Owly Addendum

After making the last post, I was lucky enough to get a couple shots of the juvenile Great Horned Owl in question, though I haven't yet been able to get a shot with one of the parents for reference.

These picture will now also appear where they should have in the first place if I had any patience -- in the body of the post below.

Have a nice day.

Owl Staring and Trickle Gazing

All winter long there have been a couple owls down in the woods behind the house... having a real hoot of it.  Nearly every night, as I sat warming in front of the fire with a book or trolling the internet for the latest Harlem Shake video, I could hear them hooting away out there.  I enjoyed listening to their duets, most especially while staring up at the stars sometimes from the driveway, contemplating the mysteries of the universe (read: where the hell did I put my gloves?), but I know about as much about owl calls as I do the Krebs cycle.  Cells metabolize, owls hoot -- the depth of my knowledge on both subjects.

I didn't know if they were a mating pair, what type of owls they were, or what they were really up to other than gabbing quite a bit.  That was until I was out in the yard picking up sticks early a few days ago.  OK, I was peeing on a tree, but I was thinking about picking up all the sticks and limbs revealed by melting snow.

A movement in my periphery caught my attention, and I looked up expecting to see a hawk.  The elegant lines and grace of the numerous red tails that seem to have taken over the skies recently were nowhere to be found.  I was rather startled to be confronted instead with the stocky, barrel-chested form of a downy fledgling owl perched on a limb not forty yards away.  That's not a thing I see everyday, and it took me a few beats to whir through the mental Rolodex to the owl section, having just been preoccupied with aiming and contemplating landscape cellulose removal.

I'd never seen a fledgling owl before, still in the down.  This guy (or gal) had a vaguely comical look about him.  Some of the sagacity and noble bearing of an adult top line predator, but concealed behind a coat of comfy looking fluff and marabou.  Like a kid bundled up to head out for a mid-winter recess.  And I don't think he had his sea legs quite yet.  As I gazed on for a minute or more, a chilly wind tossing bare oak and basswood limbs around, there seemed to be more than the normal amount of flapping and stumbling about in his efforts to get settled in on his perch.

I jogged into the house to retrieve binoculars, and returned to my owl watching post a few steps into the woods.  Our fluffy beige friend did turn to glance at me once upon my hasty return to the woods, but he didn't seem too concerned.  He was concentrating fairly hard on not tipping over in the breeze as far as I could tell, and I was having a fine time watching him.

Then I caught another movement farther back in the tree tops -- a hint of something at the edge of my limited field of view against the gunmetal sky.  Almost unconsciously, my finger went to the knob, and ran the focus back into the woods.

That was when I was suddenly confronted with the level glare of an adult Great Horned Owl, our eyes locked on each other from seemingly feet away through the binoculars.  He sat immobile now and unblinking, those huge primal eyes boring into mine.  Watching me watching his progeny.  While I try to avoid the crutch of personification when it comes to viewing wildlife, there was a moment there when I almost felt him warning me off, hunter to hunter.  And a chill ran down my spine.

Soon enough the pair flew off, deeper into the woods, and I was left looking at empty limbs swaying in the cold morning air, simply glad to have been a part of our morning encounter.



There's a certain danger that exists for some of us who spend a lot of time outdoors chasing prey and yummy green stuff growing in the shade.  Not only can we very easily lose sight of the big picture in the woods, staring at rising fish or deer walking the wrong way until tunnel vision sets in, but I think we can also skirt the danger of becoming immune to the little things.

I remind myself all the time to remember the joy in the little stuff out there.  If I didn't, this blog entry would consist entirely of 5 words - "I saw a couple owls."  That's all that really happened.  I was out to stretch my legs and relieve my bladder, and I saw a couple owls.  It would be easy for a lot of us outdoorsy folks to become so enamored of the big vistas and moments, completely engaged by a singular goal to catch or kill something, that we forget to stop and smell the Crocuses.  Which specifically, by the way, isn't really worth it.  They're really short.  Your hands and knees get all muddy getting all the way down there, and they don't smell that great.

Spring is the easiest time to take in the beauty of the little things.  For so long everything, big and small, has been dormant under snow and ice.  I love winter.  The cold, the snow, the howling wind... bring it on.  But when the last of the snow is shrinking under the spruces and all is coming alive, every little blossom and rill is a wonder. 

Like many of us who stand in rivers waving sticks, I am enchanted by moving water.  No matter how large or small I always feel the pull to stop and stare.  Springtime is the greatest time of year for staring at moving water, especially considering the April we've had around here, where we're just now seeing the sun past a forest of remembered flood watches and warnings in the distance.  If the old adage holds true, we'll be up to our ears in May flowers very soon.

Perhaps it has to do with a childhood spent "racing boats" down small streams, but I am an inveterate, committed little rivulet starer.  I pause to admire water running every chance I get.  Running down the gutters into a storm drain or out of the gutters into the grass, it matters not.  I love to stop and take in the miniature tinkle and splash.  It has been the Super Bowl of tiny stream staring in the woods behind the house this month with daily rains and mountains of snow melting fast.  All rushing steeply down to the creek that borders the property.

Add to that a mountain of ice and snow I had to hack through to get the growing driveway pond to drain before it flowed into the garage.  A few hours spent toiling with pick and spud bar where well worth it in the end, when I was finally able to stand back and enjoy the mother of all deeply gratifying man-made tiny streams running off into the woods through the snowbank.

To an unknowing observer, I might often be deemed "a tad off" standing in the rain with my hands in my pockets, kicking little twigs and leaves into flowing water, just to see which way they'll go, how far they make it before they get hung up.  It's the little things.

And I'm fine with that.  Trickle gazing and being judged slightly touched are two of my favorite pastimes.

A Diminutive King and Fallen Castle

This blog entry has been written in concert with a tying tutorial I did for my bluegill fly pattern, the Disco Cricket, over on The Fiberglass Manifesto, and author Cameron Mortenson's "Year of the Bluegill" initiative. Please head over there and check it out.  You fly fishers in particular should really enjoy the entire site.



I know a lot of us began our fishing careers chasing the humble little bluegill.  We stood there on shore, some of us with a cane pole and a bobber, and flicked squiggly globs of leaf worms to lily pads in the shallows, in hopes of hauling in a fish or two.  We didn't notice the differences between the varied species of these diminutive scrappers, nor were we aware of their many names -- long ear, shellcracker, pumpkin seed, red ear -- they were all bluegills to us kids, probably bream ("brim", as they say) to our southern counterparts.  Honestly, I still have trouble keeping all the different, brightly painted little guys straight sometimes.

Many of us learned to fish on bluegills because they are often so willing to bite.  As any muddy little kid with a sunburn and a Zebco can tell you, they will sometimes even bite on a plain gold hook when the bait can runs dry.  That makes the sunfishes royalty of the novice youth fishing world.

They're also very accessible.  Almost every splotch of blue on the map has at least a handful of sunnies patrolling the shoreline, darting into the weeds when you walk up to the bank.  Nothing is better for a kid learning to fish than actually being able to see what he's going after.  The fishing itself can be a very visual affair as well.  You can see the curious little ones swim right up, and take a nip at your bobber.  I know for myself, I wasted many a childhood afternoon trying to figure out how to catch those guys, matching wits with a three inch fish and losing.

When you do finally get a couple years of bluegill fishing under your belt, you know even more what to look for.  And what to listen for.  When the day finally comes that you spot those pie pan spawning beds laid out like honeycomb on lake bed, when you hear that little spluck! noise they make sucking in bugs from the surface, you know you're in for one of those days we fishy folk dream of.

The final part of the equation has to be the tremendous fight these buggers put up.  A bluegill flat-out pulls his little butt off.  They dart and dive, and the bigger ones do that fun spinny thing, like a maple seed falling up in reverse.  All great fun to cut your teeth on.


Then comes the time in our fishing lives when some of us are overtaken with the need to find and fight the big bluegills.  This is no longer a matter of simply flopping a bait into the city park pond, and waiting for the fish to come play.  The bruisers aren't so easily fooled -- as the saying goes, that's how they got to be bruisers, after all.  They hang out in deeper water than their slimmer brethren, they're often much more finicky about what they'll eat, and they'll yank on your 4lb. mono until they've buried your hook in the weeds, and you're left with nothing but a glob of muddy salad to show for it.  We're not in the minors anymore, this is the show, and it's wonderfully fun.

Not incidentally, bluegills are my favorite freshwater fish at the table.  Always have been.  I know the walleye and perch people will be up in arms of over this, not to mention you brookie guys and those weird, scary catfish dudes, but that's the way it is.  Given my druthers, it'd be a beer batter bluegill fry and sweet corn, with a couple thick slabs of tomato, still warm from the garden sun.  Pass me a PBR.

That's what you drink at a bluegill fry, by the way.  Go ahead and check, it's in the Constitution.  Bluegills are not craft beer fish.

For the novice fly fisher, just as the young gear fisher, bluegills are often there to help learn the sport.  Newbie fly geeks are often nearly as helpless as any kid with his first cane pole, so it works out that the quarry would be the same.  Personally, when I picked up my first dime store fly rod, and began to cast to the dink sunnies in the shallows, I was swept back to the age of dunking worms with my brother, when we'd spent more time throwing rocks than trying to catch fish.

And again, the progression with the fly rod remains the same as it was with the cane poles and spinning rods.  Obsession grows.  Sooner or later you find yourself casting past dark out with the ticks and mosquitoes, seeking advice and articles, dreaming of truly giant bulls on a fly rod.  These are not the mythic salmon of Scotland or high mountain cutties, but bluegills, through some combination of their tenacity and willingness to bite, can become downright addictive.

I don't think we need to employ Cold War era spy craft, using double secret codes and marking park benches with chalk at dusk (as is the standard internet tradecraft of covert fly fishing operatives everywhere) when mentioning that Lake Onalaska, over on the western edge of Wisconsin, is home to some of the best sunfishing you'll find anywhere.

They've pretty much put the word out.

The lake is formed by a dam on the Mississippi River.  There are miles and miles of braided water through a stand of islands at the north end of the lake where the smallmouth bass and pike fishing can be excellent.  We've spent many days up there, and occasionally nearly had to spend the night there too, after losing our way in the dozens of  near-identical looking channels.  For some reason, I was always the one who had to get out, and pull the boat over a sand bar while Brian yelled threateningly from the back of the boat, "If I have to put this beer down..."

The allure of "the chutes" as they are known locally, all those back channels and wandering paths between spits of river mud and sandy little islets, is great, but the real action happens down in the bluegill water.  Spring and fall especially, when the bite is on, you won't have to ask where, just follow the armada.  Massive sparkle fleck bass tournament rigs, fairly bristling with every fishing electronic known to exist, pull up beside plastic, roto-molded jon boats in the shallows, and everybody catches bluegills.

Lots of fish. And big ones.  Consistently over time, the biggest 'gills I've ever seen in person.  I've heard every theory out there concerning how and why this place is a sunfish factory (I like the one about the river current washing scuds and other yummies down to the pig bluegills lying in wait), but I don't think anyone really knows how exactly it works.  The important thing here, as a far as the angler is concerned, is that when the time is right, you can fight the fattest 'gills you've ever seen until the basket is full, and get up to do it again the next day.  I have, and I can personally guarantee you that none of those fish have gone to waste.



Brian inherited the trailer from Marty years before I started coming to Onalaska for bluegill bonanza weekends.  "Ol' Number 14" had been laid to rest some decades before, deemed unsafe for human habitation by any sane person, on the top of a small wooded rise in a campground right on the water, lending great views of the lake and fall sunsets from the picnic table parked out front.

Getting unpacked for another weekend at the very swank No. 14

Lest you get the wrong impression, all was not Midas gold at the trailer.  The first time I was invited, the temps dipped well below freezing for our ice fishing weekend.  When we arrived after dark, there was no power in the campground and the furnace would not run.  Within minutes, Brian spilled the Coleman lantern he was attempting to light, sending a river of flaming white gas down the counter top.  The trailer didn't burn down, but only because it was too rotten to ignite.  That night my pillow froze into a point on one end, conforming to the inside corner of the trailer as I dozed warmly with my brandy sodden dreams on the floor, stocking cap pulled down tight.  I was immediately in love with the place.

Brian and Dad, the power back on

No matter how many times her roof was resealed with blackjack, scrap sheeting, and prayers; rain always managed to run in, especially through the roof vent over the dubiously designated "living area."  Which was convenient, actually, because that's where the hole in the floor was for it to drain out.

She did have a working cook top and tiny oven, the latter of which hovered at random temperatures somewhere between glumly cadaverous and positively solar.  We used it to alternately freeze dry and vulcanize meals brought from home.  Bluegills were fried outside on the reliable old green Coleman stove, and we quickly learned where the local pizza place was.

Her greatest feature, though, was most shocking.  Literally.  After a long, soaking rain or in spring when the frost was coming out and the ground was wet, all of her metal surfaces would become electrified to the touch.  I'm not an electrician, but I remain fairly positive that wasn't right.

Brian and I would get quietly giggly on Blatz and Korbel back then, and invite fellow campers from around the grounds over for a drink.  The entire time just dying inside, waiting for them to unknowingly brush up against a wall or range hood and be jolted into a cussing streak. Yes it was mean and juvenile.  It was also some of the greatest fun I've ever had.  Closest I've ever come to peeing myself from laughter.

Buddy quickly learned that track would sting his little paws. Built in puppy barrier.

The allure of living in constant fear of being zapped, drenched, frozen or broiled alive on those summer smallie trips aside, the real reason for being there was the bluegill fishing.  At the right time of year, a limit of heavy 'gills could be acquired in plenty of time to spend the rest of the morning in junk yards looking for trailer repair parts.

Big, thick gills, too heavy for a heron, apparently.

It was not uncommon to catch them two at a time...

... or four...

... or simply have one greedy fish inhale every bait you could throw.

Ol' No. 14, beauty that she was, is gone now, trundled off to the big campground in the sky where the fish are even bigger and nobody gets electrocuted by leaning against a window air conditioner.  She brought us together, became our base camp for a lot of wonderful outdoor pursuits.  Not the least of which was embodied by the small but mighty, pugnacious king of the panfish in my mind, the ever-ready bluegill.