Learning from the Locals

Hmmmm, looks like dinner.


On our way home from the recent trip out west, Susan and I stopped in St. Louis for a few days to visit with her relatives. As a way of keeping me happy (We have a prenuptial agreement that I do not have to go to St. Louis in June, July or August when heat and humidity are off the charts.), I was invited to fish a private lake while in town. And since it doesn’t take much to lure me into fishing, I graciously accepted the invite. According to my host, the fish in this lake were (alternately) dying of old age or had to take turns swimming there were so many.
I was hoping one of the locals might be about so I could ask what the fish were hitting, but as luck would have it, I was fishing alone that first morning. Apparently I’d have to fall back on my 60-plus years of experience, not always a reliable source.
As I lined my rod I was keeping one eye on the dark clouds scudding overhead, one eye on a Great Blue Heron at the end of the earthen dam, and one eye on a Scarlet Tanager that had flown into the tree above the heron. The lightning-strike flash of the heron, instantly followed by the clap of thunder splash made by the fish it had just pinioned with its beak, served to focus my attention on the task at hand.
The heron seemed to be out matched by the large catfish. The bird wisely tossed the fish to its side, higher up on the dry land at the top of the dam. At nearly the same instant, two young raccoons dashed out of the cover of weeds at the edge of the woods. The frightened heron bobbed when it should have weaved, as one raccoon nimbly grabbed the fish in its mouth. The pair of thieves, both wearing black masks so identifying the perpetrators will be tough, dashed into the woods.
Not to cave in to personification, however, the heron looked right, then left and seemed a bit bewildered.
Okay, I thought. First lesson from the locals is not to toss onto the bank any fish you’re planning to have for dinner.



Teeth marks on your thumb at the end of the day is the best indicator of some great bass fishing.