Sargent Central High School volunteer day was Friday, November 22 (postponed from October due to the snow!). Twelve students helped in Rutland to clean the City Hall, Fire Hall, and Legion Hall. Thanks to the hard working group the City Hall floors shine like they haven’t shined for a while. There were items in the Legion left from Uffda Day that got moved and the Fitness Center equipment in the Legion also got a good cleaning. Seven of the twelve are from Rutland so it was good to get that home-town help.

The Sargent county 4-H Awards and Recognition Night was held Sunday, November 24, in Forman. Members of the County Clubs attended for the family make and time project activities before the meal and awards program. Sargent County 4-H Ambassadors Jacy Bopp, Tony Banish, Allie Bopp and Kari Fuhrman helped the younger kids with the projects that included stenciling on wood, iron-on 4-H emblems on dishtowels, making large wreaths from paper bags and other items. The Ambassadors assisted Cindy Klapperich, Family & Community Wellness & 4-H Extension Agent, with the Awards program. Rutland Raiders 4-H Club members received several awards including: First Year Members Audrey Anderson, Ashleigh Ceroll, Kylie Ceroll, Sophia Erickson, Maxwell Hamilton, Loden Jochim, Brooklyn Kozok, Henry Lunneborg, Carl McLaen, and Celie Olson; Overall Plant Science Senior Award – Tony Banish; Overall Creative & Expressive Arts (CEA) Junior Award – Gabi Christianson and Senior Award – Abby Erickson; CEA Creative Arts Award – Tony Banish; Healthy Lifestyles Education (HLE) Foods and Nutrition Senior Award – Emily Hamilton; Overall HLE Junior Award – Gabi Christianson and Senior Award – Tony Banish; Family and Consumer Sciences (FCS) Clothing and Textiles Senior Award – Abby Erickson; Overall FCS Senior Award – Tony Banish; 4-H Interview Award Winners – Gabi Christianson and Madelyn Erickson; Outstanding Senior Member – Abby Erickson. The Rutland Raiders Club received awards for Healthy ND 4-H Club and 2^nd Place for Outstanding Sargent County 4-H Club. The Rutland Raiders Club Leaders were also each recognized for with Leader Awards: Tanya Hamilton and Andrea Erickson 3-year awards and Renee Cramton received a 27-year Award. Congratulations to all the members of the Rutland Raiders 4-H Club and members of all the County 4-H Clubs on their achievements and awards.

Mike Kulzer was in Rutland last week, residing at his “home away from home” at 114 Bagley Street while participating in the 2019 North Dakota whitetail deer hunting season. Mike reports that his daughter, Amber, bagged a 5 X 6 buck with a 4” brow tine on land that Mike owns along the Wild Rice River southeast of Rutland. According to Mike, Amber did the hard work of shooting the deer while Mike got to do all of the fun stuff, like field dressing it, skinning it and cutting it up. He is a pretty good Dad. Mike also reports that he visited with Boyd Brummond who had taken a big buck in the hills east of Havana. Boyd’s big buck was one of the largest he has seen this fall, he said. Of course, a visit with a deer hunter can’t be concluded without a few more stories about other hunts, and Boyd told Mike about a large doe he had taken while hunting in the hills near his farm home several years ago. Boyd said that he had decided to take the carcass home to do the field dressing, but with no antlers to grab onto, the big doe was hard to handle. Boyd tried to get it into his pickup head first, and that didn’t work, so he tried to load it back legs first and that didn’t work, either. Finally, Boyd told Mike, he just decided to drop the deer and drive home to get a tractor and loader with which to handle the critter. When he dropped the deer, though, Boyd didn’t notice that one back leg sort of hooked itself around the ball hitch at the back of Boyd’s pickup. He drove home, got his tractor & loader, and went back to pick up the deer. When he got there, though, there was no deer to be found. The deer was certainly dead when he was trying to manhandle it into the pickup, he thought, so it couldn’t have revived and run off, but where was it? After searching the area, Boyd gave up and headed for home. As he drove the tractor into his yard, he spied his deer, hooked to the hitch on his pickup. He had dragged it home. It took quite a bit of time with the garden hose to get all the gravel washed out of that deer, but everything worked out OK. The venison on that side was pre-tenderized, too.

It’s not just our friends and neighbors who have been hunting this fall. Steve Wyum reports on a failed hunt at his Ransom Township farmstead by one of nature’s most skilled predators. Steve stated that he was exercising on his elliptical trainer this past week when, all of a sudden, KABOOM! Something hit the window beside him with tremendous force. Steve noticed a cat that had been sitting by the window, outside, had leapt about 6 feet into the air and was making tracks for somewhere that wasn’t by that window. Steve walked over to the window, and there on the ground was a red-tailed hawk, the kind our grandparents used to call a “chicken hawk”, groggily trying to collect its wits. Steve figures that the hawk had designs on the cat, but hit the window first, while in full power-dive mode. After about half an hour, the hawk took flight, again, but it just may refrain from hunting near the Wyum farm home for a while. Even the wild things occasionally have bad days while on the hunt.

Upcoming Events in Rutland include Zumba on Sunday, December 1 and 15; City Council meeting on Monday, December 2; Rutland Community Club meeting on Monday, December 9; and, more importantly, Santa Claus Day on Saturday, December 14! Rutland Santa Day activities begin at 5 p.m. with bingo, a free-will supper and the ham drawing. There will also be kids crafts and make sure the kids get to visit with Santa Claus when he arrives.

That’s it for news from Rutland this week. Be sure to check out other upcoming activities on the Rutland website at www.rutlandnd.com and follow us on Facebook!