It’s not every Sunday that one gets to hone up on the old nomadic hunting skills that lie deep within all of us, unless you live in Farmington that is, and some dumb sucker releases 7,000 mink from their cages.
It was Sunday morning around 8:30 a.m. when I begrudgingly made my way out the door to church only to find several mink sunbathing on my driveway and exploring the garage entry into my house. Although I had never seen one before, a mink that is, I thought nothing of it as I scared them away and proceeded to head on over to church in an effort to avoid the wrath of Wendy for being late to Sunday School, as we teach sunbeams together.
Little did I know the rotten suckers (the minks, not my sunbeam class), all 7,000 strong had been freed from their cages the night before around midnight by some animal rights activist group.
Therefore, shortly after church was out, half our neighborhood had initiated the hunt of tracking down and capturing these furry little creatures. Just don’t let their cuteness fool you, as they scratch and bite relentlessly to the death of their capturer. Because of this issue, Mia and I decided to join the ranks around noon to get some first hand experience.
I don’t know what the hell we were thinking but we figured if nothing else, it would be a fun outing together. Clearly we missed the memo on mink belonging to the skunk family. Memo to self and future mink hunters, mink smell if not as bad, worse than their counterpart the skunk.
The good news for us was that we were never directly sprayed; the bad news is that every stinking one (pun intended) we caught did spray their pungently nasty scented perfume in our direction. To help you with a virtual olfactory experience, the smell was that of a rotting carcass thrown down the outhouse of a construction port-a-potty with 110 degree heat and 50% humidity. I can only say it smelled the “shits” (in the worst of ways), but somehow through it all Mia and I were having a great time being together while working along side some of our neighbors we had yet to have the opportunity to meet!
A big thanks goes out to Brad Giles for donating a bloody thumb, Chris Bauco for taking a spray to the face, or so I hear, and all the other gluttons for punishment that volunteered their time and talents! I hear the bow hunt is just around the corner but you might need a bigger net.
