Nebraskaland

June 2022 • Nebraskaland 23 children don't mix, but Kim is never worried. A snapping turtle's bite will hurt and leave a three-cornered cut, but it's nothing a little Epsom salt can't fi x, she says. No one has ever come close to losing a fi nger. Kim is more concerned about broken glass or barbed wire in the swamp. "I was never worried about being bitten because Chic always said that they didn't bite underwater — which ain't true," Ben says, laughing. "But I never got bit. I've been clawed more than anything." Ben's nephews have heard the same fi b from Grandpa Chic, and perhaps it's this foolhardiness that gets a young man going. However, not all hunters have been so lucky. Ben recalled: "We went over to Uncle Dick's in the spring one time, when the turtles were coming up to lay eggs. It's always after a thunderstorm — I don't know why — but it always brings the turtles up to lay eggs. I think we picked up about 20 turtles that day. Uncle Bud had two to three turtles in a gunny sack and threw it over his back and one of them bit him in the butt. Must've caught that nerve, because he went down like a sack of rocks and couldn't get up. It wasn't real funny to him, but the rest of us sure thought it was." Another fond memory: Ben's dad had a collector's permit, and if he found snapping turtle eggs, he'd plant them somewhere else to protect them from the raccoons. One year, Chic hatched out over 120 of them and took them down to the swamp. Today, Ben continues the practice. Even now on The Island, when he ditches the crops for irrigation, he usually fi nds a nest that the raccoons haven't ransacked yet. "I'll go dig up the eggs and replant them. There are little turtles out there every year. I took one to Ponca last year and left it there," he says. Modern life off ers a young person plenty of distraction. Ben recognizes that today's generation can't hunt like he and siblings used to, which was every weekend when they were in high school. But he and Kim are hopeful the Rutten tradition will continue. "I think the boys will continue to hunt, and their kids probably will, too," Ben says. "The swamps are getting fi lled in around here with all the fl ooding, but there are still a lot of turtles around. They might not work as hard as we did, but it's still fun to go in and walk around. You see so many other things — the muskrats and frogs and red-winged blackbird nests. It's just fun being out there." Ben is a retired Nebraska Game and Parks biologist, and his nephew Seth is following the same path. Turtles aside, Kim and Ben's main hope is to instill appreciation for the outdoors in their successors. It's apparent that they've succeeded. N See the Rutten family's fried and steamed snapping turtle recipe on page 16.

• Cover