the snake’s head, piercing the reptile’s brain.

Dead snake, live mink, such is the way of nature.

I laid the snake alongside the log and made a mark where its tail and its head were so that I could return and have an accurate measurement as to the snake’s size.
When I returned the next day the snake was gone, probably dragged off by a scavenging possum but I was surprised when I measured the distance between those two marks on the log. Eight feet nine inches, more than twice as long as I was tall at eleven years of age.

The crushed anthill was entirely repaired, all that was left were my memories, I have them yet.

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