Frosty the snowman

Due to ice storms and late season snow, Frosty has been denied the opportunity to flick dry flies at trout. Or even flick nymphs and strike indies at trout.

Frosty has been denied.

To alleviate, Frosty has tied. The fly tying desk smoulders with heat. The lines are stretched and greeez'd. The housecleaning is immaculate.

..and has Frosty shoveled!

Frosty has had a SHOVEL-RAMA! Yes! A play dough shovelrama!

Frosty's back hurts!

Frosty isn't old, but he sure as hell is frosty.

Due to the rain, Frosty is nearing a meltdown.

Frosty.

The snowman.

Closing in on meltdown.

See the curl. Beautiful curl.

See the curl?

The curl is between the line and the bug.

Now see the curl, it is unfurling.

Long nice curl. Caddis.

Riffle.

Ahh...beautiful riffle.

Try and try.

No luck. Move on.

More long curls. Beautiful curls.

Head slightly turns. Turns more.

Lonely curls. Nice curls.

Damned nice curls this early.

Looks around quiet.

More curl. Deep...deep.

Love slot.

Heh hehe. Bad joke.

Feels guilty.

Has morals, alone.

More curls, better curls and slower curls.

Wakes up.

Tall and white.

Piles and piles.

No.

Wakes up to curls.

Looks outside.

No.

Beautiful curls.

A little of this and a lot of that...

Here's stupe. Stupe's smart enough to know that she doesn't know what in the hell to think about a largemouth bass laying on top of twenty-one inches of ice. Stupe is smart so she plays along.

Good dog.

A little action away from the action.

See below.

Some crappies on said twenty one inches of (didI say hand auger?) ice. Numerable and also sizeable for the piece of water I'm sitting on.

First we rollim' in eggs. Thin we rollim' in crackers....

DynoMITEcha!

aaand the real action ...

cute liddle toes, fusses on demand

Worth every penny.

Ruffed Grouse opener

Here's stupe. She hasn't lost her enthusiasm for hunting upland birds. This is uplifting for me.

I was in such a jovial mood after such a successful first outing that I donated a bird to some kin. An email soon advised me that the bird hit the plate adjacent to such things as homegrown white carrots and gorgonzola cheese. It also suggested I keep hunting.

Deal.

Information

War is hell.

Grilled tomato sandwiches

I wish I were a big, big bank.
I wish I were a worn, war torn country.
I wish I were a has been television star.

I could buy you breakfast at tons 'o pancakies.
..and feed you grapes.

My Summer Olympics

While the DA was previewing this post, she said "I feel like I'm going to puke!"

She had a smile on her face, too.

Gold medal.

The first picture is an anomaly in that involves rest and relaxation. I got up to the cabin last weekend and played hooky from work to do it. I wanted to fish the lake a lot and fished the lake a little bit. Mostly, my ass had a mind of it's own and led the rest of me to the swinging bench that looks out over the lake. When it got there, the rest of me got used to it so quickly.

The second picture is of some hack working on a house.

The third is of some significance. The DA has graciously appeared before a camera to pose for a pregnancy photograph. Undoubtedly, the background gives proof of more projects to come.

No is the answer to what sex the child may be. We don't know. We know from ultrasounds that it has arms and legs, hands and feet. A big 'ol melon adorns it's topside and a few dark spots indicating eyes and nose are apparent. We're tickled pink. It kicks when the DA eats and when she's getting ready to hit the satchel. Good solid jabs, too.

... And here's the baby room. Needs some work, but will become the greatest newborn room ever. Upon entrance, the child will look up to it's dad and say with it's eyes, "Dude, nice job, but a little more on the fancy".

That's gonna be awesome.

I thought that I'd throw in a photo of my beautiful electrical service. It's disassembly was performed by a set of dogs, now since passed. And neither by electricity.

Ruffed Grouse season is coming up, maybe.

Crem Brulay. A Photo Essay.

Four days. One million walleyes. Ten billion sandflies. A few good fires. A few good brewskis. One hexagenia. A bit of rain. Some brave mud turtles. One massive smallie. Oh, I could go on and on...

Destination here, then there.

After sitting in the front end of a canoe for an hour Stupe was getting fidgety. Much to her delight, and my dismay, our portage was a wreck. She had a ball bouncing over and under the windfalls and I had a ball acting like a snake. This was without a canoe and pack for me. Stupe looked at me like I was a wimp. I looked at Stupe wondering if she could swim that far back to the landing.

The original deal was to make out with some walleye, if the water and the weather gave the go, then I'd give the push for some extra large brook trout. The weather gave the go. The portage didn't.

At the end of a seven mile paddle, with plan A sunk, there's nothing better to do but sprinkle your loss with sugar and hone the water at hand. A pile of smallies on black stuff under the surface and green stuff above it made me feel good right away.

On the way to the walleye grounds, I perchanced upon rising fish. These weren't any ordinary fish. These were freshwater whitefish. And they were rolling on half inch long midges. Sixteen feet of boat, with three quarters of a mile to the nearest tree. I was thinking fishcakes, dry flies. Dry flies, fish cakes. I had no trouble lining them up. A long row of midges meant a long row of fat, easy dorsal to tail rises. Seven patterns later when a breeze chopped up the lake, I looked over the gunwales of my canoe and watched the fishcakes sink. No ass hooked whitey for me.

Walleyes. The walleyed pike. The pickerel. The walleyed pickerel. They taste good.

I caught four after a squall hit the lake, making life perfectly difficult. No backing up, no turning. On big water, with nothing but a paddle, the lake will tell you what to do. Straight line, stick bait, pull the damned boat out over the point shoal. Anchor out when the fish nears you or you near the rocks.

Chill.

Pretty Pictures

More green eggs and ham

The gjods smiled on me on this rainy day.

Here's a snapshot of a fiesty chrome fish that had better things to do than get foiled by some goon using bait only two hundred feet into her river. She's around five pounds and displays the nice lines delineating silver and spots on the body, nice clean gray and a faint of blush on her head. A fish you wish you could steady and examine with a magnifying glass. For a couple of hours. As it was, she got a quick beach job and the forceps. Then she tail-flapped five feet through a few inches if water and probably set the cruise on resume.

Observations of a steelhead.

The girth, lots of it. This fish has spent some time behind his fair share of baitfish. A typical steelhead from the area looks less like a fat trout and more like an arrow.

Net marks. Note the line down his side forward of the dorsal. How much time he spent cooped up with whitefish and herring that came to a quicker end is one of those questions I'll have to ask the guy that probably released him. A lamprey scar adorns his port side as well. This fella has seen as much action on the front lines and in the brothels and any fish could hope to. He also decided to climb a bit further into the river than most fish in thirty-four degree water and give a good pound to the green eggs and ham seen in his mouth.

Regardless of water type, sex, species, barometric pressure, moon phase, month of year, bait, fly, presentation, spawning phase, latitude, Dr Juice, Sure Strike, day of week, time of day and all of that excellent et cetera, steelhead here typically do not give a good pound to anything. And especially in thirty four degree water. Also note the lack of chrome. With his river being open for only two weeks and the anchor ice cleared for less than that, this is the fish I go for when it's real, real early and I know I don't have a chance.

Green, used but in good shape.

Building furniture, even small pieces, takes time, tools, patience, time and practice. If you want the piece to be perfectly square, true and most importantly, lasting, square twice mentioned attributes.

The best thing about redwood is what happens to it when it gets wet.

Having spent too many hours in a pocket filled with popple twigs and fish eggs, the camera lens needs some polishing.

Thirty five years of deck railing gets new use. Getting there the hard way, but worth it. Actually, I got pretty jealous of some of the stuff I set up for my brother, which, coincidentally was green lumber as well. This setup will be around awhile.

Devils Track Recon

An hour and a half from the door runs a steelhead river that is, without question, my favorite.

There's two reasons for this. One is the water. It's all good, clean, fast and gnarly. Two is the geography. From where the steelhead can get into it to where they can't run any further is canyon water. Also, its a shale canyon, so even if you were a billy goat, chances are you'd take a big time header trying to reach the river from the rim in ninety-five percent of it's length. When the water goes up, you just don't get to fish it. Coupled with a generous amount of spawning habitat in sanctuary water, this river gets some good steelhead runs.

Here's a tiny feeder before bailing two hundred feet into the river. This, too, takes steelhead.

Looking up the canyon.
Sanctuary starts at the river a couple of hundred feet below.

Down the canyon. At the bottom of the picture, signs of open water. At the top, the big pond is in the background.


Stupe on point. With the woodcock heading north on spring migration, she just couldn't help herself.

Weathering the last of winter...

Just before the big hookup...

Fish on in the big surf!!

Manuevering a large steelhead through early April ice...

AWWWW! Huge native buck! Cut the line at the last minute!

Green, continued.

The making of a cabinet.

Waxing eloquent about the natural beauty of wood has been accomplished by too many others. Wood speaks and this piece is already saying, "Fill me with reels, hooks, feathers and bottle openers."

Dados and rabbets cut.

I put clamps on to glue it up solidly and keep it square. Lots of clamps. Then, when the nieces and nephews come over and barrel into it with, say, a splitting maul, I'll just have to sand out some mars instead of trashing the thing and starting anew.

A sanded carcase, ready for finishing, drawers, and uploading of all kinds of wonderful fishing and hunting crap. The DA already wants it.

Part of the Green

This desk has been relocated. A sure giveaway might be the lack of feathers and thread on the floor. Another might have to do something with the fact that there's nothing on the desk. Like, say, a pile of Magic Tricks or Jungle Bunnies.

But that's all obvious banter.

The fly-tying desk needs something in the way of drawers. The man that delivered me into this great world first cut the above pictured redwood and made it into deck railing. He did a good job picking his materials. The railing lasted thirty-five years. Happenstance and wherewith dictated that contract work was to bring us together again and I tore out and rebuilt his multiple decks. I saved as much as I could.

Deep Soak

Letting the greeze and funk off:
Post two-hour deep ultra dry seep to the bones sownna fest. Tail-flop in the spindrift next to shore and realize that a pile of snow can feel real good.

For Sale

The motors are spinning in the Frozen North. And when they do, plans are born. I love it when a good plan comes together and I hatched a new one. Pictured is a 2007 Fishpond Open Range vest. I bought it sparkling new last year and used it maybe a half a dozen times. There's no rips, torns, or frays. I'd say that there isn't even a beer stain on it but I don't spill beer, so therefore, notwithstanding the holes flies make in the front foam boxes, it's mint. New units go for one-fifty. If I know this one will go to a good home and wind up smelling like the cork on your favorite stick, I'll sell it for a hundred.



Honest parties can email me at kworks70@yahoo.com

Dishonest parties can do the same, but may dislike getting dragged to a frozen slew ditch and watching me not catch fish till you puke with envy.



In case you're wondering, the fly hanging with the vest is part of the plan to accomodate more big flies because I've a freakish penchant for them. It's The Uncastable Wonder Hog. An aquaintance of mine who owns a fly shop gave it to me when I bought a Simms jacket from him. He just said, "Go fish for pike with this."

And now for a unique news flash

Well, my brothers, the local rag from the nearest biggest city has deemed our beloved Poplar River front page newsworthy. A color photograph adds touches sure to roil the hearts and minds of those who grow their own granola. A good aerial shot it is. The brown river slurry is contrasted sharply with the lake water, which looks as if it could be used by vacationing snorkelers, looking for tropical fish. In reality, as we know, those good old staples of tannin and clay will do just the same for any river in the right conditions.

At any rate, as the article states, this river has been declared Dirty Enough To Think About. Furthermore, it has also been observed that only the last two miles of this river has turbidity (shit in it, sediment only, the stuff that can't be ignored right away like fertilizer and fuel oil), and that only the last two miles have been heavily developed.

A pie graph visually depicts the culprits:

Ahhh, let's see here. Ok, we got Golf. That's one percent. No Worries.

Channel Incision, three percent. Source of incision not listed. What else.

Ok, we got the naturals, Megaslump (big dirt/clayslide) Twenty-six percent. Forest, fourteen. Gullies/Ravines, eleven. Other Landslides, ten.

Then the rest. Here's Ski (alpine resort) thirty-three percent. Seems kinda heavy. And developed, one percent.

That's a whole lotta land to river love for two miles!

This gets me thinking about solutions. I mean real solutions. Somebody has to pay for this, right? We have the feds hiring researchers already, MPCA and the rest of the state agencies, and the locals. It's just one river forthelovapete. This is getting expensive, the taxpayers really don't dig this. They can SEE it. It's in the papers. But at least they don't live in the river with the fish!!!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!

Alright, I'm done fuckin' around. Here's the deal. This is it:

Get the meetings at the stupid fucking town hall over with. Pull the wool, whatever.

Then put that Megaslump in shock and awe mode. It needs it. If that thing can just sit there and think it belongs there because the river made it, then we need to KICK ITS ASS. Do the same for the other gullies and ravines and landslides. It's concrete time, pour away and bring in the big ass rock.

Ok, that's it for all the big natural contributors. Except the trees. Special plan. Cut em' down. Takes care of that. Then more Ski Hill. This will call for more development but that's fine, they're only at one percent. After that, we encourage a nice, clean, non-profit organ, feed them state and fed grants, and give 'em the go to channelize the whole valley. Make sure some trout get thrown in there from time to time, and find some cheap deep root wonderbrush for the banks. The greener the better. Miniature chinese dinasaur whatevers. Nice.

...further quests for inner peace.

Early season approaches the galactic spring creeks of southern Wisconsin, bringing hope and questionable consumption of uni-thread; phone calls from the west coast relate glad tidings of steelhead on the swing and familiar blogs depict bionic fish that didn't come up through a hole in the ice.

Meanwhile, back at the Hall of Justice, our heroes are in throes of despair. If the right bait comes along, I'll blow this little frozen hick gossip churn and head for fruitier waters, regardless of population. In the meantime, I dig leaving the Ipod and keys in the truck at night and guiltlessly drowning the punks who throw rocks into my trout holes.

Yep, plenty Icy here shiatt! and vucabularie dwindles an' the basement is at the point feared most by the DIY club. The spit of project known as Nearing Completion. The DA has gratefully moved in, weights, yoga mats and all, requesting finish work. So when the call came through for a trip south, I jumped.

We headed for the furiously disdained bright lights, to fulfill an obligation to young nephew Ike. Having parents (though no fault whatsoever of theirs) unable to get drivers licenses, 'ol Ike doesn't get around a hell of a lot. The DA thought up a science museum trip for a late Christmas present would be just aces. The kid really rallied for the dinosaurs and had a good time. I suppose this could be a case of ringing my own bell but the outing made us feel good and warm and fuzzy. Later, when he's in his teens, I'll repay him by letting him carry the canoe and the food pack into the honey ho's.

...and to watch a little hockey.

Calgary took Minnesota in this game two to one at a sellout of about eighteen thousand. The puck off of the Minnesota wood spent a lot of time mad-dangling in front of the Flames' net and I even heard the ring of rubber to pipe. Dammit, I wanted the net to sling just to hear the crowd. More importantly, it was all the fault of one fine brother-in-law; the infamous S-Rod. Deal: eighty-five dollar seats and a hundred bucks cash, don't worry, be happy, it goes on an account. We spent it on Amber Bocks and fried mini donuts. I forgot about everything both stupid (not fishing for steelhead) and important (fishing for steelhead). Now that's brotherly love.

Meat Post

One hundred and twelve feet of real free range venison pepper stick cradle a foot and a half of the finest venison summer sausage.

This pic was taken only minutes after leaving the walk-in of the best Yugoslavian butcher in the upper midwest. Note the fine frost, a sign of perfect short-term preservation.

A Ride

An Aretha Franklin unit that sings like Aretha Franklin. The old truck on the right, just waiting to die loaded with a ton of firewood or sheetrock. Below zero tempuratures required.

A couple of minutes from the porch.

Dwindling cliffs on one of the Twin Lakes.

Sitting on Aretha, sipping a Miller, and watching the granite and birch speak to me.

An old timer in his seventies broke camp from the first lake and rode up to check her out.

He was pretty excited to see a machine running that was built back when he was gettin' jiggy with the real Aretha. He was riding an ol' Elan and wasn't comfortable letting it idle for too long. So he split.

On the way to the lakes, this cutoff trail exists. At sixty degrees from level, it rises about two hundred feet. At the top, I once watched a bogey suspension disintigrate from underneath a bombadier my dad let me use. Then there was the Elan that the patriarch of the c-boy clan was kind enough to let me destroy. That one overheated at the pinnacle of this trail. The excess heat found its way to the gasoline tank, which was around half full and, yes, ignited. It opened up the hood of the machine and left my stunned ass thirty feet behind the machine. The eyebrows came back eventually. In summer and winter I remember this spot. Here was my very first bout with mortal luck.

Happens every time

The DA wanted a new clean setting in the basement in which to tone the abs and clean the soul. Hence, in the stead of writing in this silly damn blog and ice fishing, I have been making dreams come true. Complete with new drywall, paint, wiring, plumbing, lights, tiling, trim and carpet, this will be an ab-toning soul-cleaning mecca.

I'm still working on moving the fly-tying table down but the DA doesn't think that feathers and fish are like yoga. I think feathers and fish totally blow yoga away because Gjod made them before yoga. Yin and yang, man. The fish is always biting at it's tail.

While getting into some trimwork at the basement stairwell, doing picky crap to make it look good and measuring down to a strong sixteenth, I got hit.

The steelhead.

I knew I was fucked there from the word.

Now my life is nothing but:

drift rods and fly rods and what reel to put mono on and don't forget that you didn't score in the Kadunce falls hole with a nymph.

And that I never score there with a nymph.

And then you put eggs on and...oh jeses mortification.

And the hard hammer t-mos had on the freebase hare's ear in the deep water below the shale hole on the tism that late spring

The Cross River.

The Humpy Hole and the sticky, sweet deep drift. JEEEZ.

Just remembering all the King Salmon there were in that period sized spot.

How hard can I hump the DT this year?

I need to backpack up and camp on it for ten days. Nothing but a camera.

Should I shake up the Grude and have him show me the Split Rock secrets this year?

Mom has a house at Crow Creek. I'm going to check that out.

Finagle down to the mouth of the Manitou.

Sly down to the mouth of the Caribou.

Get my ass up to Canada, where I'll stop short and spent five days at the Brule.

More bait and wait with flies at the Poplar?

No more clay banks or Kimball for me.
Focus on BASS flies this year!








A horrible, mighty struggle.

NINETEEN SEVENTY

If you ever get invited to a seventies party, cut and run. No. Run. To hell with the cut part.

In an earlier post I described the recipe for pure trouble. This was a seventies party devised by members of the same tribe as before. Given some and taken others. I'll describe the scene back then, in the seventies.

It's 1973:

That's Joe Cool in the top pic. One Nine Seven Zero youth defined. Laid back. Big, big ass matching bottoms. Perfect hair with stylish accoutrements. Joe is peaking on the latest mix of cocaine and whatever form of heat was handed to him last. He's feeling right and tops and chicks have been on him all night. All of the other dudes, gay and straight, are staring.

The atmosphere and the mirrorball are making him look all the better at the party and soon, as shown in the second pic, he decides to show off some moves. He's got plenty of hot ones, this Joe; for sure. For sure. He can point. He can sweat. He does IT ALL!

At just the right moment on the tune the best flamingo in the party joins him. The looks in the crowd tell her that he's got all the other boys beat and she matches him, hip for hip. They move, they groove and swing and duck. The dance crowd goes crazy and everyone joins in.

Later, more guests arrive with groovy brownies and more cocaine and food and Joe, with the aid of this new girl, digs in. Everyone parties and dances, chills and spills and dances some more...

In the morning, after that wild party Joe wakes up with a hangover and realizes that something has happened.

He realizes that it's nineteen eighty five. Saturday morning in June? What the hell? Are those my kids? What's with the short hair! OH MY GOD! They're not being DRAFTED are they?! Does the army really pin their jeans at the bottom like that! Son! What are in all of those pockets?! To his dismay, his mouth tastes like the haispray he uses and DAMN!... with the BeeGees still pound, pound, pounding in his brain, feels as though he's being nuetered with rubber bands!

Poor Cool Joe decides to go back to bed to try and sleep it off.

The real Joe in the pic went home early, before he tripped on those gorgeous trousers.

Clink the glasses

A legendary New Years locale. There's no power or running water. Hence, no one puking on your shoes or spilling your beer.

Stupe and the original renegade pacing part of the cabin fleet; a 1973 Polaris TX.

The Polaris with original owner.

The fishing was slow on new years eve. We thought for sure we'd get some action with a low front and some snow coming in. I thought the sunken island would hold some fish but no one wanted to paddle out that far fearing the east wind would pick up.

The DA swatting dogs off of a new set of skate skiis.

Isn't that just delicious?

We hung this for some light...

...didn't need it. Burning the deadfalls and an old dock made of spruce.

The DA recovering with Rudy, a springer puppy with a good life ahead of him.

Hope yours is good, too

Happy New Year.

Tribute

Recipe for pure, pure trouble;

Marry a finn.

Mix in some swede blood.

Add sister and sister in law with similar attributes.

DON'T STIR!!

Let combination meld for undetermined amount of time.

Ingredients will seethe and compliment, plan and undermine.

Add wigs, stretch hummer limo.

With an extreme amount of appreciation to the aforementioned, lovingly blend in time and care.

And Rock-n-Roll.

Happy Thirtieth Birthday to the DA!

Backlash Four, Three Rivers

Late June and the boat calleth. Since theres so much damn water here to see, an exploratory daytrip nearby made sense. Bragging about faraway destinations lacks soul if you don't know your own backyard, so Stupe and I made the Little Isabella, Isabella, Snake route.

Set up in the boat at the L Isabella landing.

L Isabella, first portage.

Stupe noticed the cow, but again demonstrates that upland birds are her pot o' gold.

Last portage on the L. Isabella. Stupe makes the blaze and assures me no suprises await. Like bear cubs.

When my brother first moved to spring creek country, we fished the pastures. Once, when moving to and from a run, we passed a cow. He remarked, "You have to wonder, that cow could be thinking nothing or, 'I'm gonna eat this guy'". You never can tell. Same with moose. The animal will almost always move off. When chin deep in the BWCA, always keep in mind the long slog out if a fiesty moose decides your boat would be better off with a hole punched in the bottom of it.

Aforeseen bull where, at top right, L Isabella runs into Isabella proper. Stupe and I had some cheese and crackers and a cold one and watched the moose mow the river bottom. Hungry fella.

Isabella rapids number one, this one was runnable but we portaged.

Isabella flowing, at right, into Bald Eagle Lake. Twenty pound Northern Pike like to attach themselves to your stringer of walleyes in this water. The pic is taken at the end of the seventh of ten portages on the trip and the second longest at 141 rods. This is a prime spot to pitch hell and whatnot on a nine weight and have a real shot at landing a big Pike. But it ain't free. The last portage is the longest at 198 rods, which is the trail from the parking lot to the Snake River which leads to Bald Eagle. Hope you have a light boat.

Snow Day

If the first snow is twelve inches and you call it anything less than "some snow" (i.e. a dusting, or, a liddle bita snow, eh?), then just forget it, don't read this. Yoopers and mountain men know snow better than I. Readily conceded.

Here's eleven hundred dollars worth of powered shovel at work. In the background, fifty dollars worth of manual unit. After much deliberation (notwithstanding shelling all that coin) and many tubs of elbow grease used on messrs manual a few years back, I paid for the power haven't looked back. Having a real fear of collecting shit that one eventually must repair or replace is a legitimate one, I think.

I like paddles and snowshoes. Under the radar and utilitarian seems the real deal. But I'd honestly plunk down five or six grand for a new snowmobile. The problem is, the market knows that there's too many cool people out there who absolutely need seven hundred pounds of machine with a nine hundred drive. Having spent seven or eight g's you can "get together with your buddies" and haul four or six of them to a favorite destination behind a triton v10 and use a quarter of that horsepower to hit one-ten for five seconds across a lake filled with trout. Or thrill in narrowly missing that extremely stout red maple at seventy-five. The one capable of quickly slowing down a loaded pulp truck or concealing a CO or county law man, enforcing the fifty mph limit.

So not yet on the snowmachine.

Backlash three, Bwca sawbill two

PREFACE:

According to NOAA;
Fifteen below zero at 10:30 pm, Nov 30 2007.

Give thanks, 'coasties and southerners. You get open water.

I'll post some stuff you wish you had done from my summer now that the weather is good for working on the honey-do list, unless you want to see and hear about me taping sheetrock.

90 degrees. The walleyes are off. Beer available. Lake is warm.

S-Rod, this year's sponsored mexican, introduced us to a form of relaxation he calls "diapering".

After watching us float like dying whales or kicking the lake to a froth, the Don himself decides to demonstrate the proper prerequisites for total denial of gravity. With a leap he was afloat, and witnessing his instant gratification, all of us followed. We wished for the knowledge sooner.

Given ideal water temps and atmospheric conditions, bliss is near.

Taken from the campsite.
Some classic summer fishing. The crew members are floating around to see what might happen. This is how tourists smash fish records to bits. Feet up, dangling lines, and then something pulls the canoe to the bottom of the lake. You can be as hardcore as a twenty ton piece of granite about anything. If you don't lay back and watch how the water hits the boat every now and then, you'll wish you had.

The poles sticking out of the bow and stern have yellow deer hair and rubber legs attached to them, just in case.

A pre-diaper shot of the Don. After viewing the picture shortly afterwards, we decided that total serenity or absolute stupidity gives a man enough courage to dive the way he does. Out of ten, the water entrance was a solid eight.

Shortly after landing at the campsite. Very shortly. Very, very shortly. We recognized some challenges. Yes, rookie campers, animals learn by and from you. After chasing this little fella off of the plates for two days, we trapped his ass and hung him from a tree in a large plastic bottle. There he witnessed the goings on for awhile. Then he was released unharmed. He was seen no more.

Backlash two, bwca sawbill

A meal in late June in camp. I chose Sawbill Lake this year for its darkness, thinking that the hex's would be there. They were. Portages are customary on our annual trips but we decided to stay on Sawbill. Hence, the football and chairs got the nod on this one and I'll be damned if I know how my brother in law squeaked that sink drain in between the thwarts.

Backlash one

Another adage; it is said that, where I sit by a nice pine fire, there are four seasons. Almost Winter, Winter, After Winter, and Road Construction. An educated guess in it's origins might involve a real inventive sport to blame for the coining and word of mouth with the snowbird gang and barflies to name a few. Like many, it is a twisted tale.

A disagreement:

During Almost Winter, the leaves go psychedelic. You can explore previous posts. There you'll find good times, folks. Good times.

The After Winter period revels in waiting for the Big Thaw.

The mouth of the home water. The river is pouring over the frost line, six feet up from lake level. When the line backs to the first rapids, game on for the first river steelhead. The Pond is at the left in back and early this year served as catalyst for The Thaw as well as major and minor tackle preparations.

Very exciting this After Winter is. For afterwards, one gets all dirty with fish.

Winter. At it's birth, forty degrees is a three layer consideration. Near it's death, t-shirts at thirty-five and sunny. Shorts and crocs for the adolescents.

In between; Sixty below windchills or a frozen lake so quiet you can hear a pin drop in six fresh inches on the far shore.

More to come. It just got born.

Road Construction equals summer. Here, the main thread gets wider and straighter to accomodate the tourists. Along with winter, it's aptly named. Frost heaves up on rock and clay with passion and lust. They feast on road the whole while.

Spanning three or four months of real summer-type weather, Road Construction seems a short, memorable season.

Getting off on the scenery, waiting for the deer.

I was pondering the vintage 1972 Polaris at this stage of the game and how it will pack me and a load of essentials onto a trout lake covered with another fifteen inches of ice for another winter.

Richard scouted this clear cut and in the middle of the first week, staked a blind and sat down here. He spent the first twenty five minutes of his season watching for deer and the end of the twenty sixth killing an eleven point. You watch and listen to the old dogs in all styles of life. If you don't, you're effectively turning tail on the crystal ball.

There's gunsmoke still coming out of T-mos' 94.

A quarter mile in.

Timber wolves. The night after Richard shot his deer, they followed the trail into the blind, tore up the spot where the deer was hit, tracked the run, ate the gutpile, followed the drag, and fucked up the ground where the deer left terra and entered truckbed. In an order few or none have been privy to. The spot is near epicenter of the densest population of wolves in this country. I did think about that when going back in for a field dressed deer. Sans rifle.

Still another cutover picture. There's the truck. Halfway there. The son of a bitch didn't look this big. Thank God for snow. I should have stripped those layers. I'd have chopped those antlers by now. I wish there was a little bit more snow. Fuck those four wheelers. This is fun. I'm having a brewski when I get back.

Every time I make a cut, there's a plan. Hollandaise here, bleu cheese butter there.

And a perfect one for mucking straight.

A pic for a fellow whose love of meat goes right to his email address...

Cut and Wrapped

I was thinking of holding out for a buck until a fat doe trotted out this Saturday. A fat doe equals a hundred and forty, dressed.
A big set of antlers or a really heavy deer makes for good bragging rights and rightly so. I'll pass for the fishing and the bird hunting that takes up the time to scope trophy racks. The freezer is (very freshly) full of chops and steaks and roasts and a big pile of quality grind ready to be made into any tasty thing.

Common anomalies

When an aspen tree grows up with any variation of climbing vine wrapped around it, here's what happens:

These are some of my collection in various stages of finishing.

I'll get around to making a groovy flytie table and maybe even take a crack at a chair when I find just the right specimens. Until and after then, they'll be another reason to exit indoors, mosey the "wilderness" and miss another blue ribbon edition of "Puking with the Stars".

A finished unit.

The more wraps the rarer, this is probably a one in a thousand find. Richard fashioned this walking stick. Now in retirement, he gets to think about important things more often, like wrapping romex around young popples in an attempt to create a real eye opener.

He's got a garage full and told me to turn my blog into a cheap garage sale. Comment on latest post if interested. You'll improve a SD pheasant trip for an honest Finlander if you do.

Another opener

Regular firearms deer season this time.

A sunrise, a sunset, and another sunrise later, I had a deer walk behind me and a forked buck tooling along with a six pointer pass right in front of me. They were in a hurry. For fun, I gave an estrus bleat (horny doe in a can) twice and it stopped the six-point long enough to flick an ear, hop the brush just behind the pine in the photo, and disappear downhill. I have no time for nicking running deer in heavy brush. Even less time for dragging it the mile it ran afterwards. Fack that.

Scorewise I'm ahead. Three deer through as opposed to none. No heavy weather. All the nifty shit that happens when your pieholer is shut and your ears and eyes aren't (super-duper especially when watching those addictive nighttime soaps like gheys anatomy),

and leaving the bullet riddled shore for some cabin hunting solitude.

The red carpet.

You walk on it. You clean it.

Checking off the list

Have you ever had Zup's venison sticks?

Partial whitetail deer preseason to do list:

Sharpen knife. (will it split a hen hackle fiber? How about in the air after you drop it?)
Buy license. (MN regular firearm zone one area 127 with antlerless bonus tag)
Check plat book. (It was county land the last time I checked, but best act responsibly)
Make sure T-mos is cool with me using his model 94. (T-mos is always cool, but best act responsibly)
If so, make targets for sighting it. (For a clean shot. At a deer.)
Get mega road trip style plastic bottle. (Whitetails disdain human urine as much as humans do. Well, real humans anyway)
Scope the aspen cutover and set blind. (At the risk of it getting stolen, this is to make sure I don't look up at daybreak and see orange in a tree stand anywhere. Also to naturalize the thing; Blind meet popple, popple meet blind)
Load a book onto the ipod (I watched a cow moose and her calf have dinner and bed down for the night from my tree stand three years ago. Then the sun set. Five hours turned into fifteen minutes, to my suprise.
I suck at sitting still. I'll plug in when the cutover goes quiet. The DA tells me the book she wants me to hear is a scary one, so I should be able to listen comfortably with a high-powered rifle in my lap and not get frightened, out there in the woods alone)
Dig the whole thing. (Only two weeks out of fifty-two for gun season. Six days if you dirt collar like me.)

American Woodcock

Back from a winterizing stint at the cabin with Richard. Pull the dock and Bunky the pontoon boat out of the lake, et cetera. And other generalities, like Richard exacting revenge on the cribbage board.

The American Woodcock is a migratory bird. Like ducks and geese, they travel in groups, landing in favored areas overnight or for a few days. Unlike ducks or geese, they are remarkably difficult to see after they do and must know it. A common technique used by reseachers for capturing live woodcock for banding involves a good pointing dog and a net. The dog points and the bird is netted on the ground. I've been told that the bird usually flushes before the person with the net can find it.

Richard counting primary feathers. It is difficult to dead-on determine the age and sex of a woodcock. Counting from the tip of the wing, the twelfth to fifteenth primary feathers give good indications of a birds' age and sex. Take notes on tip banding and mottling symmetrics.

Post test reward!

The recipe for Woodcock Ramake:

Breast filets of woodcock are carefully cradled in onion or green pepper the way julie cuts them. Wrap in a half of strip of bacon. Fresh ground pepper, maybe seasoned salt. Everyone knows the grill works best, but the oven works too. Use medium to low cooking temps to keep the bacon from flaring.

This photo shows ramake made with woodcock and grouse. If this doesn't look good to eat, an air freshener will help with the greasy, humid mcdonalds aura in your car or house. If still no go, peta is always looking for people to strap bombs to.

Richard's yellow lab, Rowdy, shows that the old dogs know what the game is about.

If that were a rattlesnake...

If I were fifteen feet away from a bird sitting in a relatively sparse pine in full daylight and the bird is abount an inch or two shorter than a grown rooster, I always believed I'd be able to spot it in a second. Stupe knew it was there, kept her trap shut and was looking at me real funny. I stared at the bird on the branch for five minutes. Put on your watch and look at something for five minutes. Then I got closer and closer until I could see that it's neck was bent at two forty-five degree angles and the tail was skewed way off to it's right side. It looked exactly like an eight inch chunk of branch. I looked at a ruffed grouse ten feet from me for minutes nonstop and I believed that it was not a grouse. By then, Stupe was bailing nervous circles and getting stoned on scent and then the bird gave a flinch. I've never given too much of a care for disintigration so I put one over the tree and we watched where it went.

Stupe takes another one out of the popples.

The home water takes a bath.

The same waterfall as shown in an earlier post. Rowdier. I took the previous picture from where the foam line is. I'ts rained here for two weeks steady with a day or two of what you might call letup and wouldn't call indian summer.

Thanks to some camp experience with real northwest coast steelheaders, the knee length rubber boots, dry firewood and chemical logs have been stowed just in case the water around here unblows before the season ends.

New structure

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Brule, ah. Brule. So subject to adversity. And raining like hell again as I write.

Five words for a rainy month in Minnesota

Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome. Giggity.

The nature of things

Silent... (no story, DA very effective)

and beautiful. (no story, hard frosts ineffective)

Another pic and The Reason Why

A bronze banded ruffed grouse tail.

This ruffed grouses' tail displays one of the rarer color phases. The picture may not strike the viewer in the face with a hard left. However, it affords me to show the appreciative another thing on this earth that is pretty.

It also shows the log which it had chosen for it's drumming site. Crusty grouse hunters will see the proof. The drumming log is a spot where a male ruffed grouse flaps it's wings to attract mates. No bathrooms in crowded airports, just a nice secluded stand of aspen trees.

Stupe and I had just taken one (that's granola for "kill") and as I was gutting it (that's sportsman for "taking care of wild game") this bird drummed.

Stupe makes three long loops around where I heard the drumming and halfway through the fourth, zones to the center of said loops, points, and flushes the bird and after I get a precious wingshot, makes a good retrieve. Wingshots are always precious. Like Big Fish takes on a dry, the moments deform part of your brain and you can easily recall every single one.

My pop put guns in our hands when we were real young. By the time I was twelve and my younger brother ten, we learned just what a .357 magnum could do to a person who was on the safe end of the barrel and what it did to a sprite can that wasn't. Around that time there were shotguns too, and "don't you ever fuck around with these, either". But he still entrusted us to them, took us for long walks and car rides and showed us what the ruffeds were all about. Still I wonder why we never wore helmets through this.

This led to that and I met the DA. DA the dog person, who's dad, Richard, raised and trained gun dogs for years. On a fine September Saturday afternoon he asked me how my bird hunting has been. I told him I had killed four so far that season. He invited me to go with him the next morning and guaranteed I'd see twenty birds. I saw twenty two and was barely keen enough to notice which scenes his dog acted in. Will you spell s-o-l-d for me, people? Shortly after the Da and I had two dogs of our own. She conveyed the idea of dog ownership. I held my ground of little resistance. One of them turned out to be just about the best out of the box bird dog a Labrador can be. Richard sees this and says to me,

"You better hunt that dog because you'll never have one that good again in your life".

So we hunt, the season is short. And only Kings hunt birds and fish salmon.

Gigity.

The summer side of life.

Finnish marigolds.

By late July they looked like this. They got a transplant in September to a small patch of dirt near the house (for heat) in September and I took this pic this morning. Blossoms through two frosts. Year after year, they keep on rocking and rolling after the hardwood trees around here drop leaves and after the potatos and squash and beans issue their statements.

Children talk, and rivers and trees. People (never on tv) talk from time to time. These flowers are rather articulated, so I thought I'd blog'm.

Salmon in the home water

Since the weather was tops today for fishing the brand of salmon that come into the rivers near here, I went. It doesn't take long to reach the home water. And with a bit of hiking I get to look at this:

Here's the upstream boundary for all fish that move up this river. Right after I took the pic a dark king took a very nice attempt at the falls. Figures.

But this also suprised me. The local fish polititians, with bulldoggish prompting by the local sportsman groups cut funding altogether for the pacific salmon stocking in the area. The pool you're looking at hosted state record kings and thousands of fish year after year. It seems that the more native species like brook trout, steelhead and lake trout are getting into the money around here. This suits me just fine.

I took the seven weight out and landed some of the pinks that will be there this time of year and turned one king. I spotted a few old rusty-tails cruising around but after awhile found myself thinking how much cooler this river would be if the steelhead ran it like the salmon do now.

Or even better, did then.

This afternoon

Here's stupe. (A Labrador Retriever retrieving)

Gifted with a perfectly good coat and enough sense to know that a handbag will only slow her down in life, the dog likes to focus on things that are important. One of those things, she'll readily admit, is finding ruffed grouse in the woods. Another is telling you that one is nearby and a third one is flushing it into the air. When I make my feeble contribution to this lopsided team she rewards me by a fine retrieve. When I don't she just stands there and looks at me.

The verdict is in...

Some of the guys at the office had a silent survey.

'Superman or Green Lantern?' was laid to question on this wall.

I thought superman would be a ringer with the box office returns.

Here's the results. This is Lantern country.

The view from across the road

An earlier post heralded the DA as community peacekeeper and since its inception to the www, readers wanna know; any word from the neighbors? Well, I can say this: After all the bitching, loud (and friends, I mean loud) music (with a scattering of evangelism), and vehicle revving, the finn bomb left a crater destitute of any of the above. A void where unhappy life once thrived.

Think of it. The creation of peace and quiet.

Based on experience, I can tell you the DA, despite her size, won't be eating crap sammies long if there's a Big Mac nearby. But I really am impressed with this. I hope I can pick the lock to this wonderful gift. I'll be sure to share, the world needs way more of it.

Critic

So I got an email from my new ses-in-law with a link to a Mason Jennings concert, it read "YOU HAVE TO GO SEE THIS!" My brother and her got me turned on to him since they gave me the honor of playing one of his ditties for their first dance. The DA and I pondered it and finally gave it the all clear when mom called and invited us to join her and my sis. Her nickel, to boot.

Now, I'm not a folk junkie so I can't weep tears o' prayer for this guy, but I know a solid performer when I see one. He earned his keep at the show and the cash I paid to get him on my Ipod. So cheers, Mason, you did a good job. Plus, being older than college age, its was a cool experience...Til mom started jamming the Floyd Kramer on the way home.

New season

I brake for ruffed grouse.

Here's stupe. Her apparent interest indicates a certain recognizance. I was going to shoot this bird but I got caught up in the dogs' antics and shot this pic instead. The bird flushed.

Stupe at work.

Stupe and bones.

Richard gearing up bones. Bones is a pudelpointer named after the ruffed grouses' genus Bonasa.

Richard at the walleye office. I'm sitting in the cabin. Feet up.

Here's stupe. If birds hang on a barbed wire fence beside a dog and a broken down over-under in the field for too many pictures they just rot. Cut into strips and rolled in seasoned flour and pan-fried, these went good with a can of beer.

The end of another opening day at the cabin. Richard felt it best to take the last few out of a 20 year vintage bottle of Beam given to him by his brother in law. He also felt it best to point out his cribbage win. Alas, I took the rubber match.

Here's my dog.

Here's stupe. She also goes by Casey or Lady. Sometimes Caseylady. Sometimes Youstupidfucking.

She smiles when she thinks she's in trouble or wants attention. She's a bird dog so I can put her on this blog as much as I want and she won't get offended. She's cool all the time.

Door County,Wisconsin

ART BARN
COFFEE
SHOPPING

Fin, Finn style

Bass lines breaking your windows? Suspected domestic abuse? Send in a pretty finn. The better half got fed up with the party scene across the street. So she marched over and swung the hammer. Meanwhile, the young Ike and I kept the guns ready back at the fort. He was ready to go, too. Itching for territory.

get real...get ready

One day, in a land far, far away...the barber shaved another customer.