This is the cat

We got a new cat in Canada. It disappeared after a couple of weeks. We plastered missing cat posters all over. Then I heard a woman calling out to the boat. This is the cat, she shouted.

It turned out to be a different cat. But I couldn't say for sure, since our cat had been missing for two weeks already. I thought she might have changed.

Nina found our cat the next day. Now we had two cats. They were almost identical, a siamese mix of some sort.

We entered Hudson River in the autumn. The trees were all ablaze. I had really radiant dreams. 

But the hunting season had started and we could hear what sounded like regular shootouts at dusk. These guys were serious, with camouflage painted faces.

I was about to take the cat ashore. The cat was at the bow, hesitating. From the dinghy I could see her puffy upper lip and I suddenly got a vague thought about John Malkovitch. I might have been worried about the hunting militia. We hardly saw any wildlife but I felt unsafe in the ongoing war against ducks and deers. 

So I rowed slowly ashore, kind of reluctant. I had promised to take better pictures of the cat. Just in case she disappeared again.

Anger in its nature

I'm wondering why people living close to wildlife often develop anger towards certain animals. During our prolonged stay in Canada I've heard people bad-mouthing wolves, coyotes, foxes, snakes, gray jays, crows, ravens, rabbits, mice, pack rats, squirrels, porcupines, skunks, bears and eagles.

Sometimes the anger spills over to nature itself, as some kind of evil that has to be beaten down. It's a constant battle. There's too much of everything.

I know this attitude from Norway - and it's still going on, even though the wilderness is long gone.

Bad dog

 

We drove into the woods. We had arranged a meeting with an elderly couple, living on a buffalo farm.

They had several hash brown dogs that obviously weren't used to strangers. In the barking and general commotion it broke out a fight between two of them.

The biggest dog had the smallest by the throat, shaking it like a rat. It wouldn't let go even though I pulled by the hind legs. The owners decided that this was it and went for the gun. 

We drove off with the bad dog chasing. The couple talked each other up to go through with the plan, even though the whole thing seemed more on the spur of the moment. I kept looking out the rear window. It was kind of strange to see a dog running to its own execution, but the dog was mean and I guess he had it coming. 

The couple disagreed about where to do it. Finally he just stopped the car, rolled down the window and grabbed the rifle. She suggested that he better step out. Shooting from inside the car would surely burst our eardrums.

I couldn't really see anything from where I was sitting. The rifle sounded flat and sharp. He came back and we took off. He was still agitated, red-faced. After a while she said it was stupid to leave the dog where we left it. Sooner or later some hunters would pass by, and wonder.

 

We took the dog by the legs and started swinging. We threw it down a slope on the count of three, leaving a trail of blood in the snow.

Back in the cabin they kept talking about the dog. I guess they needed to justify the killing. We where standing on the newly painted floor when I noticed a speck of blood between us. It was kind of strange because it wasn't smeared out by the shoes. We started to look up towards the ceiling. Did it drop from somewhere? We never found out.

The buffaloes

Suddenly I heard Nina shout: "Hey, where have you been?" I had no idea. I was walking around with a heavy buffalo head, not really sure where to put it.

Hangover

I decided to take a walk to clear my head. There's a path that leads deep into the forest. I was okay for awhile, but then felt more nervous. I suddenly started to think about the devil.

I really don't believe in the existence of any kind of manifested evil. Still, what's nonexistent has a major part in anxiety. It might even be the main ingredient.

So I thought a lot about the devil and met this black dog, with his head enclouded in heavy breat- hing. This may be the place to mention that I'm more of a cat person.

The fear of enthusiasm

I silently dislike Nina's enthusiasm when sailing offshore. Sure, I love dolphins or a good breeze, but I would never dare to say so.

It's my belief that enthusiasm brings bad luck. Forget about umbrellas, whistling or leaving on a Friday; outspoken enthusiasm could really sink a boat.

I never had this superstition while we stayed the winter at Tapawingo. We saw a black bear not more than ten meters from our cabin door, and my enthusiasm had no limits.


But the fear of enthusiasm runs deep in the Canadian wild. Our story about the bear got played down, like "so you got to see the forest pig, aye?"

This was typical among the trappers and fishermen at Bistcho Lake; they loved wild animals, but would never dare to say so. Black bears were often called 'forest pigs', squirrels 'tree rats', and once we heard a trapper call a flock of snowy-white ptarmigans for a 'bunch of ducks'. But the lack of enthusiasm didn't seem to be for superstitious reasons.

In the wilderness you'll gain your respect through nonchalance and coolness. You have seen it all before.

The killing of wolves

There're few animals as mythical as wolves. They're the top predator in the boreal forest: intelligent, strong, fast and even organized. A pack of wolves are an efficient killing machine. That's what they do for a living. This means they compete with humans, who kill for fun -mostly- and who have to go further and further before seeing an elk, a moose or a dear.

But also wolves can kill for fun. It's been known that they sometimes go on a killing spree among sheep. There's been offered a biological explanation for this behavior: the killing of sheep doesn't wear out the wolves. A modern sheep is so cross-bred that it can't run fast. It's just meat and wool. This kind of live-stock is a piece of cake for the wolves, and there's probably nothing to the kill that trigger the wolves to stop. This makes the farmers bring out their guns.

The wolves always seem to stirr up emotions and controversy. At least in those countries where they're still around. What we often see is a polarized discussion between rural and urban areas; between the working class and the middle class; between those who see the wolves and those who wish to see them.

It's a discussion that goes way back. The wolves even play the role as a scapegoat in a much deeper conflict -i.e. the centralization of power and the historical mischief of rural areas.

But in Norway the farmers have won (joined by the hunters). The last two-three decades we've had one pack of wolves in Norway. That was the compromise with the government. Around six wolves, that is. Apparently this number was too high; not one wolf will be allowed in Norway anymore, not on a permanent basis.

In Canada they still have some understanding of the wilderness. There is no lack of wolves either. The province of Alberta -almost twice as big as Norway- has around 3500-4000 wolves. When we stayed at Tapawingo, in the NW corner of Alberta, we often saw fresh wolf tracks in the snow. Occasionally we heard them howl. But we hardly ever saw them. The wolves were extremely shy. They avoided humans as the plague.

To actually see a wolf, in the wild, is a privilege that keeps lingering in your brain, in your very soul, for a long time. In that respect I would claim that wolves not only kill, they also gives our lives depth and meaning; they give life, so to speak.

Cruising with a cat

We had two cats in Bika while living a year in Norway, before leaving for the circumnavigation. It was okay while being moored at the jetty, where the cats could come and go as they pleased. One of them even managed to catch fish and brought them proudly back to Bika. But these cats were too old to understand the concept of sailing. We had to find them another home, before leaving Norway.

We missed the cats. We started to think about a new one when passing the animal shelter in La Coruna, Spain. The vets didn’t help the cats before a new owner came along. Our coming cat, which Nina had already named Luna (even though I was still only considering a cat), was suffering from flees and worms. I better do my considering a little bit faster. I guess cats and women know their way around men.


Luna started off great, she was healthy and happy, but after some months she got moody. She seemed bored. She loved to come along in the dingy and visit other boats, but it was difficult to find a good spot to land her, and then suddenly it was too late; Luna developed a fear of being ashore.

Flying fish was her favourite food and leisure. They landed on the boat in great numbers, especially among the Cape Verde islands and across the Atlantic. Luna would hear the fish flapping, and rush to the spot.

One night in the Atlantic, it was windy and no moon, an irregular wave suddenly heeled Bika over, while Luna was on her way forward. She slipped. Luna had the harness on, as always, and we dragged her in. But the harness failed just the second before Nina was about to grab the drenched little cat. We could hear Luna meow in the dark, the sound disappeared rapidly in Bika’s wake.

We had to take down the spinnaker pole and the boom preventer, and bring Bika around to start tacking back, counting seconds on every leg. We brought out our strong halogen lamp, hoping for a reflection of Luna's eyes.

After a couple of hours we gave up. The sea was rough, and it wouldn’t really take more than one breaking wave to swallow the cat. The Atlantic suddenly seemed cold and careless. It’s not a good place to search for anything in the dark.

A year later the cat issue was up again, this time in Erie Canal, in the state of New York, where they had an animal shelter full of cats needing a new home. To make a long story short I just agreed right away, to get it over with. “Look, she got six toes!” Yeah, sure.

Nina named the cat Erie, and off we went. This time we promised each other that Erie should be brought ashore twice every day, at least while going through the lakes and waterways in Canada and USA.

We brought Erie along to our winter cabin at Tapawingo, in Alberta, Canada. The list of predators was long, but nothing could hold her back during the spring months. She wanted to be out the whole night. She survived the threat of fox, wolf, lynx, black bear, wolverine, the great horned owl, the northern goshawk, golden eagle and bald eagle.

Erie also had the cat flu, which almost killed her. But it was a coyote in Blind River, North Channel, that eventually did her in. The coyote was observed, and several domestic cats went missing in a short span of time.

Erie was a good swimmer, and she had no fear of the dingy. She could even jump into the dingy first, if she knew we were going ashore. Erie used to meow when she wanted us to come and get her, and then she would jump right back in, without any fuzz.

Cat or no cat? Me and Nina can’t agree on this. We both love cats, but I can’t stand to see a cat being bored. They prefer grass to fibreglass. Our boat is also painfully small for a cat to run around and play. Cats can’t read, I argue. Nina, on the other hand, feels that cats are better off on a small boat than in a cage at the animal shelter.

But there is no doubt that most cats can adopt quickly to the boat, if taken offshore as kittens. Most cats are surprisingly good swimmers, and might even be introduced to water early on.

The fox

As the fox passed our window early one morning, I grabbed the camera and went out, wondering why the fox was so unafraid.

The fox ran around me like a dog. Curious, playful, intelligent. There’s something alluring about friendly encounters with wild animals. It’s easy to think that you’re experiencing the world like it was meant to be.

Hunters and trappers will often claim nature as brutal, in order to have a moral right to do their own killing. I think it’s interesting when, say, wolf hunters get indignant at the way wolves hunt. But this discussion is not getting anywhere. I’ve met enough hunters to know when they start to circle their wagons of belief. I’m not against hunting, either; I’m against certain types of hunters.

The fox sat down and yawned. I guess it’d been a long night. Then he suddenly sensed something a couple of meters away. He arched over and dived down with the nose deep in the snow. Up came a lemming.

It felt like I'd gotten a friend for life, but we never saw this particular fox again. Maybe it got trapped. Maybe the fur hangs in the closet of a bourgeois woman. Or maybe the fox had more important things to do, than hang around with me.

The fox acted as it was tame, even domesticated, but it had probably never seen humans before. This is the alluring thing about encounters with truly wild animals; they sometimes act as if humans aren’t dangerous. They don’t know better.