We vacationed as often as possible at Grayton Beach and fished as much as possible from the beach; always with Mr. Shark in mind. Everybody knew they were around; dusk and dawn were best and according to their movie manifestations cruised the surface with dorsal fin beckoning. Consequently I fished for them with the biggest bobber I could buy and a pinfish about six inches underneath the bobber.
Then I bumped into somebody who knew what he was doing. Fishermen have a reputation for “secrets”: places, baits, techniques. In fact I’ve never met one who wouldn’t enthusiastically tell you everything he knew. And this was no exception. Shavings 3 & 4 were whacking pinfish on #10 gigs and shrimp in the surf so I wandered East to see what this guy was up to. He was fishing for sharks with cut squid on the bottom. I mentioned the dorsal fin business but he assured me the bottom was the place to be. I ask him if squid was good but he said live bait was always best. I told him we had plenty of live pinfish so he rigged one up, walked out to chest deep water and cast it as far as possible.
The rest of the tutorial included leaving the bail open, finger loosely on the line, until the shark started frankly swimming away as they were inclined to fiddle with it before they got serious. This, plus making sure no swimmers were near-by as sharks tended to run parallel to the shore not straight out to sea. It did not take long. Shavings 3 & 4 got their picture taken with the big rod and a four foot black-tipped shark strapped to the hood of his old International jeep (guy was a class act).
The next morning, sans big bobber, bail open, finger on the line, standing on the second sandbar…. it starts. Just a few line wraps at a time and after about a minute off he goes. I’d been standing there thinking “I’m gonna catch a shark. I’m gonna catch a shark. I can’t believe it, I’m gonna catch a shark”.
With the second attack in Jaws you get only a brief glimpse of the shark. It was a lot like that. Out of the water comes the back third of the fish and then thunders down. I kid you not, thunders. I had a new thought; “not that shark” as I turned and headed for the beach as fast as possible.
All useful fishing knowledge seems to come from acquaintances or personal experience. Experience here taught a) forget about those swivels with gently curved snaps; use the ones that come to a point, and b) cast from, but linger not on, the second sand bar. There is symmetry to shark fishing’s possible outcomes; we’re not talking about carp or skipjack.
ML
1/26/07
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Monday, January 29, 2007
3. By the dark of the moon
We needed more snakes.
Having long been incensed by TV nature shows repeated claim that “snakes see poorly”, absent a shred of data upon the topic, we had begun an evoked potential study of the visual acuity of the snake that was easiest to come by – banded water snakes. Using Tim’s set up we had done a few experiments with water snakes captured the previous Fall. The arrival of an NSF summer undergraduate, Sheena, had exhausted our water snake stock so it was off to the creek to get some more.
Much lore and some data from nighttime road hunting suggested snakes were not out-and-about much under a full moon. A side effect of this suppression of snake ‘walkabouts’ was not apparent until we saw some data. To wit, if they are hold-up under a full moon then they will make up for lost time after a full moon. And though the moon be fullish and bright the nights immediately after it is full, it rises progressively later each night! Thus, by three nights after a full moon there is an early period of no moon; and snakes are anxious to get back in business.
Shades Creek at the end of Monarch Drive is full of minnows, pretty good sun, but not many ‘snake rocks’. They had to be more abundant than daytime trips revealed. Plus it is shallow, sandy bottomed, in town and you can literally drive into the creek so parking was close in case anybody ‘cracked’. In short, the perfect place to take a motley group ranging from the fairly sawed-off (Bob the veterinarian who raised leopard geckos), to two NSF summer undergraduates (Sheena and her roommate, Sonja) through two geeks (Tim and Mark). Mark, the fMRI foreman, was the least prepared for the events that unfolded. We bumped into him in the parking lot before kick-off. He says “what’s up”? We says “we’re going snake hunting, wanna come?” Mark says “neat”. I think he figured it was like the legendary snipe hunt. He found out different.
So thirty minutes after sunset three nights after July’s full moon, six adventurers, six flash lights, two snake bags, one snake stick (you never know) did not even get their feet wet before Bob spotted the first midland banded water snake (N. sipedon pleuralis).
The rest is history. We caught 32 and four got away; all in just under 60 minutes and 200 yards. I was surprised. Mark was way past surprised beginning with borderline apoplectic but rallying to grabbing a few himself.
We counted them the next morning. Kept five for experiments and one gravid female as Bob and Mark wanted to try some fMRI snake obstetrics. The rest went back in the creek the next night and I can imagine their story. “First there were these bright lights. Then we got graded up and put in this weird flying hole. Then they dumped us into this place with invisible sides. Then they put us back in the weird hole. Then they flew us back and dropped us in the creek. We swear, that’s what happened”!!
Bob and Mark never got around to the fMRI but the snake had her 14 babies and into the creek they went. Around October another one had five babies which, timing considered, likely resulted from a mating in the “weird hole”. At least one Casanova wasn’t complaining about his close encounter.
I’ve long thought a more systematic study of snake movements and moon phase was in order but never did it as the driving was far and typically turned up only half-a-dozens snakes on a good night. Here we had 36 snakes per hour in 200yds of creek. And in peoples’ backyards! So residents of the banks of Shades Creek looking for a good science project might consider this opportunity. For I write of adventure not far away… or long ago.
ML
1/24/07
Having long been incensed by TV nature shows repeated claim that “snakes see poorly”, absent a shred of data upon the topic, we had begun an evoked potential study of the visual acuity of the snake that was easiest to come by – banded water snakes. Using Tim’s set up we had done a few experiments with water snakes captured the previous Fall. The arrival of an NSF summer undergraduate, Sheena, had exhausted our water snake stock so it was off to the creek to get some more.
Much lore and some data from nighttime road hunting suggested snakes were not out-and-about much under a full moon. A side effect of this suppression of snake ‘walkabouts’ was not apparent until we saw some data. To wit, if they are hold-up under a full moon then they will make up for lost time after a full moon. And though the moon be fullish and bright the nights immediately after it is full, it rises progressively later each night! Thus, by three nights after a full moon there is an early period of no moon; and snakes are anxious to get back in business.
Shades Creek at the end of Monarch Drive is full of minnows, pretty good sun, but not many ‘snake rocks’. They had to be more abundant than daytime trips revealed. Plus it is shallow, sandy bottomed, in town and you can literally drive into the creek so parking was close in case anybody ‘cracked’. In short, the perfect place to take a motley group ranging from the fairly sawed-off (Bob the veterinarian who raised leopard geckos), to two NSF summer undergraduates (Sheena and her roommate, Sonja) through two geeks (Tim and Mark). Mark, the fMRI foreman, was the least prepared for the events that unfolded. We bumped into him in the parking lot before kick-off. He says “what’s up”? We says “we’re going snake hunting, wanna come?” Mark says “neat”. I think he figured it was like the legendary snipe hunt. He found out different.
So thirty minutes after sunset three nights after July’s full moon, six adventurers, six flash lights, two snake bags, one snake stick (you never know) did not even get their feet wet before Bob spotted the first midland banded water snake (N. sipedon pleuralis).
The rest is history. We caught 32 and four got away; all in just under 60 minutes and 200 yards. I was surprised. Mark was way past surprised beginning with borderline apoplectic but rallying to grabbing a few himself.
We counted them the next morning. Kept five for experiments and one gravid female as Bob and Mark wanted to try some fMRI snake obstetrics. The rest went back in the creek the next night and I can imagine their story. “First there were these bright lights. Then we got graded up and put in this weird flying hole. Then they dumped us into this place with invisible sides. Then they put us back in the weird hole. Then they flew us back and dropped us in the creek. We swear, that’s what happened”!!
Bob and Mark never got around to the fMRI but the snake had her 14 babies and into the creek they went. Around October another one had five babies which, timing considered, likely resulted from a mating in the “weird hole”. At least one Casanova wasn’t complaining about his close encounter.
I’ve long thought a more systematic study of snake movements and moon phase was in order but never did it as the driving was far and typically turned up only half-a-dozens snakes on a good night. Here we had 36 snakes per hour in 200yds of creek. And in peoples’ backyards! So residents of the banks of Shades Creek looking for a good science project might consider this opportunity. For I write of adventure not far away… or long ago.
ML
1/24/07
Friday, January 26, 2007
2. What's in a name
More than the answers to all of life’s riddles can be found in the movies.
The Missouri Breaks was a western with a cast that could not be ignored. Jack Nicholson, Marlon Brando and a good many others whose faces, if not names, you would know. It was great. However the few people I talked to, that also saw it, hated it. Cross examination of their opinion clearly revealed that it was not the movie they loathed but the character Marlon Brando played- Robert E. Lee Clayton. And he was law enforcement.
Tom (Nicholson) was the co-leader of a gang of horse thieves pretending to be start-up ranchers. Jane, the daughter of the local horse baron, pursued Tom romantically and eventually over came his amusing coyness.
One afternoon, riding face to face on the same horse (Fully clothed, the PG rating came from Robert Lee’s ‘methodologies’.) Jane, who was pretty sure that Tom, et al. were up to things other than they affirmed, attempts to get a handle on how long her new beau is likely to last.
Jane: Are you an outlaw?
Tom: No, why do you ask?
Jane: You have all those guns.
Tom: I’m a sportsman.
Jane: A sawed-off shotgun!?
Tom: I’m a sawed off sportsman.
I knew as soon as he said it…that’s it, that’s what we’ve been doing, sawed-off sportsmanship. No, not stealing horses, you can have my share. And no, not using sawed-off shotguns; it’s against the law. Rule One of the “Sawed-off Sportsman’s Code” is never break the law. In fact, one worthy of the label is generally a deep student of the fish and game laws…at the time and place. However, bonus points accrue to activities causing new law to be written.
ML
1/18/07
The Missouri Breaks was a western with a cast that could not be ignored. Jack Nicholson, Marlon Brando and a good many others whose faces, if not names, you would know. It was great. However the few people I talked to, that also saw it, hated it. Cross examination of their opinion clearly revealed that it was not the movie they loathed but the character Marlon Brando played- Robert E. Lee Clayton. And he was law enforcement.
Tom (Nicholson) was the co-leader of a gang of horse thieves pretending to be start-up ranchers. Jane, the daughter of the local horse baron, pursued Tom romantically and eventually over came his amusing coyness.
One afternoon, riding face to face on the same horse (Fully clothed, the PG rating came from Robert Lee’s ‘methodologies’.) Jane, who was pretty sure that Tom, et al. were up to things other than they affirmed, attempts to get a handle on how long her new beau is likely to last.
Jane: Are you an outlaw?
Tom: No, why do you ask?
Jane: You have all those guns.
Tom: I’m a sportsman.
Jane: A sawed-off shotgun!?
Tom: I’m a sawed off sportsman.
I knew as soon as he said it…that’s it, that’s what we’ve been doing, sawed-off sportsmanship. No, not stealing horses, you can have my share. And no, not using sawed-off shotguns; it’s against the law. Rule One of the “Sawed-off Sportsman’s Code” is never break the law. In fact, one worthy of the label is generally a deep student of the fish and game laws…at the time and place. However, bonus points accrue to activities causing new law to be written.
ML
1/18/07
Thursday, January 25, 2007
1. Problogue
I was about 10 years old walking the bank of a creek feeding into an inlet of
Watts Bar lake in east Tennessee; looking for snakes. I had a store bought cane
pole with me because the last time I’d left the pole plus night crawler on the
bank I met my first carp who had the pole bobbing up and down about 100 feet
from shore. Fortunately a near-by boat retrieved the pole and carp. Thus began
my vendetta with Cyprinus carpo but those are other tales.
It looked like good black snake territory but there in the middle of the creek swam three, foot-long, shiny fish; taunting me. They’d probably been talking to the carp. I don’t remember if a conventional approach was tried. If it was it failed as some other tactic was plainly needed.
In east Tennessee there grow thorn trees. The trees aren’t especially big but the thorns are. And store bought cane poles come in sections. Thorns come off thorn trees and fit, well enough, into the metal section connectors of store bought cane poles.
Now I know what you’re thinking. ”Fat chance kid”. It’s probably what I was thinking and possible what the three skipjack (Alosa chrysochloris) were thinking. As I said, they had probably been talking to the carp.
Well the story two of the skipjack carried back to Mr. Carp hopefully wiped the silly grin off his face. “On the first throw, we couldn’t spawning believe it”.
This was not the first, or the last, sawed-off sportsman adventure but it does capture the genre.
ML
1/17/07
(Title by ED)
Watts Bar lake in east Tennessee; looking for snakes. I had a store bought cane
pole with me because the last time I’d left the pole plus night crawler on the
bank I met my first carp who had the pole bobbing up and down about 100 feet
from shore. Fortunately a near-by boat retrieved the pole and carp. Thus began
my vendetta with Cyprinus carpo but those are other tales.
It looked like good black snake territory but there in the middle of the creek swam three, foot-long, shiny fish; taunting me. They’d probably been talking to the carp. I don’t remember if a conventional approach was tried. If it was it failed as some other tactic was plainly needed.
In east Tennessee there grow thorn trees. The trees aren’t especially big but the thorns are. And store bought cane poles come in sections. Thorns come off thorn trees and fit, well enough, into the metal section connectors of store bought cane poles.
Now I know what you’re thinking. ”Fat chance kid”. It’s probably what I was thinking and possible what the three skipjack (Alosa chrysochloris) were thinking. As I said, they had probably been talking to the carp.
Well the story two of the skipjack carried back to Mr. Carp hopefully wiped the silly grin off his face. “On the first throw, we couldn’t spawning believe it”.
This was not the first, or the last, sawed-off sportsman adventure but it does capture the genre.
ML
1/17/07
(Title by ED)
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