On the Run in Siberia

6. Starvation and Desperation

87 6 starvation and desperation Amonth and a half has passed since we arrived at the hunting cabin. The sack of sable furs is bulging, but the chunk of meat has long since been eaten. Several times, we have gone to get meat from the moose Yura shot, but without building an actual rack for the meat. We decide to make another excursion to the moose meat and bring more back to the cabin. When we reach the place, it stinks like an old urinal. A wolverine has been there and finished off the meat. “Damned thief!” Ivan snaps and spits in the snow. “Didn’t leave us so much as a bone splinter.” Like the sable, the wolverine is a member of the Mustelidae family , but it looks more than anything like a small bear, apart from its long, bushy tail. It is known as the greediest of all the predators in the taiga, feeding mainly on prey killed by others. To guard against other scavengers, it pees on the carcass, making it completely inedible to all others. Although the wolverine weighs only thirty to forty-five pounds, it does not shy away from carrying off large chunks of meat several times its own weight. That is why you can sometimes find entire moose heads high up in trees, where the wolverine has taken them. Trappers hate the wolverine, because it steals from their traps and meat caches. A hunter who caught a wolverine that had given him trouble for a while went so far as to shoot it in the knees and elbows and to leave it for the dogs to bite to death. It sounds brutal, but that is life in the taiga for animals and humans alike. In this place, Ivan Danilov is bedridden from frostbite and starvation. 88 . starvation and desperation you live by killing and avoiding getting killed. There is no room for feeling sorry for your enemy or your prey. This does not mean, however , that the wolverine is seen to be fundamentally evil by nature. In fact, a sort of myth flourishes among the trappers of the region, in which it is told that the wolverine did not become the hunter’s worst enemy until the hunter himself had betrayed it. As the tale goes, the wolverine and the hunter were originally the best of friends—even better than the hunter and his dog in our time. This is because at the dawn of time there was a hunter who took a wolverine cub in and raised it as his hunting dog. Never before nor since has anyone seen such an excellent hunting dog. The hunter did not have to accompany it on the hunt at all. The wolverine used to kill the prey by itself and bring it back to the hunter. The wolverine made the hunter the richest man in the region. But his riches made him greedy—he wanted even more money. When a trader came passing through, wanting to buy the fantastic wolverine, the hunter sold his friend. The wolverine was taken far away and put on show in a circus. But one day, it ran away and set out on the long journey back to the hunter. When the hunter saw the wolverine, he said, “Hello, my friend. How nice to see you back, as I’m out of money. Now you must hunt for me and make me rich.” But the wolverine wanted revenge. It jumped on the hunter and bit him across the throat. That was the end of the friendship between hunter and wolverine. Ever since, the wolverine has been stealing from the hunter to get back everything it once gave him. The wolverine’s tufted and unsightly fur did not become attractive as a trading commodity until sometime in the 1960s. Since the animal’s long, bristly hairs do not freeze, even under the most extreme temperatures, wolverine fur is used in Russian space science for the cosmonauts’ masks, and good money is generally paid for the fur. Many trappers, including myself, also wear caps made from wolverine fur. However, it is most suitable for travel by snowmobile or dogsled. On foot or skis, wolverine fur is simply too warm and heavy to wear on one’s head. Wolverinefurisalsoexcellentasabackcompress.Formanyyears, I regularly suffered from severe back pains, until a fellow anthro- starvation and desperation . 89 pologist brought me a piece of...