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FAIRBANKS — The mink appeared without warning on the riverbank as I paddled slowly against the current. He flashed out of the grass before stopping witb ajolt at the sight of a loaded canoe slipping right past his doorstep. He froze, white throat patch striking against his dark glossy coat, tiny dark eyes frozen in shock. Then, in a fluid flash, he somersaulted into a bank hole just a few hundred yards from where we had once found the broken, scattered shells of a raided duck nest.  For many hunters, the experience of tromping around in the woods is as important as shooting their intended prey. However, I hunt for one reason: To put meat on tbe table or in the freezer. Still, along tbe way the adventures big and small, successful or not, prove quite different than my more normal tromp-in-woods-with-the-dogs experiences. They have a depth and intensity completely lacking in tbe off-to-the-berry-patch day.  Last year proved no different. I was hunting alone while my sister Julie recovered from a cold, camping out for tbe first four days just a mile upriver from home. Two streams, two dry sloughs, trapline trails and several small lakes and marshes all crisscrossed within four square miles of my tent. Although not a highly productive spot for moose, it always had a resident cow and one or more bulls passed through every  September. The fact that we had only shot two moose in 25 years within this area did not quite outweigh how handy tbe spot was.  I hunted alone, crawling from my warm sleeping bag into the dew-covered still dark mornings to heat water for cocoa and instant oatmeal before making a morning tromp, covering two or three miles and returning to camp by late morning. After a second breakfast followed by my afternoon nap, I could lounge about, reading paperbacks or doing a little fur sewing on the mukluks I was making before heading back out for an evening hunt that would not find me back in camp until after dark.  With nights not even dropping to freezing, I didn’t expect much. In fact I never saw a thing, excluding the usual swans and beaver, a pair of common loons swimming up to the canoe during a beautiful sunrise on a small lake, and one small shrew mumbling neurotically to himself as he careened along in search of beetles and mice. Four days later I figured I was wasting my time; with potatoes to pull and fish nets to check, I headed home. After a couple days of catch-up and cooking (zucchini bread and cranberry coffeecake) I loaded up our little outboard boat and headed off downriver.  I tucked my little tent into the willows on a sharp comer of the river that curved around a grassy swamp where we’d shot a moose or two in years past, listening to the beaver murmuring to each other as they labored on their winter food supply. My hunting routine resumed, only now I could hardly turn around without bumping into cows. On the second evening I watched a cow with twin calves for half an hour, often from 20 to 50 feet away after I convinced her with my little antler that I was just a timid bull. They sifted through the brush nearby, stripping leaves from yellowing willows before splashing into a swamp to graze on pond weed. One calf slipped through the brush to peek at me from just a few feet away before returning to its mother, but no bull seemed to accompany them. The long, warm fall had slowed the rut to a trickle.  I only heard what I thought was one bull, on a day I that was contemplating heading home. I left camp before it was light enough to shoot and crashed into a cow 100 feet from the tent. I was standing there waiting to see if she had a bull with her when I thought I heard antlers rushing briefly through brush across the river. As I stepped to the bank, a sow grizzly with a well-grown two-year-old cub strolled out of the brush directly across the river, heading for the water and obviously intent on crossing to my side.  Well! This is black bear country and the rare grizzly that is spotted generally makes the gossip rounds. I violently bashed the brush with the little moose antler that I carried for calling bulls, and that turned the sow off. She started huffing nervously, walking off up river, cub trailing. That told me she was worried about angry bulls. But when I shouted at her, she immediately stopped to swing back and stare at me before  ambling on, obviously relieved it was just little old me and pot a bull after all.  Just an hour before those bears had planned on crossing to my side I had been in a deep and solitary sleep, and that cinched my plans. I went home after finishing my morning hunt, without ever finding out if the bull-noise I heard really was a moose. Most likely a bull had spooked from the bears, who, spooked by the fleeing bull, turned off to cross the river.  After that Julie and I commuted daily by boat, rising early enough to get downriver in time to hunt by first light, and returning by early afternoon. Cows littered the river bank, but only one had a boyfriend, a big old bruin with three brow tines on one side, four on the other, a tough old chew when you are hunting for meat.  We watched him from a hundred feet away as he followed a cow across to the wrong side of a swamp — away from the river — moving through the water with the slow, head-down movements of an animal deeply stressed by physical exertion. He’ d probably just been fighting with a rival, and we spent an hour fuming when he stalled out in hip-deep water, ignoring our little-bull noises as we attempted to call him back.  Finally Julie and I split up. Once positioned, I signaled with three raps of my antler against a tree, and she came out on the far side to push the pair across to my side. It would be amusing to report success in this plan, but the bull left the swamp in a place where he was either in the water, or in the brush where I couldn’t get a shot. When I approached, both moose took off in the way they do when you know you aren’t going to get them today. Two hours later we were home eating toasted cheese sandwiches.  “We didn’t really want to eat him, anyway,” we told each other.  Two days later our boat sent a bull rushing off through the riverside brush, trotting fast and dropping his antlers to bull through every bush that stood in his way. As soon as he was in the clear I gave a sharp whistle to stop him. It took a couple tries before he paused long enough for us to get a shot off, but within five minutes our weeks-long hunt came to an abrupt end.  When we skinned him we found huge deep bruises all over the left side of his body, along with several snapped antler tines, battle scars from fighting another bull. The hide went to a neighbor needing leather, the dogs delighted in the scraps, and the guts lured several lynx and fox and a couple wolves to our traps.  Julie tied a buoy on the head and sunk it in the lake for the bugs to chew on. We’ll recover it eventually so she can clean it for display in a nearby lodge. The last one she did came out pretty nice. If you ever visit the Murie Science & Learning Center at Denali Park you can see it.  Meanwhile, for the next year we had some dam good eating.  Miki Collins is a trapper who lives near Lake Minchumina.