Words and images by Geneva Chong
My friends all know I am a “foodie.” I love baking, sautéing, grilling—even flambéing from time to time. From beets to bacon, I eat it all, especially if it’s local. As a founding member of Slow Food in the Tetons, I dedicate myself to eating locally grown organic food. I buy shares from Cosmic Apple and grill Beyond Organic Beef, but I still ain’t got nothin’ on Newman.
Newman is an Elkhound. Newman is a hunter. Newman loves local food. Given the opportunity, she catches, prepares and eats her own locally grown, organic food and enjoys every second of it.
Newman was a bit of a drifter when my husband Dave and I met her in late April. She had been in and out of the Teton County Animal Shelter a couple times in her five years of life. Having recently lost our longtime companion Shadow, we’d been without a dog for two months. No canine cuddling (and barking) had left me depressed. Newman would change all that for the better. We didn’t know that she would also solve our squirrel problem.
Squirrels like our yard and we had been happy to let them fill every corner of our shed with spruce cones and bits from the compost pile. But soon, the perfect habitat of our yard and the shelter of the shed allowed the squirrel population to explode. So the squirrels decided to join us in our home. They began eating the electrical wiring in the crawl space. They scratched, ran, and played within our walls. They were loud. They were obnoxious. They were local. They are dead.
At first, I was not so sure about the whole Kill the Critters campaign–squirrels are so cute and all. When I first caught Newman in the act, hind legs and tail dangling from her mouth, I tried to take the squirrel away from her. But as I advanced towards Newman, she swallowed it whole.
Newman has since caught at least one Robin, many squirrels, and a marmot. I would have thought the marmot—really just a big squirrel—would have been fierce. Newman didn’t think so. Staring at the maimed marmot, our guilt got the best of us, and we took it away from Newman. A bystander, luckily not outraged, volunteered to take it home and tan it. Odd? I thought so too.
While I admire Newman’s dedication to eating locally, I do worry. She’s a hunter. She may get a cat. Or a celebrity fox. Or the ones our elderly neighbor feeds. I don’t know if our aging friend could survive witnessing the death of one of her foxes.
Now that we don’t have any more squirrels, Newman is dependent, just like us, on Jackson Whole Grocer for survival. This is a good lesson: we live here because we’re fed and supported from elsewhere, and we’re sustained from other peoples’ labors. Ecologically speaking, we really shouldn’t be living here year-round, so I better do everything in my power to live here consciously. I’m confident Newman will do the same, and eat locally whenever given the chance.
Bodhi has a keen interest in Newman’s “eat local” movement. Perhaps a little dinner date some evening at Newman’s place? If she can get a cat or a fox she’ll have his respect and admiration forever!
When Geneva was a child, she had good success spotting owl pellets. I wonder what “pellets” Newman leaves about, post local-food repasts? Newman is probably doing her wolf-ancestors proud. She sounds the perfect dog for that edge of Jackson where she lives.
We had squirrels in our garage attic (now converted to a “grand room” sleeping / dining area). They ripped through insulation, gnawed through sheetrock, tooth-sawed corners off the upright wood edging (what’s that called) of the building corners. We had to hire a pro to come and trick them out, lock them out, for about a fourth time replace the air vent in the roof peak with a metal one. A Newman would’ve been very useful!
Yeah, Newman!
And to think you’ve been known to give cat owners a hard time for letting their cats catch birds! I’d say the tables have turned, Geneva.
Brilliant!
Go Newman. Our cats get a dozen or so voles a day, and it is the cycle. It is also better for them to eat wild than canned or bagged food. But a pet parent is proud until their beloved is lower on the scale than they’d like.