IT'S ALL IN THE HAT

  I am a firm believer in “fishing hats.”  They don’t have to be adorned with flies and spinners like Colonel Blake wore in the TV Series, MASH.  They don’t have to have a stupid logo on them that proclaims the wearer to be a Master Baiter. But they do have to have plenty of Mojo.  Never underestimate the power of Mojo when it comes to a fishing hat.
 
  Other than Mojo, they need to have a couple of other features. A good fishing hat sports a brim to shield your eyes from the sun. A great fishing hat sports a brim that is dark-colored - preferably flat black in color - on the underside.  Hat color matters little other than in hot, sunny weather I choose lighter colors. As a matter of preference, my fishing hats are not camouflage. I have a hatrack full of camo caps, but those are for hunting, not fishing. If they have Mojo, it’s hunting Mojo, not fishing Mojo.

  Personally, I favor baseball style caps. Available nearly everywhere, if they were good enough to shield the eyes of Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron, Willie Mays and other baseball greats, they are good enough for me. I’m not saying John Wayne’s Stetson, a Mexican sombrero or other head dress style wouldn’t be as good or better, but I’ll stick to a baseball cap.
 
  Regardless of the style, they have to fit well. I’m often offered hats from a variety of companies who dole them out as advertising fodder. I own some farmland so I get seed corn hats. I buy insurance so I get insurance company hats. I write outdoor blogs so I get hats from outdoor products companies. But anymore, when offered a new hat, I slap it on my noggin and if it doesn’t feel “right,” I just hand it back. Some hats land on your head feeling as broken-in as your best walking boots, others are like trying to cram a square peg into a round hole.

The black underside of the brim makes the
hat on the right a better fishing cap. 

  But don’t overlook the Mojo.

  You can wear the best looking, best fitting hat on a fishing trip that was supposed to be next thing to fishing in a barrel and have the fishing fall flat. Immediately, if I’m wearing a new hat, it becomes suspect.
 
  On the other hand, if the trip goes better than you expected, admit it, the hat had the Mojo to put you over the top. So wear the same hat on the next trip and the next and don’t give up on it until it gives up on you.

LUCKY SHOT

 I have lots of experience in taking fish photos. They are called “hero shots” where the lucky angler who has caught a photo-worthy fish stands, gripping and grinning, fish in hand and the photo is snapped.


   Most hero shots look, well they look contrived. Sure it’s a lasting tribute to both fish and angler of the size of the fish and the smiling face of the fisher-person. On the other hand, it’s a picture of a mope with a dead fish-or nearly dead.

   Professional photographers leave little to luck. They understand what’s going on. They prepare the scene, adjust the lighting and leave little to chance. Amateurs rely on luck.

    I’m somewhere in-between. I don’t rely on my photography skills to earn much money each year, but plenty of my photos end up in print. Sometimes a bit of luck helps out even us “semi-pros.”

   This was one of those times.

   Liz caught a nice lake trout on my boat and she handed her dad the camera to do the classic “grip and grin” photo. Since we were in the “photo” mood, I grabbed my own camera to take a happy-snappy of my own.

   The first time I pressed the button, the fish, still lively, waggled a wiggle. In the tiny view screen on the digital, I could see the fish wasn’t properly displayed. So I told Liz to hold it up once more for another shot. She complied.
 
Back at home, downloading the photos from the camera to the computer and able to see the photos in large size instead of a tiny LCR on the back of the camera, I realized Lady Luck had given me a blessing.

   The second photo showed a bored young lady with an apparently dead fish and an apparently fake smile staring at the lens.  The first photo, however, showed a beautiful young lady with a real smile coping with a lively fish.  A million times better in my book! Don’t you think so, as well?

TREMBLORS

I got a Facebook post this morning from a longtime friend who now lives in Alaska. She had experienced her first earthquake.
   I’ve been to California many times, Alaska a couple times and have spent time in other areas that are earthquake prone. I’ve never been in one of these areas when an EQ occurred, but I’m not an EQ virgin. I’ve felt and lived through many of them right here in Indiana, not exactly a region many regard as a hotbed of EQ activity.
   The first one I remember occurred while I was in college at Purdue. I walked into the room of one of my fraternity brothers and sat down on his sofa. Once I was comfortable, I noticed the water in my friend’s large aquarium was sloshing back and forth. Apparently, I’d bumped it when I entered. Except it was swishing back and forth heavily enough that I should have noticed bumping into it. I didn’t.
   In less than a minute fellow frat-bros started coming down from the upper floors saying, “Did you feel that?”  It was a 5.7 earthquake. Okay, I didn’t feel it, but the fish in the tank certainly did.

Thankfully, my earthquake experiences, though frequent, have all been minor.

   Fast forward a few years. I was running Bass Lake State Beach near Knox, IN. I was to go to a two-day meeting the following day so I hopped on my 100cc Kawasaki motorcycle to put-put down to the bank to get some folding money for the journey. Halfway to the bank on S.R. 10 circling the south edge of Bass Lake, the bike almost slid out from under me. Wowser!
    I slowed through that stretch of road on the return trip but saw no oily spots or other reasons for the near-crash.  That evening on the news the talking heads revealed we’d had a five point five at the time of my incident. I was nearly a statistic!
   These were, apparently, single jolts where the substrate deep below the surface adjusted to the pressure put upon them in one snap of the finger movement. The next one was different.
   I was sitting in a friend’s house in southwest Indiana when the whole house started shaking. It lasted long enough for me to ask him, “Does your house shake like this often?”  “No,”  he said, “only when they are blasting in the coal mines.”
   A blast would be a one-time shake. This one went on long enough for us to have a conversation! Five point six was the official report.
   To give you an idea of how earthquakes work, I have one more experience to relate. The rocky substrate deep below the surface shifts and the energy released radiates out like waves created by tossing a rock into a pond.
   I didn’t feel this one, but my wife did. She was on the phone, talking to one of my sisters living  100 miles away.  In the midst of the conversation, my sister interrupted the flow of the conversation saying, “Oh, I think we are having an earthquake.”  They talked for a few seconds and then my wife started feeling the vibrations underfoot as the waves moved out from the epicenter. I was driving at the time and felt nothing. Another five point something had occurred.
   These were all “minor” quakes and I’m not belittling those who have suffered major quakes. It’s a tough world out there with storms, quakes and other natural disasters awaiting us foolish humans who think we are above or immune to nature’s fury.
   

FROZEN OVER GREAT LAKES

        As of mid-February, all five of the Great Lakes are “officially” frozen over.  In actuality, they were 90% ice covered, but when they hit that level, the people in charge of observing Great Lakes ice conditions proclaim them to be totally frozen. The last time the lakes were frozen completely was in 1994. 

        Few lakes in the upper Midwest completely freeze in the winter. Springs, muskrats, wildfowl, stream inflows, pressure ridges and other factors often produce areas with thin ice or even open water. 

          In the Great Lakes, unfrozen areas can be the result of currents as in the Straights of Mackinaw, St. Mary's River, Detroit River, Niagara River and a few others. Industries and lake shore power plants discharge heated water in other areas. There can be wind-driven openings in the ice similar to pressure ridges that occur on inland lakes.

      The U.S. Coast Guard operates a fleet of ice-breaker vessels on the Great Lakes. There's our tax dollars at work!  In some areas tug boats and other vessels do ice breaker duty to keep industrial harbors in action. 

        There are two silver linings to the frozen Great Lakes. Winter evaporation from unfrozen surface water in mild winters is one factor creating what’s become chronic, even record low lake levels. Related to the evaporation from the unfrozen lakes is, once the lakes are frozen, the lake effect snow machine is shut down. The upper Midwest is getting enough snow to satisfy most people without the lake snow this winter. 

       Will this have an affect on the fishing next season?  Maybe a late start to the action.... Maybe it will drive more fish down to MY end of the lake.... Hope so! There's only one way to find out. The fun way.  Let's go fishing ! 

THE END

WHAT’S FOR BREAKFAST
I love to eat fish. When I go out to a restaurant, the first thing I check out is the fish listed on the menu. Usually, my order is for the fish.

I’ll fly to the far reaches of Canada so I can have a shore lunch featuring the fish I caught during the morning action. I’ll always make sure on the way home the fish I caught arrive fresh, still frozen or otherwise ready to heat and eat.

But fish for breakfast?

My mother-in-law introduced me to the concept on the shores of Leech Lake, Minnesota. We were there for a family vacation that included hauling dozens upon dozens of jumbo perch from the lake’s waters. On the second or third day, Grandma Huber fired up the stove and fried up a batch of perch filets, coupled them with some eggs over easy and I was hooked.

Who knew fish for breakfast was such a culinary delight?

We just returned from Captiva Island, Florida, much of the time sharing adventures with Bill and Rita Keaton.  Bill and I fished the first day and caught a couple of “keeper” sized sea trout, aka spotted weakfish. We kept them.

“What should we do with the fish?” asked Bill.

“Fish and eggs for breakfast,” I replied.

Our rooms at South Seas Island Resort included a kitchen, pots, pans so all we needed was a few extra ingredients.  We were set after a quick stop at an island shop to pick up eggs, bread and butter.

Bill put several slices of bread in the oven at 200 degrees to dry them out, the first step of making breadcrumbs.  Once I arrived with the fish I preheated the oven to 500 degrees. Then I cracked an egg into a bowl, added a half eggshell of water to the egg and vigorously whisked it. Each filet got a quick dunk into the egg wash, then a roll in the breadcrumbs and into a baking dish.

While they were baking, Bill cooked the eggs in a bit of butter, we toasted a few slices of bread and set out glasses of orange juice.

Spectacular!

If you think bacon, ham or sausage are the only meats that go great for breakfast, think again. Fish, light and flaky, is a perfect compliment to your breakfast menu. They taste even better, if you've caught them yourself.

ENJOY!

Have you ever seen the Green Flash? Millions of people swear they have. Thousands of people look for it every evening. I watched for it just last night at Sunset Beach at South Seas Island Resort on Captiva Island, Florida.

What's the Green Flash? It only occurs in a location where the sun sets into the ocean in the evening. Supposedly, the water conditions, especially the height of the waves or calmness of the sea has to be perfect. Of course, it can't be a cloudy since the setting sun is a partner to the creation of the Green Flash.

Some say imbibing a wee bit (or more) of adult beverage prior the the evening show is also a partner to the creation of the flash. It certainly is in Key West where, I'm told, hundreds gather each evening to watch nature's spectacle. I'm told people line the rails on cruise ships, drinks in hand, waiting to toast the Green Flash.

I don't know. I've not been to Key West or on a cruise ship, but I've watched for the Green Flash on beaches in California, from fishing boats in the Pacific Ocean and other locations, including the above mentioned, Captiva Island veiwing spot. There's even a great restaurant on Captiva Island named the Green Flash.

What is it?  Supposedly, it happens as the setting sun slides into the sea and the sky dims from its absence. It only shows a split second after the last bit of sun disappears under the horizon so don't blink or use that instant to take another sip of your adult beverage. The science behind the flash holds that when the light of the now unseen sun shines through the upper strata of the ocean the sun rays now filtered green through the sea water produces a momentary green flash bursting forth just above where the sun disappeared.

Some say they've watched for it and never seen it. Me? I see it every time, at least in my mind's eye. And that makes watching for it, when I have the chance, something I'll never pass on doing.  

OWL SERENDIPITY

I've never published one of my weekly outdoor columns as a blog. This time is different. Below is my column about Snowy Owls, normally a creature of the far north, irrupting into the Midwest. The column came out in this weeks paper and I got a call from a good friend alerting me she'd spotted one very close to where we live.

I showed my column to my daughter, Abby, home for the Holidays and then told her,

She asked, "Interesting, but what's up now?"

"We got one! Want to go look for it?"

"Let's go!"

So I grabbed a couple sets of binoculars and off we went on our quest.  Sure enough, a mile west of Brook, Indiana, about 3/4s mile north in a bean field on the west side of Meridian Road was the bright white visitor from the Arctic.  Too cool.

Here's my column for those of you who don't get our local papers.

A DIFFERENT KIND OF SNOWSTORM
By Mike Schoonveld
We are well into winter and well into the routine that comes with snowstorms seemingly lined up in a regular pattern this season. But there’s another kind of snowstorm heading our way, one that just might offer us a brighter attitude about the cold dark days of winter.
The far north tundra areas of North America and Europe is the normal range for birds named the snowy owl. They are large owls, similar in size to great horned owls and barred owls frequently seen in this area. But they are white, or nearly white. With age, a few male snowy owls do become completely white while females and younger males have dusky-tipped feathers making them look somewhat spotted.
Most years they live in their native tundra areas all year around. Their staple food is the lemming, a short tailed rodent about the size of a chipmunk. People who have studied snowy owls determined they normally eat four or five lemmings each day.
But like many species of wildlife with high reproductive rates, the lemming population tends to be cyclic. Some years there are lemmings seemingly everywhere; in other years, lemmings become scarce.  Snowy owl populations fluctuate as well. Every so often, a higher than normal number of owls are faced with a lower than usual number of lemmings.
When that happens snowy owls have two choices, stay and starve or leave to find food elsewhere. When a bird population that’s not normally migratory suddenly leaves it’s normal range it’s called an irruption instead of a true migration. From early reports, it’s looks as though a snowy owl irruption is taking place.  
The center of focus for this year's invasion is the Great Lakes and Northeast. Keep an eye out for these northern owls in open areas while you're outdoors or even just driving through the countryside. Don't overlook that white bump in the middle of a farm field or on the peak of the house next door. It just might be a snowy owl.
Because they normally live in areas where there are no or very few humans or automobiles, snowy owls aren’t particularly wary of such things. I’ve only seen one live snowy owl and it was sitting on a fence post along U.S. 41 just north of Enos. I turned around, came back for a better look and it just sat there staring back at me only 20 feet away.
This lack of wariness often proves fatal when it comes to avoiding speeding vehicles. The snowy owl on display at the Willow Slough HQ was killed by a passing car just south of Lake Village several years ago. Three snowy owls were  killed recently at New York City airports by animal control agents.  This action was deemed necessary to protect passengers after instances when owls were sucked into plane engines. Once the owl shootings became public knowledge, the airport policy quickly changed to “capture and remove” should any new arrivals show up.
These birds normally live in the tundra, an area completely devoid of trees. They instinctively seek out similar open areas and that’s one of the reasons they are attracted to airports. It’s also one of the reasons they are likely to find our open expanses of farms and fields to their liking this winter.
The Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology has a program called eBird. Bird enthusiasts from across North America keep track of and report the sightings of snowy owls and other birds. Cornell tabulates the reportings and publishes updates regularly at the website: www. ebird.org.
The current map shows numerous sighting in Indiana and Illinois. The path of the sightings indicates most of owls irrupting this year originated from eastern Arctic in North America or Greenland.  Snowy Owls are one of the most impressive animals on the planet. You don't have to be a bird watcher to appreciate how cool they are.

THE END