A New Years Hunt

Rabbits fled, bullets flew, and beagles were in pursuit...all on a New Year's Day hunt!

The group of hunters and dogs in search of a rabbit lined up horizontally and marched through the briars and brush piles of ceder until a cottontail sprang out of its burrow. It hightailed it across a narrow stream. In the process of this, a dog spotted the rabbit and it began to run like its tail was on fire. The beagles circled it back and a shotgun shell ended the chase with a kill.

Not five minutes later, the dogs jumped another. After fifteen minutes of a hard run, a shot rang out and the rabbit dropped like a sack of potatoes.

Soon beagles were heard again. Fallen limbs loomed ahead as the rabbit came steadily bounding along. A couple of shots were heard and the rabbit was finished.

A spooked rabbit surrounded by beagles decided it was time to run. Or was it? The rabbit shot out only to run into a shot perfectly executed.

Ten minutes later, the dogs splotched with black, brown and white had a rabbit going again. It ran a short circle back to where it started. The hammer of a gun fell and as the dust cleared, a rabbit was found dead.

With tails bloodied, the beagles ran one last rabbit. However, this rabbit was smarter than the rest and lived to see another day.

Memories of dogs barking and the echo of a shotgun bring a smile to a face any day of the year!