31 Aug 2023 Hooded Merganser

 A RAVEN story from 2000

    Mikinaak Creek is the name of a major tributary of the South Fork of the Roseau River beginning in Section 21 and ending at its confluence with the Roseau River in Section 2. Mikinaak or Mickinock (as is on State and county maps) is an Ojibwe word for snapping turtle and was also the name of an Indigenous ‘Chief’ that lived near Wannaska and Roseau whose band was known to have camps in various places near Wannaska. 

    According to what I learned from my late Uncle Martin D. Davidson and Aunt Irene Palm Davidson, from whom I purchased this farm in 1971, Mikinaak’s band had a camp west of here about one hundred yards near where a wagon trail later passed along the bank of the creek. Within this vicinity on walks over the years I found an octagonal muzzle-loading pistol barrel. Martin found and collected quite an assortment of arrowheads when he first cleared the land; a collection later stolen from young Dean Davidson after he had taken it to school --without permission from his father -- for ‘Show and Tell.’ It wasn’t made clear whether that school was Palmville District 44 West School in Section 2 that Dean attended until the eighth grade, or whether it was in the higher grades at the  Roseau School for no one ever confessed to stealing it; something Dean felt bad about for years. However, if anyone wants to absolve themselves of the guilt they can certainly leave the collection with me, anonymously, by leaving it inside the outhouse up at the old school (still standing in 2023) and leaving the fluorescent ribbon I’ve put in there, tied to the outside lock.

     The Mikinaak is the source of memories for generations of Palmvillians, resident and non-resident alike. The Dakota and Ojibwe, among other tribes, were the first fish and hunt its banks, meadows, and seek medicines; bison drank from its waters as it was said someone discovered a bison skull and bones along the bank below the Palmville Cemetery according to the late Jack Davidson who grew up here on this farm and explored, fished, trapped and hunted, waded and swam its length.

    Beavers have dammed its flow for hundreds of years. During some preliminary excavation work done by a contractor employed by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Commission, we discovered a beaver damn nine feet below the surface.

    The raging wildfires during the dry years between 1896 and 1910 killed a lot of cedar, spruce, pine and tamarack forest land consuming vast tracts of land; river and creek banks too as depths of peat soil caught fire and burned down 4’-6’ in places. Who really knows what the land looked like before that time. The heavy rains that followed eroded the banks and hillsides dramatically altering the flowages of water. What isn’t evident from state and county roads today in Roseau County is how the elevations changed along the waterways, as in Palmville and Grimstad Townships, being quite high and steep in other places as large grassy meadows with trees along its high ground, lay resplendent and safe in the cooling fragrance of evening, or thick with millions of mosquitoes on warm summer eves layered in a bluish mist of fog. 

    In some of its shallows in pastures, the bank is nothing more than a pock-marked low spot its banks ripped and gouged by cow hooves plunged knee-deep into mud. Mosquito pupa lay wriggling in water-filled cow tracks that look like oblong puddles each reflecting the clouds in the sky or tree branches overhead as though mass-produced and carelessly flung, like watery coins, along the water’s edge, an oily-rainbow of pinks, purples and green in each. Fresh and not so fresh slathers of greenish-brown cow manure the size of a restaurant placemat indicate the direction that the leather jacketed gang of ruminants were heading when last seen amid the poplar trees and willow bushes on the higher banks. Oh, and flies go up your nose.  

    But I digress ...

    There haven’t been any beaver on the creek going on four years. Not everyone thinks as positively about beaver as Jerry Solom and I did. We tend to enjoy the habitat beavers provide as well as the higher water levels that entice pelicans, cormorants, eagles, peregrines, King Fishers, and hooded mergansers of which I recall Ula catching one on County Road 8 over near the Beito-McDonnell Memorial Bridge after it mistook the shiny wet sheen of the newly black-topped east-west road for the shiny wet sheen of the north-south Roseau River -- and temporarily lost, not only its consciousness, but also its global positioning migratory systems capability. 

Female Hooded Merganser and ducklings

    With the deftness of a Buzkashzi rider plucking the carcass of a dead goat from the ground at full gallop, the reins clenched firmly in his teeth, Ula leaned ‘way out from his open drivers door and scooped the dazed creature off the centerline with one hand; gripping the steering wheel with the other, his splayed toes hooked under the dash or so he said. 

    Afeared of the DNR, the all-knowing, all-natural arm of outdoor law enforcement, Ula prudently called the local wildlife manager upon his arrival home to see what he should do with a temporarily confused hooded-merganser as was his citizenry responsibility as a law-abiding township resident and former township board officer. Herein lies the recorded conversation:

    Ula: “‘ell-o? Excuse me, but I’m calling to find out what I should do with a temporarily confused hooded-merganser I found walking the center line of Roseau County Road 8, defying fate. Please advise.”
 

    Official: You ate a merganser? Buddy, that’s a federal offense. Your Social security number please ...”
    Ula: I didn’t eat a merganser. I caught a merganser tempting fate on County Road 8.”
 

    Official: “You caughta rattlesnake on County Road 8, eh. Has youse been drinkin? There ain’t no rattlesnakes up here in nordern Minnesoter.”
    Ula: Listen buster, I ain’t been drinkin’. I caught this here bird, see? I thought it was hurt, see? So’s I brought it home and I’m callin’ you to find out what I should do with it. Do you want me to“A:” Bring it to you, or “B:” Do you want to come and get it?” I thinks its a hooded merganser.”
 

    Official: “We can’t spend the taxpayers money running to hell and back after one lousy so-called hooded merganser. How do you know it’s a hooded merganser.”
    Ula: “Sven’s got a bird book and he looked it up.”
 

    Official: “He looked it up in the phone book?”
    Ula: “Good grief! Sven! Sven! The Fish, Fowl, and Beast Cops wanna talk to you!”
    Sven: “Geesus, again? I’ve paid my fine! I’ve been to court! Hullo? Who is dis?”
 

    Official: “I don’t have time to play games with you. Your buddy ‘Ula’ there says you have some illegal contraband. What’s this bird look like? How do you know its a merganser?”
    Sven: “It’s got two webbed feet with little claws on the toes, a sharp pointy bill and its kinda rust-colored --with wings.”
 

    Official: “Hmmm, sounds like a merganser. What’s it smell like?”
    Sven: “Whattaya mean, what does it smell like? You want me to smell it? Hold it to my nose? Do you think I’m an idiot? It smells like a wet duck for cryin’ out loud!”
    Official: “Do you think it can fly? Is it hurt?”
    Sven: “Dunno. We’ve put it in a box with a window screen on it.”
 

    Official: “Well, we won’t be spending any money on a merganser -- they’re a dime a dozen. Now if it was a Toucan or a Three-toed sloth we might make an exception. Or if it was a White Rhino .. You sure it ain’t a White Rhino? Cuz if it was a rare White Rhino I could finally drive the specially-equipped Toyota Land Cruiser with the Rhino lasso and rope attachment on it that’s been setting out here in the north quonset for nigh on ten years. Sure it ain’t a White Rhino?”
 

    Sven: “How did you get a Land Cruiser with a Rhino lasso and restraining system on it? Those are so cool! I saw one of those on Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom. It must be worth a fortune!”
 

    Official: “This is the one! Marlin used this very same one on that show! You remember that far back?”
     Sven: “Of course, I was just a kid an’ all, but tell me how did the DNR SWAT of the local outdoor law enforcement get their hands on it?”
 

    Official: “Do you remember the Elk Relocation Project near Grygla in the 1980s?”
    Sven: “So, no it’s not a White Rhino. It’s a bird.”
 

    Official: How about a California Condor? If it was a condor I could send our chain-mail, rip-stop aviary gloves we’ve got in the back room. We’d certainly drive up to Palmville for a California Condor.”
     Sven: “Nope, not a California Condor either. I’m just sure it’s a --”
 

    Official: “A Chinese Panda Bear? If it was a Chinese Panda Bear, we could finally use this barrel of bamboo shoots we have in storage for just such natural emergencies. Is it a Chinese Panda Bear?”
    Sven: NO, it isn’t a rattlesnake, a toucan, or a Three-toed sloth. It ain’t no White Rhino or a California Condor -- Or a Chinese Panda Bear! Good-goo-ga-mooga! It’s a hooded merganser What are we supposed to do with it?”
 

    Official: You could try letting it go, you know, opening the box and see if it can go on its way on its own. That’s what we’d do. Or if it was deemed injured and unable to fly, we’d euthanize it and use its wings for identification workshops and the like.
    Sven: “Just let it go? We can do that. Thanks. Goodbye.”

    Sven carried the box to the edge of the Mikinaak, opened the box -- and the merganser shot out of it, no worse for the experience.