Monday, June 27, 2011

Visitors from the forest


We've lived up here for almost two years and never saw a bear. Well, I've got trail cam pictures, they destroyed one of my apple trees last fall and, of course, they leave their calling cards on the ground.
Last week, we were watching TV and these two wandered between our two garages and marched down the driveway.
A couple days later, one was standing on our drain field about 20 yards from the house. He walked across the road into the neighbor's woods. A minute later, a deer came charging out of the woods, stood in the field across the road and was hopping up and down. Not a happy deer. About 20 minutes later the bear wandered across the road and walked past my garage and up the little hill where I shoot arrows. I walked out the garage door to see what he was going to do. He walked up to the hay bale I use to support my target, growled and swatted my hay bale. I hollered "Hey" and he stopped and looked at me. I said, "What are you doing"? He stared at me for about 5 seconds and lumbered up the hill and into the woods.
A couple of mornings later, I walked out on my porch with my cup of coffee and saw the back of a bear as he wandered down that very same hill. I went downstairs to do my morning workout. When I came up an hour or so later, I was informed that a bear ran around the house and headed down a deer trail nearby.
It's funny as I now take a look around when I leave the house and more so when I walk in the woods. I'm not worried as there's a greater chance of running into trouble living in the cities than there is living in the country.
I actual am enjoying these sightings. As much as I hate losing an apple tree, I must remember that they were here first and we are intruding on their territory.
If one chews me apart someday, I'll probably change my opinion....

Tuesday, June 7, 2011

Return to Long Lake

It's been two years since we moved to the woods of Northern Wisconsin and I decided it was time to wander back to that lake I lived on for 10 years and fished for 35. Of course, my fishin' partner Mike was right there with me.
We left early Sunday morning and were on the lake by 9:00. I went over to one of my favorite spots and we hit the big sunnies and crappies right away. We caught sunnies as big as 10 1/2" and the crappies all ranged from 10-11".We tried a few other spots on the lake just for the heck of it but all the fish were in that small area only 20' wide and in 2 -4 ' of water.
We knocked off at 3:00 to visit with an old friend who lives on the lake. We had a couple of beers and then took him out for some dinner. We were face down asleep in our motel room by 8:00. No it wasn't from the beer. We were just danged tired from fighting big sunnies with our ultra light gear. Well...and I guess we are getting older.
Monday morning we hit the water at 6:30 needing 8 crappies to fill our limit. We were heading back to shore 15 minutes later with those 8 fish.
We said our good byes to my old friend and headed home. Then we had to clean all those fish. UFFDA The downside of being successful I guess.
It was a hectic two day trip. Good friends, good fishing and good weather....
Mike and I will be back next year.....