Camp Rules- Part 6

We told the kids to catch micro toads for breakfast. Next morning I made scrabbled eggs with cheese and sausage crumbles a.k.a. micro toads- one girl wouldn't eat it when she found the empty bucket that had held the micro toads; even after I showed her the sausage wrapper she refused to eat the eggs and filled up on toast instead.

Hognose snakes are the clowns of all snakes. When threatened they shake their tails like a rattler, but have no rattles. Then the coil up and mimic a cobra, but they have no teeth or fangs. When all else fails they play dead. Every session a hognose gets in face via the campers; and every session I remark on how very funny the hognose snakes are as I take the little snake in my hands. Sorry, guys... no screams.

Lastly there was Mr. Raccoon, who raided our garbage each night and left a mess to be cleaned up in the morning. (Because the camp is run by a Nature Preserve all garbage is bagged and returned to the city for disposal thus the kids had to pick up every bit each morning & were not happy campers.) I stayed up one night; sitting in the dark I waited to hear our visitor. When I heard the rustling of the nearby bushes, I tiptoed out of the cabin. With enough moonlight to guide me, I rounded the cabin. Not only was it our raccoon, it was huge! No wonder our live trap never caught him! He could reach in for the food, but there was no way he would ever fit inside.

I turned on my flashlight and he was one surprised raccoon caught in the spotlight. Like most critters that live in and near the camp, he wasn't afraid. He was in his territory, which as you remember was human free over 90% of the time. As I began talking to him- yep, talking to him, he stood on his hind paws and slowly backed into the bushes. He was about a yardstick tall and he just stared at me. I told him we'd leave food for him, but he was not to dump the garbage pail over any more.

He hadn't had time to make a mess so I took some leftover food and threw it towards him. He ran as I reminded him, "No dumping the garbage!" Some of the campers heard me talking during the night, but there was a lot of laughter when they found I was conversing with the raccoon.

The next morning the food that I'd tossed was gone, but the garbage was untouched to the campers delight. For the remainder of camp and during the next session, we put all leftovers in an old pan for Mr. Raccoon. The garbage container was never turned over again.

Told you the camp nurse is also the cook, the mother, the firebuilder, and a Dr. Doolittle. And she never tells what frightens her!


Hope you had fun with me this week. Shalom, Connie