Fearsome Critters of the Lumberwoods (Campfire Story)

When a new logger came to work in Paul Bunyan's camp, the old-timers always gave him a proper welcome. They gave him the bunk by the drafty window. They gave him the last pancake, the burnt one. And on his first night, they sat him down by the fire and told him about the critters.

The new fellow that fall was a skinny young greenhorn named Chester, who'd never been farther into the woods than his grandma's garden. The one who told him about the critters was Brimstone Bill, the oldest logger in camp, who had a beard down to his belt and a story for every tree in the forest.

'First thing you need to know, Chester,' said Bill, poking the fire, 'is that you're never alone in these woods. There's the HIDEBEHIND.'

'What's a hidebehind?' asked Chester.

'Nobody knows what it looks like,' said Bill, 'because nobody's ever seen one. Whenever you turn around to look at it, it's already slipped right behind you again. You'll feel it on the back of your neck when you're out at night. Go ahead, turn around. Quick!' Chester spun around. Nothing there. 'See?' said Bill. 'It's still HIDEBEHIND.'

Chester didn't like that one bit.

'Then there's the SIDEHILL GOUGER,' Bill went on. 'Lives on the steep hills. Its legs are longer on one side than the other, so it can stand level on a slope. Trouble is, it can only walk around the hill one way. If it ever turns around, its short legs are on the downhill side, and it rolls right to the bottom. SIDEHILL GOUGER! Over and over, all the way down.'

'And watch out for the SNOW SNAKE when winter comes. It's pure white, so you can't see it in the snow. You step on a drift and the drift says SNOW SNAKE.'

'And don't even get me started on the HODAG.' Bill shuddered. 'Horns on its head, spikes down its back, and a grin as wide as a barn door. Smells like a skunk that's been rolling in old fish. The folks over in Rhinelander, Wisconsin, claim they caught one once. HODAG!'

By now Chester's eyes were as big as frying pans. 'Are any of them... friendly?'

Bill thought about it. 'Well, there's the SQUONK. Lives in the hemlock woods. The squonk is the ugliest critter in the forest, all warts and wrinkles, and it knows it. So it spends all its time crying about it. SQUONK! On a quiet night, you can follow the sound of its sobbing right through the trees.'

'Has anybody ever caught one?'

'Not to keep,' said Bill. 'But there's a reward. Paul Bunyan himself said he'd give a whole silver dollar to the man who brought a squonk back to camp.'

Well, Chester wanted that silver dollar. The other loggers handed him an old flour sack, and off he went into the dark woods, all by himself.

He walked and walked. The trees creaked. The wind moaned. Twice he had the feeling something was right behind him, and twice he spun around and found nothing. And then, from deep in a grove of hemlocks, he heard it. A sad, soggy little sob. SQUONK.

Chester crept closer. There, under a hemlock, was a lumpy, wrinkly, warty little critter, weeping into its paws. Chester counted to three, pounced, and stuffed it into his sack. It wailed the whole time. SQUONK!

Chester tied the sack shut, threw it over his shoulder and ran for camp. He ran as fast as he could. But a funny thing happened as he ran. The sack got lighter. And lighter. The sobbing got quieter. And quieter. And the bottom of the sack started to drip.

By the time Chester burst into camp shouting, 'I got one! I got a squonk!', the sack was nearly empty. All the loggers gathered around. Chester untied it and turned it upside down.

Out came a puddle. Just a puddle of tears, and a few little bubbles.

Brimstone Bill took off his hat. 'That's a squonk, all right,' he said quietly. 'When you corner one, it's so embarrassed that it cries itself away into a puddle. That's why nobody's ever kept one.' He patted Chester on the back. 'Close enough, son. Most greenhorns don't even get the puddle.'

Chester never did get that silver dollar. But he did get his own spot by the fire, and the next fall, when a new greenhorn came to camp, Chester was the one who told him about the critters.

Oh, and Chester? He never could shake the feeling that something followed him all the way home from the hemlock woods that night.

Something right... HIDEBEHIND!

Storyteller tips: teach the five sounds first. The HIDEBEHIND works best if a few Scouts sit behind the storyteller and the whole audience points at them. If you brought a wet sack, turn it upside down at the reveal.

Ask the Scouts to invent their own fearsome critter for your campsite, then describe it the way Brimstone Bill would.