Parker's Fishing Report...

That little girl there, yeah the one with the stinking catfish bait stuck to her hand in the photo had three catfish in the boat before I could get a good cast. That's let down, hooked and with just moderate cues like "REEL, REEL, YOU GOT ONE" all by herself. I mean Cathy does that to me sometimes but she's a grown ass woman baiting her own hook and all that so it's really no surprise but my three year old grand daughter Parker is already demonstrating some serious skills.  

There's another one. Of course fortunately for the catfish a three year old gets tired, gets hungry and attention eventually wanes as other concerns press so there are some cats left if you are thinking about going sometime this weekend.  

The lake was beautiful and pleasant with a slight north wind. It will be cool weather fishing before I am ready. 

Of course Parker's dad did not do too bad fishing himself and we ended up keeping 15 cats and throwing back a bucket full of little fish. As a matter of fact fishing laws changed September 1st on Sam Rayburn Reservoir to no minimum for channel and blue cat and only 5 longer than 30 inches. Daily bag and possession goes to 50 per person. All those little fish caught Monday? They are legal today. 

I always fillet my cats (catfish) so it's nice when they are greater than the old legal length of 12". They make a good fat fillet. I can see myself camped out, barefoot in a ragged pair of blue jeans cut off way too short for a man my age cleaning a few of those 10" blue cats whole to pan frying with the tail still on cooked up all nice, fresh and crisp. 

We left the fish biting. I seem to be keeping less and less fish these days. Just enough for a meal. Morgan took most of them home but I jacked four fillets out of the bag for mine and Cathy's supper. I grilled them along with a few shrimps in butter and Cajun seasoning and it was right tasty.   

My advice to get your kid fishing is don't bother with those colorful toy fishing poles. Get a real one and turn them loose. Fish won't stand a chance.  

 

BBQ, Freedom, Short Checkout Lines, Only One of These is Good for You...

A couple of my kids are pretty good with the barbeque smoker. They own some pretty fancy equipment and spice the meat up good like I like and cook it tender so it's easy for my old teeth to chew. There will probably be other posts how they make things easier for me the older I will get. 

My own smoker, a home made rig that costs me maybe about $240 more years ago than I can recall has rusted out and just doesn't hardly draw well enough to get a good fire lit. One of those things I am kind of anal about when it comes to cooking is being able to say what time the food will be done. Struggling with the fire made my gill time unreliable. Another one of my kids, in upgrading their outdoor cooking gear gave me this modest gas grill because of my grilling struggles.  

 I don't go to Walmart so I have not seen the very cheapest stuff but I have gathered that you can spend just about what you want for a BBQ grill. You can get charcoal, gas, or electric. It can have an app on your phone that gives detailed info on how the meat is doing while you are doing something else there by serving also as a leisure time multiplier. 

This is pretty simple compared to all that. It might not be what I would chose myself but the price was right. After all, getting everything you want is kind of like freedom or too short a line at the checkout counter. Too much of that can't be good for you. 

This non fancy grill makes me think of New Orleans trumpet player Kermit Ruffin's BBQ recipe. Spice up the meat, put on the grill, listen to all your Louie Armstrong records, turn meat, listen to all Louie Armstrong records again and it's done. I think Kermit has a beer drinking component to this method but I don't drink. 

So far I have cooked Mexican Roadside Chicken (I see this becoming a staple around here)  hamburgers, wieners and Zumo's. All have been perfect.

I think it was singer song writer Chris Whitely who said "lose what is useless." That would be a cell phone app connected to you BBQ. I'll hang on the the Louie Armstrong records.  

 

 

My Friends Have Super Powers or So It Seems...

My youngest daughter, Mary, told me once that she thought all my friends were super heroes. It's because they had what she, as a small child thought were super hero names. In this photo you see me and two of them Gary Strong and Darwin Mann. Mary thought those names had to be describing some kind of powers they possessed.

Gary is long gone now but I think his super power was bending time which we know as a sequence of events at measured intervals into his own application which he called "Yoder Time in Hootersville." I think maybe this photo of me, Gary and Darwin was taken right before Yoder Time in Hootersville kicked in. I don't participate in Yoder Time in Hootersville anymore. Too, powerful, unpredictable and you never know where you will end up. 

I still hear from my old friend Darwin. We send each other big fish pictures by email or text. I think his super power is remembering what I said. For example Darwin will say "remember that time we were on the cliff fixing to jump down into the river and you said..."

He will then go on to relate some deep space existential, quasi-religious, philosophical manifesto that I declared on the spot of this river cliff that he has been remembering and pondering and possibly using as his spiritual guide for years now. I tell him, "Heck Darwin, I don't even remember jumping in the river."  

Recently I introduced Mary to my old buddy U.S. Tico aka Donnie Mohonnie. Mary said, "See, there's another one."   

  

 

Catfish, Hot Sauce, Global Trade, What Else Do You Want to Know?...

For the first time this summer, since the catfish left their spring time shallow water patterns and found cool shelter and shad to feed on in deeper water our new fish spot Los Brazos did not pay off. Maybe it's because the water is dropping a bit. We headed over to our old favorite hole which was is a stick up that had been submerged earlier this year by high water. We call this spot the Dog Walker because when we first fished it there was what looked to be a dog leash tied to it. The leash is long gone, but the fish were there. 

The dog walker water is 30' deep. We have spent the summer catching the cats suspended, more or less pitching to them around the flooded timber. At this spot the thermocline seemed to be located in a channel drop off into 42' and the cats were close to the bottom on the edge. We had some nice fish and a good many throw backs but maybe not as many small ones as last trip where we fished Los Brazos.  

Again we used our favorite bait JPIGGS. All punch baits work but I have good confidence is this one. 

Matt, who came up from Houston to fish shows a bent rod. 

Final count for the trip was 34 cats. They were cooked up. We ate them with Miguel, and the grandkids Ezra and Luca. For those that don't know, Ezra only eats wild caught catfish. It seems that most restaurants, unless they specify, serve imported fish which if they don't call it catfish does not have to be subjected to the same meat inspections that farm raised USA catfish does. These laws hurt the American catfish farmer and I have always doubted the wisdom of shipping a product like this thousands of miles to a consumer. Can't be a good practice so you should probably do what Ezra does and eat local.  

We did not cook all the catfish but I took several pounds of fillets over to a friend in trade for his fresh tomatoes and two bottles of Whisker Bomb Hot Sauce. This is a hot sauce that seems to be associated with the guys in that little ol band from Texas, Z.Z. Top. I have been eating the habanero and instead of the usual central American style with the heat tempered by flavors of carrot and lime this is straight on Texas heat in a good way. The other bottle is Louisiana style and I have not tried it yet.

Get out, go to the lake, eat wild caught meat, fiery hot sauce and listen to your grandkids.       

 

A Catfish Dream...

 I have an active dream time every night when I sleep. Last night I dreamed about fishing.

The whole family was together on a trip to the lake and we were fishing off the bank. The catfish were biting well but something happened to my fishing pole and I was left using a beer can reel. A beer can reel is one where you wrap a length of line around a beer can, tie a weight and hook to the end, bait it up, throw it out and when the fish bites you wrap the line around the can as a means to reel it in. 

I caught several small fish this way. As I am wont to do when the fish are biting I often deviate from the method we are using thinking that if that works, this will work better. I guess long years of critical thinking on the lake makes me use creative thinking to increase the haul. 

I go to a camp area we are using and take a gym bad, zip up with handles like you might pack for overnights and empty it of it's contents. The contents of the bag were pretty much what I take outdoors in my dry bag, camera, phone, knives and so on. I put a hook on each end of the bag, tie a thick grass type rope (I have one like that around here somewhere) to the handles and prepare to fish.

If standing facing the lake is north on a compass point I sling the baited hooks and bag to a point on the compass north west and sit, holding the rope to await a bite. Nothing happens and everyone is readying to leave. Suddenly I notice the rope is now at a compass point north east and begin pulling in a large catfish.

Fish is not huge but maybe 15-20 pounds and I get him to the bank without much trouble due to the thick, heavy rope. The bank is slick red mud and I hold the catfish like a sad child to my chest and carry him up to the camp as my group pass in cars leaving. They do not see me.

Back in the camp a few people are left and I grab the kids, including one that is not of my family, put them in the back of my truck with the catfish and make a photo.

I wake up with a fierce need to urinate. That is par for the course with any dreams I have where water is present.   

The Turtle Way...

It was probably a hot summer like this one and my dad was too cheap to run the air conditioner. We were kids and did not know it was hot. There was still some woods and creek bottom areas behind our house that had not been cleared for development. The cornfield that took up the land that between my parents house and Pershing Street had been gone less than a decade and there were three large lots with good neighbors, all living the life. It was into my childhood back yard world that a large common snapping turtle crawled up from his habitat into mine.

We poked sticks at the snapper. Not in a cruel way but I like to think that with the supervision of my mother the poking was conducted as a learning experience to demonstrate the power of the snapping jaws. A little turtle research tells me that the common snapping is the most aggressive of the snappers and this one bit with worthy power, grabbing our sticks and appearing to make ready as the old wives tale tells to hold on till it thunders. 

As I say this instance was supervised by my mom and the turtle was allowed to escape and carry on in the turtle way. I'd say the turtle might still be carrying on because though there is not much info it's speculated that these turtles might live 100 years. If I had to guess I would say this incident happened at least 55 years ago.   

Common snapping turtles are considered a species of concern due to the pet trade, habitat loss, generally low reproductive success and the fact that they are the traditional ingredient in turtle soup though eating turtle meat in large quantities is discouraged because it tends to to accumulate toxins. 

We probably called our common snapping turtle an alligator snapper because we did not know better. The two turtles are barely related and it came to my attention through a sign I saw at the boat ramp on Sam Rayburn Reservoir that the alligator snapper is considered a threatened species. That's a more critical designation than a species of concern. I've spotted an alligator snapper or two in the wild but not lately. 

Texas Parks and Wildlife wants all info you can send them about alligator snappers you see whether they be living or dead. Pictures, locations GPS coordinates, and measurements. If you accidently catch one you are to return it to the wild as close as possible as to where it was caught. I have heard this is important and can recall once I picked a red ear slider up from the road and as I was on my way to the woods carried it along with me and released it there. Probably not the right thing to do. 

 The reasons Alligator snappers are threatened is overharvesting, habitat destruction and the exotic pet trade. I guess you can even add in there a guy like me trying to do the right thing. With temps hotter this summer than those summers where my dad did was too cheap to run the air you can probably add the effects of climate change.

The poking of a snapper with a stick is not the best memory of a man and beast encounter. I do recall several years ago a late winter canoe paddle when the lake had not yet become stained from the early season rains. As the boat drifted through the cold clear water it seemed every time I looked over the side there was a turtle swimming under me framed like a picture against the healthy lake vegetation that was flourishing because of sunlight penetration in the shallow water. They looked happy and I left them alone. 

Maybe this small change in my behavior means I'm a better man and on this day the turtles knew it.   

      

     

 

Look Out Science in Use...

 I've spent a good bit of time the last two summers swimming at old Ratcliff Lake. My parents took me there as a child and it's been a good place to take the grandkids. Pick a mid week day and there is usually few to no other people in the swimming area, the water is clear and cool and there are just enough fish eager to bite that fishing does not turn into work but stays interesting. My annual Forest Service parking permit that's good on Sam Rayburn boat ramps gets me in free.  

When I visited last week this sign was new about the monitoring of water quality. It's put there by the Angelina and Neches River Authority. The ANRA is a state agency, created by articles of the state constitution and has been around in one form or the other since 1935. They have their own lab here in town. I don't have this info so I'm guessing but I bet there are people with science degrees working there.  

I'm glad they are monitoring the water I swim and fish in. This info is not on the sign but I bet one thing they look at is if this lake has E Coli bacteria in it. E Coli occurs when there is fecal matter, that's poop to the non science people, in the water. Poop gets in the water, and it could be people or animal poop (see the dog sign, only allowed if you need it) from sewage overflows, sewage systems not working properly, run off from agriculture or polluted storm runoff. 

I have seen that Nacogdoches County has a program to replace septic systems in the Attoyac River watershed free of charge to prevent sewage runoff. Reports say that people are slow to take advantage of this because they think there will be a punishment for a non working system. There's not a consequence. They just don't want you doing dumb stuff like running a pipe that flows poo into the creek. 

I would be willing to bet, somewhere on a private property, an unregulated campground, a cow pond there is a septic system too close to the water or hay field run off. People are cooling off swimming, having a good time and are happy as clams. Maybe somebody had a little diarrhea but it could have been the potato salad or the Old Mil. Luckily it was nothing worse but ya'll come swimming next week end, you hear?    

Note there is also a sign warning of alligator activity in the lake. Someone with a degree in wildlife biology probably saw one and put the sign up so you don't have to scout the lake before letting the kids in or stand guard over them with a shotgun. Tie this back to the dog sign too. I have heard that gators think dogs are tasty. If you don't rely on a dog to get around, don't put him at risk. 

Science works. This is how it's effected my life this week and life is better for it. Now let's don't do dumb stuff and go swimming. 

           

Almost Jinxed Ourselves...

 Have you ever been hot on the fish and then you invite a friend, maybe one that does not fish much to get in on the fun and when you get him or her on the lake the bite shuts down? This does not happen to us much but if it does when we return to the boat ramp we gather around the unfortunate person, jump up and down, pointing as we shout, "He a Jonah, He a Jonah!" 

We did not do this yesterday but did almost jinx ourselves by stopping by the old fishing hole after an afternoon of knee boarding and tubing on Saturday and amusing the grand kids with about 45 minutes of catch and release catfish. I could tell by the looks on a couple of people's faces as every fish was thrown back that they were thinking about supper. They thought we should have been keeping.   

For the trip yesterday I had promised an old friend a mess of fillets and then invited my daughter's family for supper. It almost put the icing on the jinx because we struggled catch keepers throwing back  a pile of undersized twisting and squirming blue cats.    

It finally started to pay off though with a final tally of 26 keepers and Cathy taking big fish of the day. We have caught 175 fish in this spot over six trips going back to June. The lake has dropped from being 35 feet deep to 28 feet. Before the lake started dropping the fish would be suspended about 15' to 20' but yesterday most were caught closer to the bottom on Jpiggs punch bait.  

Look who gets a good fish now and then. This place was overran with blue cats, most of them too small and many of the small keeper channel cats had eggs. It was a change because when we first started here we caught lots of small throw backs, had a couple of trips of better than average and quite a mixed bag of sizes today.  

We managed to gift my friend four pounds of fillets and still have enough left for our supper. Can't beat fresh caught swimming in your belly. 

With these bigger blues moving in during the late summer I think things look promising for a good cold weather blue cat hole later on this year. 

Summer Ski 2021...

I have often wondered what I would have done with my life if they had not inundated East Texas bottom land to built the largest man made reservoir totally located with in the borders of our state. I learned to fish with my dad on this lake. In the late 1970s when my old friend Ray graduated from college he bought what was then a state of the art bass boat, a Raycraft, manufactured in San Augustine, Tx and to go with it a pair of Cypress Garden Dick Pope Jr. signature model water skis.     

I spotted this pair of Dick Popes hanging as decoration in Clearsprings restaurant in Nacogdoches, Tx. It reminded me that when Ray purchased these skis it was my introduction to pull behind the boat water sports. I went on to buy my first boat, a pontoon that would pull skis, kneeboards and tubes in 1986. Somewhere along that way I picked up a pair of 70s/80s vintage skis in a thrift store and though they hang in the barn and I can't get up on them but every now and then I break them out for the kids.   

We have been slow or maybe lazy to get the skis out this summer. We have been to the lake swimming and fishing plenty but it takes the right crew for a ski trip. Looks like we got some of them together for this excursion and maybe we will be able to get the others later. 

Boat Jumper. Don't worry the motor was off. I'll teach jumping off under power in a few years. 

Mary has been knee boarding since age four. She took the summer off last year to have Luca but as shown she is back in action. 

He started out a good ride for the first try but after about 50 yards he looked back to see where his momma was and lost his balance. 

Miguel shows his skills. 

You can't fall off this thing unless you do something dumb which happens sometimes, mostly to me.  

You too can be a member of Pop Pops stunt team. 

At age 1 Luca makes his first run. 

We stopped by the old fishing hole for a photo op with the Catfish Queen who I think was a little disappointed that we threw back the fish we caught. We had enough for a fish fry supper in about 30 minutes. Maybe we go back ready to keep and clean fish tomorrow. 

I showed my friend Ray the photo of the Dick Pope skis. He said, "those look very familiar." If you follow my blog all these photos probably look familiar to you. We hit Sam Rayburn for fun as much as often as we can.   

 

Standing at the Crossroads...

I saw the news this past week that superstar rock blues guitarist Eric Clapton announced he would not play a concert anywhere that proof  of vaccination or a negative Covid test is required. A brilliant musician for sure, a scientist he is not. 

I have never been a huge Clapton fan except for his earlier recordings with John Mayall, Cream, Derek and the Dominos and Delany and Bonnie. Somewhere in the mid 70s his music no longer spoke to me. I have admired that he has some measure of fame owing to his triumph over substance abuse and his assistance to others with similar problems but for these stars whose fame stretches back decades with piles of money coming in sacks and a life lived in gated communities in the nicest places gives me the feeling that they may not have a good feel for situations that effect the rest of us. 

Clapton, as with most people his age does have some underlying medical conditions and claims a reaction to the vaccine that was so severe he wondered if he would play guitar again. While I would bet Eric has wondered if he would ever play guitar again several times before this instance those with underlying conditions should consult their doctor, not an internet doctor, before getting the vaccine. 

Robert Johnson is known as the King of the Delta Blues. He born in 1911 and traveled the south playing juke joints, parties and street corners. Originally a guitarist of average ability he dropped out of sight. It was reported that he met the Devil at a Mississippi crossroads who tuned his guitar in return for his soul. Resurfacing to record about 30 sides he demonstrated a style of playing with surreal song lyrics that is the foundation of rock music today. 

Sadly Johnson saw no profit from this as on the cusp of a Carnegie Hall invitation popular legend has a jealous man slipping him poison whiskey at a juke joint gig and in 1938 he died on his all fours barking like a dog. At least three different markers have been erected at gravesites suspected to be his. Clapton, whose style benefited from his dedication to the study of Johnson's music has been instrumental in the family receiving some money from song rights and royalties.  

Though much of Johnson's legend links him to the Devil and the selling of his soul I have seen VooDoo practitioners that think the man Johnson met at the crossroads was not the devil but was the more benign figure of Legba. Legba stands at the spiritual crossroads granting or denying permission to speak with the spirits facilitating communication, speech and understanding.

Maybe Clapton needs to stand at the crossroads. He might be a little more in touch.                             

 

A Walk in the Park...

 Visiting with old friends lately and the ever onward march of time has led to old memories. My wife tells me I only have one more year to refer to my self as a "middle age man" and then I must begin saying "elderly." My soon to be elderly self walked around old Chambers Park and played with grandkids leaving their foot prints in the same places I left mine when I played there as a child. 

Chambers Park was built in 1939 by the National Youth Administration, a component of FDR's New Deal that provided work for young people 16-25. Many generations of locals have used this park which has had many changes to a playground, wading pool, scout houses, pavilions, the old Rock House which you can still rent, tennis courts, monkey cage and in recent years a splash pad replacing the wading pool.     

One change I note is the little creek that flows through the park. It had moving water, very clear on the day we visited. There had been a rain the day before and I don't know where the headwaters of this stream are but when I was a kid they seemed to be inside the old Lufkin Foundry that is across Feagin St. from the park. Seems I recall family reunions, birthday parties and picnics held at the tables in the park. There were many kids and I recall a popular shoe at the time was a white Keds sneaker that was a low cost knock off of a more expensive Chuck Taylor our parents would not buy. If you stepped in this creek with a white Ked on it immediately became a black Ked due to the dirty water flow from the foundry. 

Thankfully the clean water act of 1972 passed. It cut down on the amount of Keds going to landfills. Not so thankfully for the workers involved, Lufkin Foundry with it's early beginnings as a buggy company was bought by General Electric and as these acquisitions often go was mostly shut down. What ever the cause this stream flows clear despite recent attempts to turn back some of the environmental gains made by past leaders. There will be no more black Keds and on this day I saw no kids in the creek.

I mentioned the monkey cages. Thankfully like the water, monkeys are treated a bit better also. Seems I can remember in the mid to late 60s cigarette smoking house wives pushing baby carriages and watching bigger kids play in the park while thumping butts in the monkey cage. The monkey ate them. This was before the advent of the very fine local zoo we have and I bet there were no primate experts on the city staff at the time. Probably an interesting historical mystery to pursue would be where is the monkey buried?  

Things have changed. Looks like for the better and even though I'm older we left nothing but footprints.

 

   

   

U.S. Tico, the Man, Q, Catfish and Music How Else can you Live it Love it Wear it?...

It's numerology bouncing around my brain when U.S. Tico visits the Man. Thirty pops up on my calculator which is about the number of years since we last saw each other. When Q, not the anonymous Q but just regular old Q, shows up input 43 and that's how long since those two saw each other back on the old red brick streets of Nacogdoches. When we were all in college together the number on the dorm where we met, old Mays Hall was Dorm 11. Add seventeen because that's how many months, stuck down in Costa Rica because of Covid restrictions it took for U.S. Tico to grow his ideas. When we spent two days (do you multiply?) on Lake Sam Rayburn catfishing the number produced is 45 because that's how many catfish we caught and ate. To tie all this together is a variable number and this is the number of guitars owned by U.S Tico and the Man. No one knows that value but add one, the loneliest number and that's represents the keyboard that Q jammed on.     

The U.S Tico Fishing Team 2021, left to right Q, Tico, the Man. 

Just for the fishing record the lake, after the high water of spring and early summer is dropping fast but our honey hole Los Brazos is still producing. Two days, 45 cats and we left them biting. Fish ran a bit bigger than average for this spot and we could have caught many more. The fishing log shows four trips this summer and 150 fish caught at this place. Fish are hanging suspended 10-20 feet, easy to catch pitching to them on JPiggs stink punch bait, 

The Man and Q. That's the real Q to you. 

The U.S. Tico Fish Team. We still did not get a photo of anyone modeling a swimsuit but I think I feel a product idea coming on. 

Back in the old Nacogdoches days at Stephen F. Austin State University we spent afternoons lounging and listening in old Mays Hall to Bob Dylan songs. Now we jam on Dylan songs.  

Cathy joins in on our jams. Yes, girls can be on the U.S. Tico Fishing Team and in their guitar army.  

It was a great weekend. Tico is wandering Texas for a couple of more months. Q headed back to his home in Tyler. We will gather again, I just don't know when. I have numbers to add up and there may be answer produced by my ciphering.