The Badgers: A Farmer's Nightmare
Duke owns a farm where he planted garden eggs and other fruits. The farm produces garden eggs in large quantity. Most city dwellers come to him to buy his farm products in bags for onward transmission to the city centres. Duke is also a renounced hunter. His farm however has a big problem. Squirrels and Badgers usually feast freely on his garden eggs.ad other fruits, and most times reducing their annual yield. Duke abhors the use of pesticides and chemicals to check the menace of these creatures owing to the fact that those products are not environmental friendly. Instead, he opted for traditional local remedies, that is, setting of traps and placing of scarecrows here and there.
He was almost successful with this environmental-friendly method. But the Badgers keep ruminating freely in his garden farm and even increasing in numbers with his fruits paying for the increase. This was really giving him source of concern. In one of the evenings, he paid a visit to his bossom friend Maxwell and during their discourse which traversed both politics, economy and finally farming. At that point Duke raised the issue of the Badger attacks.
He took time to detail the damages the increasing number of Badgers in his farm have caused him. Max listened with rapt attention. Duke began, "Max my friend, sometimes I wonder if I have lost my skills as a hunter and also in setting of traps". "These Badgers by now would have been used as dry meat in entertaining my guests at home", he noted. Both friends laughed heartily. "You have a point Duke. We can still do something". Max paused for a while and then continued, "let's hunt them this weekend". "The grasses are drying up so there will be much spaces to spot them easily". "You have a point friend. I'll be ready. Let's teach them a little lesson", Duke opined. "Afterall, we are still good in the business", Max cuts in. "That's right. Time to play little games for fun, hahaha ".
That weekend Duke brought out his hunting gears in preparation for the game. His friend joined him later in the day and towards midday they hit the farm in their full regalia. Duke had also set traps to aid him in the hunt.
Both friends decided to hunt close to each other. The Badgers have a special route where they normally follow to 'attack' the farm. Duke knows it too and decided to begin the hunt therefrom. As the two hunting friends drew closer to that area all the Badgers ruminating there took to flight. Surprised by their sudden alertness, Duke and Max started giving them a hot chase.
The fleeing animals were much smarter than their assailants. "Max, these creatures have taken to flight, should we use guns instead"? "No friend, let's chase them and use the spears and bows". "That will not unsettle the rest of them still in the farm". We can still get as many as we want". And with that both friends started chasing after the fleeing creatures.
Unfortunately, they were no longer young men. Max stepped on some dry leaves on the floor of the farm, tripped and clumsily fell down while chasing after a very giant fleeing Badger. An advancing Duke fired his arrow and missed it too. Both friends burst out into uncontrollable laughter as both friends were already panting like men that had just descended from a tall mountain. "I've strained my ankle", said Max. "Oh, so sorry friend. Let me see". Duke drew closer and observed the swollen area and started shaking his head apologetically. "I think we should end it here today, Max. We have lost the game". And with that he tore his shirt and bandaged the affected area then helped his friend upwards from the ground. It wasn't an easy task as Max is of the bulky stock.
They managed to stagger to the farmhouse area and Duke beckoned his far driver who brought a van and both helped Max go in for onward movement to the nearest bone attendant.
This is my participation in "The Ink Well Fiction Prompt #152: Flight" Please check out the announcement post HERE if you want to join the contest.
The two friends lost in their game with the badgers. I liked the part where the protagonist has a true ecological conscience and does everything possible not to severely affect environment.
Thanks for sharing.
Good day.
Yes, both friends lost in their little game. Thank you for stopping by. I appreciate.
!ALIVE
!CTP
@rinconpoetico7! You Are Alive so I just staked 0.1 $ALIVE to your account on behalf of @ alovely088. (1/20)
The tip has been paid for by the We Are Alive Tribe through the earnings on @alive.chat, feel free to swing by our daily chat any time you want, plus you can win Hive Power (2x 50 HP) and Alive Power (2x 500 AP) delegations (4 weeks), and Ecency Points (4x 50 EP), in our chat every day.
Yay! 🤗
Your content has been boosted with Ecency Points, by @alovely088.
Use Ecency daily to boost your growth on platform!
This is a good application of the prompt. You describe the challenge well: How to free the farm from all the badgers. The chase after the badgers is funny. Readers can't help but root for the badgers as arrows fly past. We are relieved that no badger is hurt or killed. Of course, our protagonist still has a badger problem, but the story doesn't need to resolve that to work.
A nice tale, with a bit of excitement to boot. Some more careful editing would benefit the piece very much (for example, first paragraph you write renounced hunter instead of renowned hunter). Still the story holds up.
Thank you for sharing this entertaining piece with us.
Yes, thank you for the most encouraging words. Ah, renowned...a what printer's error. Thanks for pointing that out. I appreciate.
Badgers are feisty creatures, and this story shows very well what can happen if you mess with them. This is a very good story. I would recommend formatting long paragraphs by breaking them apart when there are multiple speakers. For example, you wrote as follows:
A long paragraph with multiple speakers is difficult to read because we don't know which character is speaking, so it is best to break up the dialogue like I show in the following example.
He took time to detail the damages the increasing number of Badgers in his farm have caused him.
Max listened with rapt attention.
Duke began, "Max my friend, sometimes I wonder if I have lost my skills as a hunter and also in setting of traps. These Badgers by now would have been used as dry meat in entertaining my guests at home," he noted.
Both friends laughed heartily.
"You have a point Duke. We can still do something," Max paused for a while and then continued, "let's hunt them this weekend. The grasses are drying up so there will be much spaces to spot them easily."
"You have a point friend. I'll be ready. Let's teach them a little lesson," Duke opined.
"Afterall, we are still good in the business," Max cuts in.
"That's right. Time to play little games for fun, hahaha!"
By breaking up the paragraph, then the reader can easily follow the story because it is less confusing. I hope this helps. This was a great story. Happy writing!
Wow, this is quite instructive @litguru. Well taken. Thanks for the kind suggestions. I really appreciate friend