The story follows Billy Colman Kris Kristofferson, a middle-aged man in 1961 who rescues a redbone coonhound from neighborhood dogs and brings it home to nurse it back to health, a memory that echoes the loyal dogs he owned in his Ozarks youth. The narrative then travels back in time to when a ten-year-old Billy first longs for a pair of redbone coonhounds to accompany him on adventures in the woods.
With determination, Billy spends two years working odd jobs to save up the exact fifty dollars and walks twenty miles to Tahlequah to claim his two new companions, whom he names Old Dan and Little Ann. Guided by his grandfather, he trains them to hunt, forging a deep bond that quickly earns them a reputation as the best hunting team in the region. On the very first night of hunting season, Billy makes a bold promise: if they tree a raccoon, he will bring it down and claim the catch. Sure enough, the dogs locate a massive raccoon high in a towering sycamore, a tree Billy believes is too mighty to fell. After two exhausting days of cutting, a prayer for strength is answered when a sudden wind brings the tree down, granting them a triumphant breakthrough.
Billy, Old Dan, and Little Ann become local legends in the Ozarks, their names spoken with awe by neighbors and rivals alike. Their legend grows as they take on the legendary “ghost coon”—a cunning quarry that no hunter has ever outwitted—pushing Billy to test his limits and his conscience. When the moment comes to claim glory, Billy is torn between the thrill of victory and the mercy in his heart; he chooses not to kill the ghost coon, attempting to protect it from Rubin and Rainie Pritchard, a decision that sparks a frightening confrontation and tragedy. During the ensuing fight, Rubin is fatally injured by his own axe as Old Dan and Little Ann intervene to shield Billy, leaving Billy deeply unsettled but unwavering in his choice to spare the ghost coon.
The grandfather eventually enters Billy in a championship raccoon hunt, held during a brutal cold spell that thins the field as many hunters withdraw. Billy, accustomed to harsh winters, endures and perseveres, making it to the final round. On the last night, Old Dan and Little Ann treed three raccoons in one tree, but a blizzard forces Billy to shelter; when dawn comes, they are found ice-bound but still circling the tree, and Billy walks away with the championship trophy and a $300 prize.
A violent mountain lion attack tests the trio once more: Billy fights to protect his dogs, and Old Dan and Little Ann manage to fend off the predator, saving his life. Tragically, Old Dan succumbs to his injuries soon after, and Little Ann sinks into despair and dies of heartbreak, leaving Billy shattered. His father’s gentle attempt to explain their family’s hard choices—driven by a wish for better education for Billy’s sisters and the need to keep the dogs with their grandfather—offers a somber perspective: sometimes divinely guided forces pull a family in a direction that keeps loved ones intact.
On Billy’s final visit to the Ozarks, he finds Old Dan and Little Ann’s graves marked by a new growth between them—a giant red fern, a symbol of faith, love, and memory. Billy recalls a legend about the fern’s planting by angels and comes to believe that a higher power has revealed itself in the bond he shared with his dogs. Though he never returns to the mountains, the memory lingers, and he continues to dream of visiting the graves and seeing the red fern bloom again.
