Murder at the Community Centre
(Lou, Yukon)
Don’t wash squirrels. I learned that this week. They don’t come out well. The amber, feather-light tail never quite recovers and the fur has the look of rat skin. That’s sewer rat, not muskrat.
We’ve been trying to ignore our squirrel problem at the old cabin all winter.
After fixing the roof and stuffing it with some old insulation this autumn, we are now using it as a storeroom and, perhaps optimistically, guest cabin.
Our plan is to keep the insulation in the roof to prevent heat escaping, the squirrels' plan is to take it down to the cold cellar to make nests and use the space above the floor as a toilet.
My understanding was that squirrels fiercely defend their territories so we could only have one, or possibly a pair of them, using the cabin. No. We got one in a snare and have shot another 4 in a tree next to the building but the squatting goes on unabated.
As we removed another tiny, bloody corpse from the snow, Neil said, “Maybe it’s a squirrel community centre?”
As penance for all this killing of cute wee things, I make sure I take the fur to make mitt liners and the limbs for an interesting variation on Cajun chicken wings.
I leave them to freeze outside (after noticing black bugs creeping up my arms as I skinned one warm) and then hang them to thaw in the cabin over the slop bucket. Which is how I came to be washing them.
Accidentally plunged in a combination of toothpaste, washing up water and soot from the chimney, the fur wouldn’t even make the grade for mitt liners.
It hasn’t quite recovered its former silkiness. I don’t know why. Surely squirrels get caught in the rain and without turning to mush? Maybe they dash into a local community centre if the weather looks bad.
I’m hoping they’ll be discouraged by the gallows we’ve built next to the cabin. It’s a strong signal. We built it so we could hoist the outboard motor off the back of the boat, but realised it looks rather macabre.
At $9000, the Yamaha F40 motor is the most expensive thing we own, by far. It was the only thing we decided we must have new. If our 20 year old snow machine breaks down on the river, as it did this winter, we might have a long way to snow shoe. To break down in a boat in the summer could be worse. We might have a long way to swim, and the river flows at 7mph.
We know everyone living on the river for 100 miles downstream. Excluding the only community at Eagle, Alaska, that’s a mere 7 households. If no-one’s looking out the window as we pass, we are off to the Bering Sea.
So we bought a brand new motor. It is heavy, 220 pounds. That’s fine for these big Canadian guys and gals, raised on beef and fresh milk, but not so good for us weedy Brits, raised on a 70’s diet of Smash potato and Angel Delight.
So we decided we’d just kind of leave it in the yard on the boat and put a few boards around it when we go back to England in the summer. Bears love the smell of gas and engine oil. The engine smells of both. Plus there are lots of chewy cables and lines and a big smash-able plastic cover hiding all sorts of delicate electrics and well… after having had the snowmachine seat chewed off by a bear last year, what were we thinking?
A friend who grew up in the bush stared at us opened mouthed when we told her our plan. Then she showed us photos of the damage a grizzly did to her cabin this summer. We decided to move the outboard into the house.
We created an arrangement of gallows, hoist, chain and shackles that might be better suited to a fetish club than a boatyard. I had a horrible feeling we were about to cause more damage than any psychotic grizzly bear.
We hoisted the motor off the boat, then down onto a plank on our sled, pulled it to the front door and then used log rollers to get it across the porch.
It was remarkably easy. Our only stupid error was not noticing the cables to the battery were frozen solid in a lump of ice and nearly yanking them out, which called for a lot of shouting and a hot kettle.
So almost nothing went wrong. How pleased were we? Until we realised it wouldn’t go through the door. Ass.
We eventually managed to inch, turn and jiggle it through.
A 220 pound motor is not easy to jiggle, but it now makes a distinctive feature, resting on a pallet behind the table.
This morning, I glanced around our living space at the outboard, the chainsaws, the 3 guns leaning beside the door, the various tools, the splayed squirrel skins on tatty cardboard on the table, the rusty dustbin full of dog food, our sagging hardboard ceiling and I thought- why is nothing nice in here?
“Neil, I want an ornament.”
I’d say I’m pretty low maintenance as far as most wives go in terms of material things, but I’m demanding an ornament. And it mustn’t be a power tool or a dead thing.
We are heading to Dawson on Saturday but my hopes are low for an objet d’art. Aside from the post office, we are going to the hardware store to buy more shackles (not very pretty) and the Fur Show. The show is a great display of dead things. Local trappers bring their furs to exhibit and prizes are given for the best in each category.
I may be the only entrant in the squirrel class. And certainly the only one with soot-dappled, spearmint-smelling fur. I am hoping to do a skinning workshop and perhaps replace Frankenstein’s hat (Read the blog about my hideous hat here) with a new one made by local crafters.
Our main motivation for the trip is the launderette. Hand washing is a pain. Water must be hauled from the creek and then warmed on the wood stove. It quickly gets too hot, so I take it off, then forget about it and gets too cold. We only have so many clothes so we have to time washes with what we might need over the next few days. The whole thing is a bloody hassle and we do the minimum.
However, the realisation that I’ve washed a couple of dead squirrels more than I‘ve washed our bed sheets has shamed us into a trip to the bright lights and the big washer-dryers of Dawson City laundromat.
We have had the most beautiful March weather. These are desert days. Clear, cold, searing-ly bright with nights down to -30c and lower. Daylight increases so rapidly I can barely keep up. Two months ago it was dark by late afternoon, now it is still bright after 9pm.
The sun rises higher each day and the glare of the snow is so intense we find ourselves lurking in the woods like wolves, rather than bear the sheer white on the river.
Sunglasses and goggles freeze up within seconds so I have created this highly individual spring look for myself with peaked cap and trapper hat.
As if on cue for our trip to town, a snowstorm seems to be blowing in and the temperature is rising as I type. Still we must go. I don’t want to miss the Fur Show and if we don’t go soon the bed linen will set off by itself.
Read next week’s blog to see who makes it to town first, us or the laundry.
For anyone remotely interested in our log building programme- we managed to get 10 logs this week! They are almost straight but not remotely the same size so I think it will be a case of creating a building to fit the logs rather than the other way round.
Don’t wash squirrels. I learned that this week. They don’t come out well. The amber, feather-light tail never quite recovers and the fur has the look of rat skin. That’s sewer rat, not muskrat.
 |
| Washed, tanned, oiled and drying |
 |
| Au naturel |
After fixing the roof and stuffing it with some old insulation this autumn, we are now using it as a storeroom and, perhaps optimistically, guest cabin.
 |
| And here's the master bedroom... |
 |
| The original roof was insulated with a tonne of mud which we had to remove before we could rebuild it |
As we removed another tiny, bloody corpse from the snow, Neil said, “Maybe it’s a squirrel community centre?”
 |
| Upper Yukon Community hall |
I leave them to freeze outside (after noticing black bugs creeping up my arms as I skinned one warm) and then hang them to thaw in the cabin over the slop bucket. Which is how I came to be washing them.
Accidentally plunged in a combination of toothpaste, washing up water and soot from the chimney, the fur wouldn’t even make the grade for mitt liners.
It hasn’t quite recovered its former silkiness. I don’t know why. Surely squirrels get caught in the rain and without turning to mush? Maybe they dash into a local community centre if the weather looks bad.
I’m hoping they’ll be discouraged by the gallows we’ve built next to the cabin. It’s a strong signal. We built it so we could hoist the outboard motor off the back of the boat, but realised it looks rather macabre.
At $9000, the Yamaha F40 motor is the most expensive thing we own, by far. It was the only thing we decided we must have new. If our 20 year old snow machine breaks down on the river, as it did this winter, we might have a long way to snow shoe. To break down in a boat in the summer could be worse. We might have a long way to swim, and the river flows at 7mph.
 |
| Draining the engine oil. The bottle fell down later and wasted lots of the expensive and toxic oil. So don’t tie it on with a shoe lace if you try this at home |
So we bought a brand new motor. It is heavy, 220 pounds. That’s fine for these big Canadian guys and gals, raised on beef and fresh milk, but not so good for us weedy Brits, raised on a 70’s diet of Smash potato and Angel Delight.
 |
| Old habits die hard |
A friend who grew up in the bush stared at us opened mouthed when we told her our plan. Then she showed us photos of the damage a grizzly did to her cabin this summer. We decided to move the outboard into the house.
We created an arrangement of gallows, hoist, chain and shackles that might be better suited to a fetish club than a boatyard. I had a horrible feeling we were about to cause more damage than any psychotic grizzly bear.
 |
| "Neil! Mind the tiller!" "Eh?" |
So almost nothing went wrong. How pleased were we? Until we realised it wouldn’t go through the door. Ass.
We eventually managed to inch, turn and jiggle it through.
A 220 pound motor is not easy to jiggle, but it now makes a distinctive feature, resting on a pallet behind the table.
This morning, I glanced around our living space at the outboard, the chainsaws, the 3 guns leaning beside the door, the various tools, the splayed squirrel skins on tatty cardboard on the table, the rusty dustbin full of dog food, our sagging hardboard ceiling and I thought- why is nothing nice in here?
“Neil, I want an ornament.”
I’d say I’m pretty low maintenance as far as most wives go in terms of material things, but I’m demanding an ornament. And it mustn’t be a power tool or a dead thing.
We are heading to Dawson on Saturday but my hopes are low for an objet d’art. Aside from the post office, we are going to the hardware store to buy more shackles (not very pretty) and the Fur Show. The show is a great display of dead things. Local trappers bring their furs to exhibit and prizes are given for the best in each category.
 |
| At work on a squirrel. Going for those legs |
Our main motivation for the trip is the launderette. Hand washing is a pain. Water must be hauled from the creek and then warmed on the wood stove. It quickly gets too hot, so I take it off, then forget about it and gets too cold. We only have so many clothes so we have to time washes with what we might need over the next few days. The whole thing is a bloody hassle and we do the minimum.
However, the realisation that I’ve washed a couple of dead squirrels more than I‘ve washed our bed sheets has shamed us into a trip to the bright lights and the big washer-dryers of Dawson City laundromat.
We have had the most beautiful March weather. These are desert days. Clear, cold, searing-ly bright with nights down to -30c and lower. Daylight increases so rapidly I can barely keep up. Two months ago it was dark by late afternoon, now it is still bright after 9pm.
The sun rises higher each day and the glare of the snow is so intense we find ourselves lurking in the woods like wolves, rather than bear the sheer white on the river.
Sunglasses and goggles freeze up within seconds so I have created this highly individual spring look for myself with peaked cap and trapper hat.
As if on cue for our trip to town, a snowstorm seems to be blowing in and the temperature is rising as I type. Still we must go. I don’t want to miss the Fur Show and if we don’t go soon the bed linen will set off by itself.
 |
| Storm's acomin'. Homer don't care |
Read next week’s blog to see who makes it to town first, us or the laundry.
For anyone remotely interested in our log building programme- we managed to get 10 logs this week! They are almost straight but not remotely the same size so I think it will be a case of creating a building to fit the logs rather than the other way round.
Comments
Post a Comment