In a year when I’ve had the best yield and quality of produce from my Tuckasegee garden I’ve ever had, I’ve also had the worst infestation of raccoons in the 12 years I’ve been living here.

The large garden space I inherited from my neighbor this year was full of beautiful Silver Queen corn about two weeks ago when the ears were just beginning to set-on. No sooner had the kernels come on to the cobs than the first “scouts” were in the patch checking it out. And it wasn’t long before the whole family was coming into the field at night and chowing down on the premature corn.

I immediately started camping out at the far end of the field at dusk — sitting for an hour or more in an old folding chair with a .20-gauge resting in my lap. Since my garden represents a sizable portion of my income and my food source, I don’t cotton to anyone or anything that starts stealing my source of sustenance. The next night, was the same thing. An hour or two of motionless watching and no sign of four-legged corn mongers.

However, the following morning a whole section of the cornfield had been slapped down and ravished like it had been hit by a mini-burst or a little twister. The raccoons clearly had me figured out, and had decided that they could avoid me by not showing up at the stereotypical dusk-time hour.

That night when I went to bed, I set my alarm for 3:30 a.m. When the alarm went off, dragging me out of a sound sleep and dreams of creamed corn and hot biscuits, I got up, put my pants on and grabbed my gun as I went out the door. Inching my way in the dark, quietly, to the edge of the field, and remaining stationary in order to listen for the magnified sounds of stalks falling like giant redwoods and of incisors biting into corn like those car-crunching machines, all I could hear was the deafening sound of crickets and cicadas.

Even if the coons had been in the middle of the field having a corn feast, I couldn’t have heard them. Cursing under my breath, I walked around the perimeter of the field hoping to walk up on a group of unsuspecting revelers. But all I may have done was to scare away anything that may have been there pillaging my crop. I tried this late-night, early morning tact for a few more nights with no luck — only to be greeted each morning with the same devastating scene of more cornstalks laying on the ground and corn husks scattered hither and yon in all directions from the field.

With almost all of the young roasting ears from the first planting gone from the patch, I decided I’d had enough. I got on the phone to the agricultural extension agent, a wildlife representative, the animal shelter, various vets in the community, farm supply stores, coon hunters and local farmers I knew. In the end, I came up with one large cage-trap of the have-a-heart variety on loan from an old fella over in the Speedwell community. The cage came with about a half-hour’s worth of stories and a bit of advice for baiting the trap. “Bait this here trap with Moon Pies. H’it works ever’ time. I’ve caught five coons this week with nothin’ but Moon Pies. Damn coons love something sweet. And I guess Moon Pies are their favorite,” bragged the owner of the trap. “And maybe throw in half a roastin‘ ear, too. That’ll get ’em for sure.”

A friend of mine — a coon hunter with no trap since he had plenty of hounds patrolling his land and fields — had suggested I use sardines. “They like that stinky fish smell,” he had said over the phone. “And them ole sardines that you get at Ingles — you know, the cheap ’uns — they’re pretty sweet, that is if’n you can get past the bad fish taste.”

So, with a large cage-trap and a poke full of canned sardines and a box of Moon Pies, I made my way home after picking up the trap and shopping at Ingles. The first night, I baited the trap just before dark with sardines — a whole can — and placed the trap where I thought the raccoons were coming into the corn patch from the woods. The next morning, I went out first thing to check the trap. No raccoons. Not even a possum. Nothing. Next night I used the day-old sardines and hinged the trap open so the critters could have easy access to the fish. Again, in the morning, I was greeted with an empty trap. Nothing had visited the cage during the night.

Since the sardines didn’t seem to be working, I baited the trap the third night with a single Moon Pie and an ear of store-bought corn, but left the cage in the same location — thinking the best way to catch anything was first thing as it came into the field. I got up the next morning at the crack of dawn and went out to check the trap. Nothing.

With increasing frustration and getting tired of being out-smarted by the raccoons, I decided I’d had enough and would go for broke. That night at dusk I put a full can of sardines, a Moon Pie and an ear of corn at the back end of the trap near the trip plate that would shut the gate to the trap when any weight was placed on it. Then, I moved the trap about 10 yards or so into the part of the corn patch which had already been picked over and was away from the second planting.

Next morning when I went to check the trap, sure enough, there was a young male coon munching on the corn cob I’d put there to bait the trap the night before. The little bugger was relaxed and almost bloated from the sardines, corn and a full Moon Pie. He didn’t seem to be upset about the cage or by his being caught. He seemed satiated and appeared to be rather enjoying himself, in fact. I left him there and went back in the house to use the phone. As I hung up the receiver, I reached down into the poke from Ingles and pulled out an unopened can of sardines and another Moon Pie. Late-night dinner for the coons.

(Thomas Crowe is a writer, poet and translator who lives in Tuckaseigee. His recently published book, Zoro’s Field: My Life in the Appalachian Woods, is available in area bookstore. He can be reached at newnativepress@hotmail.com.)