I will confess that the way I have explained to the dogs that nobody chases things that run in the forest, unless it’s somebody amongst ourselves doing the running, is that running things are Danger. So this works pretty good if we hear deer or see a bobcat (ok hasn’t always worked on bobcat) or a coyote or the worst one, trio of coyote, which is a pack of equal amounts but perhaps unequal life skilz since the coyote trio lives in a rougher neighborhood than us.

I whisper to everybody, “Come here you guys DANGER.” When I whisper danger it is a long drawn out hiss, I try to sound like a chainsmoking hundred year old gas station owner who keeps an ax right there in plain view behind the cash wrap. I will cackle if I have to.

This usually does the trick. Danger faces on and we all sit there quiet until we know the deer have passed or while I am using psychic waves to move the coyote and we will move quietly as a unified group towards safer grounds. I use this on all snakes, I assume any snake is guilty even if you were to prove it innocent to me. We use the Danger if we don’t know what it was we heard. Everybody shares the forest.

I now know how to orient via a compass and straight lines, using magnetic north and a map, that clearly delineates where the best places are to hide. I have exactly enough knowledge to probably get myself into a heap of trouble if I ever took these skills to genuine wilderness where there isn’t a road within 6 miles. I also have learned that the way we move through the woods sometimes is called tracking, but was warned to watch out with this knowledge, because we may be tracking anarchists who have covered up their tracks. Oops. We’re just in there walking. That’s just what we like to do.