Ratcliff Lake Canoe Fishing...

I figured once I retired I would be doing stuff like buying a cheap Astros tickets and running down to catch a few more ball games than I normally would and I did have reservations for live music this summer that have since been canceled all due to the changes the danger of Covid has brought to us. One door closes another opens. A purchase of a $30 U.S. Forest Service parking permit gets me in all the boat ramps I use on Rayburn and also Ratcliff Lake. I think I have got my monies worth from the Ratcliff visits alone this summer. 

Here's an example of one of the four big bream I caught. This is a certified lunker for this species. I have always caught fish at Ratcliff, even on hot summer days like this. I was just thinking I don't think I have ever fished a really prime time like spring when the spawn is on or fall when coming cool makes everything want to fill up a belly. Maybe I'll try that this fall. 

We have taken several swims this summer at this lake. Go out about midweek, 3-5 in the afternoon. The swimming area has receded into shade and there is very few people around. It's been typical to meet one party leaving as we arrive and another arriving as we leave. I don't know what kind of weekend crowd there might be. 

Park facilities are well groomed and bathrooms are clean. I have never seen and staff but some one is doing a great job. 

After fishing, all fish CPR (catch photo release) I sat overlooking the lake for a sardine shore lunch. I advise you to visit, just not early in the morning when I might have the fishing all to myself or midweek afternoons when we are out for a swim. 

Another New Blog Character...

Welcome Cullen Edgar. Born 7/28/2020 to Morgan and Ali. He's our grand child #7. 

He's a big old boy at 8lbs 5oz and 21 inches. 

They are down in the Houston area and with the virus it might be a bit before we get the baby in the tuba photo but bear with us. These are interesting times but surely blessed times that draw us closer to our family. 

July Fishing Report...

With a tropical storm turning to a hurricane we decided we better preempt that action on Thursday afternoon with a fishing trip. High winds were predicted for the weekend, which is not always a deal breaker since wind is an important component of where fish are but of course humans must be able to survive the wind to catch them. 

We found the fish deep at 30 feet and using this old Zebco reel, it's actually a made in USA model, if I turned the reel handle 3 cranks up that's where I got the bites. That old reel makes a heck of a noise bringing in a filleting size cat. I call this rig the grinder. Cathy says it sells wolf tickets with sound leading her to believe my fish seems bigger than it is. Another fishing tip, see that old sweet gum way over there on the bank? I always get a bite if I point my pole directly toward it. 

2001 was the last year Zebco made reels in the USA. This reel is older than that I believe.   

Nice cats, some throw backs. I think someone might be fishing my spot because while it's still producing seems like there is more small fish around. 

Final count for the fishing log is 26. We had the Zamoras out and fried them up last nights with hushpuppies, oven baked cheese potato, green salad and jambalaya. There's enough leftover to keep me busy today.   . 

A Tale of Two Tubas...

I have been shifting old photos. Not digital, but the kind you hold in your hands if that description helps anyone and I came up with these two. Before the old memory fades to black I'll try to reconstruct the story. 

This first photo is of Morgan playing with an old gold sousaphone. Morgan was born in 1987. That red wall paper and it should be noted that the other wall to the picture takers back is also red wall paper but of a different pattern that all went away in about 1990. The house plant in a mop bucket style of decorating as well as the green linoleum floor also did. The horn must be on loan from Angelina College where I had been playing in the community band. After a long gap I started playing again out there a few years ago and there is a gold sousaphone that could be this one piled up in a back storage room.  

Piled next to the gold sousa in the storage room is a fiberglass horn that is this one. I recall having it on loan and playing it on some community band gigs but while I can't really recall any of these during the years of the child raising and I don't recall why I had one and then the other I do recall Morgan taking the valves out of this horn, banging them around which required music shop repair done just in time for some event I played. 

I do remember having this horn at home when I came into possession of my current horn, a 1936 King 1240 recording bell concert tuba. I recall the day when I returned the sousaphone to the Angelina College Music department. I went to an office with the horn. At the time I knew no one working there. I said "I've had your horn at home on loan and thought I would return it." They said, "OK," and accepted it. 

I don't know where this photo was made. Probably the next thing that happened is that I ran into that light fixture and broke it. Tuba players do stuff like that all the time.   

So there you have it. A bit of history added to the tuba story and maybe some one will add a bit more when they see these photos one day. I do notice from browsing of the internets there are a lot of band geeks in the world studying about buying shiny new horns. As the owner and player of an 84 year old horn and a New Orleans music fan where a 100 year old horn is not uncommon it makes me a bit sad that these tubas are piled up back in a storage room. 

May they one day be free. On a wall where the paneling does not quite meet the door frame you can peer in and catch a glimpse of the red wall paper so I guess you can consider that it is kind of free, free enough to make you wonder why.   

Turtle Shell Guitar...

Looks like it has been a couple of years since I constructed a homemade instrument. Last things I made were a run of BOAT PADDLE GUITARS. On a recent visit to Chicago Katie gave me this turtle shell. With COVID concerns we had driven up there instead of flying so as flying in recent years has been kind of a bare bones bad bus trip kind of thing I had room to transport this shell safely back to Texas.  

I have made percussion instruments out of turtle shells before but this is the first stringed instrument. It's a one stringer in the diddley bow fashion. If you study music and how it moves around the world you should be aware that sub Saharan people imported to this country way back in the early 1600s brought the traditions of one string and bowed instruments here that turned into our fiddles and banjos. The Caribbean and South America is where the forest people of Africa brought the drum. That's why music sounds like it does.    

I wish I had had some bass guitar turners on hand to use. Seems like I had a set and I know I used a couple on a guitar I have hanging down in the Museum of East Texas so there shoukd be a couple more somewhere.   

I don't know where Katie got this shell. It's a Yankee Turtle. 

You do know if you are playing more than one string you are just showing off.  I play this with a slide, like a steel guitar or a diddley bow. 

That's an old axe handle used for the neck. One time years ago I lived in a rent house and the landlord came over to paint it. He got drunk while painting nd somehow went off and left a fine double bladed axe in my backyard. He never came back for it and I used that axe till the head got loose so I put a new handle in it. The pack rat I am I of course saved the old handle and it came in handy. 

I have a small shell and some old tool handles that might become some creation.  

Here's the video. I occasionally make money when I play music live, which no one is making money playing music live right now but I have made more money making things like this and selling them. People ask me if one string is easier to play. I don't know. You kind of need to know a little music theory, have a groove and a little imagination.  

Give a Man a Fish and Other Adventures...

While on a recent visit to Chicago we rode bikes over to Humboldt Park. It's only a few blocks from the PK and Wallace house and there are trails, playgrounds and a lake. A bike malfunction led to a quick run for some back to the house. I had carried a fishing pole so I headed for the water. 

It was the second time I had fished the park lake. Using my go to spinner baits I only get an occasional nudge from small bream. Later when I was fishing the Chicago River I asked a guy fishing there if he was having an luck. He said "getting a few snaps." Apparently a snap is a bite. I don't know if this is in wide regional use or not but I like the descriptive term and will use it from now on.

I don't know what kind of fish are in the lake and I don't think the PK and Wallace know either but they do see people with fish. There was an alligator that came to be in the lake last year. In East Texas there is an alligator in most every lake but the source of this one was unknown and he caused quite a stir until captured and sent to hopefully a good home. 

I saw no alligators  this day but sitting on the stone steps to fish I watched this momma mallard swim up with four little ones. On the river while canoeing we often saw mallards with as many as a dozen babies following. Seconds after I took this photo there was a big splash and one baby duck, the one center left was gone. A large fish had eaten it. 

As I sat there I noticed a heavy piece of mono fishing line, maybe 50lb test, tied to a fence post and stretching out toward where the duck disappeared. I gave it a tug, felt resistance and pulled it in. A big carp was on the end of it. I don't think the carp ate the duck. They are typically bottom feeders and the mouth is not that big. I think that was a bass or maybe a big catfish. I let the carp back out.   

In a few moments Wallace and Peter came down the trail and we put Wallace to work, hauling like a sailor in a hurricane to land the carp again. 

Turns out the carp is not hooked but instead he is tethered with the line looked through his gills. He's on a leash so to speak. 

As we admire our fishy friend and educate Wallace on the natural world this guy comes running up. His speech is accented so I suspect, while he could be a citizen English might not be his first language. He says, "you going to eat fish.?" 

I tell him, "Heck fellow, it's not even my fish. He's tied out here." He probably though my accent was different also. He asked if he can have him and as he seemed to be quite excited about the prospect of a carp dinner I said sure. He sacks him up in one of those reusable grocery bags, thanks me and off he goes. Note his mask, which is falling off with excitement but I'll still count this as a non contact delivery. 

 

So like the duck, the carp is eaten. It swims in the man's belly. It's the way of the world. I'm glad to know there are large carp in this lake. Next time I fish I'll chum a bit with canned corn and fish a kernel on the bottom with a small hook. Water quality is improving in Chicago area waters but eating wild caught fish in city waters are not recommend. It's not even recommended in waters flowing through the Texas cities of Houston and Austin because of automobile and fertilizer run off. 

Maybe instead of teaching a man to fish we should teach him what fish not to eat and make sure he has some alternative so that him and his family stay healthy and well. 

New Blog Character...

July 7th, 2020 was the day Mary, Miguel and Ezra welcomed Luca Angel to their family. He was 6lb 10oz and 18 inches long. Ezra was ready to meet his new brother and when we picked him up from summer camp yesterday afternoon Luca was the first thing he asks about. He usually asks if we are going boat. 

Everyone is doing fine. 

His name means "Bright Angel." That he surely is. 

Monday Morning/Weekend Fishing Report...

Poor old Ezra talks about the boat and fishing all the time. I think he wakes his parents up asking if perchance a fishing trip is on the calendar. Since he has been in St. Patrick's Catholic School summer camp this week I figured he need to blow a little steam off (joking, how could a kid know he has to blow steam off unless he reads this blog) and we took him to the lake. 

Two hours of fishing is a pretty good attention span for someone about to be 3 years old. He has the family fishing gene I think. I recall once on a deep sea fishing trip with Ezra's mother, Mary when she was about 10 years old and jerking red snapper off the bottom in 100 feet of water. The deck hand on the boat asked "little girl, where did you learn to do this?" Her reply, she had been fishing all her life at this point said "I do not know." Ezra will be like this.    

Ezra get his free swim off the boat in deep water wings with the watchful eye of Uncle Matt. 

Final total for the day was 17 cats caught in 3' of water on slip corks and punch bait floated over hydrilla. Many fish had eggs so the spawn is on. This made for a 72 fish total this Fourth of July weekend. 

On thing Ezra does is when he gets the fish about 15 or 20 feet from the boat he starts trying to lift it in. Most of our rods range from 5 and a half to 7 feet long. Not really mathematically possible but hopefully a good Catholic education at summer camp will help with this kind of thing.  

Catfish will swim in our belly as fish tacos tonight. 

Big Blow on the Lake...

It started out as a sunny, fairly still, a little north wind but blazing hot summer day. Me, Cathy and Matt began fishing deep as is usually the case this time of year and were doing pretty good but sweating a lot. 

The wind shifted to the east and we headed for shelter. I have probably nearly died several times out on Sam Rayburn so notice we did not say we headed in to the boat ramp to leave. 

I had purposely launched from Monterey Park so I had a land fall between me and the ramp due to the fact there were thunderstorms predicted. We lay in a sheltered spot while the rain pounded and open lake whitecapped. We flipped out a lure every now and then and Cathy tossed out a slip cork with catfish bait. She caught one. Everyone else grabbed a slip cork and a punch bait and the bite was on. 

In the rain you see in this photo we ended up with 55 catfish all caught about three feet deep. No chum was required. As you can see from the photo of Cathy and Matt we tied right against the bushes. Good thing our boat has a top. After being almost too hot we were a bit chilled and Cathy and Matt pulled out a space blanket for a little warmth and shelter from ongoing rain spatters. 

Some of these cats are swimming in our belly right now. 

I have not checked back the fishing log but I think we are on a banner year for numbers. Usually there is lots of tubing and knee boarding in June and July but with the pregnant women that's cut down on some of that so we will just fish. 

To the Big City...

We did a thing. Drove to Chicago. We had not see our daughter Katherine, husband Peter and grandson Wallace since about Christmas time. A lot has happened in our world and in the world in general during that time. With Covid 19 we were not comfortable with flying so we drove. All total about 30 hours on the road and 1966 miles in the hybrid. On the way up we spent one night in a motel and drove straight through on the way back. It was an old school trip of sack lunches at road side parks and quick stops for gas and potty breaks. Here's the view driving into the big city. 

Here's the gang. Chicago has not had the reckless re opening many southern states have seen. Masks are required in businesses and I guess there cannot be a fine so anyone's important rights can't be trampled on but not one challenges this. Everyone wears a mask inside around strangers and many people wear them in park areas such as this one where the photo was taken. 

I'm ok with all that as I prefer time outdoors and you can see Wallace likes it also. 

One of the little lakes that dot Humboldt Park which is a 10 minute walk from the PK house.  

If you get tired of the walk Pop-Pop is a handy guy to have along. 

Cathy and Wallace take a break from park fun. 

I have not been to town yet here in Texas since returning and there are new recommendations on mask wearing so I'll see what's up in a day or two and how good people are doing. In the mean time I see on social media folks wondering what to do about the summer. I suggest to make your family important. Go see them. Social distance and wear a mask for their sake. You will be glad you did.