By Tom Bevel
Part I - I was eight (8) years old when my Great Grandfather began taking me on horseback into the Ouachita Mountains adjacent to Talihina, OK. This area is part of the Native American Choctaw Nation in Leflore County, Oklahoma. While the free or open range was declared closed by the territorial legislature in 1895 in Oklahoma, my Granddad continued to pasture hogs and cattle in the mountains. He checked on them at least two times a month. Many fences now chop up this area; thus, the free grazing of stock animals is no longer possible.
During our trips Into the mountains, one of the common stops was to rest in the shade of a great oak tree. Near the tree, he showed me how to work an area near a rock outcrop that revealed a natural cold spring. Once it started flowing, we cupped our hands to wet our faces and drink the cold water. It was so refreshing; I always looked forward to this stop. I asked him how he knew where the spring was, and he said, "You learn from your elders and from paying attention to the land, as it speaks to you if you “ah, mah!” (listen) to it."
Around the same age, I started going with him on deer hunts, where again he mentioned “ah, mah!” when tracking a wounded deer. I came to learn his “listening” was analogous to “yaki”,(seeing) and “ahni”, (observing) all that is around you. He advised that if you don’t see blood but think you hit the deer, keep following the trail as the blood will build up over time and begin to be lost, creating a path to follow.
On one trip, after a deer was wounded and ran off, we followed the trail of blood. As we walked, he began to teach me what the different kinds of blood told him about the deer’s bleeding wound. In this case, the blood was frothy with bubbles, and he remarked that the deer was wounded in his lungs. He advised that bright red to pinkish blood could indicate a lung wound due to oxygen mixed with the blood. As we continued following the trail, he described other types of blood trails and what they would tell you. Very dark red blood can come from a liver wound. The green matter will likely be from an injury to the stomach, of which the deer has four. A narrow blood trail that goes to less blood and back to heavy blood may indicate a leg wound as the blood trail changes from leg movement. He also advised that when following the deer trail, look for blood on the surrounding brush, and if you find blood, it tells you about the type and location of the wounds to the animal and indicates the direction of travel. While my Great Grandfather has been deceased for many years, his teachings remind me to observe what is around me, listen to the story it tells, and try to understand what it tells us.
