Vison, the Mink (American Woodland Tales)

by Jean Craighead George

  In a well-protected den under the rocks of Buck’s Creek, Vison’s son was born. At the breast of a mother mink squirmed the spirited offspring of the woodland outlaw, a son with the temperament of the warrior of the Potomac. Of this Vison knew nothing. Nor did he care. He was watching a sunfish on the bottom of Muddy Branch. He slipped into the cold water and swept down on his prey.

  The activities of the spring night kept Vison hunting late. The dawn was filled with color when he started back along the waterway to his stump hideout. Passing over the roots of an elm tree, he leapt to the sand bar beyond. The bar was narrow and surrounded on one side by a steep bank and the high roots of the elm. As he landed on the bar, Urocyon, the gray fox, turned and faced the mink. The meeting took both by surprise. Both flashed into action. The nearest retreat that Vison could reach was the stream. He splashed through the shallows at the end of the bar and dived into a deep pool. The fox, traveling more swiftly than Vison, had almost closed the gap between them as Vison disappeared in the water.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  SLOW CHANGES CONTINUED along the Potomac River during Vison’s life. Houses appeared on the hills and cliffs. Fields were fenced with white rails, and horses pounded the sod. The old canal was made into a park, and on Sundays and holidays it was noisy with the chunk of paddles and the lilting laugh of human voices. Hunters filled the woods in fall, and fishermen speckled the river in June and July.

  The disappearance of the wildlife was gradual. The fishermen came in from the water with fewer fish on their stringers, and the hunters’ game bags were not so full.

  Vison held to his range. The little valley carved by Muddy Branch was still wild. It provided refuge for squirrels and rabbits, ’coons, and foxes. The muskrat pond, carefully maintained by old Will Stacks, was always a good hunting ground. But silt washing down from the eroding farms in the uplands was gradually filling the pond, slowing up the stream and driving out the fish. Muddy Branch was becoming muddy.

  Vison was in the prime of his years, a beautiful animal who would have thrilled anyone sensitive to grace and aliveness. He was rightfully feared by the woodland dwellers, for he was a carnivore and he led his way of life well. He was keen, efficient, and powerful. He was bold and fearless, meeting his enemies as well as his prey without quarter.

  He lived as a menace to the weak and slow of Muddy Branch, and as a measuring rod for the best of each species. Those who did not fall under his flashing attack, carried on to produce better progeny along the stream bed. The men of the river were also benefited by the woodland outlaw. If he came to their homes, the rats and vermin they considered pests disappeared.

  One night in spring, Vison was hunting along the canal bed. The night was full of frog songs. He searched the moist strip of land bordering the water where the reeds and grasses grew. He heard the frogs stop piping as he passed, and saw the wings of the night heron bow as the bird lifted itself into the air at his approach. His light bound was tiring this night. Only his hunger kept him from slowing his pace. Vison now had passed the peak of his years.

  The six winters that had come and gone since Vison had taken up his life along the stream had wrinkled and bent Sam, the old Negro of Red Sand Hill. He stayed in his gray room with the multi-colored chairs, longer and longer each day. He still went down to the river to fish in the warm summer sunlight and was often seen hunting in the autumn, but his shot was never so sure, and his stringer of fish not so long. One summer Sam took up gardening. He turned over the loam on the south side of his hill and planted vegetables, corn, and a small border of flowers. These he tended with constant care, delighted that the things he had planted could grow and bloom.

  Stacks came by his house one June morning when Sam was carefully pulling weeds away from the onion shoots. He chatted with his neighbor. Later he told Al that Sam was getting along in years. Al agreed that he was rolling up the seasons. They brought him fish from the river and game from the woodlands. A man could not let his neighbor be hungry just because he could no longer hold a gun steady or pull a rod at exactly the right time.

  Occasionally Sam saw Vison. He never found his den again, but he would meet him along the river now and then. Once he came across him digging turtle eggs from the bank of the canal. Sometimes he would see him leisurely swimming the pools of the stream. Sam still admired the great Vison for the traits he possessed and the agility he exhibited. Reading his own guilty thoughts into the little animal’s head, he was certain that Vison had lost all respect for him since the day he showed Will Stacks his foot-log den. One morning when he saw the outlaw bounce off through the wildflowers to disappear in the stream, he ran after him a few steps calling:

  “I’m sorry, old Vison. I’m sorrv!” He turned away when the water closed over the sleek body. He again put his thoughts into Vison’s actions. The mink was angry with him for his wickedness. Their friendship could never be repaired. He had forgotten that Vison was older and wiser, and that he could now escape the eyes of the old Negro as easily as he did those of Bubo. And Sam had grown older. Sometimes the mink he called to was not Vison, but his son, the male of Buck’s Creek. Like his father, he was a strong and alert mink. There was a time when Sam did know Vison. The characteristics that made him different from others of his kind were as recognizable to the man as differences in men. Now he was too old to detect the fine gradation—and all mink became Vison to Sam.

  One evening he was hoeing his garden late. He saw an animal move swiftly down the rows of tomato plants. He thought it was a rat and leaned down to pick up a stone to throw. He saw the furry tail. Sam stood perfectly still and squeaked through his tightly pressed lips. Vison stopped and turned. Quickly he bounded toward the man. Right up to old Sam he came, and once more mink and man looked at each other. Vison smelled Sam. He did not run, but stood on his hind feet, cocked his head to one side, and looked him over carefully. A moment later he turned and disappeared into a tangle of blackberries at the edge of the garden.

  That night Vison cleaned out the rodents from Sam’s woodpile. He went back to his stream at dawn. As he came to his den in a log on the bank of the creek, a wincing pain shot through his leg muscles. Vison slowed down as he entered his retreat.

  After a heavy July rainstorm, Vison made an overland trip to Buck’s Creek. Coming down to the water he found the mud castle of a crayfish and dug into the earth to find it. He lifted his head to watch for prowlers. The scent of mink was on the wind. Vison abandoned his hunt and rose to his feet. Through the lush foliage of the little stream valley he saw the male of Buck’s Creek. The strong youthful body of the male was wet and glistening. The fur was ruffed at the neck where he had shaken off the water. He moved with flowing movements from roots to stones. Vison sensed the power and vigor of the young animal. The outlaw of Muddy Branch turned away and slipped softly into a garden of jewel weed. He sprang up the hill of the stream valley and went back to his own domain. It was the first time in his life that he had turned away. For many nights he fished his waters alone.

  It was almost midnight when Vison took his trail to the pond where the muskrats lived. A westerly wind was blowing good weather across the Maryland countryside. Running, diving, and swimming, the mink came up the bed of the stream to the open pond. He scented the musky smell of the water rodents as they gnawed at the pond plants in the dark. Vison slipped into the water to stalk a male muskrat. The big vole did not see the mink until he was upon him. Certain that he had his victim, Vison moved in closer. Like a snake he wove within striking distance. The muskrat made a frightened attempt to escape, but the tight screen of cattails checked him. Terrified he leapt at his enemy, desperately trying to save himself.

  Vison saw that the muskrat was going to leap. He knew that he should make the fatal stab, but his body did not respond. Instead of striking an instant before the other animal, he leapt simultaneously. Vison did not connect with the animal’s neck, but closed his jaws harmlessly on his shoulder. The force of the muskrat’s attack tore him free
of his enemy and he crashed to safety in the underwater maze of pondweed. To Vison this was defeat. He turned to the land and denned for the night.

  The next few nights he gave all his energy to his hunting. It took an entire night to satisfy his hunger. More and more it was taking all his time to keep himself fed.

  The mice on which Vison lived had built up great numbers during the past few years. Now they had disappeared abruptly. Whereas, formerly he could always get a mouse meal, he now had to turn to other food. Bubo and Vulpes were also looking for available prey. Vison was vulnerable. He hunted longer hours and was not so wary. Bubo saw him occasionally as he moved through the brush. Vulpes could move closer upon him as he fished the streams.

  The first snow of this winter came during the night. Softly it slipped through the trees and onto the dry leaves and grasses. Vison was fishing when the white flakes dropped around his head and vanished on the water. A deep silence came upon the forest, the snow fell faster and faster. The grand monarch looked up from time to time to see the earth grow lighter and the limbs become white against the black forest glades. He frisked from his fishing stone and bounced out into the woods, running and sliding on the spotless white floor. As he passed the roots of a beech tree, he stopped and went back, sniffing curiously. The scent of mink had caught his attention. He knew the smell. It was the male of Buck’s Creek.

  All night Vison watched for the young mink, at the muskrat pond, along his stream, across his fields, but the invader did not appear. It was a colorless dawn. Snow clouds hung low in the sky and the forest was gray with falling flakes. Vison ceased his prowling for the night and hurried toward his den. He heard a flock of geese crying overhead. They were circling uncertainly in the bank of clouds. When they had passed he still listened, for over their melodious cry he had heard another sound—the leaping stride of the young mink.

  The mink of Buck’s Creek moved toward the pond with arching bounds, the snow pressed into tracks beneath his feet. He twisted through the broken grasses and stopped. Waiting for him was Vison, the Mink. The young male smelled the old monarch, crouched to the ground, and waited for him to attack.

  The outlaw watched the young male with beady eyes. He saw the sinewy muscles draw tight under the glistening fur. He smelled the strong scent emitted from his anal glands. He turned away from him and continued his lope to his den.

  The young son did not move. He kept his attention on the graceful form. When Vison had gone, he chose an old log for a den and fell asleep for the day. From time to time he awoke, and with his head on his tail and his eyes open, listened to the soft noises in the snow-filled world. At dusk he came out and searched with his sensitive nose for the great mink of Muddy Branch.

  Vison was up at the muskrat pond. The water was still open and it lay black and lustrous between the white hills. The dark branches of the pines twisted across the smooth curve of the hill like jagged pencil lines. The young mink followed Vison to the muskrat pond and fished among the dormant roots of the lily pads. Vison swam out to him, enjoying the cold rush of water under his chin and the vigorous snap of the winter air. The great mink rolled smoothly through the water.

  The young male was on guard as Vison approached him. However, with an easy turn, Vison dived, went under the water without a stir and emerged with a fish in his mouth. A few minutes later he went down again and came up with another. The young male admired his nimbleness and timing. He, too, then searched for fish among the tangled debris of the pond’s bottom. He didn’t know the pond as well and it was not until the third dive that he came up with a fish.

  All night the two hunted, the young mink learning the secrets of the woods from the old expert. He saw how Vison moved across the trails of mice, then quickly selected the one that led to the quarry. He saw him stop a wild hound with a curdling screech and then slip to safety in the waters. He also noted the old monarch’s knack of timing his leap to the right instant.

  For months the two mink met by night and hunted the canal, the river, the stream, and the pond. On cold nights when the wind was still and the ice snapped as it formed across the creeks, they would run and slide through the dark woods.

  Though the young male learned much from Vison, he had not yet matched the great talents of the old master. He was never so sure of the sounds of the woods, the roost of Bubo, the habits of the muskrats. He denned when the wild hound picked up his trail. He was cautious when he approached the homes of the men of the river. Above all, he could not relax with this great hunter.

  It was a cold moonlit night when Vison betrayed himself to the young mink of Buck’s Creek. He was leading him to the river. Coming to the canal, he crossed the ice with the lightness of thistledown. As he raced up the far bank, however, he faltered. The old monarch climbed slowly to the tow-path. The young male passed him in a spurt of confidence. Vison saw him dash by with inspired vigor and rush agilely through the maze of blackberry and greenbriar.

  Vison would not be second. Ignoring the pains in his body, he plunged down the hill after his son. He covered the low ground to the river in buckling leaps, and angrily closed on the youngster. The male of Buck’s Creek turned at the hissing and wrathful odor of the old male. He saw his bared teeth, and burning eyes. He slipped to one side and let Vison pass; then curved over the rocks and crossed the ice to the nearest island.

  Vison watched him move away. He was still leader. He could tolerate the young male only as long as he himself was first. The outlaw went through a hole in the ice and fished among the rocks in the weaving waters.

  The winter passed. Vison and the young male had not met for many months. One night the old monarch was down at his fishing pool in Muddy Branch. He was not hungry and was playing over the roots of the trees, when he saw the dark bulk of the young male swimming through the glaucous depths. He, like the leaves and the stones, was distorted and strange. His feet paddled like wavering fish, and his lithe body stretched and wove out of shape. Vison watched him blur down toward the still fish at the pool’s bottom. He could see the bubbles rise to the surface.

  A screech owl called plaintively from a distant tree. A hound cried, its wavering howl moving across the hills. Vison tightened his toned muscles and watched the water. He saw a bass rise from the depths, suck down an insect with a smack, and swirl to the bottom. The circle from the rise spread out and swept down the stream.

  Vison cut the water in a smooth dive, and surfaced to swim up the stream to meet the young mink. He sped through the shallows in splashing bounds. Dauntless, and without fear, Vison raced to his last battle.

  A Biography of Jean Craighead George

  Born in Washington, DC, on July 2, 1919, Jean Craighead George loved nature from an early age. Her parents, aunts, and uncles, all naturalists, encouraged her interest in the world around her, and she has drawn from that passion in her more than one hundred books for children and young adults.

  In the 1940s, after graduating from Pennsylvania State University with degrees in science and literature, George joined the White House Press Corps. She married John Lothar George in 1944 and moved to Michigan, where John was attending graduate school. Her husband shared her love of nature, and they lived for a time in a tent in the forest. They began to write novels together, with Jean providing illustrations. Their first novel, Vulpes, the Red Fox, was published in 1948.

  Following the birth of their first child, the Georges relocated to New York, living first in Poughkeepsie, then in Chappaqua. The family welcomed wild animals into their backyard, to stay for as long as they wished, but the creatures always remained free to return to the wild. Many of these temporary pets became characters in the stories George wrote with her husband.

  After winning the Aurianne Award, the American Library Association’s prize for outstanding nature writing, for Dipper of Copper Creek (1956), George began to write on her own, at first continuing to illustrate the books herself. She won a Newbery Honor for her third novel, My Side of the Mountain (1959), which tells the stor
y of Sam Gribley, a young boy who runs away from home in New York City to live in the Catskill Mountains in Delaware County, New York. The book was adapted into a film by the same name in 1969.

  In 1963, divorced from her husband, George and her three children, Twig, Craig, and Luke, began to travel around the country, visiting parks and preserves to learn about the plants and animals that thrived there. These experiences were the inspiration for many of George’s novels, including what is perhaps her best-known work, Julie of the Wolves (1972).

  In the summer of 1970, George and her youngest son, Luke, visited the Naval Arctic Research Laboratory near Barrow, Alaska, one of the northernmost cities in the world. In preparation for a Reader’s Digest article, George studied the wolves living on the tundra nearby, learning about the animals’ social structures and intricate methods of communicating through sound, sight, posture, and scent. One day, George saw a very young girl crossing the tundra alone. The image remained with her as she began to write Julie of the Wolves, the story of an Inuit girl who escapes her abusive husband and survives in the wild by joining a wolf pack.

  Julie of the Wolves was awarded the Newbery Medal in 1973. The book was a finalist for the National Book Award, and it was selected by the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) as one of the ten best American children’s books of the previous two centuries. A film adaptation was released in 1987, and George later wrote two sequels about her Eskimo heroine, Julie (1994) and Julie’s Wolf Pack (1997), and shorter illustrated stories about the wolves, Nutik, the Wolf Pup (2001) and Nutik and Amaroq Play Ball (2001).