The Bugged Raccoon

by John Greengrass
translations by Sheila Shigley and Ken Miner

Shigley's Translation

¹ Once upon a time, a certain Little Raccoon used to be going around there, ²as he’d be going around the prairie there, ³so at times, then, he’d go along there. ⁴It is said that once he heard a noise and, ⁵so then he stood bolt upright ⁶and listened to it, ⁷but, well, it must have still been speaking. ⁸Nonetheless, then, when he heard the noise, well, ⁹it then ¹⁰said:

¹⁴And so then he ran, it seems. ¹⁵So he ran away ¹⁶and, after a point he lay down in a hazel thicket, ¹⁷eventually he came to be in that hazel thicket.  ¹⁸He reached there. ¹⁹so there wasn’t any place good to go through and so, ²⁰then so, deep there he entered that way, ²¹and finally where the brush was thickly intertwined, ²²Finally there he sat. ²³And then, again that sound he heard, ²⁴then again it made a noise. Then listening to it, again it said:

²⁸"Hué!" he said and ran, ²⁹he ran like heck and then ³⁰finally that hill there, ³¹then it had a cave and he went in, well deep inside there and, ³²and eventually, then there eventually in the dark, finally then, ³³and finally then, ³⁴there he sat. ³⁵After a bit he again heard the noise. ³⁶and then again for the last time it said,

⁴⁰Little Raccoon then, hearing that, he, ⁴¹he felt in his ear and⁴²here there was a woodtick sitting there, ⁴³and he was angry, pulled it out and chewed it to pieces, so.¹

Miner's Translation

¹From time to time Little Raccoon would be going around there. ²While he was going around in an open field, ³now then he was going along there, ⁴a noise he heard. ⁵He stopped short, ⁶he listened and listened... ⁷again it continued to speak. ⁸Again when he heard the noise, ⁹... ¹⁰it said: 

¹⁴Then he ran. ¹⁵He ran fast. ¹⁶Since a line of hazel bushes was lying there, ¹⁷He went there where the hazel bushes were. ¹⁸He reached there. ¹⁹Since it was not possible to go through, ²⁰he went deep inside. ²¹The thicket was criss-crossed. ²²There he sat. ²³As he sat, he heard that noise again; ²⁴When he heard it again, again it said:

²⁸Ha again he ran. ²⁹he ran fast. ³⁰A hill [was there]. ³¹Since there was a cave there he went. ³²It was dark inside, ³³there ³⁴he lay inside. ³⁵Again the noise, again he heard it. ³⁶Again it said:

⁴⁰Raccoon understood now, of course. ⁴¹Of course when he picked into his ear, ⁴²then a tick was in it, he! ⁴³Angry he was, and chewed it to pieces!²

Musical Score

Miner attempted a handwritten score of the three songs, which are isomorphic to each other with respect to their melodies.³ His handwritten and somewhat inaccurate score is here replaced with an accurate score by Sheila Shigley:

Little Raccoon Song 1

11.

Wakéįgᵉrō-ō,

Wakéįgᵉrō-ō,

Wakēįgᵉra,

||

Wakēįgᵉra,

mą̄ǧōsgā

jāną̄kāgrē,

||

hą̄kēižą

nı̨̄he      hanįną.

||

Hēi hēi

Wakéįgᵉrō-ō

Wakēįk.

Little Raccoon Song 2

25.

Wakéįgᵉrō-ō,

Wakéįgᵉrō-ō,

Wakēįgᵉra,

||

Wakēįgᵉra,

hūsīk

jāną́gāgre,

||

hą̄kēižą

nı̨̄he      hanįną.

||

Hēi hēi

Wakéįgᵉrō-ō

Wakēįk.

Little Raccoon Song 3

37.

Wakéįgᵉrō-ō,

Wakéįgᵉrō-ō,

Wakēįgᵉra,

||

Wakēįgᵉra,

nı̨̄žōpōx

jāną̄gāgrē,

||

hą̄kēižą

nı̨̄he      hanįną.

||

Hēi hēi

Wakéįgᵉrō-ō

Wakēįk.

Among the tribes east of the Mississippi, "the melodic movement is usually unspecialized and tends to be gradually descending."⁴ This is clearly evident in our song, which starts at D/E then falls to G, the exception being the third phrase, which begins with B/D before descending once again to G. The note G forms a baseline that each phrase reaches but below which no phrase descends. What is interesting is the fact that it exhibits four such descents, showing that the melody, like the whole of the story, is quadripartite in structure. However, although there are four phrases to the music, each musical phrase contains three words in its libretto, giving it a tripartite substructure for each element of a quadripartite musical structure. The song also contains within it the exclamation, Hēi hēi! This is typical of the style of the region, as Nettl notes that "[one of] the main musical characteristics of the Eastern area [is] the use of shouts before, during, and after songs."⁵

Structure. Miner sets out the structure of this story as follows:⁶

This short wōrák was built out of a small part of a much larger waiką́ "Hare Retrieves a Stolen Scalp." The latter is not so structured, and the episode is but a fraction of the whole story. It is plain to see, as Miner points out, that much of the present story is tripartite. There are, for instance, only three songs. Inasmuch as four is the number of completion, based as it is on the four directions, structural elements usually form tetrads. Therefore, the grouping into triads would seem to be a modernism. However, each song exemplifies a tetrad of musical phrases with corresponding lyrics made up of triads of words placed under each element of the tetrad. In this way the composition plays with the idea that 3 = 4, each being a number of completion.

Commentary. "John Greengrass" — probably John Carriman Greengrass, 5 August 1918 - 27 Jan 2012, son of Ed Greengrass (Ciwįjikerehiga, "He Who Makes a Rumbling Noise,"), b. 1870, who was the son of Xą̄wįcóga (Greengrass), b. ca. 1828. They are members of the Thunderbird Clan. John C. Greengrass,

was born August 5, 1919 in Black River Falls, Wisconsin the son of Edward and Jennie (Blackhawk) Greengrass. He was inducted into the U.S. Army in June of 1942 at Ft. Sheridan, Illinois. He was in battles and campaigns in Normandy, Northern France, Ardennes, Rhineland and Central Europe and earned the European-African-Middle Eastern Theater Ribbon, 4 Overseas Service Bars, 1 Service Stripe and 1 Silver Battle Star. He also participated in the D-Day Invasion at Normandy. He was honorably discharged as a corporal in October of 1945. John returned home to become one of the first two minority journeyman carpenters in the State of Wisconsin and a member of the Carpenters Union. He was also a dedicated member of the Native American Church in the Wisconsin Dells area where he contributed to building two churches at the present site between Wisconsin Dells and Lyndon Station. In October of 1951 he had married Margaret Lonetree and together they raised 10 children in the Madison/Middleton area.

He is buried at Indian Baptist Church Cemetery, Lyndon Station, Juneau County, Wisconsin.⁷

"Little Raccoon" — Wakḗįka, from wakḗ-įk-ka, which Miner translates as "the little raccoon." However, the word comes from wakḗ, "raccoon"; -įk, a front clip of nįk, "little"; and -ka, a definite article usually used in personal names. In fact, Wakḗįka is a personal name, "Little Raccoon." This kind of diminutive name is frequently found in stories, as this nearly exhaustive list shows: Little Fox, Little Pigeon Hawk, Little Ghost, Little Muskrat, Little Skunk, Little Red Eyed Duck, Little Cottontail, Little Mink, Little Hare, Little Sparrow, Little Woodpecker, Little Garter Snake, Little Orphan, Little Concave Face, Little Pigeon, Little Red Turtle, Little Spotted Turtle, and Little Star.

The raccoon (Procyon lotor) is a familiar animal native to North America. Their family (Procyonidae) is most closely related to the family to which dogs belong (Canidae), having diverged from them in the late Eocene or Oligocene.⁸ The Hōcąk term for raccoon is waké. The word "raccoon" comes from Powhatan ärähkun, from ärähkunem, "he scratches with his hands,"⁹ a reference to their scratching food and tree bark. Hōcągara have a month called Wakékirúxewirá, "Raccoon Mating Moon,"¹⁰ which runs from late February through March, corresponding to the mating season of raccoons at this lattitude.¹¹ It marks the beginning of hunting season. Raccoons are highly adaptable and very intelligent, although they tend to have short lives.¹²

"prairies" (mą̄́x-hosgá) — it's a bit odd for a raccoon to be about in such a habitat. When they venture out in to open country, they usually stick close to the forest edge so they can escape into the woods should they encounter a predator. They do, however, set upon corn fields (mą̄ǧᵉra), maize being one of their favorite foods.¹³ The idea that the raccoon could be found on the prairie we might think is an atavism pointing to its origins in the waiką́ "Hare Retrieves a Stolen Scalp," where the protagonist is a rabbit. However, rabbits also tend to avoid open spaces unless they are near cover.¹⁴ Nevertheless, it remains true that in a prairie state like North Dakota, raccoons and rabbits alike must live in the open. The typical range of raccoons runs from 1-3 kms, with a maximum of about 6; whereas on the prairie they have a range as high as 10 kms.¹⁵ So at least occasionally raccoons can be seen in open country.

CC Eli Sagor

Hazel Bushes in a Red Pine Forrest

"hazel bushes" — as Hōcąk hunters know well, raccoons can be found sleeping under hazel bushes. The tendency of these bushes to form thickets with dense intertwining branches, makes hazel shrubs excellent shady cover for raccoons to escape the heat, and conceal themselves from predators during the day. When the omnivorous and nocturnal raccoon comes out to forage at night, it finds hazel bushes, whose nuts ripen in late summer and fall, to be a good high-calorie food source.

Mgvuvan

A Raccoon Peeking Out of a Rock Crevice

"cave" — raccoons are called trogloxenes (“cave guests”), animals that use caves temporarily but depend on the outside world for survival. Raccoons may have to negotiate space with other trogloxenes like bats, bears, skunks, frogs, birds, and insects such as cave crickets. However, caves are not the only cavities occupied by raccoons. They can make their dens in rock crevices, cavities in trees, fallen logs, and the abandoned dens of other animals such as foxes and badgers.¹⁶

"Raccoon" (Wakegá) — translated as Wakēįka. Miner has this to say about dropping the diminutive -įk from the name:

The use of wakega in line 40 for 'racoon', rather than any of the other forms for 'racoon', is the only trace of the waiką́ or sacred story behind this tale. It lacks the diminutive suffix and has instead the personal name suffix -ga; this would be translated 'Racoon' in a waiką́́. I take it to have been a slip. Lavina Thorud, who helped me prepare a transcription, said that in the original story Grandmother Earth (usually an Algonquian feature) put the tick in Racoon's ear, and he had to go to her to have it removed.¹⁷

The "lost" waiką́ to which they refer is actually the extant "Hare Retrieves a Stolen Scalp." In the version translated by Oliver Lamere,¹⁸ the voice comes from a tick. In an earlier version obtained in the 1850s from the interpreter Peter Menaige, it is referred to as "something that looked like a bug":

One day in the morning, as he was on his customary travels 'from one end of the earth to the other,' he heard a voice hallooing to him, and calling, Wašjinkéka (Hare), Wašjinkéka! This alarmed him and he ran in an opposite direction from where the voice appeared to come. This was repeated four times, when, in his surprise, he came to a region where it seemed to be perpetual summer, and he found there a long lodge, pleasantly situated, and he peeped into it and saw a woman sitting, her back towards him and her head covered. She said, "You have come. I was expecting you. Rabbit, feel in your ear!" He did so, and pulled out something that looked like a bug; and the woman, whose name was Wak-k-ka ('Waterspirit Woman', cf. 1), told him, 'That was the voice which had alarmed you,' and this had guided him on the road to the long lodge.¹⁹

Replacing Hare with Little Raccoon sets the story, now a wōrák, off on a rather different tangent.

	CC Cambridge University Press
	A Woodtick Infestation on the Snout of a Raccoon and Raccoon Ticks in the Ears of Raccoons20

	NOAA		CC Sam Droege		Interactive ID Key for the Hard Ticks (Ixodidae)
	The Deer Tick		The Woodtick		The Raccoon Tick

"woodtick" — cārásgápke, translated by all sources (including Miner's dictionary) as "woodtick," but here translated by Miner as simply "tick." The Dermacentor variabilis, more commonly called a "woodtick" or "dog tick," is usually identified in contradistinction to deer ticks (Ixodes scapularis). However, cārásgápke appears to be cā-rá-sgáp-ke, where cā means "deer," and the suffix -ke indicates a kind or species. The component ra-sgap is from sgap, "to press." (cf. šgap, "to catch"), and the suffix ra-, meaning "to do by means of the mouth." So cārásgápke means, "those who press onto deer by means of their mouths." The term, therefore, seems more appropriate to a deer tick (Ixodes scapularis). Apparently the word for "deer tick" was adopted for the ticks generally through the linguistic process known as broadening or generalization. The same process can be seen in the English word "predator," which was coined in 1840 to denote a group of beetles that preyed upon other insects, but came to be generalized in 1862 to apply to any animal that preys upon another.²¹

As a hunting people, Hōcągara are well acquainted with the essential features of the raccoon population. Raccoons, especially young ones, tend to become infested with ticks, and "a favorite spot is in the crevices of the ear itself" for these miniature arachnids.²² "Ixodes texanus was the most common and abundant tick found on the raccoons which was expected as this species is found on hosts year-around and is assumed to be acquired within the nests of their vertebrate hosts."²³ The Ixodes texanus is also known as the "raccoon tick." It seems more likely that it was neither the woodtick nor the deer tick that the author had in mind, but the raccoon tick.

Comparative Material. A tale is told by the Inuit in which an animal gets inside someone's ear and speaks to him in order to mislead him. In the beginning there was no light and people lived in perpetual darkness. Crow told them that in a far away land was a wondrous ball of light that could illuminate the world. The idea was exciting, so the people coerced Crow into going to this land and taking this light. So Crow found the lodge where the ball of light was kept in a box. Nearby a young child was playing. Crow transformed himself into a speck of dust, and entered the boy's ear. There he caused a great deal of irritation, until the boy cried. When his father, the chief, asked what troubled him, Crow told him that he wished to play with the ball of light, so this is what the boy told his father. The father fetched the ball of light, and the child delighted in casting it about with the string that was attached to it. Again Crow agitated the boy's ear, and the child cried again. This time Crow told him to say that he wanted to go outside to play. His father was again very indulgent. As the boy was playing outside, Crow extracted himself from his ear, and morphed back into his natural form, whereupon he swooped down and seized the ball by its string. When he arrived in the far north, he dropped the ball and it immediately exploded into a great burst of light causing the sky to turn blue. The Inuit were amazed and were ever grateful to Crow for what he had done. However, Crow told them that this single ball of light he obtained from the south needed six months of rest every year, and during that time it would become dark again; but the Inuit were happy enough just to have daylight for six months of the year, and always felt gratitude towards their benefactor, Crow.²⁴

Links: Raccoons, Ticks.

Stories: mentioning raccoons: Bladder and His Brothers, Lake Wąkšikhomįgra (Mendota): the Origin of Its Name, The Spirit of Maple Bluff, A Raccoon Tricks Four Blind Men, The Raccoon Coat, Raccoon and the Blind Men, The Were-fish, The Abduction and Rescue of Trickster, Trickster and the Mothers, Grandfather's Two Families, The Green Man; mentioning ticks: Hare Retrieves a Stolen Scalp.

Themes: a small insect embedded in an animal's ear speaks to him in such a way as to create the illusion that someone nearby is hunting him: Hare Retrieves a Scalp; someone hears a disembodied voice and only later discovers its source: Trickster Eats the Laxative Bulb, The Orphan who was Blessed with a Horse, Hare Retrieves a Stolen Scalp, Pete Dupeé and the Ghosts.

Notes

¹ Sheila Shigley's translation is based on the text in Kenneth L. Miner, "Short Modern Winnebago Text with Song," Kansas Working Papers in Linguistics, 7 (1982): 91-103. https://doi.org/10.17161/KWPL.1808.3619

² Kenneth L. Miner, "Short Modern Winnebago Text with Song," Kansas Working Papers in Linguistics, 7 (1982): 91-103. https://doi.org/10.17161/KWPL.1808.3619

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.  Copyright is held by the author.

The contents of the original article have been considerably reorganized to conform with the format of this Encyclopedia. Some words have been corrected based on further investigation.

³ Sheila Shigley, text based on Miner, "Short Modern Winnebago Text with Song," 101.

⁴ Bruno Nettl, Music in Primitive Culture (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1956) 115.

⁵ Nettl, Music in Primitive Culture, 115.

⁶ Miner, "Short Modern Winnebago Text with Song," 101.

⁷ Find a Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/84176894/john_carriman-greengrass: accessed May 14, 2026), memorial page for John Carriman Greengrass (5 Aug 1919–27 Jan 2012), Find a Grave Memorial ID 84176894, citing Indian Baptist Church Cemetery, Lyndon Station, Juneau County, USA; Maintained by mmel (contributor 47686399).

⁸ John H. Kaufmann, "Raccoon," in Wild Mammals of North America: Biology, Management, and Economics. ed. Joseph A. Chapman and George A. Feldhamer (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982) 567-585 [567]. Rosalie F. Ewer, The Carnivores (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1973).

⁹ Dr. Ernest Klein, A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language (Amsterdam, London, New York: Elsevier Publishing Co., 1971) 831b, s.v. "raccoon."

¹⁰ Kenneth L. Miner, Winnebago Field Lexicon (University of Kansas: June, 1984) s. v.

¹¹ Kaufmann, "Raccoon," 570b; Danial G. Schneider, L. David Meek, and John R. Tester, "Movements of Female Raccoons and their Young as Determined by Radio-Tracking," Animal Behavior Management, 4 (1971): 1-43; William F. Cowan, "Ecology and Life History of the Raccoon (Procynon lotor  Nelson and Goldman) in the Northern Part of Its Range," Ph.D. Thesis, University of North Dakota, 1973, 176 pp.; and Erik K. Fritzell, "Aspects of Raccoon (Procyon lotor) Social Organization," Canadian Journal of Zoology, 56: 260-271.

¹² Kaufmann, "Raccoon," 577a; "only one raccoon in a hundred attains an age of seven years." Glen C. Sanderson, "Breeding Habits and History of the Missouri Raccoon Population from 1941 to 1948," Transactions of the North American Wildlife Conference, 16 (1951): 445-460.

¹³ Kaufmann, "Raccoon," 573a; Schneider, et alia, "Movements of Female Raccoons and their Young as Determined by Radio-Tracking"; Leonard Lee Rue III, The World of the Raccoon (Philadelphia and New York: Lippincott Co., 1964) 90. Corn (Zea mays) is the most important item in the diet in some localities ...", Kaufmann, "Raccoon," 573b-574a.

¹⁴ University of Wisconsin > Wisconsin Horticulture Division of Extension > Rabbit Ecology and Damage Management > Habits & Habitat, electronic text, viewed: 18 May 2026.

¹⁵ Kaufmann, "Raccoon," 572b; Erik K. Fritzell, "Habitat Use by Prairie Raccoons During the Waterfowl Breeding Season," Journal of Wildlife Management, 42 (1978): 118-127.

¹⁶ Kaufmann, "Raccoon," 572b; Rue III, The World of the Raccoon, 112. University of Wisconsin > Wisconsin Horticulture Division of Extension > Raccoon Ecology and Damage Management > Habits & Habitat, electronic text, viewed: 18 May 2026.

¹⁷ Miner, "Short Modern Winnebago Text with Song," 100.

¹⁸ Paul Radin, Winnebago Hero Cycles: A Study in Aboriginal Literature (Baltimore: Waverly Press, 1948) 107-111. Paul Radin, The Trickster: A Study in American Indian Mythology (New York: Schocken Books, 1956) §§18-21, pp. 81-87. The original Hōcąk text is missing, but the English translation of Oliver LaMère is preserved in Paul Radin, "The Hare Cycle," Winnebago Notebooks, Freeman #3851 (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, n.d.) Winnebago IV, #1: 96-134.

¹⁹ Thomas Foster, Foster's Indian Record and Historical Data (Washington, D. C.: 1876-1877) vol. 1, #3: p. 2 col. 4 - p. 3 col. 1. Told by Peter Menaige, interpreter at the old Minnesota Winnebago Reservation.

²⁰ Kayla Buck Garrett, Renee Schott, Lea Peshock, and Michael J. Yabsley, "Prevalence and diversity of piroplasms and ticks in young raccoons and an association of Babesia sensu stricto infections with splenomegaly," Parasitology Open, vol. 4 (12 April 2018): electronic text, unpaginated, Figure 2. See also, Daniel E. Sonenshine, and R. Michael Roe, edd., Biology of Ticks. Vol. 2 (Oxford: Oxford university press, 2014). Guha Dharmarajan, James C. Beasley, William S. Beatty, Zachary H. Olson, Jennifer A. Fike, and Olin E. Rhodes, Jr., "Genetic co‐structuring in host‐parasite systems: Empirical data from raccoons and raccoon ticks." Ecosphere, v. 7, #3 (2016): e01269.

²¹ predator (n.) — "animal that preys upon another," 1862, from Latin praedator "plunderer," from praedari "to rob" (see predation). Latin Predatores (Swainson, 1840) was used in biology of the group of coleopterous insects that ate other insects. Douglas Harper, Online Etymology Dictionary > s.v. "predator".

²² Rue III, The World of the Raccoon, 85.

²³ Garrett, et alia, "Prevalence and diversity of piroplasms and ticks in young raccoons ...,".

²⁴ Sandra E. Schlosser, Native American Trickster Tales (electronic text) 3-5.