trout whisperer

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fred thompson for president…

after 22 yrs in the United States military and serving with two branches, air force and army, i agree with cetain points and perspectives of both writers. i didsagree with some aspects of there writing as well. in time of national defense, no one should be immune to serving and protecting the country they live in, in times of a politically driven war,  i can certainly support a total volunteer military.

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The Tonight Snow 

Its flickers in my peripheral vision and I know it’s too cold to be a moth or mosquito so I look and there it is, snow.  …I exit the pole -shed from butchering my little girl’s deer.  It’s weird, she isn’t little, and proudly, neither is the deer.  She shot a northern Minnesotan whopper and I showed, or told everyone who would listen to her bragging father. This the red wool coats buck, she was wearing her legal blaze orange, but this buck comes from a strong
Minnesota tradition.  A buck people come from all over the
United States to take a poke at. It is the type of deer that only northern climes produce. Big thick rack, swollen neck and hide color so rich in browns, white and black.  

She’s in the house right now, working on her homework.   My hands are numb from the cold deer hide, and the meat cut away in thick robust chunks, of a rich, almost mahogany color I can’t actually describe.  The buck is slowly going from a northern
Minnesota whitetail deer to venison. From the great north woods, to my freezer.  

Little snow flakes draw me away from my project.   It’s cold, but so new and friendly. I try to rub the stiffness from my cold fingers and at the same time let the north wind have my face and even into my barn coat collar, like you would dip your toe in a springtime creek until; oh that’s enough.  

From  my yard lights illumination I get a white powdered sugared lawn trying hard not to get buried, but old man winter is gonna have his way, maybe not tonight, but soon.  In a month I will wade through snow to my wood pile. Tonight I play like a kid. First snow, fresh snow, and it was back on May fifteenth, the fishing opener when I cussed it for being the same snow.  

Im not worried about a snow shovel or snow plow. Were not getting an east wind dump the likes of which ruin your day from huffing heavy wet shovels full. The other bad snow is the one that locks your yard down for the next four months. You’re buried. You exit house in big boots, plod to frozen car. Turtle your own neck into the collar.  Snowbird snow; is the coldest snow, I know.  

Snow is about timing, and my attitude. Fishing opener snow makes for a great story and a tough trip. That’s the macho snow. Tonight’s snow is more akin to a Norman Rockwell poster. It accents my yard and highlights the skidder trail edges. Since we haven’t had snow in awhile, it’s a pillow fight the yard is having with itself, and I want in, so in it, I go.   

Neat little side benefit to living in the boreal is if someone pulled in the driveway right now, they would not have a clue that I’m just goofing off. At night leaving the pole shed gives you “country” street cred. Hey, half a deer butchered in a slight snow squall and me in my winter bib overhauls red faced and in the dark, is manly. I may look middle aged and surly on the external, but inside, the snow found a fourteen year old.  

With up turned face I try to catch a few. They have no trouble landing in my eyes, but even with my yapper open I can’t get one.  Okay, I now I get one; and that’s, enough for a victory.  I go back to the butcher shop and get to work. In large chunks the tallow comes off the back straps as crisply white as the snow falling, and it feels even colder. The trout whisperer

Somewhere in the future a baby will be born. Boy, Girl, no matter, and I have no preference.   This little person will grow up and wonder hopefully as I have.  For instance, I wonder if I like cigars, like my grandpa did. Then from my comfortable perch in heaven I will hit the “oh that’s a given” button.  Since its heaven, I will also hit the” but no smoking till your old enough, switch”.

Since my cigars probably got me up yonder earlier than necessary, I can from a distance still be a great grandpa, right?  I can’t erase all the photos of me makin smoke, and I really don’t want to. I may be the exception, but whoever invented a fine rolled stogie will always have my respect.

Wonder who invented cigars?

But the little tyke of the future will also question things like, should I use a Mcginty, or one of those ancient Mickey Finns.   Since the Irish lineage must persevere I will gently, with a mere wisp of my angelic wings tip the balance to the Mcginty of course.

The fly will sail forth and light softly at the head of the pool and as my second generation offspring lifts ever so slowly on the rod tip, the progeny of some Wiley strain of brook trout with a skewed eye will snap at the fly.  The fish dives and the rods responds with bowed arc and its on.

I will be jumpin around in my white robe trying not to make to much ado but cheering with every fiber of me being for a solid hook set, and one sturdy fish with a staunch regard for nothing but light flour and real butter after one serious tussle throwing water and snagging some underwater obstacle, but with deft care by the rod holder in playing the fish ultimately to the net.

Now if it’s my grand daughter who brings the fairest of trout to creel, the man in her midst must now be a gentleman by congratulating her in all haste.  I mean a big fuss over the rod handling and fly selection with special aplomb on the knot selection that held that nineteen inch fish.

Here is where she softly tips her cap, and just loud enough for all to hear, “my gramps taught me that knot before he went to his trout pond, up above”.  Um, I think I’d send a small breeze across the rivers surface for her perfect testimonial about then.

If it be my grandson, well then he best light one for both of us right then and there. Nothing like fine tobacco to settle my nerves and the quicker the better after a nineteen inch kype jawed male the likes of which I saw once in all my years of brookie fishin on earth. Up here, I catch twenty inchers all the time. No, really, you can’t lie once you’re up here, honestly.

With me hopping and flying all over the porch up in heaven it would surely draw a crowd of eternally winged fishing fans.  They all ask almost at once what the fuss is about and I would say how my great grand child just put the touch on one of the finest brook trout ever reared from a wild one spotted egg in the darkest streams still flowing in the boreal forest.

Oh, can you hear that heavenly sigh?

The music plays, they all congratulate me for inspiring my earth bound kin with the desire to fish.  I float just abit off my cloud and humbly announce it was all I could do,   I mean it was “his will”, as I point to the big office with the trumpets pealing, up the golden road next to the biggest set of pearly gates in heaven by the pond guarded day and night by retired game warden angels with the twenty four incher brook trout swimming in it.  

I wonder if God owns a nine foot five weight?

The trout whisperer

Thanks to the guy I will never meet

So in 1999 I bought a 1965 aluminum fourteen foot boat.  It was well used. I do not mean to imply worn out, I mean it was used well, as in properly cared for. I put a down payment in with a boat broker. He said to sit back and relax and he would find me exactly what I wanted. I relaxed all that summer and most of the fall, and after I could relax no more, I called him just prior to thanksgiving.

Dec 27^th that year he called me back with the exact boat I wanted. I gave him my email and he sent photos. Needless to say I bought the boat having never met the seller. I knew this was the type of boat I wanted and the price was a great buy, but I found out years later there was some unseen value to the original purchase.

 This is one of the old guide series boats with heavy gauge aluminum, four seats, not three, and solid oar locks. I can also with the motor off the transom, lift the boat onto a trailer by myself. I wanted a one man guiding boat. If I get stuck or in trouble I need to be an army of one.

Who ever had the boat before me never touched a rock with the keel or hull. No dents or patched rivets. The transom was still solid and no water rot. The seats had been modified to accommodate the new cushioned and folding style boat chairs but the person who installed did a class A job. I know he was a craftsman who did the installation because I had to change out one of the cushions this spring. To undo the well thought out original installation was a snap.

Bolts with washers and lock washers, not stripped when installed, with metal bushings and wood spacers to keep the metal frame off the factory installed aluminum seats was a

Very thoughtful approach. This guy was a forward thinker. Like he knew I was coming some day to sit in his boat.  Maybe he knew he’d never sit with me.

Well I changed out the old seat and put in a 2007 comfy version but reused his old bolts and I did not have to tweak anything. I want to thank him. I want to tell this guy what a great job he did on the initial install. Then I’d like to spend the day fishing with him.

The anchor system, the metal cup holder where I set my soda cans and the rod holders could only have been made by a guy my size. The reach for anything is too easy to be a coincidence that many times. He was me, years before me. He is my past and I’m his future but we both keep using the same boat.

It’s got a new boat license, fresh anchor rope and I put new oars in the boat and hung his old wood oars along my trapping shed. Those two rowing sticks I retired. I like to think maybe me and the previous owner were a matched set of oars, he’s gone and someday I’m gonna be. But that boat is just gonna keep fishing for a new owner, and then we can both thank the last guy.

The fisherman may change, the lures keep getting fancier and the regulations just boggle the mind. But the boat, the old boat I have, has kept up with it all. So whoever the boat owner was I have to tip my cap and say thanks.

The trout whisperer

Time to ant’y up!

This morning I’d bet a months worth of live bait whitetail bucks will start itching the velvet off those new antlers. To me there is no way they started yesterday. This morning I was roused from my sleep by a wind blowing in my bedroom window at 3:31 am. It was cool and refreshing. The temp demanded my down comforter. I obliged, but not for long.

I went outside and the moon was full, and the air crisp. My American flag flapped full, illuminated by my yard light, and showed a steady wind directly out of the north. My yard was wind washed free of the sticky humidity, and September by the calendar is but days away.

The air, early morning or just the final end to hot humid air I can’t explain it. I feel a bit antsy. My cigar smoke is swept into the dark and the ash glows red. One deep drought of cigar smoke is a cerebral shot of endorphins. I turn, and gaze out my driveway.

The red doe’s of summer have been all over the roads at night with at least one spotted fawn, some with twins. Every coffee pot I hunker next to guys are chatting about the groups of bachelor bucks we’ve been seeing. Its time, and we all sense it, and know it. I wager some ancient bucks know full well were coming and they horn thrust all the harder.

The pull, draw or want deepens in me this morning. Last Saturday I saw a big track when I skidded out some future firewood but it was more a mental note to me, than a significant find. It was hot and humid and I was tired. Today seeing that same track I would cut a tracking stick and try to follow that sharp hoofed rascal, or at least try.

The thoughts of taking a deer, big buck, little buck, doe, have lain dormant for months. There has been gentle mental musings and every once in awhile some hunting friend would mention a thick horned velvete’d  monster  seen or some  found antler shed of a promised stag from last fall that has to be larger this season to await us all.  Verbal Snacks to tide us over. The full meal deal, is still ahead.

Bow hunters, of which I consider myself semi-retired will clip shooting lanes and stuff long darts into hay bales in anticipation. Sporting goods store owners will tempt and tease me with concoctions of potency and the newest blaze orange super suits. Were pawing, and rubbing itchy antlers in our own way.

Looking into the early morning sky I wonder where he is walking or feeding. Stars above, where is the great hunter Orion this morning? Send me some luck you celestial night stalker. Could that big buck be feeding on my spilled bird seed right now in the darkness?  Boy I hope he’s a fat gray nosed ten pointer. Maybe it will be one of those of those pine pitched dark racks from some old swamp buck. Hunches played in my mind.

There is a newer game of poker, which the name escapes me, it’s all the rage. But the phrase when your hand is gonna make or break you, your final option is to make the statement “I’m all in”. I just pushed my cool morning air to the middle of life’s great outdoor poker table.  So to this falls deer season, I see your bet Mr. Whitetail deer of a summer’s full of imagination, and I am all in, and betting heavily on me. I flick the cigar ash to the ground.

The trout whisperer