WHAT I DID ON MY WEEKEND VACATION

I'll be the first to admit I'm not mechanically inclined.  Nor do I have a keen sense of construction science.  But I am smart enough to be slightly dangerous and haphazard when power tools are involved.  I've royally screwed up some stuff and my friends have had some good laughs at my expense.  Fortunately, I still have all my fingers and my power tool privileges have been reinstated. 

So last weekend when the wind was howling and I was bored since I wasn't fishing I decided to build a portable fish cleaning station.  For the past two decades my chest freezer in my garage has served as an impromptu platform that has processed thousands of fillets and is adequate.  However, it gets a little nasty in there and awful toasty in the summertime.  I was looking for something I could stick under a shade tree in my backyard.

It was about 5:30 p.m. when I dreamed up this plan so the lumberyard was closed.  But the local hardware store had 2"x4" studs, 8-feet long that would work just fine.  I bought six of those for $3.69 each and a pound of screws for about $10.  In all I'd have about $35 in it.

My construction plans were to fly by the seat of my pants which has proved eventful in the past.  But I reasoned even if I screwed things up I wouldn't be out a whole lot.  I had several goals, one of which was to incorporate a piece of countertop I could take off and keep out of the elements and also use in my garage in the winter or inclement weather.  I also needed a place to fill a pan with water to clean the fillets and a tub kept underneath to house my electric knife, plastic bags and other supplies.  A convenient spot to hang my hose was on the list, too. 

In less than a couple hours I finished my project and was quite proud of my accomplishment.  Granted, you wouldn't want me to build your house but the finished product got rave reviews from friends, neighbors and family.  It's sturdy, functional and light enough I can move it easily by myself. 

Other than a coat of paint or stain it's nearly complete.  The only step left is to get out and catch some fish and see how well it works! 

GOTTA HAVE FISH FOR FISH TACOS

It's always a gamble to count on fish as a main course on a camping or road trip.  Some anglers have a back-up plan and that's probably a good thing.  But knowing what we did about Glen Elder Reservoir I had no such thing and I was positive we would catch plenty of tasty walleye for wonderful fish tacos I planned.

However, our trip started out much slower than expected.  Wind gusts well into the 40's didn't help matters but that was still no excuse.  So when we started catching a few sub legal walleye and some REALLY nice white bass I made an executive decision.

"We better start keeping some of those whites if we want fish tacos!" I laughed and told my buddies, Kent and Jim. 

Se we pitched a few into the livewell just in case.

Don't get me wrong, white bass meat is plenty palatable.  But given the choice I'm all over walleye fillets.  Walleye is the filet mignon of the piscine world and white bass is hamburger.  But I love hamburgers, too, and was going to be happy to have them under those circumstances.

But the fishing Gods shined on us and we started catching keeper-sized 'eyes.  Once we had at least one for each of us the white bass got a pardon and swam hastily away after they were pitched back into the lake.  Life was good once again.   

If you're wondering, here's how I do my fish tacos.

Grill or fry the fish fillets.  I like to use Shore Lunch Beer Batter recipe if I'm frying and light oil and Cavenders Greek Seasoning if I'm grilling.

Add the cooked fish fillets to a tortilla, I prefer flour but corn works, too. 

My favorite ingredients beyond that to add to the "taco" (get big tortillas as the concoction gets large in a hurry) are Chipotle and garlic salsa, sour cream, shredded cheese, guacamole, coleslaw and black beans.

Bon appetit!  

TOO MUCH WIND BLOWS!

Wind is nearly a constant on the Kansas landscape in the spring.  And at this time of year it doesn't seem like there's much middle ground and usually it leans towards way too much.  There's never much rhyme or reason but you can bet whenever I schedule a fishing trip it's going to howl.

A couple buddies and I had a wonderful trip to Glen Elder Reservoir last May.  A gorgeous afternoon on our first day allowed us to find some fish and despite bad weather the next few days we managed to do well.  We caught boat loads of walleye and huge crappie.  Last fall we decided to return again so we booked reservations for one of the cabins in the state park for last weekend.  Our hopes were high for another great trip.   

We were leaving Thursday morning.  The previous four days prior to our departure were absolutely gorgeous.  Winds 10-20 mph with temp's in the 70s and 80s.  But the closer we got to Thursday the forecast didn't look favorable as far as the wind was concerned.  And they were right and then some.

Don't get me wrong.  I generally like SOME wind, particularly for walleye fishing.  But everything is good in moderation and the extreme makes me grumpy.  It's hard to find fish and if you do big winds don't give you a lot of options on how to catch them. 

We got on the lake at noon as most boats were leaving the ramps like rats from a sinking ship.  They'd "had enough" they said of the giant winds.  Wind speeds were constant at 33-38 mph with gusts well into the 40s.  Undaunted, we headed out.  Amazingly we caught enough fish to consider it fair success.  But at the fish cleaning station we got more wonderful news.

"Did you hear it's supposed to be worse tomorrow?" one angler asked as we discussed the wind.  "Yeah, it's supposed to blow 60 mph tomorrow!"

Granted, he was an angler and prone to exaggeration, but he wasn't too far off.  Friday was worse.  Again, we still managed to catch fish but I would consider our success mediocre.  My chair up front was a lonely one.  I couldn't even sit in it at anchor as waves would crash over the front with my added weight. Several times the winds blew my rods up and out of the rod holders.  Brutal.

Saturday the winds finally backed off about lunch time.  We'd been on the same pattern catching enough keeper 'eyes for a few fish frys.  Add a couple dozen wipers, white bass and huge slab crappie, including several 15-inchers, that ate our jig-and-nightcrawler combinations each day and it still wasn't a bad trip. 

Of course, Monday, my first day back at work was absolutely perfect for a day on the water.  I guess that's the way it works when you fish in Kansas.  I'll take the good with the bad...I just wish the bad wasn't SO darn windy!  

WHO SAYS CORKS ARE FOR SISSIES?

You may have heard some hard-core anglers scoff at the notion of using bobbers (corks or floats) for many types of fishing.  Some believe they're better reserved for kids, novice anglers or those only fishing from shore.  But if the truth be known a bobber can be a deadly tool in an angler's arsenal for many species of fish, particularly this time of year.  Such was the case recently for a couple buddies and I fishing Milford Reservoir last week.

I rarely fish Milford so we were hunting for some likely looking crappie spots.  I found several brush piles and while we caught a few on these piles we found no concentrations of crappie to bite.  So we started pitching jigs to a rocky bank and dipping in and around stick-ups.  My middle-of-the-boat buddy caught a monstrous crappie dropping a jig next to a submerged tree and our day was looking up.  My back-of-the-boat friend strapped on a bobber the size of a beach ball and started pitching his jig there, too.  He followed suit catching several BIG crappie.  The game was on.

One little stretch we worked yielded a bunch of nice slabs with most averaging about 1 1/4-pounds.  Real bruisers, fun to catch and colored as vividly as an impressive painting the fish wasted no time whacking the jig causing the bobber to twitch or go completely under.  Without the bobber the jigs would have been snagged more often than not.  It also allowed a real SLOW retrieve which seemed critical as well.

So don't overlook the ol' bobber.  It can save the day in a pinch and makes fishing a jig more effective in certain situations.  A bobber is also deadly for walleye at times.  But that's a story for another day!

Good fishing! 

LIFE AND DEATH LESSON

I once read where 70 percent of all cottontail rabbits born die before they reach 5 months of age.  It doesn't sound kind but if you look at real world Mother Nature it often isn't, particularly at the bottom of the food chain.  Nowhere in the wild will you find animals with the anthropomorphic traits Walt Disney would lead you believe to be true.  It's a coyote-eat-cottontail world and only the strong survive.  It's not pretty in a predator-prey world. 

But I still have a bit of a soft spot for young animals.  All this despite shooting thousands of ducks, geese, pheasants, quail, rabbits, deer, turkeys and more over the last few decades.  Herein lies the quandry some of my friends and coworkers find entertaining.  Some have even referred to me as a "closet bunny-hugger." They laugh when I tell them of stories like I've experienced in my backyard for the last week-and-a-half.

It all started when my 18-month-old Lab, Gator, found a nest of rabbits that were no more than a day old.  By the time I saw them he had all six of them out on the grass and was rolling around on his back, playfully flipping one of them up into the air.  Two were already dead from the slobbering and cold evening.  I kenneled Gator and put the remaining four back in the hole and covered them with grass and fur. 

The next morning I checked on them and two more were dead.  I had my twin boys with me and they are well-aware of how nature works and although sad they realized the perils of being a prey species.  Had the neighborhood cats found them (don't get me started on free-range cats) they would all have been killed and maybe some of them eaten.  Gator was just looking for a play toy in his own backyard. 

So for the next week every morning and evening when I let Gator out of his kennel to feed and let him run I covered the hole with a Rubbermaid tub.  Occasionally, my boys would go out to check on the rabbits' status and hold them and show them to other neighborhood kids.  After they were done they'd stuff them back in the hole and cover them up.  So it went for the next week.

It's important to note that not once during the last 10 days did I ever see the female rabbit at the hole, or even in my fenced backyard for that matter.  She fed them under the cover of darkness and they grew well and rapidly.  All wild animals should be left in the wild, no matter what it appears.   

Finally, the other morning I forgot to put the tub over the hole and when I went back out Gator was chasing the two small rabbits, who were now able to run all over the place, around as a game.  Once again, I put the young rabbits back in the hole although they barely fit.  I put Gator up and went back to check on them and they were gone and nowhere to be seen and likely now fending for themselves.   

Rabbits have raised more than a dozen litters in my backyard in recent years.  Some of them make it to adulthood while others haven't been so fortunate.  Watching them grow is a natural life lesson.  Understanding they die and why is also the same.