One of many unforgettable nights

We left Case's place right after dark and while on the way to our first location.  No matter what the moon looked like, full or no moon, we always tested the darkness in the same customary fashion, by turning the off while driving to see how well we could see without any lights.  We could see without the headlights which told us that we might be in for a longer hunt.  We reached the wooded hill we wanted to start at and kicked the dogs loose.  There was a small creek that skirted the bottom of the hill and aways beyond that, the creek met up with the a dry creek bed that headed back towards the west.  We sat there for a bit before Tango started in with her familiar chop, as if to say, "I'm getting this track started!"  As we listened we could hear that she was moving the track down the creek and towards the area where the old creek bed joined up.  Suddenly, we heard Cash join in with his familiar bawl refrain, and that was our cue to start heading that way. 

Tango was pretty cold nosed and would work a track on a coon that had been dead a week given the opportunity but once Cash joined in, we knew that they would be treeing soon enough.  As we made our way towards the dogs, they suddenly sounded as if they were a mile away or better, then just complete silence.  We knew what that meant, they had to be in a hole and fighting the coon.  We picked up the pace trying to get there to assess exactly what it was that we were dealing with.  We finally got close enough to where we could hear the fight underground.  We reached the hole in the bank and Tango came out to greet us then went back inside to help Cash.  

Now anyone who has coon hunted enough has run into this situation.  Coon in a hole and you have several options when it comes to getting them out.  Normally we would light a smoke bomb, throw it in the hole, and wait until the coon came out.  The way that this hole was set up, didn't allow up to use this method.  Normally we could pull the dogs off the hole and leash them while we smoked the hole but this hole was big enough that both dogs fit inside as well as the coon.  We had decided that one of us was going to have to crawl in the hole, grab the dogs, pull them out, then go back in for the coon.  How it was decided that I would be the one going in, I don't remember but as luck would have it, Cash decided to come out for a quick breather.  We grabbed and leashed him but Tango was still in there and it sounded like it was getting pretty intense.  I started crawling into the hole and as I did, I came face to face with a  a coon was trying to sneak out!  I yelled for the gun and managed to get him before he got me!  After dragging him out I could still hear Tango fighting in the hole.  I got back down and crawled in the hole, this time all the way, and saw that the hole didn't go straight back but rather turned and made a blind corner.  Belly crawling in there, I reached the corner and could see that Tango had the other coon cornered.  I managed to get a hand out from under myself and grabbed Tango by the collar and dragged her, begrudgingly, out of the hole.  I then proceeded to crawl back in, gun barrel first, and as I peeked around the corner I saw the coon starting to come towards me.  It was really an act of self defense at this point!  Luckily I managed to stop him before he got to me!  

There was a lot of laughing as we made our way back to the pickup as the language got plenty colorful and Case said he could see my legs kicking and squirming while I was in there with the chaos!  We loved the dogs up for a job well done, got them loaded up, and headed down the road to the next spot.