Gray's Sporting Journal - Nov Dec Edition 2018 by Cowboy Publishing Group

Grayâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Sporting Journal VOLUME FORTY-THREE

ISSUE 6

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2018

Features VOLUME FORTY-THREE ISSUE 6 • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2018

Limit by Brian Grossenbacher

A PHOTOGRAPHIC JOURNAL

10 The Accidental Apprentice by Art Isberg The influence of a master maker of decoys lives on.

24 Evolutions of a Duck Hunter by Rusty Ward Crawling from the mud and duckweed, he became an upright hunter.

30 Fathers & Daughters by Samuel Lucy Melancholy and hope, on a season’s bittersweet end.

36 Skeena Steel by Adam Tavender A PHOTOGRAPHIC JOURNAL

42 A Day on Choctawhatchee Bay by Miles Powell Jr. A new, first taste of autumn signals a shift in the cosmos—and joy in the hearts of sportsmen.

48 Dog Quintet by Roger Pinckney Hope springs eternal and always.

108 EXPEDITIONS Victorian Ducks Great by Matt McCormick A PHOTOGRAPHIC JOURNAL

by Worth Mathewson The duck hunting is excellent in Australia, and you might find a good friend like John Byers.

FRONT COVER: November Wings, by Brett James Smith

oil on linen • 14 x 18 inches

Columns & Departments VOLUME FORTY-THREE ISSUE 6 • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2018

6 JOURNAL

78 ART

by Russ Lumpkin

by Brooke Chilvers

Spey Lessons A day on the River Tweed.

60 TRADITIONS The King Gander of Sea Dog Shoal by Sewell Ford Edited by Will Ryan

On raining geese, and other tales of the coast.

68 SHOOTING From Euclid to Dostoevsky by Terry Wieland

Shotgun patterns in four dimensions.

Richard E. Bishop Etching and the aerodynamics of wildfowl flight.

82 EATING

Beating the Chill by Martin Mallet

A British seafood menu.

126 BOOKS

Epic Traditions by Chris Camuto

128 POEM

First to Know by Timothy Murphy

74 ANGLING

The Other Fish by Miles Nolte

New Zealand’s lesser-known fly fishing opportunity.

66 Gear Guide 107 People, Places & Equipment 120 The Listing

Gray’s Sporting Journal Group Publisher John Lunn A s s o c i at e P u b l i s h e r Michael Floyd

706-823-3739 / mike.floyd@morris.com

Editorial Russ Lumpkin, Editor Wayne Knight, Art Director Terry Wieland, Shooting Editor Miles Nolte, Angling Editor Seth Fields, Digital Content Manager

~Purveyors of Fine Sporting, Wildlife and American Art~ Please call for a complimentary copy of our fall catalog

770-696-7619 / seth.fields@morris.com

Nina Eastman, Advertising Production Coordinator Contributing Editors R. Valentine Atkinson Barry & Cathy Beck Denver Bryan Christopher Camuto Brooke Chilvers Pete Fromm

Brian Grossenbacher Martin Mallet Will Ryan Dale C. Spartas E. Donnall Thomas Jr.

Advertising Sales Northeast ~ Scott Buchmayr 978-462-6335 / buchmayrscott@gmail.com Midwest/Southeast ~ Amos Crowley 216-378-9811 / amos@crowleymedia.us.com West ~ Scott J. Cherek 307-635-8899 / cherekgroup@bresan.net Stone Wallace Communications 512-799-1045 / jimkstone@gmail.com Write to the Editor

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Inventory includes works by Pleissner, Browne, Ripley, Benson, Tait, Frost, Bishop, Clark, Osthaus, Hunt, Goodwin, Kuhn, Maass, Hagerbaumer, Rosseau, Carlson, Blum, Eldridge Hardie, Brett Smith, Reneson, Coleman, Abbett, Swan and others

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GSJ

JOURNAL

Spey Lessons by Russ Lumpkin

ichael Farr crushed my preconceived notions of a ghillie. I expected him to be less cheerful, a little crusty, but there he was, with a contagious smile and jaunty stride, wearing a dandy deerstalker. His beat is the Rutherford on the River Tweed. He also raises yellow Labs—sweet and beautiful, and a few that appeared large for their breed. At least half a dozen canines padded around, happy to give and get attention. “They’re the most photographed dogs in Scotland,” Michael said. An anglers’ shack stood behind a quaint, rectangular home that overlooked a quiet stretch of river, placid except for the comings and goings of mallards and occasional rising fish. I had arrived as

the guest of Simon Barr, who, along with his wife, Selena, founded Tweed Media a decade ago. Overcast skies boded well for the angling, but there were obstacles. Michael spoke of low flows that impeded the upstream movements of spawning salmon. And the cormorants. They had moved in from the coast and were taking a toll on salmon and brown trout up to 15, 16 inches. He pointed to a long expanse of riverbank colored a near uniform white, covered by cormorant droppings. Coupled with the environmental pressures on the salmon, I had my own handicap. I’d never cast a two-handed rod, and Spey rods composed the weaponry on the Tweed. In high school, though, I had experienced some low-grade success in baseball

Michael Farr instructs the author on the basics of casting a two-handed rod. 6 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

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and basketball, and felt I could make a passable cast pretty quickly. Scots have been casting two-handed rods— which can reach water that’s either too deep for a wading approach, too far for a single-handed cast, or affords no room for a backcast—since the 1800s. In the United States, two-handed casting took hold and began taking off in the early 2000s. Where I live and fish, it’s never taken hold, and I’d never needed to know how to cast a Spey until I stood on the banks of the famous Tweed, just downstream of a riffle and just upstream of likely holding water lining the far bank. Michael made a couple sample casts, gave me some simple instructions, and then watched me make an attempt. After giving some good-natured ribbing, he pantomimed a few adjustments. As he scrutinized my second attempt, I asked him about life on the river. He said his father had been a ghillie on the Tweed, a brother of his works a beat upstream, and his son works the river, too. The Tweed runs in his veins just as true as it runs its course to the North Sea. I finally made a couple decent casts, and Michael told me to repeat the process of making a couple decent drifts and then taking a step downstream. He left to visit other fishermen on the beat. In his absence, I began to concentrate on fundamentals, which seemed to come down to the proper angles. First, the angle of the rod as I lifted line from the water had to be straight overhead, parallel to my right ear with some oomph, in order to whip the line from downstream to behind me upstream to anchor it properly. After I anchored the line, I concentrated on bringing the rod back through the same angle, but going forward, and again, parallel to my right ear as I pushed the tip-top with oomph to a quick stop. Simon, who’d been shooting photographs with his camera and new drone, waded out. He’s an experienced Spey angler, and he said, “You’re doing remarkably well for a beginner, and I’m not wanting to change what you’re doing, but we can finesse how you’re doing it.” He told me I was letting the anchored line sink too much, and that my mechanics needed to be smoother. Planting the rod butt in my gut and turning my hips toward the anchored line just before I began the roll cast would help fix both. Most important, he said, “You need to speed up the process of anchoring the line, then slow down on your forward cast.” 8 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

Taking his advice and finally coordinating the movements, my speed in anchoring the line increased, and that gave me time to concentrate for a second at the beginning of the forward cast to focus on the fundamental of stopping at about two o’clock. As I began the push forward, I recall the rod bending deep into cork, and it felt good—similar to a good swing that results in a line drive or, closer still, a jump shot that feels so good in timing and form, you know the ball is going in as soon as it leaves your hand. In the regimented world of fishing on the Tweed, at one o’clock, everyone gathered on the grounds around the anglers’ shack for lunch and tea. Each angler had been skunked, but that dampened the spirits and mood of no one. Conversations ran from angling around the United Kingdom, Brexit, and the approaching season of pheasant shooting. Wonderful chaps all. During the afternoon session, I moved to a different section of the beat and switched to a singlehanded rod. Within the first couple casts, I realized that my motion felt better than usual. I attributed the stronger casts to the very events of that morning, when I had to concentrate hard just to make a decent presentation. Even though there had been a lunch break and I had moved to a different beat with a familiar rod, my mind remained in two-handed mode, focused on fundamentals, and I could sense that thought process affecting my stroke—just as it had throughout the morning. So I slowed down a little. Immediately, I began to feel the rod work, feel it more fully, bending deeper into the blank and functioning as its creators intended. And it felt good. And once, for several shining seconds, I had a fish. A grilse almost came tight, but cleared the water and dropped the hook. At 5 p.m., fishing ceased. Back at the shack for coffee and tea, Michael brought out his logbook and asked, “Any joy for you gentlemen today?” No one had caught anything, and as he entered the number of anglers and results, he said he possessed daily catch records dating back to 1969. That news struck me for its great sense of narrative. While I experienced some low-grade success— learning some rudiments of two-handed casting and feeling the pull of a Tweed River salmon—it somehow felt poignant to be a small part of Michael’s history on the river, which is living and written. n

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PINTAIL (DETAIL), BY ADRIANO MANOCCHIA

10 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

THE

ACCIDENTAL APPRENTICE The influence of a master maker of decoys lives on. by Art Isberg

November / December 2018 Â· 11

S A BOY OF 11 IN 1947, I should have been thinking about other things—the aftermath of World War II, the anxiety and excitement of the approaching teen years, discovering girls. My thoughts, however, centered around duck hunting, and that year when Christmas rolled around, I had only one overriding concern: Would there be a big box of real, commercially made plastic decoys under the tree? It wasn’t as though I didn’t already have decoys of my own, because I did. And even though mine were old, heavy wooden models that I’d repatriated from the town dump, left there by members of the private duck clubs in the marsh, I prized them almost beyond belief. Some had eyes missing; others had been holed with lead shot. Others lacked rudders or keels, and that they floated lopsided meant little to me. I painted new eyes, nailed flat lead to their undersides to keep them from listing, and sanded away years of faded paint and applied my own unique style and colors. Why would such things be so important to a kid of only 11? You have to understand, I was brought up during World War II, and the heavy worries of those years

made the outdoor world more special to me than it likely would have been otherwise. It took my mind away from the concerns of my parents, the concerns I carried, and gave me hope for better days. Also, hunting was big in my hometown. I lived in the little country town of Fairfield, California, which was backed by the lovely Coast Range mountains, home to cunning blacktail deer that local rifle hunters chased in late summers. In town at Hickey’s Brass Rail saloon, they’d bend their elbows and spice their stories with anecdotes of black bear encounters or glimpses of tawny-colored mountain lions sprinting away. The deer hunting, though, took a backseat to the biggest and most-anticipated outdoor event of the year—the opening of duck season—that arrived in late autumn. Just one mile from Texas Street, the four-block main street of Fairfield, began the vast, watery world of the 54,000-acre Suisun Marsh, the largest estuary marsh of its kind in the entire nation. The unusual name, Suisun, is Winton Indian for “west wind,” and no finer single word could describe that wild, endless, windblown world more precisely. Come winter, the marsh would howl with ferocious blue northers that bent tules to the waterline and took down trees like a scythe takes down blades of grass. But there is nothing waterfowl love more than

BELLS AND WHISTLES, BY ADRIANO MANOCCHIA

12 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

DUCK HUNTING MEMORIES, BY ADRIANO MANOCCHIA

powerful, gusting winds they can ride daylong. The gunning was nothing short of spectacular. Fairfield and its twin town, Suisun, were separated only by main line railroad tracks that came up from big cities to the south and west. For most of a century, those same tracks brought dedicated duck hunters who hunted the many plush, private clubs that dotted the marsh from one end to the other. Those men hunted in pure splendor, ferried to and from blinds in boats manned by year-round caretakers. They slept on soft mattresses and feather pillows, waking to a jangling alarm clock and the crackling aroma of bacon and eggs wafting in from the kitchen, all washed down with strong, black coffee. The names of some of those old clubs read like a who’s who of the waterfowling world. The Valantie, Canvasback, Red Rooster, Grey Goose, and Teal, to name only a few. Many years later, the marsh christened another club, the Mallard, which friends of mine and I started and enjoyed for years. This large complex of individual gun clubs spawned more than dreams and zeal to one day belong to such an outfit—but I didn’t realize it for the longest time and discovered it that same year quite 14 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

by accident. It was that moment of discovery when I forgot about plastic decoys forever. One afternoon, I pedaled my bicycle down an alley off Texas Street. The sound of a buzz saw got my attention and drew me closer to a small one-room shop with a tin roof and lit in bright lights. Duck decoys in various stages of completion lined a big table and shelf under the building’s one and only window. The man behind the table was bending over, carefully cutting a decoy body from a strange piece of wood, the likes of which I’d never seen. I would come to learn that man was Bud Peters, a California highway patrolman during the war, when he helped enforce the “patriotic speed limit” of only 35 miles an hour, which helped conserve gas for the war effort. I approached the building, and Peters glanced up at me but did not speak. I straddled my bike, transfixed at seeing a grown man hand-making and carefully painting decoys one by one. I said nothing but edged closer to get a better look inside this fascinating world. Half a dozen freshly painted pintail decoys—the bulls, white chested and chocolate headed—sat in one corner next to the same number of mallards with their white neck ring dividing

dark green heads from reddish-brown breasts, all with accompanying hens. The exquisite feather detail Bud added to each decoy astounded me. It was clear, even at my age, these wonderful decoys were not meant to ride fireplace mantels as folk art. They were working decoys destined to feel the slaps of winter waves and coax flying birds to shooters rising from blinds with bucking shotguns. Next to the decoy table sat a big cardboard box full of unfinished wooden heads. Bud pulled one out, brushed on heavy glue, and inserted a thick wooden dowel in its flat bottom before pushing it down on a newly finished body. After I made several more trips to the shop, Bud began to tolerate my presence and actually spoke to me about my budding interest as a decoy maker, I learned he purchased the heads, in bulk, from the old Herter’s Company out of Waseca, Minnesota. A large wooden garbage box lay just outside the door of the little shop. On days the shop was closed, I stopped by, hoping to find a discarded head or misshapen decoy body. But the item that always caught my attention most was the strange material Bud used to make his famous decoys. I discovered it was palm fronds, of all things. Small as Fairfield was, it was also the county seat with a city hall, library, high school, and jail—all surrounded by tall palm

trees. When the top layer of fronds grew too thick, city workers trimmed them and hauled them off to the city dump. Somehow Bud got the idea to use this unusual material to make his wonderful decoys. It was cheap, if not free, and otherwise refuse. Close to its base against the tree, a frond grows thick and wide for about two feet—and he cut his decoy bodies from this section. The material is dense yet light as balsa wood and waterproof as cork. It floats high and dry in water. It sands smooth to the touch of a paintbrush, and with a good coat of paint, Bud’s decoys could last years. Members of the many private duck clubs in the marsh purchased and used Peters decoys by the hundreds. As his imitations grew popular and his local fame increased, duck clubs up and down California’s 500-mile-long Central Valley and across state lines into Nevada purchased his floaters. It was common practice for clubs to float 50, 60, or 70 decoys around just one set of double barrel blinds, to lure in the always-wary, circling pintails. Bud’s carefully crafted and painted decoys became well known for doing just that. One day Bud let me into his wonderful world with the admonition, “Don’t touch anything.” He showed me how he achieved the fine-line feather detail that Continued on page 91

FAVORITE DECOY, BY ADRIANO MANOCCHIA

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Photography by Brian Grossenbacher

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November / December 2018 Âˇ 19

When you’re hunting in the shadow of Beaverhead Rock, pay close attention. Such a golden opportunity may come along only once. Good thing Willie the dog is by your side. He never loses focus. He sees ducks and geese approaching across the big sky and happily anticipates splashdown.

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November / December 2018 Âˇ 21

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Drawn by decoys and calling, the ducks and geese arrive in fast profusion and at close quarters. By midmorning, you’ve got your limit. The shooting stops, even though the birds keep coming. Willie doesn’t understand limits. He is still focused on the ducks.

For more information, see page 107.

November / December 2018 · 23

s I understand what we think we understand of evolution, it does not necessarily progress toward a higher order, rather is concerned only with differential reproductive success in response to selective environmental

pressures—progress toward any defined goal not involved. I have no quarrel with the fact of evolution as the powerful and overarching framework of modern biology; still, I think we may not yet have grasped the whole warp and woof of it. The same biology that decries evolutionary change as progress teaches that inert matter self-assembled into cells and, after a billion increasingly complex iterations of microbes, worms, fish, dinosaurs, birds, shrews, and primates, in more or less that order, composed the Ninth Symphony and Hamlet. I might add to those achieve-

ments the eventual crafting of elegant 6½-pound double guns capable of extending our diminished fang and claw with an ounce of 7½ shot. It seems that reconciling our present understanding of evolution with the observed progression of life without acknowledging something like linear progress is like forcing a camel through the eye of a double helix. And yet . . . , and yet . . . , my own journey as an aspiring duck hunter seems to have followed the textbook evolutionary formula—of adaptation to opportunities presented randomly when life exposed me to various waterfowlers, each of whom pursued the craft in a manner distinct from the others. COMING TO ROOST, BY MANFRED SCHATZ (1925-2004) COURTESY OF RUSSELL FINK GALLERY, LORTON, VA

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Evolution of a

Duck Hunter Crawling from the mud and duckweed, he became an upright hunter. by Rusty Ward November / December 2018 Âˇ 25

lan was the first. Transitioning out of high school into college, I was already a determined hunter whose thoughts lived in the woods more so than anyone I knew. Alan, a year older, dabbled at hunting but was driven by political and career ambitions I lacked, so he sought out and befriended community movers and shakers. To my good fortune, he wasn’t shy about asking them for favors. “Hey, Rusty,” his call came breathlessly one winter afternoon as the north wind rattled the windowpanes with needles of cold rain. “I met a guy who owns some catfish ponds south of town, and he said they’re full of ducks and we are welcome to come hunt them!” A whirlwind hour later, we were on the road with newly acquired duck stamps, high brass 4s, and our go-to shotguns—mine a Remington 870, Alan’s an 1100. We drove close, saw ducks on the ponds, sneaked up to the nearest pond, Alan to one side, me to the other. We jumped up, ducks flew, we shot, nothing fell. Undaunted, we flattened ourselves on the bank and for the next hour shot at ducks as they arrowed

overhead, the wind driving them at relativistic speeds from which they arced like falling meteors into the ponds. Speeding up our swings, we finally killed a few, but our plan hadn’t included how to retrieve water-bound ducks. Stymied, the wind, which had been our nemesis, became our friend as it slowly nudged the floating birds to the bank. Proud that I was now a duck hunter and eager to feast on nature’s bounty, I removed the smallish breasts from our entire take (Alan’s interest ended when the ducks hit the water) and noticed for the first time a faintly fishy smell as I chunked them on the grill. Innocent of even rudimentary cooking skills, I hoped if I cooked them long enough, the smell would go away. They were, of course, mergansers, and their fish-fed breasts condensed in the flame to the size and density of golf balls and smelled like cheap cat food gone bad. True caveman style, I ate them to the last bite, proclaiming them excellent fare to my dubious parents, and thought, Hell! Yes! I am a duck hunter! Of course, I was no such thing. I had merely shot a few ducks, but it was a start.

SHOOTING MALLARDS PINOAKS, BY BOB KUHN (1920-2007) COURTESY OF REMINGTON ARMS

26 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

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few years later, Alan and I stood at the edge of a backwater slough dotted with towering cypresses and laced with duckweed and hordes of high-balling, quacking, chuckling mallards. Ducks streamed in as we crouched in the shadows and planned our attack. By then, my evolution as a duck hunter included leaf-pattern camo, rubber waders, a Yentzen call around my neck, and a dedicated light duck gun in the crook of my arm. I had bought the Parker long-distance from an older gentleman who sent a couple of Polaroids along with a two-page description that concluded with the magnificent hook line, “She’ll gut a duck at forty yards.” She was a skinny 16-gauge DHE (these were pre-steel-shot days) with 30-inch barrels, twin ivory beads, and a stock of flame-colored walnut pretty enough to palpitate the heart. Duck-gutting patterns with high-brass 6s were the norm, and 4s weren’t far behind. Life just didn’t get any better. Though Alan had more spare change than I did, he was also shackled with a boring pragmatism and clung to his 1100, wore GI hand-me-downs gleaned from the bins of army surplus stores, and—

get this—wrapped plastic bread bags around his boots to keep his feet dry. In evolutionary terms, I was eons ahead of Alan. Our plan, actually Alan’s, called for him to remain hidden where we were (so as not to put his bread bags to the test) while I worked around to the far side of the slough. Alan agreed to sit tight and not disturb the ducks until I got into position; then we would rise in unison and have our way with them. It was a good plan, but I had barely rounded the end of the slough when Alan’s 1100 clattered itself empty and the sky filled with more ducks than I had ever seen, mostly streaming away from me. I tried to run and immediately swan-dived into the duckweed. Sputtering foul water, barrels plugged with fetid mud, dripping duckweed, and filled with dark anger, I told Alan he had five seconds to explain why he ignored our agreement before I throttled him. He said with a little too much glee that he had agreed not to flush any ducks before the appointed time, but nothing forbade him from popping the easy pair that came in on set wings. Continued on page 98

WINGS OF THE MORNING, BY ROY MASON (1886-1972) COURTESY OF THE COUER D’ ALENE ART AUCTION, HAYDEN, IDAHO

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Fathers Daughters Melancholy and hope, on a season’s bitter end. by Samuel Lucy

JEFF MOORE

November / December 2018 · 31

AUL WAS THINKING OF

Camille’s thick wavy hair and her smile that expressed an air of importance as she steered the outboard up-lake after her first duck shoot earlier in the fall. October’s orange colors swelled the marsh’s blue water. Puffed-up clouds in a warming sky reminded him that summer had begun to wane. There would be leaves to rake and pile that afternoon, firewood to split and stack, garden work, too. All this would be pleasing work after the morning hunt. She’d likely fall asleep on the ride home following a treat at the bakery. She’d been up at 4:30 and in the truck by quarter to five “If only I was this fast when it came to making the bus, huh, Papa?” Her wit alone nearly broke him. Never mind that she was already eight. She loved watching the Labs take turns on the birds. Then there were the pinfeathered first-of-the-season birds to pluck and clean by the woodpile, where the cats lounged in the late sun. She’d help choose the meat for that night’s grill and vacuum-pack the rest. Maybe they’d grill and eat the whole lot? To have and to hold, all right; things always deepened when the leaves turned. Right then, his heart sighed, wanting that moment frozen as he’d wanted the past eight years to rewind and then proceed a lot slower. She herself had said more than once: “I don’t want to grow up. . . .” But then, he and she wouldn’t have now, and that is what was to be gained by putting one’s heart on the line—as it had once been with lovers, with dogs, and now with children. Children trumped them all. The mere hint of loss in this regard was agonizing, yet it had played on his mind. Within their community, there were too many parents who endured such a cruelty, most recently a good friend, Ray, whom he’d hunted with late last season, just after the new year. While leaving the marsh that opening morning, Paul knew that he’d never visit it again without remembering this time with Camille. Even if she decided just once was enough, she’d already gotten a taste of early-season duck hunting when all the local birds mixed with the early comers. He and she hid in the tall grass by the beaver lodge, and the Labs perched comfortably as gadwalls, pintail, mallards, and divers buzzed through in the early hours—enough birds so Paul tried to shake off the 32 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

rust of the past eight months, regained some of his old swing, and dumped a few right there in front of the decoys so Camille could understand shooting range. “Okay, this one is going to be a shot,” she had said as a pintail swung wide over the grass, cupped, tucked in its long neck, and headed for the blocks she’d help place. They watched it flare, and Paul stood and buckled the bird as it tried to climb for those early autumn clouds, and everything went still a moment before she said, “Whoa . . . got that one!” And then chose which dog to send.

ince that October morning only three months had passed, but it seemed long ago. Though he’d asked her a few times, Camille decided not to join him again that season, even for an afternoon hunt. He’d had some good hunts with steady friends, including Ray, who’d shot his first goose. If the autumn’s mellowing colors weren’t enough to elicit the blues, the low gray fog over the mighty winter river, the silence, and the last day of the season all added to Paul’s a shaded heart. Heavier on his mind, though, on this Sunday, when he may have had enough hunting for the year, was that he’d convinced himself he could easily have stayed home with the family. It had been his wife who exclaimed: “I can’t believe you’re not going to hunt!” And that had done it. He loaded the gear and dogs and headed down-valley to the big river. Over the previous few hunts, Paul had hunted over water, and the divers and geese had afforded late-season shooting, but it hadn’t been as good as usual. He’d not been field hunting since Christmas, and as another whole season drew to a close, he regretted not scouting more, though he knew some puddlers and geese were using the standing corn, even as snow deepened. After an hour or more of looking for a place to hunt, Paul settled on a particular corn plot deep within the refuge. The spot bordered a long strip of corn and sat not 50 yards from the river. Better yet, he had a windbreak behind him. He had brought only a couple dozen silhouettes and left the rest of his shells and field gear home—the hunt almost an afterthought. As he considered decoy placement, he scanned the skies but saw nothing but hawks, thin lines of bare trees,

and eagles working the river for crippled birds, surfacing fish, or whatever else they might gather up during this coldest time. He set the decoys in walking fashion on the corn’s edge. He placed the goose sentries in the white opening to draw attention, then placed the mallards right in the horseshoe pocket of the geese. Finished, Paul found plenty of cover in the windbreak for himself and the dogs, and began the wait. Watching over a frozen field with the low ceiling of fog felt somehow lonelier than sitting over the big water, where almost always, there were birds circling, even if they moved offshore. Guilt began to creep in. Perhaps he felt sorrowful because he’d not stayed home to ski or sled or skate with the girls. Yet, there was plenty of winter left. He supposed, too, that other fathers might be watching football or doing something other than family sledding— this came as small consolation. Once, he heard geese from out on the big water, but they seemed as far away as the moon. He wished for some company. He’d asked his daughter to come along; she’d declined. “Next year, Papa. If it’s okay . . .” “Right,” he’d replied. “Hunting alone is good, too.” Already, just the one hunt that fall, and Paul feared Camille might be growing bored—not just with hunting but with him as well. After all, he’d been the only one shooting. Her presence there in the frozen corn with the silence working on him

He reached over and steadied the dogs. The field was small and the birds would have to work tightly from the side to drop in, but they’d been here. In this field. Their footprints in the snow and their droppings provided proof. He waited. The shots would be close if they committed. Then he spotted them; already sliding inland and toward the bluffs. The geese talked to the silhouettes when they first spotted them; Paul called on his flute. The birds responded and turned his way— 30 strong. Too many, he thought—too damn many eyes. But they kept coming. Their noisy approach lifted his low mood. ould Paul tell her how it had been 35 years since he shot his first goose? Thirty-five years, and he could still see it stall in midflight when he shot straight overhead with his brother’s 16 gauge. Would he tell her that every goose since had brought the same excitement? The sound of them alone brought the same rush, whether sky-high on their migration with the faint, distant, age-old music spoken as if from the clouds or the quiet murmur as they appeared from the fog to circle once and then drop their feet straight for the spread. He theorized that a goose for the holiday sanctified country living, rich or poor. How he could feel their thick winter down like cotton on their breasts—smell the fresh, northern air from their travels when he plucked them out— loved to see the yellow, marbled skin that he knew would be perfect for the grill. Oh, she’d eaten her share. She loved the geese and ducks. Both his daughters did. Birds were the first meal he cooked his wife, not knowing she was vegetarian at the time. This group took a peek, circled once, and headed up-river. Was it the spoof they detected? Paul felt confident they couldn’t possibly have seen him and the dogs. Too many eyes for the last days in January. That’s all. Too many eyes. Quiet returned as Paul stared at sagging corn stocks surrounded in white. He wondered, just when had those little duck tracks and the heavier prints of geese occurred? He was sure it had been within the last day, yet they were Continued on page 102

She herself had said more than once: “I don’t want to grow up… .” But then, he and she wouldn’t have now, and that is what was to be gained by putting one’s heart on the line. would have added new purpose and perhaps given him light, yet Paul felt creeping thankfulness that she’d stayed home. Seeing boredom on her face would have taken him deeper into his funk, which had burdened him so that he himself felt an awkward boredom—something that he’d never experienced during a hunt. Then he heard geese murmuring behind him. Are they coming? 34 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

36 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

Skeena Steel

Photography by Adam Tavender

November / December 2018 Âˇ 37

Gathering on the shores of British Columbia’s great steelhead rivers is a matter of logistics, and any number of small towns—Smithers, Terrace, Hazelton—cater to fly anglers who hope to catch sea-run rainbows that tend to run larger than in most other places. Between the chopper’s departure and its return, the logistics are over. This is where your plan becomes reality.

38 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

November / December 2018 Âˇ 39

40 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

The plan is to explore the Skeena and its tributaries—including the Kispiox and the Babine—via inflatable rafts and use Spey rods to cover runs that can’t be reached with a single-hander. A couple hookups a day would be a bounty, but hope dictates that one might be the fish of a lifetime. Catch one that stretches 37, 38 inches—that’s where your hopes become reality.

For more information, see page 107.

November / December 2018 · 41

REDFISH, BY ED ANDERSON

42 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

A Day on

Choctawhatchee Bay A new, first taste of autumn signals a shift in the cosmosâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;and joy in the hearts of sportsmen. by iles owell r.

November / December 2018 Âˇ 43

T’S 5 A.M. AND STILL DARK,

with the exception of an amber glow from a streetlight a few houses down. The cool fall air is filled with the rhythmic taps of water dripping from downspouts—the homebound sound of wet weather. Wind-driven sheets of rain rake across the concrete drive as I loop a shorter-than-normal fluorocarbon tippet to the last segment of knotted mono. I tie on a favored go-to hybrid shrimp pattern, then hook it to the eyelet at the base of the rod. The pattern is utilitarian; I can strip it like a baitfish, slow-jig it like a shrimp, or let it settle onto the bottom to crawl it like a meal-size crab. Perfect. Though the middle of autumn, this is the first cold front of the season, a significant event to any fly fishermen worth their salt around here. The redfish are on the move, and by midmorning, they should be working the shallow marsh coves as low tide bottoms out. I’ll explore some promising-looking water I’ve never fished but have eyed for a while, and I’m champing at the bit to get after it. Due to miserable and lingering dog days of summer followed by a busy work schedule, I’ve not fished in a while. I’m ripe with anticipation—by that, I mean falling-off-the-damn-tree ripe—and nothing will shake me loose like an autumn trip to the skinnywater coves shooting for tailing reds. I stuff some food and a rain jacket into my waterproof dry bag, then place it and my new, fully rigged 8-weight in my van. I had the foresight to load my kayak last night before this little system moved in, but while backing out, I remember sunscreen so I run back in to grab it. For a redhead, this stuff is critical; but this morning, the miracle salve serves equally as an act of optimism as it does functionality. I’m hoping for classic cool, crisp, sunny weather after the front clears out. The rain comes and the rain goes, but here along the Gulf fringe of the Florida Panhandle, it does so with little correlation to predicted forecasts. General knowledge of weather patterns for times, places, and seasons is crucial ancillary knowledge for any outing. Doubly important if you’re heading out on water; but this place really has me bewildered. The open water dynamics of the Gulf present 44 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

complexities that make a mockery of modern-day meteorology. Not unlike the Rocky Mountain West, the wet stuff here usually doesn’t stick around too long, so regardless of the forecast, the rain is not my concern, but those loop-crushing gusts of wind have me a bit edgy. Still, the elements have zero chance of dimming my determination. I’m eager for a worthy rod christening, so I grab my hat and coffee and hit the road. The coffee is top-shelf and brewed stout for effectiveness. I’m only a quarter way into my field mug, and the caffeine is already talking to me.

rossing the narrow neck of Okaloosa Island, heading eastward toward Destin in the early morning light, I see a flock of red-breasted mergansers, the first I’ve seen this season. The madcap divers are strung out in two large flocks characteristically shifting and reshifting as they traverse the wet, gray sky at a slight angle from south to north, which is Gulf to bay. Among the ducks that migrate into the immediate coastal waters here, they’re most predominant but also the only ones that lay claim exclusively to the Gulf waters. A spattering of other divers—hooded mergansers, goldeneye, buffleheads, and later in the season, large flocks of bluebill—will eventually join them. They’re not mallards or cans, but nothing ignites a fire in my belly like seeing waterfowl working in a front. The wayward migrants are a beacon of the season; the heavy weight of fall is finally here. The telltale marks of the season are not limited to the sky. The water, reacting to the front’s push of wind from the northwest, reveals another coded harbinger of fall. Atop Marler Bridge, coming into Destin, I scan the waters of Choctawhatchee Bay and see the outgoing tide combined with an opposing incoming surf that creates large, ominous white-capping rollers that surge through East Pass to the south, rolling 200 yards beyond into the fading gray mystery of a dark, stormy Gulf. This scene never fails to rattle my landlubber soul. It’s serious business out there. The clear, emerald green water this area is

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known for is nowhere to be seen today. Instead, the dark, tannin-stained water, like the mergansers, is an indicator that the fullness of autumn is here. Tannin water is simply the by-product of nature’s fermentation process, and results in the dark, tealike tint of inland waters observed in coastal regions. It’s a transitory product of the vast system of lowland rivers, creeks, intermittent streams, and swamps now bulging to capacity from recent autumn rains. It’s also the alchemist potion that turns red drum into shimmering slabs of finned gold. To me, this brassygold hue is the most beautiful color variation in the redfish’s chameleon-like palette. Beyond the pass, the Gulf current swallows the stained water, sweeping it westward toward the coasts of Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas, respectively. The nutrient-rich sediments settling in and down, still fouling clarity as they go but providing crucial sustenance for the lower stratum of the food chain as they enter and merge with the current-driven, planetary process of swirlingwater oneness connecting all seas. Gray sky, black water, gold fish, variegated forests; besides color, yet another, more unique indicator of the season is also revealed on top of the water—an indicator that simply isn’t present in warmer months under similar conditions. It’s a complex, geometrical pattern of surface textures that is produced this time of year by various simultaneous natural conditions: wind, rain, cold temperature, and an outgoing tidal current. Remove any element of these requisite conditions, and the final product fails to materialize. Together, though, these conditions weave a tapestry with lines of frothy, wind-whipped contrasting white foam, which is further divided into thinner fractallike lines, each sorting into its own reticulated patterns. A quilted crosshatch of design and motion that shifts and slides along the surface of large swaths of the bay in a singular mass. It’s pure organic art, not unlike a well-placed 80-foot cast that unloops into the direct path of an approaching underwater shadow. Both are beautifully temporal, but this is untouched by man, unintended for man; it’s there for wanting eyes or none at all. It’s Nature. And like us, this simple, natural 46 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

creation from seemingly chaotic conditions has roots of universal laws that shoot in infinite tendrils outward, upward, toward the source, into the cosmos, that universal tapestry of all above. Forty minutes into the drive, after punching my way through a jungle of condos, gated communities, and outlet malls, I cross the county line and eventually turn north toward Choctawhatchee Bay. I maneuver the asphalt maze of country roads to reach the nondescript access point I’d scouted virtually on Google Earth. Along the way, I travel through vast, dense stands of immature lowland timber, including swampy pockets of cypress and its swamp mate, water tupelo, each with signature swollen trunks. The cypresses glow with an autumn orange hue; the less hardy tupelos are already nearly bare. This area is only four miles north of the whitest beaches in the United States, but with the exception of a few small communities and isolated houses situated on higher ground, most of this low-lying area north of the main highway is simply too wet for human habitation. Swarms of biting yellow flies, biting black flies, and biting no-see-ums, however, seem to do just fine. Heavy emphasis on biting; fish upwind. As hoped, the rain has now pushed out, and breaking clouds reveal chunks and slices of deep blue sky. It’s a shade of blue seen only momentarily here in fall or winter immediately after the passing of a cold front. If it were night, the thick radial bands of the Milky Way would be impressive. Even better than open sky, the loop-crushing wind has subsided, leaving in place a manageable southeasterly breeze. It will be no issue chunking beefy patterns with my 8-weight. The setting looks a lot different at ground level than it did on Google Earth, and getting to my target area—a series of marsh coves near deeper water—will take more effort than I imagined, but I discover a small, eight-foot-wide canal (think ditch) that runs perpendicular to the road and straight into the heart of the marsh. I can possibly use it to avert a long and arduous portage to the bay. I pull a folded aerial photo of the area from a Continued on page 103

Dog Quintet Hope springs eternal and always. By Roger Pinckney

FAVORITE SEASON (DETAIL), BY DAVID LANIER

48 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

November / December 2018 Âˇ 49

A boy coiled up in his grandma’s quilts

and goose down pillows one chilly autumn night on the Carolina coast a good long while ago. A fire popped and roared in the hearth, but it was a long way from where he lay. He heard the crackle but could not feel the heat. ind in the pines, oaks, and panish moss, northwesterly that time of year. It rattled the sashes and made little whirlwinds among the dead magnolia leaves upon the porch. His grandmother read him to sleep some nights, nightmare ghost stories, what happened to bad boys who would not say their prayers. “His pappy heard him beller and his mammy heard him bawl, but when they turned the kivvers down, he wasn’t there at all.” And that terrified him into his best behavior. His pappy would get all liquored up at parties, get down on his knees, recite, and act out “The Face on the Barroom Floor,” the painful doggerel wherein as payment for a drink, a besotted vagabond takes pool table chalk and draws a picture of his lost love, then clutches his heart and falls across it dead. But at home, he sang the boy to sleep with a voice like a bumblebee in a bucket. It was only an old beer bottle, floating down the foam, It was only an old beer bottle, many a mile from home, And in it was a piece of paper, with these words written on, “Whoever finds this bottle, will find the beer all gone.” His mammy read him Bible stories, the Children crossing the sea dry shod, the quail flying into the camp of the hungry Israelites. But his favorite was about the Creation. “In the beginning,” she intoned in her soft Lowcountry accent, “the earth was formless and void and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.” His mammy recounted all six days in detail, the creation of the birds of the air, the fishes of the deep, and the beasts of the field—the beginnings of the world the boy was already learning to love. “And God saw all that he had made, and it was good. And on the seventh day, he rested.” Then his mammy would lay her hand upon the page, cast a loving eye upon the boy, almost asleep now, 50 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

and she would construct upon Scripture. “But before he rested, he created a dog to be man’s special friend.” His mammy was Episcopal, and she could do that.

lue was hunting stock out of a kennel in Tomahawk, Wisconsin, and I got her from an undertaker in St. Paul. I read the ad in the Pioneer Press. “Give away to good home, AKC registered 2-yearold black Lab female. Comes with doghouse.” I had a good home, a farmhouse in the Anoka County sand barrens made of defunct Soo Line boxcars. I had a big garden, a coop full of laying hens, and a deer stand in a birch tree. I drove down to the city to check her out. “I never know when I might be called,” the undertaker explained. “Blue breaks loose and runs down to the river to swim.” The river was the Mississippi. It was 20 blocks away. Blue was unlike any Lab bitch I had ever seen, before or since. Ninety pounds, long-legged, webbed feet big as buttermilk biscuits, and a deep vee of a chest. “Load her up,” I said. The doghouse was fashioned from a casket crate. Blue hunted pheasants, ducks, and geese, plentiful in Anoka County in those days. But her best retrieve was a skinning knife I lost at a deer kill. Soon as I got the buck hanging, I turned her loose and she backtracked my trail a mile or more, and daybreak the next morning, she laid the lost knife in my hand. Blue gave me a sudden and serious lesson in Newtonian physics when she was in heat and I was on one end of a half-inch nylon line and she was on the other. I bred her once to a field champion, 13 pups. The breeder came with a whistle and a pistol.

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He blew and he shot and he took his pick. I wish I would have kept the runt. We nicknamed her Square from the shape of her head. She kept breaking out of the kennel and coming to the back door, the only pup that could. I’m a damn sap now, mourning the mourning doves, commiserating over the quail I kill, moaning and praying over the deer, but I was a hard-scratching, hardbitten SOB in those days living in a Soo Line boxcar. So, I let her go. I made my share of mistakes in my time—and I’d run out of fingers and toes if I tried to count them— but that was a big one, for a stinking 40 bucks.

en years later, but a hard-bitten SOB still. Twenty, yea 40 below, log cabin, outhouse, wood heat, kids yammering at the table like convicts in some jailhouse movie, bacon and beans, kerosene when I could get it. Scant time for idle sentiment. Ad in the Hawley Herald told a sad story between the lines, 20 miles east of Fargo: He got the pickup; she got the car. They sold the house and split whatever money the lawyers and bankers didn’t get. But they could not split the dog, a three-yearold yellow-eyed Chesapeake Bay retriever, Lacey. I scooped up my youngest daughter, about as old as the dog, and drove west from my farm at Thistle Ridge, black dark by the time I arrived. A man met me in the driveway, went around back to the kennel, and loosed the dog. I loosed the daughter, she took off running, and dog came running, collision course. “Dear Lord, I am fixing to find out right quick if I want this dog!” Lacey sat back on her haunches, skidded six feet to a stop, peeling leaves the whole way. She gently poked the child, her nose in the middle of her chest, licked her cheek. “Load her up,” I said. Fifteen degrees. No seat belts, no car seats in a 1953 three-quarter-ton Ford, heater doing the best it could. I tied the daughter in place with a couple of loops of baling twine. The dog went into the back, affixed to the spare tire with a short length of twist-link chain. Thirty miles to Thistle Ridge. A mile into the return, there arose a piteous howling. I pulled over to find the dog had hogtied herself. I untangled her, threw her into the cab. 52 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

About the time I hit fourth gear, she sighed deeply, put her big yellow head upon my knee. Bless her, she could not imagine my stupidity, but she knew I had rescued her from it. She was my dog from that moment, my dog forevermore, my dog till the day she breathed her last. Folklore says the Chesapeake originated when two yellow dogs swam ashore after a shipwreck on the Virginia coast, the sole survivors. I believe it. Lacey was a bit snappish with strangers and cost my insurance carrier four grand after biting an aspiring porno queen on one cheek of her most valuable asset and it left a scar. But that’s a whole nother story. Lacey had a single other eccentricity: She would invariably defecate in the truck. I was driving a wellused Chevy suburban by then, and a steaming load in the rear compartment was akin to chemical warfare. So, she ran behind the truck a mile to the lake, swam another mile behind the canoe, retrieved the birds, then swam and ran all the way home. I was a hard-bitten SOB in those days. But some cold winter nights when the aurora crackled and the snow lay deep upon the land, I would cradle her in my arms. I’d ruffle her ears and she would slobber on my cheeks and chin. “Oh, Lacey. Oh, Lacey, if a woman had eyes like you, she’d win an Academy Award.”

here is little profit in owning a Newfoundland dog,” Josh Billings once remarked, “unless one has a small child and a pond.” Josh Billings was a friend of Mark Twain. I had a pond, several of them, full of ducks in season. My kids were up and running by then, but I wanted a Newfoundland anyway. A Newfoundland dog jumped overboard and saved Napoléon when he tried to drown himself on his way to exile. Lewis and Clark took a Newfie all the way to the Pacific and back. Lord Byron bedded 300 women a year when in his prime, but wrote his best poem to his Newfoundland dog dead of rabies. Byron nursed him to the end and never got bit. Porgy was one-eighth golden retriever. You could not tell it, but the AKC could, and there were no papers, didn’t matter, he was a working dog, not a breeding one. He’d drag a deer, haul a sled full of groceries Continued on page 105

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54 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

GREAT Photography by Matt McCormick

November / December 2018 Â· 55

56 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

A row of cans speaks volumes to the tremendous public waterfowl hunting on Utahâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge, which is a thoroughfare for the Pacific Flyway and part of the Great Salt Lake Basin. To see these big ducks come to a set of hand-carved decoys and cup their wings . . . Well, what can fire the blood of a dedicated waterfowler more?

November / December 2018 Âˇ 57

How about being one of the lucky hunters who draws a tag for a realistic chance at a tundra swan in one of the few places hunting tundra swans is allowed? To see these big birds break on decoys, flying faster than seems possible . . . Well, maybe this is what is really meant by Great Salt Lake Basin.

For more information, see page 107.

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November / December 2018 Âˇ 59

GSJ

TRADITIONS

EDITED BY WILL RYAN

On raining geese, and other tales of the coast. by Sewell Ford (Adapted from Truegate of Mogador: And Other Cedarton Folks. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons. 1906)

The

King Gander of Sea Dog Shoal 60 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

WINGED MAJESTY, BY MANFRED SCHATZ (1925–2004) COURTESY OF RUSSELL FINK GALLERY, LORTON, VA

f all the wonders of natural history most are written about by spectacled scientists. Often it is the silent, taciturn, eagle-eyed, sharp-eared fellows, who spend their lives in the open, that see and hear the odd things which never get into books, things which those same scientists profess not to believe. For instance, there was the unique discovery concerning the habits of wild geese, made by Captain Otis Huckins, B.O. (Barnegat Oysterman). Let it be told in his own words, just as he told it that December evening in the cabin of his oyster sloop, with the frosty creak of boom and rudder head, the crackle of thin ice under the bows and the distant gabble of wild ducks as an accompaniment. If it were possible, you should see him, round of face and beardless, his pop-eyes shifting restlessly as he talked through the lantern-lighted, tobacco-scented haze which filled the cramped quarters wherein four town-bred sportsmen smoked and listened. “High Bar, eh? Well, now, I’d like to take ye acrost; like to be accommodatin’ when I kin, but you see, Si an’ me’s been tongin’ since sun-up an’ we’re some tired. Besides, they ain’t enough air stirrin’ fer to hardly git us there ’fore mornin’. They’s new ice a-makin’ in the Bay, too. Don’t want to git froze up to leeward with oysters bringin’ a dollar a bushel right on the dock. “Five? Well, five dollars is five dollars, I s’pose. Shall we chanst it, Si? All right. Tumble yer stuff right aboard. Ker-honk! Ker-honk! Brung live decoys, did ye? Aint that old Joe a-honkin’ in that thur box? Thought so. Oh, I’ve seen old Joe come down to the Inlet every season fer goin’ on a dozen year now. He b’longs to Poppy Van, up to Cedarton. He’s a good one, ole Joe is. Reg’lar old Judas Iscariot, I says. Joe’ll honk ’em down if they’s any gittin’ ’em to stop. Tickles him to death, too, ter see ye drop a goose. Oh, I’ve seen the old sinner at his tricks. He can hear a flock comin’ a mile off an’ he’ll jest stretch his old neck an’ talk to ’em, talk as nice as he knows how, jest as if he was sayin’: ‘Hello, brothers! Glad to see ye, dumb’d ef I ain’t. Goin’ to stop a while, ain’t ye? That’s it, set yer wings an’ come down here fer a rest. Bully feedin’. Hanged ef I ain’t glad ye come along. Why, bless me ef—’ an’ jest then, when yer

raises up outer the blind to poke it to ’em, old Joe he pulls in his neck an’ squats flat, squintin’ over one shoulder to see if ye drop ary one. Knowin’! He’s as cute as Satan an’ jest as wicked, he is. Honk away, old Judas Joe. I wouldn’t have as many dead geese on my conscience as you’ve got on yourn fer this whole sloop full of silver dollars. “Got yer duffle all aboard, have ye? Then git down into the cabin where it’s warm. I’ll be down soon’s I help Si git under way. Lucky we got a full moon to steer by fer it’s a windin’ channel up that there thoroughfare to High Bar. Oh, we’ll git acrost all right. Little more on yer peak halyard, Si. Little more. There! Shove her head off with the settin’ pole. Look out, that deck’s slippery’n glass. Here, you take the tiller while I go below an’ keep the passengers comp’ny. No, don’t try Mud channel to-night. Put her straight for Oyster Crick, an’ sing out as you pick up the buoys, so’s I kin know where we’re at. “B-r-r-rl I tell ye, gents, it’s some frosty out tonight. Warm as toast down here, though, ain’t it? Have a cup of coffee. Pot’s right thur on the stove, help yerself. Cups in the starboard locker. “So you’re goin’ down to High Bar to shoot over old Joe? Guess you’ll have some sport, fer they’s a heap o’ ducks in the Bay. They been a-comin’ in all this week—red necks, mallard, black ducks, and brant. My suz, but the brant’s thick! And fat! Saw a pair yesterday that weighed four pound apiece if they did a ounce. There’s thousands on ’em, too. We kin hear ’em, when we git further out into the Bay, jess a-settin’ round on the water an’ gossipin’ like a mess of old women. But geese is skurce. ’Tain’t been cold enough yet to drive ’em down, an’ them as has come has gone on South. Saw three flocks go over to-day. They was travellin’ high and lively, like they had business some’r’s. “Me? No, I don’t do much shootin’. I stick to oysterin’. Geese? Well, I’m no goose hunter; leastways, not now. S’pose I might’s well tell ye about it. Like’s not you’ll hear the yarn an’ won’t hear it right. Don’t s’pose they’s a man on the Bay, from Harvey Cedars up, but knows why I don’t shoot geese no more. “It was jest ’leven year ago the twenty second of this month that I quit goose shootin’; ’leven year, an’ I don’t feel a bit more like tryin’ it now than I did the day that happened. Before that, mind ye, I’d killed geese from the time I could lift a gun. November / December 2018 · 61

The way we come to go was like this: My brother Sam he’d been workin’ in a brick-yard up Freehold way an’ hadn’t had no fun fer months. I’d jest got home from a two-year v’yage from Frisco to Hong Kong an’ back as ship’s carpenter on one o’ them big Maine vessels. Sam he says: “‘Ote, d’ye know what we oughter have fer our Christmas dinner?’ “‘Canvas back,’ says I, kinder suspicionin’ what was in his mud. “‘Canvas back nuthin’,’ says he. ‘We want wild goose fer our Christmas, an’ a big fat gander at that.’ “‘Geese ain’t come down much yet,’ says I. “‘Mebbe not, Ote, but they’ll be comin’ ’fore long. Let’s hook up the old Shinin’ Star an’ go over to the Inlet an’ wait fer ’em.’ “So we got our kit together, beat the ice off ’n the mainsail, shoved the Shinin’ Star to the mouth of the crick an’ scudded over until we rounded to under the lee of Clam Island. That was the fifteenth of December. Well, fer four days we jest lay there, waitin’ fer goose weather. They was ducks, plenty of ’em. They was bangin’ away at ’em over on High Bar, and we could see the fellers from the Life Savin’ station shootin along the beach—pop, pop, poppety, pop—but we wa’n’t down there to do no meadow poppin’. We jest loaded shells an’ iled our old pot irons an’ waited. “One mornin’ we woke up to find a sou’easter mixin’ things up. It rained an’ blowed all day an’ kept the ducks on the move. That night it swung around into the no’theast an’ blowed some more. “‘That’s the stuff, Ote, let her swing,’ says Bill. “Swing she did. By the next night it had come cold an’ the wind had jumped around into the no’thwest. Then she did blow. “‘Now, Ote,’ says Bill, ‘we’ll git geese.’ “It was about four o’clock in the mornin’ when we tumbled out of our bunks an’ begun to git ready. Smokin’ mackerel, but it was cold! I put on three pair of yarn socks before I hauled on my hippers, and I wore three coats besides my oiler. You can’t git on too many clothes when you’re goin’ to lay in a blind that kind of weather. “‘Shall we try the North point of Clam Island, Bill?’ says I. “‘No, sir,’ says Bill. ‘Sea Dog’s good enough for me when I’m after a gander.’ 62 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

“You know Sea Dog, don’t you, right inside the mouth of the Inlet? It’s just the top of a shoal that sticks up when the tide ain’t too high. Well, we gits into our sneakbox and rows out to Sea Dog. Mostly it was covered with ice, but we shovelled some away and dug us a hole. We put out fifty goose stools, scatterin’ ’em to make ’em look like a big flock. Then, jest about daybreak, we crawled into our sand hole an’ wrapped ourselves in two old pieces of canvas. Talk about your blinds, that was a slick one. The sand was white, the ice was white an’ we was white. But you have to be cute to fool Mr. Goose. “Well, it was more’n an hour ’fore we got a crack at anything in the geese line. Then five of ’em split off ’n the tail end of a flock an’ came in to us. We poked it into ’em good an’ plenty. Bill, he cuts one out with his right barrel and another with his left. I drops two first lick and knocks the last one endways jess as he was biddin’ us good-bye. Yes, we could shoot some then, Bill ’n me. Besides, we was cal’lating on goose when we put six drams o’ black powder and two ounces o’ BB’s into them shells. “‘There, Bill,’ says I, as we waded back over the shoal after pickin’ up our kill, ‘There’s yer Christmas goose.’ “‘No, ’taint,’ sez Bill. ‘I want gander fer mine. My teeth’s good and I like his flavor better’n that of hen geese. Mr. Gander’s a good feeder, he is, an’ he oughter be good eatin’. We’ll wait fer him.’ “So we waited, an’ it was the coldest an’ onluckiest wait I ever had. They was flyin’, all right. We could see ’em, strings of ’em, goin’ down between us an’ the main, huntin’ fer rest and feed. But none of ’em came our way. ’Long about ten o’clock, when it seemed as if I was froze as stiff as the barrels of Betsy, my old eight-bore, I says to Bill: ‘Bill, we got enough geese to last a month, les’s quit.’ “‘No,’ says Bill, in that mule way of his’n. ‘I’m after gander, an’ gander I’m agoin’ ter have.’ “Well, sir, ’twa’n’t more’n ten minutes ’fore we heard music comin’ down the Bay. Bill, he pokes his head up fer a squint. “‘Holy cats!’ sez he. ‘Cover up! Cover close! Here comes a bunch o’ geese as big as the United States army!’ “They was away up by Great Sedge when we see ’em, but they was jabberin’ so we could hear ’em plain. They wa’n’t travellin’ in no V an’ they wa’n’t

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keepin’ step with their wings, fer they was beat, dead beat, an’ flyin’ ragged an’ low. We knew what that meant. “‘Ote,’ whispers Bill, ‘did ye ever see such a bustin’ lot of ’em together afore?’ “‘It’s the all-firedest flock I ever see, Bill,’ sez I. “An’ it was. I ain’t goin’ to try to tell how many they was, ’cause I hain’t got no idea. They was just a slew of ’em. An’ leadin’ the bunch was a gander. Well, talk about big ganders, he was a big cuss. There wa’n’t no mistakin’ who was boss o’ that flock. Looked like a six-foot drum major leadin’ a lot of school boys. P’raps he wa’n’t twict as big as ary other one, but he looked it. He just gave a squint at our decoys with one eye, then turned an’ squinted with the other an’ the next minit we see him set his wings an’ come plump down at us with all that slew o’ geese behind him. “You know how foolish a goose generally looks when he lets himself go fer a quick light; how he sticks his wings down an’ spreads his legs out stiff an’ stretches his neck? But that old gander didn’t look foolish a bit. He jest came down kind of proud and solemn and dignified like, same’s the President or Governor settin’ down in a chair after he’s made a big speech an’ the folks is all cheerin’. My suz, but he did look grand, with them great wings of his spread, as he came sailin’ down through the air. Fer the life of me I couldn’t do a thing but set an’ watch him. But Bill, he didn’t give a cuss fer nothin’ when he see suthin’ he wanted. “‘Let ’em have it!’ he yells, an’ throws off the canvas as he riz up. “That big gander was right over us an’ not more’n sixty feet away when Bill cuts loose at him, an’ the next thing I knew, there was that great, graybellied thing a whirlin’ an’ a-tumblin’ smack down onto us. I yelled an’ tried to jump, but I wa’n’t quick enough. Next minit I didn’t know nothin’ at all, not a blame thing. “Well, it might of been minits, an’ then ag’in, it might of been hours. I wa’n’t takin’ no account of the sun jest then. But when I come to I was feelin’ mighty sore all over an’ I was stiff from cold. Fer a bit I didn’t know where I was or what had happened. I saw the Bay, all runnin’ full of new ice. I saw the lighthouse, acrost the Inlet, standin’ up still and straight outer the sand. I heard a gun bang over 64 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

on Vol Sedge, an’ that made me remember that all fired flock of geese an’ that big gander. “Then I looked around fer Bill. There he was, settin’ on the edge of the sand hole, his right arm hangin’ limp an’ his face half covered with frozen blood. His eyes was set an’ his mouth part open. First off I thought he’d shot himself an’ was dead. Then I goes over to him an’ sees he was alive. “‘Bill,’ sez I, ‘what ails ye? What’s the matter, Bill?’ But Bill he wouldn’t pay no more attention to me than if I hadn’t been there at all. I shook him, but it didn’t make no difference. ’Twas then I found his arm was broke. “Next I looked around fer the gander. The top of Sea Dog was about eight inches out of water then an’ there was a strip of sand an’ ice p’raps fifty yards long an’ ten yards wide. There was blood an’ feathers all around an’ the ice was mashed and the sand tore up like a lot of horses had run over it. But there wa’n’t no gander. He wa’n’t in the blind, neither. An’ yet I had seen Bill pump a load of BB’s into him at short range. “But I didn’t lose no more time huntin’ fer that gander. I jest uncovered the sneak box, loaded our stools onto it and dragged Bill in. He wouldn’t move a step by himself, or do a thing. I must aworked half an hour gittin’ him from the sneak box into the cabin of the Shinin’ Star. “Some way or other I got him home. We put him to bed an’ got a doctor to set his arm. It was broke in three places, and his trigger finger was broke, too. But that wa’n’t the worst of it. For three weeks Bill was the craziest sort of a crazy man you ever saw. Brain fever, the doctor called it. We had to strap him hand an’ foot to the bed. I tended him through it all an’ heard most of the things he said when he was out of his head. Couldn’t no one else make head nor tail of it. But I could, an’ it made my flesh creep. “Never hear tell of a king gander, I s’pose? No, most folks hain’t. The sharps that write the bird books say there ain’t no such thing. But I know better. I’ve seen one. “There ain’t never but one king gander at a time, same’s a country never has but one king at a time. But a king gander’s a real king, that’s what he is. It ain’t jest because he’s the biggest gander of any, or the knowin’est. It’s somethin’ more. He’s kind of a sacred gander, he is, and there ain’t a wild goose that Continued on page 93

GSJ

GRAY’S GEAR & LIFESTYLE

isher + Baker, a Minneapolis-based brand that vaulted into the outdoor-lifestyle-apparel scene in 2016, wasted little time crafting a line of stylish men’s clothing that showcases a nuanced appreciation for timeless good looks without sacrificing fit and function. The company’s goal is to maintain balance in every product it creates, and among its collection of premium shirts, jackets, and outerwear, the Lexington Vest is a fine example of its emphasis on versatility. A true three-season garment, the vest can be easily dressed up or down, is windproof and water-resistant, and comes with a magnetic-closure chest pocket that is subtle yet highly functional. The Lexington also packs down easily for stashing away in small compartments, making it an ideal travel companion, while its high warmth-to-weight ratio makes the vest perfect for easy layering. Best of all, it is unsurpassed in terms of comfort and feel—and there’s a place for that in any gentleman’s wardrobe. www.fisherandbaker.com $298

here was a time, not so long ago, when the name Duck Head was synonymous with khaki pants—especially if you matriculated in the Deep South, where the classically casual chinos graced the grandstands of many a bourbon-soaked football Saturday. There, they paired perfectly with your white oxford shirt and sports coat, along with an elegant sorority beauty who was probably out of your league. She was outfitted in her favorite Laura Ashley sundress, a bow atop her head in a valiant effort to control the dark, flowing locks that still thankfully managed to rain down across her forehead and accentuate a pair of impossibly big brown eyes. Life was good. And then, rather suddenly, the brand faded into oblivion, along with its iconic golden tag, unrivaled flat-front, and glorious wrinkle-resistance. Alas, whatever happened between you and your lovely date is now lost to the sands of time, but rejoice in knowing the same cannot be said of Duck Head. The Classic Fit Gold School Chino has been revived with you in mind, right down to its 7.5-ounce cotton twill, signature buttons, coin pocket, industrialgrade zipper, and the same perfect fit—not too full, not too slim—that made you a believer in the first place. Just remember, these may need a couple more inches around the waist than the last pair you owned. www.duckhead.com $89

ew products have experienced more technological advancements in recent years than handheld flashlights. Gone are the days of dim, yellow rays that eat batteries and corrode at the first sign of moisture, replaced instead by blinding streams that turn night into day with an ever-increasing lumen count and energy life. Now Coast has taken things one step further with the Polysteel 600R LED, a virtually bombproof dynamo that’s perfect for your boat, SUV, or hunting camp. Taunted by claims of indestructibility, we ran over our test model with a five-ton van to no ill effect. Equipped with Coast’s Dual Power system, the light can run on a custom rechargeable lithium-ion battery pack or standard alkaline batteries, either of which produces an output of 530 lumens with an 810-foot beam. Yet all that power is packed into a stainless steel core and poly outer shell that’s under eight inches long and weighs less than 12 ounces. Drop-proof, waterproof, and backed by Coast’s lifetime warranty. www.coastportland.com $89 66 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

ith 100 percent American-made materials and a supply chain completely within the USA, Farm to Feet strives to make sure you’re never again disappointed to see socks in your Christmas stocking. Developed in collaboration with the Alaska Mountaineering School and created from lessons learned over decades of experience navigating some of the world’s tallest peaks, the Denali features more merino wool content than any other sock of its kind. A relaxed fit accommodates the muscle swelling that often comes with high altitudes, but still maintains enough structure to prevent drooping on the leg. Plus, a ribbed section between the ankle and top of the foot ensures the socks stay in place. Adding to its comfort is a four-ply wool foot bottom for additional insulation and cushioning. While designed for use with mountaineering boots, the Denali is also ideal for other cold-weather pursuits like ice fishing, winter camping, sledding, or our personal favorite—reading a good book in front of the fireplace. www.farmtofeet.com $30

t’s been a labor of love, bringing wild quail and trophy whitetails back to the old family farm. You’ve spent countless hours, and probably more resources than you’d like to admit (even to yourself), in hopes of transforming this raw piece of land into the type of sporting property you’ve always dreamed it might one day become. Now the coveys have returned, and with them a call to commemorate your hard-won accomplishment. New World Cartography specializes in creating beautiful, hand-drawn plantation maps, and one of their artisans will meet with you to begin an iterative process through which a colorful, informative, and heirloom-quality design can be created for current and future generations to enjoy. Map size, coverage area, landscape details, and artistic outline can all be customized to your specifications, resulting in a unique and informative treasure to adorn your walls for many years to come. Prices differ according to size and details, but $3,500 is a solid estimate. www.newworldcartography.com

ore than 20 years ago, in the tiny Quail Belt hamlet of Leesburg, Georgia, a team of designers, engineers, and machinists set out to build the ultimate bird-hunting machine. Today, Bird Buggy churns out custom-built, motorized masterpieces of dog-toting perfection, complete with aluminum kennels, leather chairs, secure storage boxes for guns and ammo, and plenty of optional bells and whistles to satisfy the wants and needs of most any wing shooter. The process begins with a straight frame, typically born of a stripped-down pickup truck or SUV, and from there the vehicle is built to order from the ground up. Sizes differ, and they’re also happy to customize your existing vehicle into what you wish it had been all along. Prices vary according to model and customization options, but the largest buggies generally start around $60,000. www.birdbuggy.com November / December 2018 · 67

SHOOTING

From Euclid to Dostoevsky

hen one goes in search of enlightenment on the subject of shotgun patterns, it’s not surprising to encounter the names Brister, McIntosh, and Major Sir Gerald Burrard. Dostoevsky, Proust, and H. G. Wells, on the other hand, make an appearance less often. But shotgun write to fit. write to fit. write to fit. write to fit. write to fit. patterns write to fit. write to fit. write to fit. write to fit. write to fit.are about time as much as write to fit. write to fit. write to fit. write to fit. write to fit. anything, and time has been an endurwrite to fit. write to fit. write to fit. write to fit. ing subject of literature. 68 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

TERRY WIELAND

GSJ

Shotgun patterns in four dimensions. by Terry Wieland

Top clays shooter Ryan Mason applying his knowledge of nonEuclidean geometry in a most productive way. That clay was obviously centered in his pattern, where the pellets do the most good.

November / December 2018 Âˇ 69

In Dostoevsky’s Brothers Karamazov, Ivan tells his younger brother, Alyosha, “I have a Euclidean earthly mind, and how could I solve problems that are not of this world? And I advise you never to think about it either, my dear Alyosha, especially about God, whether He exists or not. All such questions are utterly inappropriate for a mind created with an idea of only three dimensions.” Substitute a word here and there, and the coldly logical Ivan could be talking about the performance of your favorite 12 gauge. The key lies in his reference to Euclid, who laid down the rules of threedimensional geometry. Shotgun patterns are fourdimensional—hence, non-Euclidean—and that fourth dimension is time.

arcel Proust dealt with the question of time in terms of memory, while H. G. Wells’s Time Machine dealt with time as a universe to be explored. There is so much material, in fact, there is hardly time to look at it all. Now, there’s an irony. All this introspection began with a comment in an article written long ago by Francis E. Sell, who was one of the most respected shotgun writers of the 1950s and an early exponent of the 20 gauge. In Gun Digest, he pushed the idea that a 3-inch 20, with 1¼ ounces of shot at 1,230 fps, could equal the 12 gauge and bring down geese out to 75 or 80 yards on regular basis. What’s more, he said, it could be done with a gun that weighed a mere 6½ pounds, and the recoil would be less than a comparable 12. The line that really caught my eye, however, was where Sell admitted the 3-inch 20’s longer shot column would result in a longer shot string but argued that this was actually an advantage. It allows the gun to shoot too far in front, he wrote, yet still catch the bird with the tail of the extended string. All of this flew in the face of my own experience. First of all, I have never downed a bird at anything approaching those distances, although I have seen it happen twice. One was a pheasant in Colorado, the other a red grouse in Derbyshire. In both cases, a “golden BB” did the trick. In other words, mostly luck. The question here, though, is shot stringing. Mankind, especially those of the genus Marketus, have a talent for turning vice into virtue. For ex70 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

ample, bullets that fly apart on impact, rather than holding together and penetrating. Snake oil salesmen for such bullets claim they behave “like shrapnel,” with shards flying off in all directions to hit heart, spine, and brain simultaneously. Hogwash. The same is true with shot-stringing. I am not saying it does not happen occasionally, but it’s not something you should depend on. Since serious folk first began studying, measuring (or attempting to), and visualizing shot patterns, the ideal has been a cloud of shot roughly the shape of a beach ball, sailing through the air. Such a shape allows for a certain amount of error front to back, top to bottom, but ensures there is sufficient density of shot to grass the bird regardless. I thought the first real work in this regard was published by Major Burrard in 1923, but Bob Brister (Shotgunning—The Art and the Science), traced it back to an Englishman, R. W. S. Griffith, in 1887. Griffith used a rotating drum in an attempt to chart shot stringing; a later Englishman tried a falling steel plate; Major Burrard shot at an armor-plated Model T Ford. This is where we come back to Euclid or, to be precise, non-Euclidean geometry. For the better part of two centuries, shotgunners have used a patterning board to determine where their shot is going, and to see whether choke is having the desired effect. A patterning board is merely a flat surface, approximately four feet square; the shooter stands back at 40 yards (the standard distance for determining choke), fires a shot, draws a 30-inch circle around the main body of shot, then counts the pellets, or looks for gaps, or whatever his purpose may be. (In some instances, after a series of baffling misses, it’s to reassure himself that his cartridges actually contain lead pellets instead of talcum powder. Just ask me.) Useful though they are, patterning boards can also be highly misleading. They are Euclidean—a two-dimensional flat surface—whereas a shotgun pattern is not only three-dimensional in shape, it’s also constantly changing. It is, therefore, fourdimensional, and that fourth dimension is time. The rotating drum, falling plate, and fleeing Model T were all attempts to include time lapses in the determination of a shot pattern—to measure the length of the shot cloud and see how much lead

was strung out behind, accomplishing nothing. Proponents of long shot strings, such as Francis E. Sell, remind me of shotgun instructors who try to teach you to do the exact opposite of what several generations of instructors, in many different countries, have taught for two centuries. “I have seen the light,” they say. “Those guys knew nothing!” Well, I doubt that.

Useful though they are, patterning boards can also be highly misleading. In the case of shotgun patterns, the beach-ball concept has been well established, it’s logical, and it baffles me that anyone could seriously argue against it. Bob Brister certainly didn’t, and he was not only a fine writer (he was longtime shooting editor of Field & Stream), but also one of the best shotgunners in the world, having won both the world trap and live-pigeon championships at various times. Brister himself did extensive pattern testing, using a 20-foot-long target board towed behind a car. He tested all different gauges and shot charges, at various velocities, going into it more deeply than any other researcher I know of. Brister pointed out that John Olin devoted years to the development of a load that would deliver optimum patterns. These were first marketed in the 1920s and called Winchester Super-X. You may have heard of them. It was this load that really put Winchester on top in the shotgun world. The idea that a long shot string will allow you to make hits you otherwise would not sounds good until you analyze it. Obviously, you have a finite number of pellets, so any that are in the tail are not in the main cloud, which reduces its effectiveness. And for what? So that if you lead too much, you will still hit the bird? The problem is, the number of misses in front are a fraction of those resulting from shooting behind. Champion trapshooter Rudy Etchen estimated that fewer than 10 percent of misses occurred in front. In fact, if someone is having consistent difficulty 72 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

with a particular type of target, trying to deliberately “miss in front” often solves the problem. Therefore, with a long tail, you are increasing your odds of hitting in a very rare circumstance, while reducing your chances in the majority of shots. G. T. (Gough Thomas) Garwood, the foremost English shotgun writer of his generation, went so far as to suggest that patterning a shotgun can actually be damaging if the shooter then loses confidence in his gun or misinterprets the results. We’ve all shot skeet with a group that includes a guy who will say knowingly after you miss, “You shot in front,” or “You were behind on that one.” The fact is, he has no more idea where you shot than he does about the origins of non-Euclidean geometry, and if you try to correct your next shot on the basis of his comments, you are in for a sad and frustrating time. At skeet, good earplugs are valuable in more ways than one. Unfortunately, a patterning board may tell you your pattern is too tight or too open when in fact— because the shot cloud is three-dimensional—the problem is not your choke; it’s the length of your shot column, which translates into a long and inefficient shot string. You look at the board and see two pellet holes an inch apart. Aha, you think, no bird could get through there. It’s possible, however, that the pellet on the right was the very first to hit the board, and the one on the left the very last. In which case, one would have passed in front of the target, and the other far behind, all the while giving the impression that nothing could get through that gap. Remember the puzzle about the piece of paper with two holes, eight inches apart? How do you move them closer together without tearing the paper? You fold the paper, and suddenly two holes become one hole. Yet it’s the same paper, the same two holes. That may be reductio ad absurdum, but it’s this concept of the shot pattern—a fluid ever-changing kaleidoscopic flock of pellets—around which we need to wrap our Euclidean earthly minds. n In some ways, pattern analysis is the equivalent of ballistic navel-gazing, which Wieland tries to avoid when a bird is coming. Keep your eye on the bird, swing through, pull the trigger. Simple.

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ANGLING

OTHER FISH The

New Zealand’s lesser-known y fishing opportunity. by

iles olte

SHIMMERING FLATS STUDY, BY C. D. CLARKE

74 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

he wide, dark figure—roughly the size and shape of a sunwarped Hula-Hoop—glided through knee-deep water, stirring sand. My cast was lazy, flirting with disinterest, bordering on ennui, having already hurled multiple empty offerings toward the creature. The fly settled four feet ahead of the shape’s plodding progress. A series of short, erratic strips mimicked life, something small and helpless panicking along the swell-sculpted bottom. The dark shape wasn’t supposed to eat the fly. It was a visible target, a stand-in for a fish that had bewitched me; a fish that, until a few weeks ago, didn’t exist in the scaly stew of my piscatorial brain; a fish that may or may not have been hovering around the dark shape. Kingfish are difficult to see; stingrays are not. Kingfish, however, often follow stingrays that patrol the shallow flats of Golden Bay and snatch up fleeing morsels dislodged by the bottom-feeding rays, so stingrays make good proxies for anglers stalking kingfish. When the dark shape accelerated and the line came tight, I wondered, for the first time in my life, what does one do when standing on a shrinking sandbar a quarter mile from shore, attached to a stingray by a fly line? “Just damn.” Apparently, one swears. The cartilaginous ray spun—stiff tail whipping, wings undulating, 8-weight folding—anthropomorphically angry. Attempting to land this creature struck me as foolish but tempting—assuming I could actually bring the thing in. I was a solid JV substitute in high school, but removing the barb without getting pierced by a bigger, more poisonous barb seemed like a dance beyond my athletic ability. Agitated rays wield their Godgiven maces with the grace and speed of steroidal hummingbirds. “Be smart—break the leader,” but I hesitated. The locals I’d befriended around a fire the night before had assured me that the stingrays don’t eat flies. “Nah, never,” Jake told me, elongating his vowels like any good Kiwi. I nodded intently, a Speight’s lager cooling my palm. “They’re too smart to eat flies.”

What a grand prank, then: me on a sandy saltwater flat, nearly nipple deep, tethered to an uncatchable incidental species when, over the past four days, I had failed to successfully hook the supposedly catchable target species. I had seen kingfish daily, blue-silver streaks with bright yellow tails, darting and slashing an impatient radius around the methodical rays; had watched them chase flies with predatory purpose, detonating the surface but somehow never finding the tiny hook point, that impossibly small space around which all angling orbits. The fly riding out to sea in a fleshy maw felt valuable, or perhaps invaluable. It was the only one of its kind in my possession. The previous morning, three kingfish attacked the gray and black baitfish imitation, while every other fly I’d tried was treated like a panhandler slumped behind a cardboard sign outside a midtown subway station. My saltwater fly boxes sat on a shelf nearly 8,000 miles away. This was supposed to be a trout trip. Never mind their invasive colonial history, trout hold the center of angling ethos in New Zealand. Fly fishers from around the world make pilgrimages to the South Island. They genuflect at the caudals of massive brown trout and await judgment. Should your leader, your fly, your cast, your drift be deemed worthy, you will be bestowed with that hallowed white flash when the fish accepts your offering. Should you be found wanting, the river will appear as Saint Patrick’s Cathedral to the nonbeliever— sublime in beauty and assembly, impressive in scale and sculpt, but lifeless. New Zealand is not known as a flats-fishing destination, and I did not come prepared for salty presentations. As I stood contemplating stupidity and ecstasy, states I don’t find at all mutually exclusive, the tide kept climbing, and my reel kept steadily turning out line. “Damn it.” My linguistic quiver had shrunk that morning. Though short on flies, I carried a fat sack of expletives. One might wonder at this point, What’s a kingfish, anyway, and how did you wind up tethered to a stingray in the international mecca of trout fishing? Golden Bay curls below Farewell Spit, a gnarled finger of sand and scrub jutting off the northwestern tip of the South Island. It’s isolated and remote. Visitors have long ventured here in the summer months November / December 2018 · 75

for an even quieter slice of the downtempo lifestyle for which New Zealand is renowned. The past few years, however, have seen an influx of a particular type of tourist—one who carries long, supple rods and reads water. My wife, Amy, and I had scheduled a few days in Golden Bay for hiking the spit or the Abel Tasman trail and lying on the beach under the partial shade of open books. On our first drive up the coast, I spotted loose knots of figures standing almost still hundreds of yards from shore. Their posture and pace gave them away. Normal people don’t walk fully clothed into the ocean and stand still. That’s when my plans for the week changed. In the United States, anglers who speak of kingfish are referring to king mackerel. I had no idea what a New Zealand kingfish was until I wandered the flats for several hours that first evening, watching the tide suck out toward Wellington, seeing lanky starfish exposed in slow-motion retreat. There, in front of me, a juvenile yellowtail amberjack cut just below the steady wind chop. I stripped out line, cast, and watched the fish continue toward the sunset.

trange water offers a chance to restore all the imaginative opportunity that was sucked out of us in middle school science class: observe variables, create hypotheses, test, revise, repeat. Instant feedback, biology, predator–prey relationships, and the web of ecosystem interconnectivity, my inner eighth-grader turns out to be far more motivated by the prospect of a bucking fly rod and salt-crusted shirt than deducing the average volume in a sack of marbles. Day one, I discovered what a kingfish looks like. Day two, I spotted a group of fish following a stingray. My prey variables were limited to a handful of saltwater baitfish imitations that found their way into my trout streamers, so I began proffering each of them upon the backs of cruising stingrays, pursuing any sign of progress. Late into the second evening, I got a kingfish to accelerate in the direction of a black and gray baitfish imitation. For the next four days, my life swam with stingrays and kingfish and half-formed hypotheses. Rise before dawn; wake Amy to share a few moments of the orange and magenta sky lighting up the bay behind our rented bungalow; carry my fly rod to the 76 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

fluid edge of earth; scan between the near horizon and sand in front of me; seek out hovering black shapes blurred by wind, water, and sand; cast all around them. Each morning felt fertile, success imminent. At midday, I would return, soaked to the neck, fishless but certain that I had learned something. Amy and I would eat lunch on a salt-weathered deck overlooking the bay glittering under the sun’s zenith. Evenings, I’d repeat my pilgrimage. On day three, I began getting strikes. Another angler I’d met on the

Each morning felt fertile, success imminent. beach told me the kingfish were primarily feeding on immature flounder that the stingrays flushed from the sand. A dull pair of pocketknife scissors let me trim the gray and black streamer to match the ovular silhouette of a small flounder. When the streamer was allowed to sit on the bottom in front of an approaching stingray and then stripped aggressively, the kingfish not only chased, but ate–or at least attempted to, sometimes. My fourth morning walled me in to the true scientist’s nemesis, a hard deadline. We had to be in the Owen River valley that night. This was the last opportunity, but I swaggered confident, knew how to find the fish, knew what they were eating, knew how to imitate those baby flounder. Perhaps my theory proved a bit too successful, because that uncatchable stingray now carried my one good fly off the edge of the flat into the merciless rising tide. Beside me, a kingfish tailed aggressively, reminding me of a tired guiding joke, “Why do fish jump? Because they don’t have middle fingers.” I fought the ray—knowing that I’d never land it, unsure that I even wanted to—just to feel the life of it, to remember that learning about the world necessarily involves being immersed in it. When the leader did finally break, I walked back to the bungalow and packed up my rods. Time to go trout fishing. n Miles Nolte still regularly thinks about the kingfish he never caught.

Spring Explosion 9”x12” pastel on Wallis paper, framed to 16”x20” in a custom frame

Spring Explosion was included in the 2011 Birds in Art exhibition at the Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum in Wausau, Wisconsin. For more information, visit www.lywam.org.

Jan McAllaster Stommes Please visit www.janstommesart.com for pricing and contact information.

Sharing the River 9”x12” oil on panel, in a custom frame

GSJ

ART

MALLARDS, COURTESY OF REMINGTON ARMS

78 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

Richard E. Bishop Etching and the of D S aerodynamics wildfowl ight.

by Brooke Chilvers

mericas love affair

with sporting prints dates back to 1852 and A. F. Tait’s Adirondack hunting and fishing scenes for Currier & Ives. Charles Scribner’s Sons followed in 1895 with the publication of A. B. Frost’s 12-plate Shooting Pictures. The increasing popularity of lithographs, etchings, and drypoints well into the 20th century resulted in a handful of lucky East Coast wildlife artists, including Richard E. Bishop (1887–1975), leading the very best of lives. Starting around 1936, Bishop was a regular shooting guest at hunting estates such as Pebble Hill Plantation in Thomasville, Georgia; Wingmead on the banks of La Grue Bayou in Roe, Arkansas; and the exclusive Santee Club, founded in 1898, “to acquire tracts of land in South Carolina . . . as a private preserve for the benefit of its members for the purpose of hunting, fishing, yachting, health, rest and recreation.” Tall and handsome, well married into an established Philadelphia family, and naturally endowed with intellectual curiosity and a Puritan work ethic, Bishop was the Frank Benson (1862–1951) or Roland Clark (1874–1957) of his generation, but he took his images to another level with his innova-

tive use of high-speed motion-picture photography as a study tool for his waterfowl art. By slowing down the images, he discovered that ducks and geese whiffle (basically fly upside down but keep their head upright as they decrease altitude), and ever so subtly adjust their feet and tails to balance, brake, steer, and act as a rudder as they navigate down to the water—sometimes all in a single picture, as in the engraving Along the Mississippi or the oil painting Gadwalls. A photo of Bishop and his wife, Helen (née Mary Ellen Harrington), shows solid folks—hers, the sparkly charm of a lover of flowers who cataloged her pickings during a bear hunt in southeastern Alaska; his, the distinguished salt-and-pepper confidence of a midcentury “fin, fur, and feathers” country gentleman; for in 1940, they settled on land in Mount Airy, Pennsylvania, cleared by Helen’s great-grandfather. Bishop had attained longed-for commercial success in 1936 with J.B. Lippincott Company (Philadelphia) and George G. Harrap (London), simultaneously publishing a limited edition of Bishop’s Birds, Etchings of Waterfowl and Upland Game Birds, with 73 aquatone plates accompanied by his clear explanatory texts. November / December 2018 · 79

FEDERAL DUCK STAMP DESIGN,. COURTESY OF RUSSELL FINK GALLERY, LORTON, VA

He immediately embarked on designing collectible porcelain plates of game birds and hunting dogs, first for Lenox and later for Wedgwood, as well as drinking vessels, launching a tradition for Bishop table arts that continues today at www.richardebishop.com. Bishop never ignored a business deal, and from 1945 until he was 81 years old, every year he painted six surprisingly bright, colored-forreproduction oils for Brown & Bigelow, for reprinting as popular calendars for some 250 companies. But Syracuse-born Bishop arrived at sporting art through an entirely different door than most other artists. The son of a railroad engineer for New York Central fascinated with locomotion, he accompanied his father to hunting blinds in gunning marshes early on. While studying for his master’s degree in mechanical engineering at Cornell University, including courses in technical drawing, Bishop played varsity football and was assistant editor of the campus humor magazine, The Widow. In those do-it-all-days, the observant lad would have developed his sense of layout and design. Upon graduation, Bishop worked as an electrical engineer in Milwaukee for a company that manu80 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

factured power-control-equipment for the Panama Canal. In 1917, he enlisted for the first time, serving as captain in the U.S. Army Chemical Warfare Service; and during World War II, as deputy director of the War Production Board. Discharged in 1919, Bishop joined his father-in-law’s rolling mill plant, E. Harrington, Son & Co. of Philadelphia, which manufactured hoisting machinery that, fortuitously, required melting down copper. He remained until 1933 when he turned full-time to art. Bishop’s trajectory really began at the mill in 1920, when he picked up the used copper plate for an old wedding invitation and recycled it into an etching of a man, using an old phonograph needle as a stylus. The engineer soon decided to master the art of printing. His my-way-or-no-way character required complete control over the process, so he simply built his own roller printing press. Learning mostly by trial and error, the untrained artist recognized his need for instruction beyond his inspiration by Benson and Clark, and joined the free art classes at Philadelphia’s Graphic Sketch Club. He sought out Ernest D. Roth (1879–1964), the eminent German-born colorist painter and printmaker,

WASHO WIDGEON, COURTESY OF RUSSELL FINK GALLERY, LORTON, VA

mostly of European architecture. When ready to conquer oil painting, the striving-to-be-best Bishop turned to two members of New York’s National Academy of Design: impressionist painter John F. Folinsbee (1892–1972), and plein air artist of snowy landscapes Aldro Hibbard (1886–1972). While I was visiting the gallery of Bishop-scholar Russell Fink, in Lorton, Virginia, he pulled out the artist’s oil sketches for portraits, nudes, and street scenes, demonstrating Bishop’s style of elegantly expressing the essentials without overworking the details. Already in 1924, Bishop won the Philadelphia Print Club’s Charles M. Lea Prize for his etching of flying geese, which he registered with the title #1. By 1933, he’d produced 50 more for publication, generally in unnumbered editions of 65. Interestingly, Bishop pulled and signed his etchings and drypoints only when they sold or were placed in a gallery such as Crossroads of Sport. Then, in 1934, outdoor writer Nash Buckingham (1880–1971) wrote, “We are drifting faster than we ever dreamed toward a sterility in wild life of the marsh and upland, from which there will be no returning.” That year, President Franklin D. Roosevelt

established the Migratory Bird Hunting Stamp Act, putting the Pulitzer Prize–winning political cartoonist Jay “Ding” Darling in charge of assigning different artists every year to design the nation’s “Duck Stamp.” (In 1949, it became a contest open to all.) Richard E. Bishop was the third Federal Duck Stamp artist, submitting four designs of three Canada geese sporting leg bands to demonstrate the importance of tracking migratory wildfowl. Bishop stipulated to Darling that no lettering was to encroach upon the image; and, unlike every other duck stamp, none did. While 603,623 images of the 1936– 37 one-dollar stamp were being printed, Bishop invented the soon hugely popular collectible of a framed limited-edition Duck Stamp print mounted above the stamp itself. Abercrombie & Fitch ran with the concept, and eventually Darling, Bishop, J. D. Knap, Roland Clark, and Lynn Bogue Hunt provided their duck stamp designs, although Benson held out for six years. Conservation also concerned Edgar M. Queeny (1897–1968) who, like Bishop, had studied at Cornell but quit to join the navy in World War I. M was Continued on page 96 November / December 2018 · 81

GSJ

EATING

Beating the Chill A British seafood menu. by Martin Mallet

t a time when most people have traded their rods for guns, the frigid depths of winter can still provide lots of action for the dedicated angler. Where there are fish, there can be fishing. Every region has something to offer when the days are short and the winds are cold: whether it’s steelhead in Oregon, alpine trout fishing in Colorado, or redfish in the Gulf or Mexico. And let’s not forget ice fishing, which is my favorite way to fish freshwater lakes. Lake fish have nowhere to go, which I find extremely reassuring. In addition, fish don’t hibernate (Antarctic cod and African lungfish notwithstanding), and even though their metabolism slows down considerably in winter, they remain active. So connecting with your scaly quarry under the ice comes down to the perennial challenge of finding where they are hiding and what they are eating. In theory, all the same species you would catch in the dead heat of summer can also be targeted in the winter, from perch to walleyes and crappies, whitefish, bass, and even trout. As an added bonus, most people agree that fish pulled through the ice taste better than warm-weather catches. It’s probably a combination of diet change, improved water quality, and instant preservation. Eating fish and seafood in the winter can also be a nice change of pace. When we think of coldweather comfort food, chances are hearty, heavy meat dishes come to mind rather than freshly caught fish. Seafood is often synonymous with bright, Mediterranean flavors and the grill rather than the oven, but this is just a cultural quirk. Fish dishes can 82 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

be equally rich and comforting, as many Britons will attest. With their cold, damp, miserable winters and plentiful seafood, it’s no surprise the British Isles have produced an abundance of warm, comforting winter fish dishes.

HOT TODDY Coming home from a winter fishing trip, odds are, a hot beverage of some sort will be more than welcome. The hot toddy has been a winter pick-me-up since the early 1700s, and was also popular as a cold remedy. With such an old history, there is a huge range of regional variations, from rum and brandy in the United States to the use of spices such as cloves, cinnamon, and anise. This particular version uses lemon, honey, and a tea base instead of water. Pretty well any whiskey will do, and a blended scotch wouldn’t be out of place, either. for each drink 1 cup hot water 1 tea bag 1 tablespoon honey 2 teaspoons lemon juice 1 to 2 ounces whiskey, depending on taste and need 1 slice fresh lemon Boil the water in a small saucepan. Remove from the heat and add the tea bag. Let it steep for 1 minute; then remove and discard the tea bag. Add the honey, lemon juice, and whiskey, stirring to dissolve

the honey. Pour the drink into a cup, add a lemon slice to garnish, and serve hot.

and a splash of olive oil. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

MUSSELS, CUCUMBER, AND DILL

FISH PIE

Mussels are an underrated bivalve. Unlike oysters, which evoke a powerful sense of place, or diver scallops, which are as equally versatile as they are impressive, mussels are all too often used as a throwaway menu item, smothered in garlic and cream. Mussels are cheap, plentiful, and very easy to prepare at home. Usually, we cook mussels simply in their own sauce, a delicious way to start a meal. In this recipe, we take the extra step of removing the mussels from their shells and use them as an ingredient in a cucumber and dill salad. This recipe comes from Fergus Henderson’s The Whole Beast. Serves 4 2 tablespoons olive oil, plus a splash to finish 2 onions, peeled and finely chopped 2 stalks of celery, finely chopped salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste half a bunch of thyme 4 pounds mussels 1 cup dry white wine 1 cucumber 1 medium red onion, peeled and sliced very thinly a bunch of dill (leaves only), coarsely chopped 2 tablespoons capers juice from 1 lemon In a large pan, put 2 tablespoons of the olive oil over medium heat; then add the onions and celery. Cook for 5 to 6 minutes, until softened but not browned. Season with salt and pepper; then add the thyme, mussels, and wine. Give the mixture a stir; then put a lid on the pan and let cook just until the mussels open, 2 to 3 minutes. Remove from the heat and let sit until just cool enough to handle. Scrape the mussels from their shells; then strain and reserve the liquor. Cut the cucumber into 2½inch lengths, split each length in half, and then again into three wedges. In a large bowl, mix the cucumber with the red onion, dill, mussels, and capers. Dress with the reserved liquor, along with the lemon juice 84 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

Fish pie is a rich and satisfying preparation, sort of a variant on shepherd’s pie. A mashed potato topping overlays a mixture of seafood in a creamy sauce. The filling is very flexible, and often includes a mixture of a red- and white-fleshed fish, as well as shellfish. Freshwater or saltwater fish can be used, or even mixed. This recipe is adapted from Marco Pierre White’s Great British Feast. You can make it either in individual pies or in one large dish. Serves 4 1 tablespoon butter 1 small leek, white and pale green parts only, chopped 1½ cups fish velouté (see recipe below) 1 pound assorted fish (salmon, cod, bass, etc.), cut into 1-inch pieces ½ pound shrimp, lobster, and/or crab meat salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste 4 cups mashed potatoes 4 ounces grated gruyère or swiss cheese Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. In a large pan, melt the butter over medium heat and add the leek. Cook until the leek has softened, 5 to 6 minutes; then add the fish velouté and bring to barely a simmer. Add the fish pieces, and poach gently until the fish has just cooked through. Add the shellfish and stir to combine. Taste for seasoning and adjust with salt and pepper. Transfer the seafood mixture to a buttered 13-by-9-inch baking dish and top with the mashed potatoes. (You can pipe them on for a more decorative effect.) Sprinkle with the cheese, and bake until the top has started to brown, 10 to 15 minutes.

FISH VELOUTÉ 1 teaspoon unsalted butter 1 shallot, diced small 1 /3 cup white wine 1 /3 cup dry sherry or vermouth

DAY’S CATCH, BY JAN STROMMES

/3 cup fish stock /3 cup heavy cream

2 2

In a medium saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat and add the shallot. Reduce the heat and cook until the shallot is soft but has not browned, 5 to 6 minutes. Add the white wine and sherry, raise the heat to medium-high, and reduce until the pan is almost dry. Add the fish stock, bring to a boil, and reduce by half. Add the cream, reduce the heat, and simmer until thickened, 5 to 6 minutes. Pass through a fine-meshed strainer and reserve.

LEMON SURPRISE PUDDING What’s more British than pudding? This particular pudding is easy to make. As it cooks, it separates, creating a sauce underneath. This is known as a self-saucing pudding, of which endless variations are possible. As one example, arguably the precursor to the now cliché chocolate lava cake is the selfsaucing chocolate pudding. 2 ounces butter, room temperature 6 ounces granulated sugar zest from 1 lemon 86 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

/3 cup lemon juice 3 eggs, separated 2 ounces flour 1 cup milk 1 teaspoon vanilla extract icing sugar, for dusting heavy cream, to serve

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. In a food processor, combine the butter, sugar, and lemon zest, and process until pale and creamy. With the motor running, add the lemon juice, egg yolks, flour, milk, and vanilla, and process until you have a smooth batter. Set a full teakettle or medium saucepan of water on high heat, removing from the heat when it reaches a boil. In a medium bowl, beat the egg whites until they are firm but not stiff, and then fold them into the batter. Pour the mixture into a buttered baking dish, and set into a 9-inch round cake pan. Pour the hot water into the outer pan until it comes halfway up the sides of the baking dish, and bake for 45 minutes, until the top is lightly brown. n Martin Mallet is happy to get his hands on fresh fish, no matter the season.

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The Sporting Emporium

Distinctive Collectibles, Gifts and Sporting Art for the

Sophisticated Sportsmen Gray’s Sporting Journal proudly presents its gallery of distinctive collectibles, holiday gifts and sporting art ideally suited for your home, sporting adventures, sporting lodge or office. Contact these artists and purveyors of fine products for more information on how you can add their works to your collection.

88 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

The Sporting Emporium

November / December 2018 Âˇ 89

Apprentice Continued from page 16 graced each decoy. He used a Chinese writing brush with a bamboo handle, its tip needle-point sharp with a wider body near the handle that could hold enough paint that didn’t require constant reloading. That same week I became the owner of one of these unusual brushes and began using it immediately to reclaim my decoys. He named his company Nicky Decoy Co. The bottom of his decoys were stenciled in a black oval surrounding the words nicky decoys. The name Nicky was vertical with Decoy on the horizontal. The two crossed at the letter c. He named the company after his son, Nicky Peters. Several years later, I started high school at Armijo Union High School, and Nicky arrived a few years behind me. I remember him as a light-haired kid who didn’t say much and never mentioned that his father was the famous maker of custom decoys. Had Bud been my dad, I surely would have let everyone within earshot know, and with great pride.

Morning Flight A new acrylic, framed 26 x 39, image size 21 x 35 Visit chetreneson.com to view new paintings Prices and information on lithographs and commissioned watercolors on request. renesonpen@att.net • 860.434.2806 Chet Reneson 42 Tantumorantum Road, Lyme, CT 06371

ne day, I biked to the shop, as usual, only to find the big wooden bin gone and the shop locked up tight and dark. Peering through the dusty window, I saw the interior abandoned. I wondered why Bud had left so suddenly. I would learn only much later that the magic man who created wonderful, handmade decoys has passed away to a world where all flocks swing in without hesitation and parachute into easy shotgun range. I couldn’t comprehend why. All that talent and artistry lost so unexpectedly, so completely. The finality of death is not easily understood by an 11-year-old. I had to resign myself to the fact that Bud left his stunning decoys behind as his legacy to future generations of duck hunters who love the thrill of birds with bowed wings rushing toward your face and decoys so perfect, the wild birds could not resist joining them. Though I lacked his talent, his influence rubbed off on me, for when I entered my teenage years, I took jobs repainting decoys of my

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own design for several clubs out in the Great Marsh, to earn side money.

ow many decoys did Bud make during his years? It’s a question that’s hard to answer. His brother says Bud made about 1,500 decoys. Somehow I think that number might be on the short side. Here’s why: The pair of pictures accompanying this story of his legendary bull sprig were taken in 1940. To me that means he’d already settled on his famous

body style and feather detail he’d use on all his decoys from that point forward. It’s not too hard to assume Bud was making decoys before 1940, possibly as early as 1938 or ’39. If that is true, he would have at least an eight- or nine-year run. If he produced only 300 handmade decoys a year—and, remember, he could work at it 12 months a year—he could easily have eclipsed that 1,500 number by as many as another 200 decoys, or maybe more. We’ll never know for sure, but this certainly seems possible.

Consider this, too: Bud didn’t sell his decoys just to private duck clubs statewide and outside into Nevada. He also sold them to individual hunters who purchased two or three dozen for their own hunting. There is no telling how many sales he made. It could certainly run into a considerable number. During those years, commercially produced wooden decoys were turned on a lathe, rough, and poorly painted. They couldn’t come within a mile of the product Bud turned out. Even today, nearly seven decades later, the level of detail Bud imparted to his creations is just now beginning to see itself repeated in our plastic decoys. Note also that today just one matched pair of Peters decoys, either pintail or mallard, is valued at several hundred dollars, but they’re so good, you might still be tempted to hunt over them. Today, all these years later, I still lay out my large decoy set and carefully repaint new life into them using the same Chinese writing brush Bud showed me. It’s habit that’s in the blood. Bud left too early, and I’m getting pretty old myself, but I’d give just about anything to ride my old bike down that alley off Texas Street to Bud’s old decoy shop under the tin roof and to peer transfixed into his magical world and the fantastic handmade decoys he produced. I’m one of the few people who can say I knew a decoy master and I actually watched him at work. I’ll always remember watching him work and the man himself who loved the delicate curve of a decoy body and the exquisite, fine-line feather detail he laid on them that no one could match. n Art Isberg has been a freelance outdoor writer for more than four decades. His stories have appeared in all major sporting journals. He lives in Northern California’s mountain country and actively pursues his lifelong love of rod, reel, shotgun, and rifle.

92 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

Traditions Continued from page 64 flies but knows it. He’s captain of ’em all, an’ it’s only the pick of the geese that flies with him. He takes ’em further north than any other gander dares go, he stays later than most of ’em, an’ when he does start out for the south he goes thousands of miles at a clip. “Ner that ain’t all, neither. What do you s’pose became of that big king gander Bill shot? Ever hear of a dead gander bein’ carried off by his flock, restin’ on their backs and them a-honkin’ out a reg’lar buryin’ dirge? Well, I’ve said enough. Fact is, I’ve said all I dare say. “But I’ll tell you this; if ever you have a chanst to shoot a king gander, don’t you do it. ’Taint good luck. If you don’t believe it, look at my brother Bill. He killed one; leastways, he shot him. And then what happened? Only the Lord and Bill Huckins knows. An’ Bill’ll never tell. Why not? ’Cause he’s been as crazy as a coot ever since; yes, sir, crazy as a coot!” n

hese days, Canada geese seem to be everywhere. Recently one showed up at a baseball game in Detroit’s Comerica Stadium. A sort of Wrong-Way Corrigan, the goose landed in right-center field, maybe mistaking the outfield grass for a fairway. The action occurred during a rain delay, so members of the grounds crew gave chase lest the base paths slicken further, and they finally managed to flush the furiously waddling bird. But the goose couldn’t quite achieve the requisite lift. It smacked into a façade on the upper deck and dropped like a sack of decoy anchors into the lower seats. A veterinarian happened to be at the game and, identifying herself to the stadium crew, went to the goose’s aid. She soothed and stroked the dazed bird and basically got the entire class back on the bus. As it turned out, the goose was shaken up but didn’t end up on IR. The vet took the goose home, fed it some spinach, and then dropped it off at an animal shelter for some hangar time. From there, the goose re-

joined the flock. Meanwhile, the Tigers won a comeback victory, which of course was attributed to the “rally goose.” The fans, with their inherent good sense, began showing up at games with goose decoys on their heads. But the Tigers’ winning didn’t last. As we all know, it helps to have luck, but you need good pitching. Geese such as that one actually descended from old Joe and other live decoys of the early 20th century. When live decoys were outlawed in 1935, most hunters released them—and those birds had come to enjoy being fed by hand or at the least weren’t in the migrating state of mind. Their numbers grew, and they came to constitute a second population apart from the migrating North American geese, the subjects of King Gander. For a half century, the migrants outnumbered the residents, but in recent years, the residents have exploded in numbers, thanks in part to the chill suburban environs. The continental nesting population now stands at about five million birds. Keronk! All of this lay in an unfathomable future in 1906 when Canada geese appeared quite possibly to be headed for oblivion, and when

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author Sewell Ford spun this story. And he could spin them. Ford was born in South Levant, Maine, on March 7, 1868, and spent his boyhood in Michigan and later in Massachusetts. He showed affinity for writing, and worked for various newspapers in Boston, Baltimore, and New York, as well as the American Press Association. He also wrote fiction and is best known for two book series, Torchy and Shorty McCabe. As a Nation reviewer noted, â&#x20AC;&#x153;The stories hold their interest not so much due to plot or variations, but diction.â&#x20AC;? Like many writers of the day, Ford relied on vernacular to give the readers the inside scoop on how â&#x20AC;&#x153;othersâ&#x20AC;? lived, be they office boys, ex-fighters (as in the above books, respectively), or oyster boat captains in front of woodstoves. Thanks probably to his reporter days, Ford had a great ear for how people spoke. Be it the stories of the capâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;n or the jawing back and forth when the boys are in their boxes and waiting, the liquid voices of the coast carry the narrative. Ford had retired to Toms River, New Jerseyâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;not far from Barnegat Bay and had an intimate sense of the local scene. The telling of the tale feels

real, even if the most significant secondary character is a goose in a cage. The capâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;n recognizes old Joe like theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d been out late slamming brandy. He knows the waterfowl status of the bay. Reality lies not in the new empiricism of scientific inquiry but in the lilt of the yarn-spinning tradition. Heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s navigating out to High Bar like heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s the ferry, which for all intents and purposes, he is. Somebody has to get the sports to their sport. You can almost taste the salt. At any rate, itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s warm in the cabin and cold out there and before long Capâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;nâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s telling about the King of geese and goose funerals. Oddly enough, such stories about animalsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; interiorities were not at all unusual for the day. A number of authors, including Ernest Thompson Seton, William Long, and even Jack London in Call of the Wild, for instance, began writing stories and books about what animals might be able to do. Some told of wolves saving children, foxes intentionally leading hounds across railroad tracks, crows trying other crows in crow court, and woodcock splinting their broken wings. Such tales ran up against the new religion of scienceâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;to say nothing of

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94 Âˇ Grayâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Sporting Journal Âˇ www.grayssportingjournal.com

common senseâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;and men such as John Burroughs and President Theodore Roosevelt called them absurd, and that only further fired the controversy, which became known as the nature fakers debate. The new interest in the complexity of animalsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; emotion and sentiment was at least in part a response to their plummeting populations. After a century of thinking about them as nothing more than an early stage of dinner, people now exalted them. The sentimentalists were also, on some level, pushing back against the new smugness of â&#x20AC;&#x153;spectacled scientists,â&#x20AC;? as Ford puts it. But, if nothing else, both sides agreed on the importance of wildlifeâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;and that was an absolutely key step forward in the decades running up to federal legislation to limit excessive hunting. In fact, some of the sentimentalists were hunters. The issue fell along a different axis, one that indexed the emotional and cognitive lives of animals. And if anything, hunters adopted some of the animal savviness proposed by the nature fakers to make their quarry seem more elusive and themselves more skillful as a result. For example, the idea that black ducks could smell huntersâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s why they were so hard to decoyâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;lingered into the mid-20th century. Moreover, TR would have spirited debates with Long and others, and then read his kids their tales before they went to sleep. It was a different time. With the plummeting numbers of waterfowl and game birds in general, Fordâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s story used metaphor to make a sportsmanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s case. King Ganderâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s death tells a Christian tale, a goose that sacrificed himself to take out two hunters and shield his flockâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;and presumably the flocks in the future. Middleclass Americans were God-fearing if nothing else in 1906, and they definitely got it. (The idea of redemption in spite of excess was a familiar trope; see, for instance, â&#x20AC;&#x153;The Death of the Red-Winged Mallard,â&#x20AC;? in Outing, January 1900.) The death of geese weighs on the capâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;nâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s conscience; he even refers to old Joe as Judasâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;an unremorseful one at that: â&#x20AC;&#x153;Joe he pulls in his neck anâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; squats flat, squintinâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; over one shoulder to see if ye drop ary one. Knowinâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;!â&#x20AC;? Writers and hunters in 1906 had no idea there would be a Migratory Bird Act of 1918 that would end market hunting and regulate sport hunting. For all they

knew, the population slide would continue. So they loved the idea of a redemptive goose, as reflected by the story’s initial appearance in Outing, the premier hunting and fishing publication of its day. Most forwardthinking hunters only hoped that restraint would make a difference—and that their grand sport would survive. Will Ryan teaches expository writing at Hampshire College. He spent many happy mornings in the fields of Addison County, Vermont, scanning the skies for geese coming off Lake Champlain. He has never worn a helmet, but is willing to try. His most recent book is Gray’s Sporting Journal’s Noble Birds and Wily Trout: Creating America’s Hunting and Fishing Traditions, published by Lyons Press. ”Country”

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Continued from page 81 for Monsanto, as in Monsanto Chemical Company, established by his father and named after his Spanish-Portuguese mother; Edgar was president and chairman from 1928 until his retirement in 1960. A founder of Ducks Unlimited, Queeny established his 14,000-acre private hunting estate and wildfowl preserve, Wingmead, in 1939. Its rice fields, flooded pin oak flats, and 4,000-acre lake harbored Mississippi Flyway waterfowl that he and Bishop shot more often with a specially built high-speed 16 mm Bell & Howell motion-picture camera than with a 12-gauge. “Shooting” birds at a shutter speed of 128 frames per second, Bishop scrutinized them at oneeighth their actual velocity. And then he drew them. Queeny took some 60,000 stopaction pictures of wildfowl, using longdistance lenses at a shutter speed of 1/2000 second, capturing what the human eye cannot. In 1946, he published the transformative work, Prairie Wings, using 276 of his photos accompanied by 140 of Bishop’s precise drawings of Anatidae anatomy and aerodynamics. Bishop declined Queeny’s offer to be credited coauthor, as he would with future projects. Prairie Wings did for waterfowl what Muybridge did for mammals in Animals in Motion (1899). Now Bishop could depict with certainty pintails in Fall Ducks using their primary and secondary feathers to reduce their speed and maintain balance, dropping their feet like landing gear. In They’re Off!, they fly vertically out of the water, raising themselves almost a body length above the surface with their first powerful downstroke, their primaries bending under the pressure. Bishop’s feeling for composition made him an artist rather than an illustrator. In his 1948 Bishop’s Wildlfowl, with 33 etchings, drypoints, and aquatints, plus a dozen full-color images of his oil paintings, he gracefully traces his subjects’ watery landscapes of cypresses and willows, flooded timberlands, Dixie pinelands, and the roseau cane of bayous. And with the sight shot of the hunter, he

conveys the shifting light and shadow patterns of snow geese, whistling swans, and herring gulls passing overhead. In the field with a borrowed retriever at his heels and maybe Queeny’s Purdey, back in the days when greater and lesser yellowlegs, plover, willet, and curlew made a day’s game bag, the topranking field shot also carried his camera and art box. Yet when the very best of like-minded friends, Queeny and Dick with their wives, Ethel and Helen, sailed 1,500 miles from Ketchikan to Juneau on an 85-foot sailboat for a six-week bear hunt in 1940, immortalized in Queeny’s Cheechako: The Story of an Alaskan Bear Hunt—other than a discreet reference to Bishop’s bagging his bears on Admiralty Island and Tracy Arm Fjord, a single photo of the four pals, and a few oil sketches of Berg Bay—when it comes to big game, Richard E. Bishop is not heard from. Ditto for Queeny and Dick’s 1950 and 1953 East African safaris, sponsored by the American Museum of Natural History, of which Queeny was a trustee.

Although the two avid sportsmen were accompanied by the era’s finest professional hunters—Donald Ker (cofounder of Ker & Downey, which still exists today), the young Tony Dyer (president for 14 years of the East African Professional Hunters Association), and Myles Turner (Serengeti’s deputy chief game warden from 1956 to 1972)—trophy hunting is not evident. Perhaps even more fascinating than the wildlife they beheld were the tribal peoples they filmed: the Masai and Latuka (Lotuko) of Kenya and Tanzania, and the Dinka and Wakamba of today’s South Sudan. In his 30-page article, “Spearing Lions with Africa’s Masai,” in the October 1954 issue of National Geographic, Queeny mentions Bishop’s participation in the safaris only as “an artist friend.” Even the dozen or so of Bishop’s African landscapes in Fink’s gallery are surprisingly devoid of creatures. Other than an album of safari photos that Fink says changed hands years ago, no sketchbooks of Masailand’s elegant lesser kudu, its unusual gerenuk, or herds of

Thomson’s gazelle have surfaced. Alas, Bishop did not follow in Wilhelm Kuhnert’s footsteps. Bishop’s passion was clearly waterfowl. The engineer’s knowledge of their anatomy and flight, combined with the spirit of the wing shooter and the eyes of an artist, resulted in his distinctive style. Although many wildlife artists after him terribly abused photography, Bishop never mistook it for his art. n Brooke Chilvers thanks Russell Fink for the generous gift of time spent in his “cabinet of wonders,” and his limited-edition book, Richard E. Bishop: Etchings, Drypoints, and Aquatints (2008).

November / December 2018 · 97

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Continued from page 28 Later, I discovered a philosophical gent named Montaigne, who had something lively to say about everything; I read of a Spartan king who, after agreeing to a seven-day truce with his foe, fell upon him after nightfall and vanquished his army. The Spartan afterwards declared that the truce stipulated seven days but made no mention of nights. Montaigne’s conclusion—that “the hour of parley is a dangerous time”—would have benefited me had I read him earlier. As the years flew by and my duckhunting experiences broadened, I found the wily Frenchman to be a reliable companion, guide, and sometime source of solace, and determined that even if he himself hadn’t been a duck hunter, he was no stranger to their ways.

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uch as an ancient fish waddled out of a primeval ocean and found new ways of doing things on land, I knew that if I was to evolve as a duck hunter, I needed to explore new environments, and life responded by throwing me into the path—almost under the wheels—of another kind of duck hunter. Vic was mildly eccentric, accident prone, full of tics and twitches, and absentminded. We once spent an hour of valuable hunting time looking for his glasses, not once considering the pair he had pushed back on his head was the “lost” pair he was looking for. Vic thought deer hunting coarse, squirrel hunting trivial, and fishing mainly for kids. For him, wing shooting was the pinnacle of sport, and ducks were preeminent. Although he was a true southern gentleman in some respects, I would discover that Vic’s style of duck hunting, put gently, lacked finesse. Soon I was swept up in a modified version of sneaking and bush-whacking, the only duck-hunting experience I’d had to that point. Vic hunted out of a comfortable if not swanky river camp, had a boat with a motor that ran some of the time, a neurotic Lab named Duke, and a sawed-off L. C. Smith 20-gauge that wore the patina of long abuse. He liked to run the river wide open with a

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98 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

point man in the bow to warn him of floating debris while he looked for places where rising or falling water levels had concentrated a few ducks. When we spotted ducks, he would shoo ’em out with the boat, and hide in nearby brush, hoping they would return. Vic claimed he could tell from the way the ducks took off whether they would come back. A dispassionate observer could see that he was wrong about as many times as he was right, but Vic remembered only his successes, which goes along with Montaigne’s belief that prognosticators didn’t keep records of their miscalculations, while they rank their hits as remarkable. Of my many hunts with Vic, all were memorable, some frightening, but one bolstered my status in his impressionable eyes and nudged me toward another evolutionary leap. A bluebird day, not good for ducks, but Vic had great confidence in one spot, and we were standing in knee-deep water before our lunch settled. After an hour of looking into empty skies, he began tossing sticks for Duke to retrieve, his patience worn thin. I was watching their antics from a distance and glanced up for the hundredth time into a sky I expected to be empty. Except this time it wasn’t. A pair of mallards, winging over at treetop level, was almost on me. I was still shooting the Parker 16, and I’ll let Vic take it from here: “Ol’ Duke was bringing mah stick when ah hu-ed two shots—Bam! Bam!—and when ah looked up, two mallards were spinning tail-over-teakettle out of the sky. They hit the water ten feet apart, and Duke was on ’em just as quick. Purtiest double ah evah saw!” I was never sure why this so impressed Vic, as he was a good wing shot and had certainly made his share of doubles. Maybe it was as much vindication of his belief that this indeed was the spot and pride in his dog’s quick response as my lucky shots. We sloshed back to the boat, mallards in tow, with the Lab eyeing the ducks a little too keenly. (Duke had been known to eat a duck.) Vic fired up the outboard and went from zero to all-out as soon as it caught. The next few seconds were a study in chaos.

Duke lunged for the ducks, Vic pounced on Duke, and we nearly capsized when the unhelmed boat rammed a giant cypress at full throttle. Major evolutionary changes often follow catastrophic events that result in mass extinctions, and having survived my own near extinction, I knew it was time to move on.

ast-forward a few seasons. I traded the Parker 16 for a 3-inch Charles Rosson 12-bore fitted with Briley choke tubes to handle the now-mandatory steel shot. As a deal clincher, the words wildfowl magnum were engraved on the big gun’s fences. As if on cue, one of my professorsturned-friend, Douglas, introduced me to a new kind of duck hunting. A serious-minded man in a way that wasn’t in the least dull, Douglas had come to his way of hunting ducks naturally. His parents, Walter B. and Hazel, had taken out second mortgages to preserve an important Native American site near Moundville, Alabama, until Walter B. could

persuade the state legislature to establish it as a state park. An avid duck hunter and conservationist, Walter B. bought a tract of land on the Tennessee River, bulldozed a couple of ponds into it, and erected an austere concrete block cabin in a nearby stand of dogwoods. Decades later, after he had passed, Miz Hazel became the matriarch of Dogwood Lodge. She kept her cot in the kitchen near the wood-burning stove, hunted well into her 90s, and was featured in Ducks Unlimited magazine. By then, Douglas had risen to prominence as a scholar and university administrator and had established himself as a champion of worthwhile conservation causes. My years at Dogwood Lodge were a revelation. Douglas was the first hunter I knew who lived the higher philosophy of hunting I had read about but had rarely seen practiced. His respect for the ducks he pursued was innate, as unaffected as his next breath. You could see it in the way he watched passing ducks critiquing his setup—as if he were trying to see the world through their eyes—and

at fireside when he spoke of long-ago mornings at Dogwood, when ducks crowded the ponds in numbers not seen since. It was most apparent, though, in the way he touched and handled ducks brought to bag, gently smoothing their feathers as he held them. No shortcuts were taken at Dogwood. Any talk of breasting out the day’s bag was met with an uncomprehending stare. Ducks were rough-picked by hand, then immersed in melted paraffin and peeled. Our reddened fingers were homage paid for the ducks we worked so hard to attract, call, and shoot. I warmed to Douglas’s ways, and we got on well from the start. One bitterly cold morning when the ducks were ignoring our best efforts to entice them, the discouraged and frigid hunters began trickling back to camp not long after sunrise. I was warmly dressed and enjoying being out under the high Vs streaming overhead from the nearby refuge so decided to stay a little longer. One by one, the ducks began noticing the Dogwood ponds, and after a while

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November / December 2018 · 99

I slogged back to camp with a limit of gadwalls. In Doug’s world, perseverance was an admired quality, and seeing it rewarded brought a smile. I knew Doug to be a great reader and would have bet he had an intimacy with Montaigne, who, quoting the emperor Julian, remarked that “a philosopher and a man [I confidently insert duck hunter here] to be admired, should never take his ease.” On another day, perhaps my most memorable at Dogwood, I looked

up to see a big duck barreling through the treetops and sent a load of steel 3s from the Wildfowl Magnum in its direction. The duck faltered, then disappeared into the timber. No one ever wants to lose a duck, but Dogwood protocol required the shooter to stop shooting until every possibility of recovering the crippled bird was exhausted, so I waded into the timber though I had little hope of success. Coming to the water’s edge, I almost turned back, then decided to go

a little farther. The duck lay a few yards ahead in a bed of sycamore leaves, its neck curled back toward a wing, a single drop of blood at the tip of its bill. It was colored like a hen mallard though larger and darker, and the speculum was almost violet. Could it be a black duck? I had never seen one but knew Douglas thought them the rarest and best of ducks, exemplars of the noble character and wild blood he saw in all waterfowl. Doug’s father had killed the only black duck taken at Dogwood long years ago, and I suppose Doug associated the birds with his earliest memories of the camp and of the hunters who had gone before. I offered to have the bird mounted and hung over the fireplace, but Doug declined. He knew that most of his Dogwood days were behind him, and his children’s interest in the place was only sentimental. He didn’t want to hang his iconic bird on a wall that would be demolished when the place was sold, preferring instead to keep it where his father’s black duck had been safely held all these years—his imagination. Douglas was a man of science but also a man of faith. Although he would embrace Montaigne’s ahead-of-its-time claim that “miracles arise from our ignorance of nature, not from the essence of nature,” his sense of wonder remained undiminished. When I encountered the following passage in Montaigne, which some might consider preachy, I saw Douglas looking out at me from the weave of its words: “Whoever considers as in a painting the great picture of our mother Nature in her full majesty; whoever reads such universal and constant variety in her face, whoever finds himself there, and not merely himself, but a whole kingdom, as a dot made with a very fine brush, that man alone estimates things according to their true proportions.”

o has my path—evolution, if you will—as a duck hunter been entirely one of contingence, or is its trajectory better defined as progress from a rudimentary to a more refined state? Certainly I wriggled into a new skin (adapted) to better fit every happy opportunity (environment) that came along. Still, I began as the kid feigning delight over badly

100 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

cooked mergansers and, after shedding a few skins, became the man standing in a blind with Douglas. Kind of like a trilobite scuttling happily along the seabed, caroming unknowingly toward the Ninth Symphony. Once more, I default to my French friend who, after penning a thousand strongly opinionated pages on everything imaginable, warned readers against the pitfalls of hubris with his most universally recognized quotation, â&#x20AC;&#x153;What do I know?â&#x20AC;? Remembering this never fails to bring a quick smile and jolt me out of my reverie. My Parker 12-bore (yes, I traded in the Rosson) leans in a nearby corner under a rumpled coat redolent of marsh grass and wet feathers, and on my speed dial is the number of an old friend with a boat and a marsh and an energetic young son who can help make it all happen. The season is almost upon us, and I have a few more skins to shed. n Rusty thinks his evolution as a duck hunter has mirrored that of life in general, seemingly random but decidedly better than before.

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Fathers Continued from page 34 not fresh enough to be that morning’s. Afternoon feeders, Paul decided—they had to be. The younger and quieter of the Labs circled the snow, scratched at it, then bedded down with a groan. The older female stayed intense, ever faithful to the thought there could be action any moment. But the pall continued, and the strange hollow afternoon kept working on him.

nother flight of too many geese came off the river, and a few ducks trailed it. The geese looked only once before setting for another field. The mallards, however, broke back and swung the field twice and dipped toward the spread about 60 yards out. Paul readied himself, deciding the small group’s next swing would be lower and he would shoot. He’d push the distance with bigger loads. Overland, a cripple wouldn’t be a problem with two dogs on it. The ducks set up for their next swing over the trees. He saw the lead drake,

stood, and began his swing. . . . Not a shot, he thought. He would not even have considered it if Camille had been there. He knew it wasn’t a good shot. A cripple is a cripple, he repeated to himself. A potential intentional cripple was even worse. “Not a shot,” he heard himself say. He hoped his daughter’s interest would hold up and spare him hunts alone with his thoughts. The ducks flared when he rose, but he was surprised that the late-season birds approached the field at all and risked feeding during the day—it just wasn’t cold enough for such a gamble. Just about all good field hunts Paul recalled over the years had one common ingredient: cold. Today, it was above freezing, not close to the right sort of cold. The last half hour, or more precisely, that last 10 minutes of legal shooting hours often made all the difference. Having lasted this long with his tainted thoughts on the last day, Paul planned to hunt to the bitter end. He owed it to the dogs. Plus, when he got home, she’d be there to ask: How was it? A northerly breeze stirred from the river behind him. His ass was sore from

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sitting, but he knew it wasn’t the time to get up and go for a warm-up walk with the river just starting to darken on a dark day, and a check at his watch showed 20 minutes until closing for the day, the week, the season. Paul felt the age-old lift in anticipation with the subtle change in light. Something caught his eye—something above the far edge of the corn against the farther, almost impossible backdrop of dark bluffs also blotched in snow. Then there was another flicker and he picked out the white movement of wings and breast; then he saw the pair low, already hooked in the right direction that would take them up the edge of the corn. The birds would either set to the dekes or rise up for the river. He felt himself sink in his seat as he held his breath. The pair of geese kept coming, closing the distance without making a sound. “Both or neither,” he’d already told himself. If she had been there, he’d explain later why he wouldn’t risk just one. He was loaded stiff with number 1s, and these were big, winter-tough, and wary honkers, already paired for spring. Sixty yards, 50, 40, 30. They flared up over the silhouettes. Now, that’s a shot! Paul almost shouted as he stood and swung with them. He crumpled the first bird, then panicked after missing the second shot, but staying with it, tripped the second with his last shot. He could still see the second bird falling after the two distinct thuds, and the dogs raced out across the crusted snow to bring in the pair. It hadn’t taken that long. . . .

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he met him at the door, and he could still see the busted feathers waving in the gray winter air as he ran his cleaned hands though her hair. “Got those ones, huh!” “And maybe we’ll get more next year,” he said. “Yup. Maybe with my own shotty.” Maybe so? Maybe next year, a buckled bird or two of her own for the Labs. Paul couldn’t wait. n Sam and his wife own and operate an organic-grain business in Washington State. In his “spare time,” he enjoys two daughters, hunting, skiing, and writing. His work has appeared in Gray’s for more than 20 years.

Cabinproperty44@gmail.com 102 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

Choctawatchee Continued from page 46 ziplock to confirm my discovery. From the picture, I see the canal connects to a network of others that provides deeper access to more parts of the large marsh. I welcome the adventure aspect of utilizing the canal system but absolutely revel in the discovery of a secretive access route to some gamey-looking water. I live for such things. After unloading my kayak and sliding it into the canal, I tie it off, load my gear, and then drive the van and park in a small turnout on the shoulder of the county road 50 yards away. I down the last of my medical-grade coffee to optimize mental and physical fortitude for the paddle ahead. Returning, I carefully ease into the cockpit, double-check my rod and gear lashings, then take my first stroke into the unknown waters of the little canal. It’s a tight passage with cordgrass walls but very doable. I feel exclusive. I’m downright smug with satisfaction. The water is a thick tannin stew, and

as I glide along the inky trough, I think once again of the dark, quilted water of Choctawhatchee Bay and the hidden treasures of finned gold beneath. The latter serves as an incentive, a carrot at the end of the proverbial stick; the former taking me beyond. . .

hey say Einstein died having never resolved his hunch that all matter and the active and reactive elements of universal laws in which they’re embedded are elegantly connected in a theory of everything. I highly suspect that should his elusive theory someday be deciphered, cracked like an egg, and dropped into the hot pan of mankind, we’ll find that the rain and streams and bodies of water it produces, the dark microbes of nutrients and sediment that give it color, the crustaceans that scoot and scuttle along its floor, the diversity of fish that swim within, the swirling froths of foam that float on top, the birds and insects that fly and buzz above, the animals—mammals, reptiles,

and amphibians—that slip within and creep beyond its shores, the vast marine forest along its coastal edge that subtly shifts to deciduous as it gains elevation, even the moon that drives the tide, the sun that energizes Life, and the billions upon trillions of sister stars, planets, and moons in the galaxies beyond are connected, one and all, we and all of Nature, easing forward together, eternally, into an ethereal continuum of one singular, unending Supreme moment of infinity, not unlike that floating quilt of foam on the bay, morphing and shifting to a chaotic universe of change as we go. And on occasion, within the grand process of this wonderful perfection, we’re gifted a beautiful autumn day like the one unfolding before me. But I resolve that it doesn’t take the mind of Einstein to know this, and I smile, paddling along solo in the narrow hall of black water and cordgrass.

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cackles deep from within the cordgrass. It’s the first time I’ve heard one. I stop paddling so I can hear it better as it sounds off again. I’m amazed at how similar it sounds to a cock pheasant, and for a brief moment I’m projected by memory to the wide-open sea of harvested South Dakota grain fields in early October for my first opening day with my dad—it’s a damn good moment. When I finally reach the crest of the broad, treeless expanse of the marsh, a belted kingfisher rattles its alarm, taking flight from the dead top of one last tree—a slash pine—just ahead along the edge of the canal. It dips first, then darts into a straight-line soar above the surface of its tiny, home-water canal, driving forward in cascades of wing-beat flight the way kingfishers do, still rattling off as though beckoning me to follow. I comply. Out in the bay, although out of view beyond the marsh, I can hear the unmistakable splashing of a pod of dolphins feeding on schools of mullet that number into the thousands this time of year. Reds

and speckled trout are known to follow along the outer edges and beneath these massive shifting schools and feast on fingerlings like a roving buffet. My confidence for a successful outing climbs. I’m not the only one attentive to the scene; ring-billed gulls gather in concentric circles above, and a squadron of brown pelicans is approaching from the north, over the marsh, with a determined hurriedness in their direct flight to the plundering dolphins. Unlike their larger cousins, white pelicans, which feed from a floating position, brown pelicans feed with a flare of drama, employing an effective dive-bomb strategy. Considering their size, it’s an impressive sight to see. And once again, I smile.

he first of several targeted grassy coves of the marsh is now in sight. I can see that the tide has cooperated and is nearing an ideal low. My thoughts immediately shift and settle into my purpose of being here. I begin to dial in my focus, envisioning protruding tails and

dorsal fins of feeding redfish among the grass. I imagine the whiny buzz of the reel’s drag and the taut-line arch of my new rod attached to a shimmering, heavy slab of gold, finned gold, cosmic gold, as it charges for freedom. Yet whether I christen this new rod today with a slot-size red, a raging bull, or even a highly possible speckled trout seems to me, well, neither trivial nor irrelevant, but certainly damn near secondary to these experiences I gain along the way. That hasn’t always been the case; at least not to the degree it does now. Having entered the northern side of my 50s, perhaps it’s my age; I can only hope so. Regardless, seeing that grassy shallow cove ahead, I stretch the paddle out farther now, digging deeper into the black primordial water, pulling harder, faster, and I push on into a realm of infinite possibilities. n Miles Powell is an environmental consultant, naturalist, and freelance writer thriving in Boulder, Colorado, with his beautiful bride of 32 years.

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Dog Quintet Continued from page 52 or firewood, drag the duck boat to the slough, retrieve the ducks, pick up the decoys though I could never get him to wind up the anchor strings. And then he would drag the gunning skiff uphill to the truck. But Porgy had his limits. He would not pick up a woodcock, nor would he leap from the boat to make a retrieve. But he carefully marked every bird and when the shoot was over, he would whine and moan till I put him ashore. Then he would work the birds from the bank. Porgy weighed 160 dry and pulling a wet dreadnought of his tonnage over the gunnel was a hazard to boat, man, and beast. Beating up a laptop in a cottage on a Minnesota lake, up at dawn, nursing a coffee, tweaking my tales, checking emails in my robe and slippers. Early March, cottontails easing out of the woods to browse. Eighty-yard head shot

with a .22? Ease open the door, steady the Remington on the doorjamb. Porgy liked his nights on the porch when it was only 5 below. He sprang from slumber, snorted, shook off the snow, and tore around the porch to the gunshot. “Rabbit, Porgy, rabbit!” Nose to the ground, he’d run the tree line, bring the rabbit to hand. I’d wrap the guts and skin in yesterday’s Fargo Forum, lay the quarters by. I had supper before I even got my britches on. Call me a liar. Porgy served me a dozen years, a long time for a dog his size. I buried him where the digging was easy.

ebo. Fixing to raise that lump in your throat, fixing to raise that lump you almost forgot you had. Finally, back home on Daufuskie Island, a dozen miles north of Savannah, home at last after a generous quota of Minnesota. I fell in with some

island environmentalists, I sued a man, kept him in court 10 years, wore out three lawyers, five judges, maybe six. Finally, we cut a deal and he gave me a yellow dog. I first thought it was revenge. Zebo was a five-year-old Lab, a copper red, about the color of a new penny with darker swirls and whirls at nose, shoulders, butt, and eyes. He was 1910 Remington shot-shell calendar perfect, but no manners whatsoever. His boys had gone off to college and the wife couldn’t handle him. Banished to the kennel, Zebo got progressively worse and worse, as banished Labs will always do. First day at my place, he stole a steak off the table, broke an ear off my black bear rug, put his big head clean through a windowpane. I stole the steak back, patched the bear with a glue gun, put a piece of cardboard in the window. That cardboard lasted through a tropical storm, longer than you might suspect. But Zebo came around and he came around good. He was a tireless retriever,

November / December 2018 · 105

but I didn’t get to use him till after frost, the ponds and rice fields being loaded up with gators that way they are around here. He had a great nose, and sometimes I would work him with a baton at night, just to hear him snort and snuffle. But his field skills were transferable—he came to know every family member by name, even by their nicknames, 40 commands in English and Spanish, and he slept stretched out full-length beside me during the roaring crash of a direct-hit hurricane. He was not afraid, but he knew I was. Behaviorists will tell you Homo sapiens is the only species that can contemplate death and that is what separates us from the other animals. A damn lie. When Zebo contracted canine influenza in late spring of 2017, he knew he was dying. He ate only from my hand for two weeks, drank only from a cup if I held it. And when he no longer would do that, we knew he was dying, too. We grieved openly until we realized he understood all we said and became depressed, as he knew he was upsetting

us by dying. From then on, we kept our grief to ourselves. His last full day with us, he followed me around the house, room to room, always by my side, like he knew he would leave me soon and meanwhile, he wanted to get in as much time as he could. A gentleman to the end, he asked to go out at daybreak, then struggled back onto the porch and lay at my bedroom door, five feet from my hand, as close as he could get. I dozed off, 30 minutes, no more, and when I awoke, he was gone forever. Oh, my heart! He did me one final favor. He hid himself so well, not even the buzzards could find him. I was spared the heartbreak of putting him in the ground.

sleeps on my feet as I write this. He’ll be up shortly, gnawing shoes, upending the trash, making maximum mischief. “Puppies are so lovable,” Laura said. “It’s a survival technique to keep you from drowning them.” Laura, the little girl who helped me bring Lacey home, all grown up and gone now, with a little girl and a dog of her own. Hope springs eternal and always. n Essayist and novelist Roger Pinckney is a juke joint poet, a patriot of pines, a partisan of palmettos, and a prince of porpoises. He lives on Daufuskie Island, South Carolina, beautiful, remote, and sparsely settled.

amn tedious. I reckoned to get a dog that would go to my funeral instead, so I did. Mojo, silver Lab pup with green eyes. Fourteen weeks, he fetches on command and craps outside, mostly, and

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106 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

People, Places & Equipment Spey Lessons (page 6) With an invitation from Tweed Media, Russ Lumpkin fished the River Tweed for Atlantic salmon. Gordy & Son provided some of the equipment and apparel for the day. To fish with Michael Farr, check out tweedbeats.com/beats/rutherford. Limit (page 18) Brian Grossenbacher hunted near Twin Bridges, Montana, with Rooster Leavens and Tyler Barrus. More of Brian’s imagery can be found at grossenbacherphoto.com. Skeena Steel (page 36) Adam Tavender and friends fished British Columbia for steelhead in the

Skeena River and its tributaries. They made rendezvous in the town of Smithers and entered the wilderness with Highland Helicopters (www. highland.ca). See more of Adam’s work at adamtavender.com. Great (page 54) Matt McCormick hunted ducks and tundra swans in Utah’s Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge. In 1962, Utah became the first state open to legal hunting of tundra swans. Today, the birds have increased, and two other states, Montana and Nevada, offer strict draws and harvest limits. See more of Matt’s work at images onthewildside.com. Gordon Allen An artist from Chapel Hill, North Carolina, Gordon has been contributing to Gray’s for years. His line art is scattered throughout this issue. You can see more of Gordon’s work at www.gordonallenart.com.

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108 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

PHOTOGRAPHY BY WORTH MATHEWSON AND JOHN BYERS

N DUCKS The duck hunting is excellent in Australia, and you might find a good friend like ohn yers. by Worth Mathewson

November / December 2018 Âˇ 109

May 23 certainly might seem a strange time of year to start out on a duck hunt, but on that date, in the darkest moments before sunrise, I left with John Byers, who drove to the boat ramp with great care to avoid a possible mob of kangaroos—catch one mid hop, and it goes through the windshield. Or almost as bad, a wombat, which is short and thick—kind of like a block of granite. John put his boat in the waters of Lake Wellington, a lake in the Australian state of Victoria that covers more than 37,000 acres. We motored a couple miles to the lower end of Tucker Swamp. He dropped me off near a raised blind and threw out 17 decoys that he had hand carved. Then he headed to another blind about a quarter mile distant. Before entering the blind, I loaded my W.W. Greener 12 bore F25 with steel 4s. With a flashlight, I carefully checked every inch of the area, looking

for tiger snakes, which are highly venomous and, at times, seem to go hand in hand with waterfowling in Australia. Finding no snakes, I climbed in and prepared for shooting hours. The sliver of light on the horizon was ushered in by various bird sounds, including rushes of ducks. About 10 minutes before sunrise, skeins of waterfowl—especially Pacific black ducks— began splashing down among the decoys, and the flights continued long after legal shooting opened. I missed a num-

A brace of pink-eared ducks frame the author’s W.W. Greener 12 bore.

110 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

ber of easy shots but ended the morning hunt with five gray teal and one black duck. Then, as quickly as the ducks had appeared, they disappeared. So I waited for John and occupied my time watching vast flocks of impressive sulfur-crested cockatoos and their smaller cousins, galah cockatoos, create havoc in the woods behind me. Fewer in number but even more striking in appearance were the crimson rosella parrots, which are native to eastern Australia and so beautiful that a flock appeared to be rubies in flight.

Soon, I heard the roar of John’s outboard as he powered across the water. When he pulled up to the blind, I handed him my Greener and the birds. He he said that he didn’t see very many ducks, but even with just a few shots, he killed two chestnut teal, and one black, one gray, and a highly interesting black duck–gray teal cross.

made my first trip to Australia in 2002. I had gone to hunt the stubble quail, but during that same trip, I saw a lot of ducks. At the time, anyone who wished to shoot ducks had to first pass a waterfowl identification test, and I hadn’t taken it. (This ruling has now been changed, and foreigners who haven’t taken the test can hunt but only alongside anyone of any nationality who has passed it.) Still, the numbers and interesting species of ducks that I saw compelled me to make a return trip. I’ve since been back six times just for the ducks. I have been

fortunate to hunt waterfowl over much of the United States and in several different countries. I don’t hesitate to state that some of the best of those days have taken place in Victoria, Australia. In the United States, duck hunters know next to nothing about waterfowling in Australia. For certain, the subject has been overlooked by our national hunting magazines. I can recall only one article, published years ago in Ducks Unlimited, about duck hunting in the state of South Australia. When I speak to duck hunters in the United States about my days in Australia, the first question I receive is nearly always: “What kind of ducks do they have down there?” Actually, the Land Down Under has only 14 species of duck, and of these, only eight are legal for hunting—the Pacific black, mountain, wood, hardhead, Australian shoveler, pinkeared, and gray and chestnut teal. Aussie wingshooters hold Pacific black duck in higher regard than they do the others. For me that was good. Despite the years and miles I have spent chasing

waterfowl, American black ducks have been a rare find. I killed my first along Virginia’s Smith River on Christmas afternoon 1953. For the second, I had to wait until October 12, 1985, when I killed one near Wishart Point, New Brunswick. More than 21 years had passed since I shot a black duck in North America—January 5, 1997, at Long Island, New York. The Australian black duck is very similar to our black duck, but the colors of their wings’ speculums differ. The Pacific black duck has green, while of course ours has blue. Their strongest similarity is that the two species are very wary, and require good decoys and, most important, excellent calling to bring them within range. The gray teal is Australia’s most numerous duck. In years of good water conditions, it will breed twice. Apparently, at such times the flocks can number in the thousands. I didn’t see numbers such as those, but I did see hundreds on some days. The drake chestnut teal is Australia’s most striking and beautiful duck, Worth Mathewson pulls a decoy sled across a marsh on Victoria’s Lake Wellington.

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That was the year William James Lindskov purchased his first quarter of land. Eighty-three years later, things are a little different—or at least the scope of them is. You see, Bill’s son, Les, had a vision: to share with the world the beauty and splendor of the immense Lindskov Family Ranch through a lodge called Firesteel Creek. In 1999, the world was supposed to end, but Les, his wife, Marcia, and their four sons, Monte, Bryce, Mark, and Todd, had other plans. While the world worried about Y2K, the Lindskov Family lodge rose on the banks of Firesteel Creek, in Isabel, South Dakota. A decade later, they added Timber Lake Lodge, with its herds of American bison, Rocky Mountain elk, and whitetail deer. A legacy was born. Today, the birds fly wild and strong. Pheasants, sharptails and Huns bursting from cover. The deer and antelope really do look through the kitchen window, yet it never ceases to amaze how well they can hide when they want to. As I gaze off into the vastness that is western South Dakota, I sometimes wonder what draws hunters to Firesteel Creek and Timber Lake from all over the world. Surely there are a host of destinations to choose from, yet we have been fortunate that so many have returned to our lodges time and again. Is it the scope of infinite acres spotted with grainfields or one of Dad’s famous cocktails—“a glass of pop with a stick in it”—personally delivered in the lounge?

‘Life is worth enjoying; come visit us.’ Perhaps it is our talented hunting guides and their canine companions—each tuned so flawlessly it’s like watching an orchestra play. To them it’s not a job as much as a passion—the ability to come home each evening and say “That was a great day.” But the biggest reason people return must be Mom. Perhaps it’s her chicken-fried steak or fried chicken, or maybe it’s her buttermilk pheasant or famous roast beef. Then again, it could be her moon pies, chocolate cakes, or fantastic apple crisps—made from apples picked in her front yard. I may be biased, of course, but I think many would agree: Mom’s cooking is where it’s at. Mom is also a true role model— one who can fry three dozen eggs, make biscuit gravy, greet a stream of guests and not miss a chance to see what her grandchildren are up to that day. So there may be many reasons sportsmen keep returning to our ranches. And we hope that one of them is because they love it here— just like we do. We love that there are no roads or people. We love that we can walk out on the porch and hear nothing apart from nature. We love it this way, because life is simpler and moral out here. We hope you, too, can experience the way we are blessed to live every day. Life is worth enjoying; come visit us. —Mark L. Like his brothers, Monte, Bryce and Todd, Mark Lindskov is a thirdgeneration guardian who manages the Lindskov Family’s Lodges.

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and is most common in Victoria and Tasmania. There have been days when I shot more chestnuts than grays. Teal is somewhat misleading when discussing their ducks and thinking in terms of our teal. The grays and chestnuts are larger than the North American teal—both are about the size of our hen wigeon. The mountain duck is large, being similar to New Zealand’s paradise duck. From time to time, it is shot over water, but the most common method to hunt them is in large pastures, set up with decoys as is done with geese here. The wood duck actually looks like a small goose, a little smaller than a brant. It is called a wood duck because it nests in tree cavities. Like the mountain duck, the wood duck can be taken at times over water while hunting other species. But the general method for hunting them is sneaking up on farm ponds where they spend most of their time and jump-shooting them. The very small pink-eared duck is almost comical due to an odd bill. During my trips down, I wanted to add that spe-

cies to my list, but on most years didn’t see any. Then, in 2013, they were everywhere. I had a few days when I filled my limit primarily with pink-eared ducks. While I have a great appreciation for the Pacific black duck, my favorite is the hardhead. They are a pochard, very much like our redhead. They fly around in large flocks and come to the decoys in pure classic diver fashion. They are also likely the tastiest of Australian ducks. On each of my trips, I was able to bag a few hardheads but overall many fewer than other species. Two thousand five, however, was the year of the hardhead. John Byers and I shot limits of them. I’m often asked about gun laws Down Under. They are tight. A permit is required to own a gun, and that permit can be revoked for any number of reasons. As for shotguns, pumps and autos are illegal—breechloaders only. Rifles are limited to bolt action only. When I first went down, I took my W & C Scott 12 bore. But after dealing with airport customs both coming and going I decided not to do that again. I

purchased a Charles Boswell 12 bore in Melbourne, then a W.W. Greener F25 12 bore. I listed those two guns on John Byers’s permit and left them with him. But note: Prior to arriving, I still had to be issued a permit to use them. The permit process isn’t all that difficult, but it takes time; allow at least three months prior to any trip. Also, when applying for a permit, you need to state whom you will be shooting with and where. As a warning for all of us, anti-hunters have been successful in totally banning hunting in the states of New South Wales, Queensland, and Western Australia. The breeding habits of ducks in Australia are interesting. They can and do breed the year around, but the peak breeding takes place as the result of high water. With a flood, ducks come from great distances to breed. For example, a few years ago, just prior to the opening of the season in Victoria, New South Wales experienced a large flood. Almost overnight, ducks from Victoria flew north to the flood. On the other end of the spectrum, droughts cause major

Hardhead ducks, divers very much like our redheads, aren’t very commmon in Victoria, but in 2005, they prevailed in great numbers.

114 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

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problems. After my 2002 trip, I planned to return in 2003. But due to a drought, hunting was canceled in Victoria in 2003 and 2004. Generally the duck season in Victoria opens in mid-March and runs into early June. I have always made a point of going down in May, which weather-wise is similar to November in Oregon, where I live. One of my reasons for selecting this time frame is snakes. Briefly: The bite of most snakes down there makes the bite of our rattlesnake a bee sting in comparison. By May, most snakes have gone into hibernation. But not all! In 2005 and 2009, I ran into a tiger snake.

ost of my trips were two to three weeks, but in 2006, I stayed for six. That was an especially good year, as I had taken one of my Barnegat Bay sneakboxes up to Portland, Oregon, put it in a container, and shipped it to Melbourne. John picked it up and had

it waiting for me, along with a rig of hand-carved decoys. We had some banner shooting that year. In 2013, I hunted with John for 11 days. Most were outstanding. A few not so. For the first 10 days, we either limited out or killed just a few, and the bags were usually dominated by one species, gray teal, but always mixed with some other ducks. However, on June 2, my last day, the shooting left me with lasting memories. We set up along the shoreline of Lake Victoria. The weather had turned bad, perfect for ducks. Wind howled across the lake, and a heavy chop churned the shoreline. John dropped me off on a point and threw out a set, and the waves nearly broke over the top of the decoys. He went to another point about a mile down the lake. Long after shooting light crested the horizon, I had next to nothing—I had missed a single gray teal and then shot a chestnut. Due to the wind, I couldn’t hear any action from John, but he did well, killing his limit of 10 ducks, gray and chestnuts, quickly. John motored back to me and sug-

gested I move to his point. This I did. In short order, I shot another chestnut, a gray, a hardhead, and made a double on blacks. I picked up only one of the blacks, however, because a sea eagle dived down and took the other. John had come ashore to sit by me. He hissed, and I looked to see a flock of fully 25 hardheads sweeping into the decoys. I calmly missed with both barrels. John let out a prolonged moan that could be heard over the wind. I was fully ready to call it quits right then. That was the largest flock of hardheads I had seen since 2005. But John urged me to stay a little longer. I am glad he did. A single hardhead came with the wind, then suddenly cut to the outside of the decoys. It was a long shot. Likely 45 yards or more. I crumpled it. John muttered something about missing a flock at 20 yards, then killing what seemed like an impossible bird. The day couldn’t have ended better. n Worth Mathewson wrote his first article for Gray’s 40 years ago. He is field editor for Delta Waterfowl.

The variety of duck species Down Under includes Pacific black duck, hardhead (bottom right), and chestnut teal (upper right).

November / December 2018 · 117

118 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

If You Go

Duck guides are hard to find in Victoria. ABH Outfitters hunts the same location around Lake Wellington that I hunted with John. Check out its Instagram feed (@abhoutfitters) and contact them at ausbirdhunters@gmail.com. Also, John Byers runs Poddy Bay Custom Duck Calls. He makes fine calls from native Australian wood. Check out his website: www.poddybay.com.

November / December 2018 Âˇ 119

Al a s k a Alaska Sportsmanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Lodge PO Box 231985, Anchorage, AK 99523 (888)826-7376 E-Mail: bkraft@alaskasportsmanslodge.com Strategically located on the Kvichak River in the heart of the Bristol Bay fishing paradise. This river is the only connection between Lake Iliamna and the ocean. Each year, millions of salmon use the Kvichak to travel to their spawning grounds. This provides an enormous food source for the native rainbow trout, which grow in excess of 20 lbs. Because of our location, we donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t need to spend countless hours flying to the fishing spots. www.fishasl.com Alaska Wilderness Outfitting Company PO Box 1516, Soldotna, AK 99574 (907)424-5552 Experience incredible fishing, remote wilderness, and some of Alaskaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s most spectacular beauty. Guided and self-guided trips to the pristine waters of Prince William Sound,

the wild lakes and rivers of the Wrangell Mountains and the untamed wilderness of the North Gulf Coast. All trips are remote fly-in destinations that include fully outfitted self-guided trips in our one-of-akind outpost cabins and floating cabins as well as a full-service lodge on the Tsiu River. We accommodate groups of any size and offer discounts for large groups. www.alaskawilderness.com

We offer two different fly fishing adventure trips located in remote areas of the Alaska Peninsula. On the Pacific side is a sophisticated camp that offers extreme isolation, a unique coastal fishery, breathtaking scenery, day hike options, and helicopter fly-outs. On the Bristol Bay side is a no-frills camp offering an affordable option for die-hard fishermen after BIG fish in a small stream. www.epicaaa.com

Anglerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Paradise Lodge 4125 Aircraft Drive, Anchorage, AK 99502 (907)243-5448 E-mail: pete@katmailand.com Since 1950, we have offered the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s finest freshwater sport fishing. All lodges have superb fishing within walking distance and are in close proximity to the finest salmon, rainbow, char, and grayling rivers in Alaska. www.katmailand.com

Great Alaska Adventure Lodge Kenai Peninsula, HC01 Box 218 Sterling, AK 99672 (800)544-2261 E-mail: greatalaska@greatalaska.com Visit our world-class resort, featuring record-size Chinook, halibut, and rainbow trout. Deluxe lodge, fly outs, wilderness bear viewing, and fly fishing camps. We also offer fly fishing for IGFA record salmon (specifications upon request). Contact Laurence or Kent John. www.greatalaska.com

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Stoney River Lodge PO Box 62, Sleetmute, AK 99668 (907)526-5211 E-mail: Stoneyriverlodge22@gmail.com Owned and operated by Curly and Betty Warren, Alaska Master Guide License #111. Built in 1984 as a prime base of operation for guided top quality hunting adventures. Grizzly, moose, sheep, caribou and black bear, as well as daily fly-out sport fishing adventures. Lodge offers custom designed trips. We cater to people that wish to enjoy rugged Alaska outdoor activities incorporated with a well-appointed full service lodge operated by 30 year plus Master Guide and experienced staff. www.stoneyriverlodge.com Tikchik Narrows Lodge (907)243-8450 E-mail: info@tikchik.com World-class fly-in/fly-out sport fishing lodge hidden amid spectacular 1.5 millionacre wilderness park in pristine western Bristol Bay. Daily fly-out fishing for salmon, trout, char, grayling, and pike. Extraordinary service, accommodations, gourmet meals, and experienced guides. Owned and operated for nearly 30 years by Bud Hodson. www.tikchiklodge.com

Unalakleet River Lodge (800)995-1978 E-mail: appel@unalakleet.com Unalakleet River Lodge is a remote luxury fishing destination in the northwestern bush of Alaska. We have been sharing the natural beauty of the Unalakleet River and the surrounding Nulato Hills with our guests since 1998. We offer our clients Salmon fishing in the wilderness of Alaska with all the amenities and comforts of a full resort.The Unalakleet is recognized as a National Wild and Scenic River and is home to large runs of King Salmon, Chum Salmon, Pink Salmon, Silver or Coho Salmon, Dolly Varden, Arctic Char, and a native population of Arctic Grayling. The Unalakleet River offers 140 miles of prime Salmon fishing isolated from the pressures of road systems and fly out operations. www.unalakleet.com

A rge ntina Argentinaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Best Hunting (225)754-4368 E-mail: contact@argentinasbesthunting.com The perfect blend between hunting, fishing, gourmet dining, and luxury accommodations. Look no further if your goal is to experience the best that Argentina has to offer, as we have a wide variety of species, lodges, and

regions at our fingertips. To learn more, visit www.argentinasbesthunting.com South Parana Outfitters (804)693-3774 E-mail: wingsargentina@gmail.com World class wingshooting in a classic Argentine setting! Argentina, in comparison to other countries, has the advantage of having no restrictions when it comes to the hunting of doves, due to the threat that they represent to agriculture. However, Entre Rios is known for its prolific fauna, its great care for the environment, and its deep respect for the law. We can proudly say that conservation is at the foundation of our company. All of our guides are bilingual and it is their job to accompany you during the hunt and they will take into account your personalized tastes and interests. Duck hunting season goes from May through August. Dove is available for hunting all year long. Combination shoots and customized package shoots are available. www.southparanaoutfitters.com

Be lize Belize River Lodge (888)275-4843 E-mail: info@belizeriverlodge.com Belize River Lodge rests quietly on the lush,

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November / December 2018 Âˇ 121

green banks of the Belize Olde River, only 3.5 miles from the mouth of the river—the entrance into the Caribbean Sea and classic Flats fishing, where anglers will pursue bonefish, tarpon, permit, and snook. This beautiful historic mahogany lodge is situated amidst an abundant tropical setting. Balmy breezes rich with the sound of bird song drift among the private cottages creating a naturalist’s paradise. Relax and delight in our Belizean hospitality and our delicious combination of fine Belizean-Creole cuisine. www.belizeriverlodge.com

B r i t i sh Co l u m b i a Legacy Lodge (877)347-4534 E-mail: info@legacylodge.com Wonderfully remote yet easily accessible, Legacy Lodge offers a premier sport fishing experience found nowhere else in the world. In harmony with the natural environment and in a world all its own, here on the protected waters of Rivers Inlet, surrounded by the panoramic beauty of British Columbia, all the elements converge for epic battles with world class salmon and halibut. For couples and families, parties of friends to corporate groups, Legacy Lodge was made for those who yearn for the perfect fishing vacation. www.legacylodge.com

C alifornia Wing & Barrel Ranch (707)721-8845 E-mail: info@wingandbarrelranch.com. Escape to Sonoma, CA and enjoy a private hunting club just minutes from the Golden Gate Bridge. Wing & Barrel Ranch brings together the best of the shooting, food, wine, and wine country lifestyle in an elegant setting. Here, legendary memories are made with menus inspired by the surrounding countryside, world-class wines, exceptional shooting opportunities, and incomparable hospitality. www.wingandbarrelranch.com.

C olorado GR Bar Ranch (800)523-6832 E-mail: info@grbarranch.com Nestled along the Grand Mesas, just nine miles outside the town of Paonia, CO, this working cattle ranch has thousands of backcountry acres, trout lakes, miles of trails, and endless fishing and hunting opportunities on our private paradise. A vacation at our ranch is the trip of a lifetime. www.grbarranch.com Kessler Canyon 4410 CR 209, De Beque, CO 81630

Lease Excellent Hunting Property Also year round recreational activities. 20 minutes from East Montgomery, AL.

Deer, Turkey, Duck, Doves, & More! Fishing 15 acre lake & ponds. Bottomland hardwoods with year round large creek adjoining upland native grasslands with cedar ridges and gently rolling hills. Long term lease only.

Overnight Accommodations. Call: Work: 334-273-8387 or Cell: 334-850-9769 122 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

(970)283-1145 Combine 23,000 acres of pristine wilderness located on the western slope of the Colorado Rockies with one of the most magnificent hunting lodges in the country. Team that with the most elite hunting guides and dogs in the state pushing up pheasants, chukars, and Gambel’s quail in perfectly maintained bird cover—you could only find yourself at Kessler Canyon. Arguably the finest sportsman’s lodge and resort in Colorado, Kessler Canyon awaits the discerning sportsman who wants to experience the best of the best. www.kesslercanyon.com

Ge orgia Pine Hill Plantation 2537 Spring Creek Road Donalsonville, GA 39845 (229)758-2464 E-mail: dougcoe@pinehillplantation.com An Orvis-endorsed wingshooting lodge, we provide private plantation amenities and hunt quality to discriminating upland bird hunters who appreciate finer traditions of plantation-style quail hunting. Experience the best Georgia has to offer from horseback and mule-drawn wagon. Pine Hill’s lodges are arguably as nice as any private quail hunting plantation…you can trust Orvis on that! www.pinehillplantation.com

Spring Bank Plantation at Barnsley Resort 597 Barnsley Gardens Road, Adairsville, GA 30103 (770)773-7480 Spring Bank Plantation keeps alive a long Southern tradition of managing and preserving our game and lands. We offer upland game hunting and one of the Southeast’s most extensive shooting clays facilities— over water, in open field and in the woods. Shooting guides ensure that all hunters— beginners and experts—fully enjoy their outing. Ladies and teens are particularly invited to experience our Southern shoot tradition at our luxury North Georgia quail hunting plantation, just an hour north of Atlanta. www.springbankplantation.com Wynfield Plantation 5030 Leary Road, Albany, GA, 31721 (229)889-0193 E-Mail: Annick@wynfieldplantation.com Orvis Wing Shooting Lodge of the Year in 2005 and has also been named among Garden & Gun magazine’s “Top Fifty People, Places, and Things in the South.” With private cabins, southern cuisine, and a sporting clays course, Wynfield’s accommodations have a unique charm. Located in the heart of quail country, Wynfield represents bobwhite hunting at its finest.

Few things in life are more exciting than your dog locked down on a covey that flushes high and fast when the time is right! Book your quail hunting experience of a lifetime at Wynfield Plantation. www.wynfieldplantation.com.

Idaho Flying B Ranch 2900 Lawyer Creek Road, Kamiah, ID 83536 (800)472-1945 E-mail: info@flyingbranch.com Located in beautiful north-central Idaho, we are an Orvis-endorsed wing shooting and fly fishing destination with a complete big-game program. Flying B Ranch offers adventures that bring back guests again and again. Open year-round with a full-time staff, the Flying B Ranch delivers consistent quality. Enjoy no-limit wingshooting from our spacious western log lodge, pack into the backcountry for a big-game hunt, or fish for everything from wild westslope cutthroat trout to giant B-run steelhead. It’s all here for you, your family, and friends. www.flyingbranch.com

Kans as Ravenwood Lodge (800)656-2454

E-mail: ravenhpsc@aol.com Contact Kenneth Corbet for reservations. Ravenwood is a place where hunters can have it all. Located on the eastern edge of Kansas Flint Hills, Ravenwood offers great hunting grounds and a spectacular mix of hard-flying European driven pheasants, private guided field hunts, or plantation hunts for wily bobwhites, big cock roosters, prairie chicken, turkey, deer, or sporting clays. Open year-round, reservations required, established 1985. www.ravenwoodlodge.com

M aine Libby Camps PO Box 810, Ashland, ME 04732 (207)435-8274 E-mail: matt@libbycamps.com Orvis-endorsed wing shooting and fishing lodge. Lakeside log cabins, home cooked meals, master guides, and sea planes to access the four million acre private timberlands of the North Maine Woods. Daily fly-outs for trophy native brook trout and land-locked salmon (May-Sept) and for wingshooting in October. Hunting for grouse, woodcock, moose, deer, and bear in the “big woods.” Fifth-generation owners, since 1890. Orvis Fishing Lodge of the Year 2006-07. www.libbycamps.com

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Mo n t a n a Al Gadoury’s 6X Outfitters Bozeman and Lewiston, MT (406)586-3806 E-Mail: al@6xoutfitters.com Since 1979, guided walk trips on private spring creeks, Yellowstone River floats, and private lakes. Upland bird hunts are based in Lewiston. All wild birds—sage and sharptail grouse, Hungarian partridge, pheasant, and turkey. www.6xoutfitters.com Gallatin River Lodge 9105 Thorpe Rd, Bozeman, MT 59718 (406)388-0148 Our resort is located on a quiet ranch on the Gallatin River west of Bozeman. We offer fly fishing guide service on the Madison, Yellowstone, and Missouri Rivers, plus many famous spring creeks nearby. Superb accommodations, exceptional dining, and conference facilities are available year-round. www.grlodge.com

New M e x i c o Land of Enchantment Guides (505)629-5688 or (505)927-5356 E-mail: trout@loeflyfishing.com Offering single-day guided fly fishing trips and all inclusive, multi-day packages on

the best rivers, streams, lakes, and private ranches in northern New Mexico and southern Colorado. Excellent year-round fishing. Experienced guides welcome beginners and experts alike. Orvis-endorsed. www.loeflyfishing.com

Ne w Z e aland High Peak (643)318-6575 E-Mail: Simon@highpeak.co.nz Where great hunting stories begin. Exclusive New Zealand hunting experiences for discerning clientele seeking that rare combination of fine trophy, authentic stalk, and a personal approach. Set among the central South Island’s Southern Alps, the Guild family takes pride in hosting their clients individually on their private station in pursuit of famous Red Stag, Thar, Chamois, and Fallow Buck. www.highpeak.co.nz

North Dakota Dakota Hills Hunting Lodge HC56, Box 90, Oral, SD 57766 (605)424-2500 or (800)622-3603 E-mail: dakhills@gwtc.net Contact Tom Lauing. We offer some of the finest world-class wingshooting available, with an abundance of pheasant, Hungar-

Harry Murray’s Fly Fishing Schools

1 - the Daystream Smallmouth Schools from June “On schools”Bass for smallmouth bass on the to August ($196 per person). 1/2 - Day Fly Fishing Shenandoah River (2 days-$295) Lessons from June to September ($98 per person). Mountain Trout Schools in the Shenandoah National Park Mountain(2Trout Schools in the days-$295) Shenandoah National Park (1 day @ $196). All tackle provided free • Twenty separate schools All tackle provided free. Twenty separate schools.

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P.O. Box 156 • 121 Main St. P.O. Box 156 • 121 Main St. Edinburg, VA 22824 Edinburg, VA 22824 Phone: phone:540-984-4212 540-984-4212 • e-mail: info@murraysflyshop.com e-mail: info@murraysflyshop.com www.murraysflyshop.com www.murraysflyshop.com

124 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

ian partridge, chukar partridge, sharptail grouse, snipe, dove, and bobwhite quail. Allinclusive package includes first-class lodging along the Cheyenne River, all beverages, three Western-cuisine meals per day, open bar, ammunition, clays, license, 21-bird limit, processing, and airport pickup. www.dakhills.gwtc.net

S pain Hunt Trip Spain 011-34-931162001 E-mail: contact@hunttripspain.com A professional hunting company established by Francisco Rosich in 1986. Its exclusive purpose is hunting game trophies throughout Spain. Hunt Trip Spain has hunting concessions all over the country for the broad range of magnificent game animals available in Spain: 4 subspecies of Spanish Ibex (Beceite, Gredos, Southeastern & Ronda), Spanish Red Stag, Mouflon Sheep, Fallow Deer, Pyrenean and Cantabrian Chamois, Feral Goat, Wild Boar, Roe Deer and Barbary Sheep. Outstanding hunts for Red-Legged Partridges, driven or upland hunts are also available. HUNT TRIP SPAIN has served International hunters for more than 20 years. Come, let us transform your visit to Spain into an unforgettable adventure. www.hunttripspain.com

Ut a h Falcon’s Ledge (435)454-3737 E-mail: info@falconsledge.com One of the great western fly-fishing and wingshooting lodges. Cast to trophy trout on clear tail-waters, mountain freestone streams, private stillwaters, and enjoy a day floating the famous Green or Provo Rivers. Secure, pristine, and unpressured. Non-fishing spouses stay free! Honored as the 2012 Orvis Endorsed Fly Fishing Lodge of the Year! www.falconsledge.com

Vi r g in i a Chincoteague Hunting & Fishing Center (888)231-4868 Virginia’s Eastern Shore has one of the largest, most diverse populations of waterfowl in North America. Hunt puddlers, divers, sea ducks, mergansers, Atlantic brant, Canada, and snow geese all in the same day with over a 30-bird limit. We also offer rail hunting in September and October. www.duckguide.com Murray’s Fly Shop PO Box 156, 121 Main Streeet Edinburg, VA 22824

(540)984-4212 E-mail: info@murrayflyship.com Located in the Shenandoah Valley, 90 miles west of Washington, DC. Over 300 rods by Scott, Winston, Orvis, and St. Croix. More than 50,000 flies in stock. Harry Murray conducts 20 fly fishing schools for trout and bass. Complete guide services. Free mailorder catalog. www.murraysflyshop.com Primland 2000 Busted Rock Road Meadows of Dan, VA 24120 (866)960-7746 Join us for a rare opportunity to visit Virginia’s Blue Ridge Mountains and experience driven pheasant shoots comparable to the best in the U.K. From pegs in a deep valley you’ll aim your double gun at the wild flurry of game birds as they appear from the towering ridges above. Upland birds is also a signature activity with spacious grounds and hard-flushing birds. Primland is the ultimate retreat for world-class golf, refined dining and outdoor activities in an environment of rare natural beauty. www.primland.com

Y ukon T e rritory Tincup Wilderness Lodge (604)484- 4418 or +41 43 455 0101 E-Mail: info@tincup-lodge.com

Situated on the shores of Tincup Lake close to the Kluane National Park in Canada’s Yukon Territory, surrounded by mile up upon mile of unspoiled natural landscape, Tincup Wilderness Lodge enjoys a truly unique location. The surrounding Ruby Range provides views of breathtaking beauty from dawn to dusk. The Lodge can be reached only by floatplane. In order to ensure our undisturbed privacy in a family environment, we limit bookings to a maximum of 8-10 guests per week. This level of occupancy also enables us to welcome groups, giving all members plenty of scope to pursue their various interests and activities. www.tincup-lodge.com

NOTICE The outfitters, guides, lodges and plantations listed here are advertisers in Gray’s. The copy is provided by the advertiser, and Gray’s makes no claim as to the value of the services provided by any advertiser. When hiring an outfitter or guide, shop with care, and check references before making a financial commitment.

“Your Gateway to the North Maine Woods”

www.libbycamps.com / 207-435-8274 matt@libbycamps.com

COLORADO ROCKIES

TROPHY ELK-DEER-BEAR Archery, Rifle, Muzzleloader Hunt thousands of acres from secluded cabins on our private hi-country ranch, directly bordering the Grand Mesa National Forest. Summer vacation: explore ranch & wilderness by horse and 4 wheel. Fish 7 trout-stocked lakes. Breathtaking scenery.

GR BAR RANCH, Paonia, CO www.grbarranch.com 800-523-6832 November / December 2018 · 125

GSJ

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Epic Traditions by Christopher Camuto

The story of American fisheries is one of American character. . . .

try to keep superlatives in reserve so that I have them when I need them. I need them now. Barton Seaver’s magnificent American Seafood: Barton Seaver, American Seafood Heritage, Culture & Cookery from Sea to Shining Sea (Sterling Epicure, hardbound, large format, 520 of how the author looks at the hard-won bounty of pages, $50) combines the contemporary culinary marine life when it comes into the kitchen. interest of an award-winning chef with a keen hisWhile accounting for the qualities of fish with a torical sense of the great labor of American fisherchef ’s eye, Seaver also offers up a good deal of history men and an awareness of the ecology of our oceans. about the rise and, often, decline of fisheries as well as As the author notes in the introduction: “What you the rough lives and hard labor of the men and women hold in your hands is not a cookbook. It’s not an who work them. He notes that “though fishing comAudubon-style guide, it’s not an unbiased reference munities have become somewhat marginalized sobook, it’s not specifically a history book, yet it’s all cially and economically, there is a great literary tradiof these things at once. It is the story of American tion of paying homage to the fortitude and character seafood—the product, the people, the places.” of these brave fishermen.” The soul of this book is its The heart of this unparalleled effort is an encymesmerizing illustration in historical and contempoclopedic catalog of more than 500 species of fish— rary photos of those lives and that work. The book’s including, of course, many sport fish—and shellprofuse color and black-and-white illustrations bring fish. In brightly written entries, Seaver reveals the to life the labor and importance of fisheries, the charculinary character of each species from the virtues acter of a centuries-old industry. Finally, Seaver knows of familiar fish like flounder and sea bass, salmon well that seafood is the bounty of the nature of the and steelhead, cobias and haddock to the less well oceans—myriad complex and vulnerable ecologies known uses of flying fish, moonfish, and squirrelfish stirred together by world-swaddling currents—many to the possibilities of jolthead porgies, dog snapof them already damaged by centuries of pollution pers, octopuses, and the silver jenny. Shellfish are and misuse. Healthy seafood depends on the health also covered at a level of detail that unlocks the full of the sea. Much remains to be done to reverse our culinary range of clams, crabs, oysters, and shrimps. abuse of a resource that American Seafood celebrates to No species or subspecies escapes Seaver’s boundsuch an extraordinary extent. less curiosity, heartfelt admiration, and imaginative appetite. His knowledge of the nuances of seafood, owever much hunting has become marrich with history and science, is as interesting as it ginalized in our own times, for most of our history, is useful. You will not find another seafood book hunting was near the center of national values, real like this, and, although this is hardly a cookbook, it and imagined. Philip Dray explores that centrality does offer enough recipes to get you into the spirit

126 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

in The Fair Chase: The Epic Story of Hunting in America (Basic Books, hardbound, 396 pages, $32). For the most part, this is not a history of the ordinary sportsman’s experience of hunting in America through the centuries, but is rather a social history of hunting’s place in American culture. Indeed, as Dray ably shows, hunting (and shooting) was one of the drivers of American image-making and an important part of the national identity from colonial times to the Second World War. Dray does an excellent job of recounting the rise of sport hunting in colonial times as British traditions met colonial conditions and the example of Native American lifeways later memorialized in James Fenimore Cooper’s novels. He tells the fascinating story of “Frank Forester” (Henry William Herbert), “one of the country’s first outdoors writers,” who gave voice to the emerging mid-19th-century sporting culture that flourished after the Civil War, when the energies of American outdoor leisure met the enviable opportunities of the wealth of North American game. From the Adirondacks to the mountain West, Dray tells the story of how the practices of American hunting evolved and how they were publicized by an avid sporting press led, of course, by the redoubtable Forest and Stream (1873–1930). That publicity fed the more enduring treatment of hunting that seeped into American literature, where American perspectives on wildlife and nature achieved permanence. Intimately related to hunting, of course, was the evolution of American sporting arms and ammunition, especially the innovations during the latter 19th and early 20th centuries. Writing with lively authority, Dray pulls this complex story together, often focusing on strong personalities who seemed to summarize the American appetite for the outdoors and for hunting: Forester, Custer, Buffalo Bill, Teddy Roosevelt. Dray doesn’t shed as much light as I would have liked on the ordinary experience of hunters, especially the details of hunting in the disparate regions of North America—the hunting of whitetails in eastern forests, of small game in the South, of pronghorns and sheep in the West are vastly different experiences. And waterfowling—so important in the East, Midwest, and South—might have been given more attention along with upland game hunting and the role of dogs in so much of American life afield. Dray takes the history

of American hunting into our own controversial times when hunting has eddied out of the mainstream and come into question in some quarters. But if hunting has long been at the center of American identityformation—as Dray so ably depicts—we should not be surprised to find it near the center of our own cultural controversies. The author tells a helpful, colorful story, and puts hunting squarely in the rich context of American life, where it belongs.

ohn Bryan and Rob Carter, along with many contributors, have produced a lavish tribute to the American trout fly with America’s Favorite Flies (America’s Favorite Flies, hardbound, large format, 656 pages, $145). Two hundred twenty-four anglers responded to the editors’ invitation to submit a “favorite fly” and the story behind it, “a collection of writings and voices and words” that reveal the “flavors and personalities and individualities” of a great swatch of America’s most passionate fly fishermen and -women. The most charming of these submissions are casually revealing of unassuming angling lives, others assert valuable expertise from angling professionals about flies or angling tactics, some are well-crafted narratives, vivid recollections of onstream hours. Those accounts are accompanied by photos and biographical sketches that create an epic contemporary encyclopedia of the fly fishing obsession from all over the map. Each fly is illustrated with a full-page color photograph that shows an eye-catching range of these “favorite” selections from classical to whimsical choices, sentimental patterns to tactical mainstays. Homage is paid to Norman Maclean, whose wonderful book may or may not need the sentimental adulation it inspires. (I liked it better when this gem was a little-known cult classic you came across in used bookstores.) Paintings, essays, and photos complete the happy chaos of this unusual book, clearly a labor of love by the editors—a heavy volume (lift with your legs) that is perhaps proof that the fly fishing obsession has reached its peak and may well be in danger of getting out of scale. n Chris reads epics—The Odyssey and The Aeneid for preference—but works in minor forms, restoring the ecology of his woodland, writing, teaching, and fishing and hunting when he can. November / December 2018 · 127

GSJ

POEM

First to Know by Timothy Murphy

“I’ve never known a man more ready to meet his end, to wrap up his long span and greet our Lord as friend.” So Steve three nights ago hearing my horrid news. He’d walked through blowing snow, declined the best of booze. We’ve hunted thirty years, buried many a dog. Now as my own death nears memories from the fog come flooding home, God’s love descending like a dove.

Timothy Murphy, whose work has appeared in Gray’s many times, succumbed to cancer June 30, 2018. 128 · Gray’s Sporting Journal · www.grayssportingjournal.com

Winter Marsh, acrylic on board, 28 x 46 inches, by Chet Reneson

Back Cover: Hunterâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Moon, oil on canvas, 30 x 24 inches, by Eldridge Hardie