Rudy’s “Holy Laker”

The coffee maker gurgles to life at 3:30am. Lights blink and steam begins to whisper its song of roasted fragrance.  Before the alarm radio turns on, I am up and feeling my way down the hallway steps, grasping the handrail with one hand and bracing against the wall with my left. I know I am sleepy and do not trust my feet on the polished wooden steps. I fill my favorite steel thermos, a gift from the Norbert Buchmayr Society, with the pungent French Roast and add a dash of real maple syrup.  Within minutes I am out the door, headed to the truck and surveying the night sky, looking for signs of weather. It looks like a clear day, the stars are still shining brightly and there is a wisp of wind from the Southwest. The pressure appears to be steady but the forecast is for clouds moving in and a barometer to be dropping later this morning.

In the truck, I search for my favorite old radio station, WWVA 1170am, from Weirton, West Virginia, which sometimes comes in on clear nights all the way up here near the Canadian border. There is something magical about radio waves that carry that far and I enjoy the crackling sound reminiscent of my radio youth of the 60’s. I chuckle to myself as I think “Times were simpler then”, recognizing that my grandparents used those same words when I was growing up. For them the world was changing in fearful ways; communism was a threat, kids played “rock and roll” and shook their bodies violently, as if convulsing in some primitive animalistic mating ritual. We could trust those we elected to office and our country was the world leader in productivity and prosperity. Now, my generation fears what the advent of video games where kids learn to kill without empathy will lead us. Government and corporations are blended together in one authoritarian entity dictating to us what we hear, see, feel and eat. The world is frighteningly complex. Just like it was for our grandparents.

But as I drive through the pre-dawn, with the window rolled down I can smell the lake turning over its summer depths and wafting inland. I inhale deeply. I swear I can smell the fish and the seaweed. It calms me.

Pulling into the boat access, I am alone. I wander down to the shoreline and breathe in the blessing of pre-dawn on the lake. Headlights pierce through the canopy of maples and oaks and reflect off of the lightly rippling surface of the lake in sparkling crystals of light. My friends have arrived, towing the old Hawk 18’ center console boat. We greet each other with our traditional teasing. “Barely made that 15 minute rule! I was gonna’ leave without you!” I say to Chris.  Our friend from Michigan, Rudy replies, “That would have been tough to do Carleton. Seeing as how we have the boat!” “Yeah, well. Details like that won’t stop me!” I reply. A round of “How are ya’ Bro’s?” breaks out at once between the three of us, like long lost brothers.

We launch the boat from Chris’ little Volvo wagon as he swears again that he doesn’t need anything bigger. There is a nice ripple on the water and a very slight shade of dark purple and green in the horizon to the East. The motor fires to life quickly and Rudy shoves us off the wooden dock. The smell of the outboard mixing with the fresh, clear water is intoxicating. As we pull out of the bay I am reminded of the scene from “The Perfect Storm” where George Clooney’s character describes the joys of pulling out of the harbor, “the fog’s just lifting. Throw off your bow line, throw off your stern. You head out to South channel, past Rocky Neck, Ten Pound Island. Past Niles Pond where I skated as a kid. Blow your horn and throw a wave to the lighthouse keeper’s kid on Thatcher Island. Then the birds show up; black backs, herring gulls, big dump ducks. The sun hits ya’. Head North. Open up to 12 (knots). Steamin’ now. The guys are busy; you’re in charge. Ya’ know what? You’re a goddam swordboat captain. Is there anything better in the world?”…I am lost in revelry, pretending I am a swordboat captain. It’s universal. Whatever boat you run, whatever lake or pond you pull into, whoever your crew is, you are a part of the Universe and you can feel your soul swimming in the dawn’s first light.

We pull out of Converse Bay and head South past Garden Island with the cliffs of the Adirondacks catching the first golden glows of the sun.  The spray from the wake is sparkling as drops of water fly in an arc from under the hull, wave after wave of compounded beauty. I’m sitting on the bow grinning as I take a pull of the travel mug of coffee and swear I am in heaven already.  Rudy and Chris are looking off in the distance, alone with their thoughtsand focused on this moment of transcendence.  

Chris is piloting his boat with a deft hand. Our faith in our captain is undaunted. We know that he has seen his share of storms and steadily maneuvered through heavy seas. We are bound together by a sense of supreme contentment, alive and aware of the present.

Slowing the boat down to 2.6 mph Rudy and Chris turn their backs to set the downriggers. I grab the wheel.  A brief discussion of which lures to use is quickly decided. Cop car down at 33’ and a Sausage and Gravy cheater down halfway to the ball on the port side. Starboard will be a Michael Jackson at 40’ and a Strawberry Milkshake for a cheater. On the port side, just ahead of the rigger, we play out a tadpole diver with a brokeback Rapala 100 pulls back. On the starboard side we feed out a lead core flyline with a Magog smelt imitation. Between sips on the coffee and jokes about jelly donuts, we all keep an eye on the rods. And then we wait.

As we are drifting in our conversation to the dangerous territory of politics, the flyline on the starboard gunwhale begins to sing. It whizzes. We all turn around quickly and someone yells “Holy Crap!” Rudy begins to laugh. He’s up to his tricks again. He likes to reach behind his back and tug the line real fast. We all laugh and are caught up in the moment, when the starboard rigger releases. This time it’s for real! “Fish On!” I yell. Rudy is closest to the line and grabs it, raising the rod over his built-for-a-center football shoulders. “It’s a pig!” he says as the rod begins to thump downward in a heavy pulsing action. Rudy steps back and reels in line, when suddenly; the line starts spooling out of control. The big fish is on a run. He dives heading for the abyss of Lake Champlain’s 300’ bottom. I hear Rudy say a quick prayer that he doesn’t go all the way to the bottom.  It is a moment of connectedness that transcends our short lives. His prayer echoes in silence off of the Adirondack cliffs. He waits patiently for the reel to stop screaming and gently at first, then forcefully, horses the rod over his right shoulder and reels down hard. Whatever it is, it’s heavy.

As if time were suspended, we all watch with amazement at the power of this piscatorial king of the deep as the fish fights to stay down. Minutes pass by like hours, all of us wondering if the 8 lb test line will break. Rudy skillfully plays the beast, letting him run when he wants and dive when he feels the urge. We all know that the trick to boating a behemoth is to tire him out and slowly work him to the rippled surface.

After four minutes of wrestling, the fish finally surfaces and rolls hard on his side to shake the hook. Rudy keeps his line tight and, once again, wrestles for control. The beast of the deep begins to tire. Like a large saturated tree stump, Rudy reels him in to the stern and steps back for Chris to net his trophy. Chris swipes under the exhausted fish and finds that he barely fits in the net, bending the pole. Into the boat he comes, eyes blazing with fury.

  

Rudy unhooks the spoon from his jaw with a pair of pliers and hoists the fish up to his chest. Even against Rudy’s massive torso, the fish looks like a monster. “Holy Mackerel!” I exclaim. “To be correct, Carleton, this is a holy laker!” retorts Rudy.

Pictures are taken and Rudy is crowned King for the Day. 

Turkey Divine

I spent the night at the deer camp alone. The fire in the old woodstove was my only company. I’d had an early dinner and gone to bed at 8:00, early even for a 53 year old. But tomorrow would be the Opening Day of turkey season in the Green Mountain state and I had made an appointment with a big ridge-running tom up in the saddle during last deer season. I had a vision of how the next morning would unfold and wanted to get an early start for the long hike up into the beech and oak stand at the end of the worn logging trail.

The alarm rang moments after I put my head on the pillow and had covered myself up in a Hudson’s Bay blanket I had been given for my 16^th birthday. At first I was groggy but quickly the image of the big tom snapped me to attention. My bare feet hit the cold plywood floor. The oil lamp in the corner glows a soft gold against the hemlock paneling of the camp’s walls. I stumbled to the stove and the propane burner made a whoosh sound when the blue flame magically appeared. Within minutes the old blue enamel percolator was gurgling and popping bubbles into the glass dome on its top. I filled my thermos with the pungent coffee, packed a granola bar and a container of water into my pack, and strolled out the door to meet the promise of dawn.

Peepers were singing in the backwash of a small pool created by the brook that flows by the deck. I began the long hike up the trail. It took several minutes for me to find the rhythm of my lungs inhaling the cool night air and my exhaling breath. I was definitely not the young man I once was. “But I do still have the drive to pursue the quarry of my dreams” I muttered out loud. Before long I found my stride and the cadence of my footsteps became melodic. The waning half moon shone through the trees and I pictured the big tom silhouetted against the sky, cast in moonlight and sleeping in his pine roost with one eye open.

As I neared the area where I had seen him last fall I slowed my pace and tried to breathe only through my nostrils to calm myself down. As I entered the back door of the old tom’s house, I crept silently into the kitchen, awash with luminescent trilliums blanketing the floor. In the moonlight I could distinguish the triangular shaped scratches of the flock that had fed earlier, before flying up into their roost for the night. My heart thumped in my chest. I prayed that my stealth would not be broken by an errant satellite bird on the outskirts of the feeding area. With great caution, I set out my jake and hen decoy in the trillium patch right on top of a big scrape with acorns littering the ground. The smell of wild leeks, called ramps in colloquial terminology, was permeating the night air.

I gathered my vest together and sat at the base of a large oak tree that provided a hammock-style root system offering me natural armrests. I used my pruners to clip some small hackberry bushes and pushed the pointed end of the branches in the moist earth at my feet. I leaned back against the tree and looked at my watch. It blinked 4:12. I had covered the distance to the spot in less than the 45 minutes I had allotted. Sweat ran down my neck and trickled down my back, tickling me as it cooled. I would not itch. I closed my eyes and listened to the sound of the woods.

I could hear the stream in the distance, gurgling down the ravines cut into the hillside. I heard a barred owl and my ears perked up for the response. Before the owl finished his “who cooks for you” song, a deep guttural sound penetrated the pre-dawn. The Big Bird had been awakened by this predator of the night and voiced his discomfort with a reverberating shock gobble. It sounded as if he was about 100 yards away.

“Perfect!” I thought. I didn’t get busted sneaking in. As dawn crept its way into the dark blue and purple horizon of the hillside to my east, I waited. Would he speak again? 15 minutes later I was beginning to get discouraged and started to think that maybe he flew down and walked away from me, up into the hillside on the opposite bank. No sound. Nothing.

Finally, half hour before sunrise I begin to hear timid hens purring on the roost. Still no response from the big tom. Pulling out a half-wing that I had salted from my bird last year, I beat it against my thigh, increasing the tempo rapidly to make it sound like a bird coming out of his tree. I thought fondly of my friend, Matt Norris, of Starksboro, who taught me this trick about a decade ago. After the wing beating I do another, this time with a fly-down cackle in syncopation with the tempo of the wing. I do a few gentle putts as my phantom hen hits the ground.

I lose my breath at the response. A thunderous gobble rings through the hills, obviously pointed in the direction of my ghost bird. I imagine that His Majesty is very upset that he had counted his entire harem of hens and knew where each of them were, and when he heard this one fly down, it was not one of which he had been aware. Perhaps, overnight, he had acquired yet another concubine and has not yet been properly introduced. I putt a few more times and he roars back his response. Who are you that have come into my kingdom unannounced?

Within minutes I hear the wing beats of several birds coming off the roost, one of which, I imagine is the King himself. Everything goes quiet.

Fifteen minutes pass and it feels like time is standing still. Knowing that silence, at this point in the game, is the most powerful indicator of a bird on his way, I raise my old Benelli Super Black Eagle to my shoulder and lean the forearm on my knee. My mask covers my face but I can see clearly through the eye and nose opening. I practice breathing through my nose, taking each breath with intent and purpose, inhaling deeply into my lungs. The smell of acrid onions permeates my nose. About fifty yards away I catch movement. Just a black shadow between brush.

Five minutes later, from behind a single beech tree I see a red and blue head peak out. He is now thirty yards away. Behind the cover of the beech he spits and drums the ground with his powerful wings. I can hear the leaves being tossed out from underneath his scaled legs. Five more minutes pass and I inhale a breath that sears my lungs with adrenalin. He steps up on the top of a fallen tree and throws himself into a full fan presentation to this mysterious mistress of spring.

His beard hangs in a thick braid of rope from his chest and touches the moss on the fallen tree between his feet. I draw my bead on the base of his neck and wait for him to stretch out again. It seems he is going to spot me any minute. Finally, he lifts his head in regal disdain for this hen that will not show herself. I whisper to myself “Here I am!” and pull the trigger.

I do not remember hearing the report from the 12 gauge 3 ½” shell, but I see him drop and know that my shot has found its mark. I rush to his side and as the green fire fades from his eyes, I pray.

“Great Spirit, whose breath gives life to all the world, hear me. I am small and weak. I need your strength and wisdom. Let me walk in beauty. Make my eyes behold the red and purple sunset. Make my hands respect the things that you have made. Make me wise that I may understand that things that you have taught my people. Let me learn the lessons you have hidden in every leaf and rock. I seek strength, not to be greater than my brother, but to fight my greatest enemy, myself. Make me always ready to come to you with clean hands and straight eyes, so that when life fades as the fading sunset, my spirit may come to you without shame.”

I am in rapture with the universe. The walk back to the camp seems strangely easy. I feel the weight of the big tom on my back as I carry his legs strapped together by an antler and leather lanyard made by a friend from long ago.

The passage of time washes over us all and for moments we are blissfully aware of its salutary nature. A chain of memories binds us all to the present and eventually, when that chain is full of cherished moments like these, it is time to go.

 

The red and purple sun sets over the mountain and I embrace all that I have known. I drift to sleep in my reclining chair in front of the woodstove, with firelight dancing on the hemlock walls.

 

PLEASE JOIN US THIS WEEKEND!

Come join us at the Yankee Sportsman's Classic this weekend! I will be giving waterfowl seminars Sat & Sun at 3:00. We need some warm bodies in the room! We're up against the Benoits...I willl have smoked goose breasts for samples and a movie of the season that never happened! Please come join us!
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Malletts Bay Produces Huge Pike

Malletts Bay Produces Huge Pike

 Whistlers

The boat trailer is already hooked up. As the truck turns over the thermometer on the dashboard blinks reluctantly. 10 degrees. Most accesses will be frozen. I toss the axe in the bed of the truck in anticipation of chopping ice. As I lay my fingers on the steel head of the axe I feel a burn. It’s one of those mornings when everything I touch has a little sting associated to it.

During the drive to the access I reflect on the beginnings of my day. A cold blast of arctic air had crept in through the window of the bedroom. Usually, I leave it open just a crack to let in fresh air to offset the old Vermont Castings woodstove which cranks out an almost intolerable heat from down in the kitchen. I had been sleeping above my covers when the frigid Arctic fingers reached through the window and wrapped themselves around my feet like a death-tolling ghost. I bolted upright and looked at the clock. 3:25am. It would be five more minutes until the radio began crackling the local country station’s middle-of-the-night news. I figured that I might as well just get up. I staggered downstairs and when I opened the porch door to let out my whimpering black lab, Boo, I was assaulted by the air sailing around the Northwest corner of the porch. I commanded him to “hurry up!” and he wriggled past me, breathing frosty exhalations of gratitude for letting him back in. I meandered over to the sink and turned on the weather. The old radio whispered static for a moment then the voice of the outdoors began to deliver his monotone soliloquy. The voice in the box said that the wind was indeed from the Northwest and attached the moniker of an Arctic Clipper. These were to be clear, cold winds of 10-20 mph on land with more dramatic currents on the lake. The lake level was deemed moderately low at 95.5 feet above sea level and the water temperature was delivered in the same uncaring voice; only 36 degrees at the Coast Guard station 20 miles North. In minutes I was dressed and was pouring a thermos of dark French Roast coffee. I grinned as I add a drizzle of maple syrup. What is it about maple syrup in coffee that warms the soul after spending hours outside? Maybe it’s the thought that something that comes from trees has to be helpful to ward off a chill.

Arriving at the access, launching the boat goes smoothly. The ice is about 1” thick but breaks with a gentle tap of the axe. The amber lights of the trailer guides glow warmly in the rear view mirror. Slowly backing down the ramp so as not to lose the boat by sliding off the trailer, I hit the ice on the bottom of the ramp and the truck lurches backward, sending my heart into high gear. Then as the wheels enter the water they catch traction again and I settle down. The bowline is clipped to the rings on the bed of the truck so I can launch solo. The boat slides easily off the trailer and into the steam rising off the water.

The whistler decoys are in a bag, strapped to the bow with bungee cords. The wind is blowing about 10-20 knots from the Northwest. I climb into the canvas blind surrounding the cockpit, being careful not to tear any of the Fastgrass on the sides. I lean over the stern and pray. “Please let this old motor start this morning.” The old Honda resists on the first two pulls and then she coughs once, sputters, and roars to life like a race horse at the gate. I call my pup, Boo to “kennel” into the boat and he jumps proudly on top of the decoy sack, like a hood ornament.

We shove off, busting through a thin layer of sheet ice, turn into the wind, and head toward the corner of the island.

With each decoy I toss out, I am thinking that later it will be painful to pick up with its wet cord and anchor. I set out 2 dozen whistlers and a dozen bluebills, then pull the boat up to the rocky shoreline. I wedge the boat’s hull under an old oak tree that clings to the rocks. My Barnegat Sneakboat is as mobile and shallow drafting a boat as can be made. I am filled with pride that it took me 18 months to complete this craft in my old garage and now it is serving me in these rugged conditions like a dependable friend. I light the propane heater and push it up under the spray curtain. It billows a welcome heat out from under the fore deck. I set up my milk box with a flotation cushion and hunker down inside the grassy mound. I pour a cup of coffee from the neoprene covered thermos and place it on the port shelf made by the canvas siding. I watch the steam swirl off of the cup and feel nirvana arriving. As I load my Benelli I hear it. The distinct, unmistakable sound of cold arctic air tearing over stiff wing pinions, like a child blowing on an acorn top. Goldeneyes!

I scrunch down, hunching my shoulders under the top of the blind and peering out into the smoky fog rising off of the water. I raise my gun to ready and watch closely. The big bird swings across the bay from shore. A lone drake whistler. He swings over the decoys at 30 yards and presents himself to me in a picture perfect broadside belly shot. I raise my gun to my shoulder and swing through the gorgeous black and white body. As my eyes find the cheek patch, still swinging, I squeeze the trigger and the bird folds up in mid-flight, bouncing off of the surface and coming to rest without motion at the edge of the decoys. Boo is shivering with excitement on the bow. “Back!” I command loudly. Boo flies off the bow like an F-16 leaving the deck of a carrier. He breaks through the surging water and creates a wake with his powerful swimming technique, using his tail as a rudder. As he approaches the bird he opens his mouth and slams his jaws shut on the big drake like it was the most important singular event in his life. 

His swim back to the boat is filled with pride. His head is held high above the rippling surface. I could swear he is grinning. He crawls up on the bow and holds the beautiful boutonniere-adorned bird, it’s head glistening in the sunlight, a black-green iridescent sheen. “Leave it!” I command. He gently places the drake in my hand and in that moment life is defined as the joyful expression of the present. I am grateful for all that is. Man and dog share the bond that has spanned generations. 

Join us at tomorrow's Dead Creek Wildlife Day!

Join us for the fun! Blow our goose calls, hide in our layout blinds, play with our dogs, learnt o "flag" a goose, set up decoys and "talk to the birds!"

http://www.vtfishandwildlife.com/images/deadcreek/poster_11_for_web.pdf

An Important and Well Written Read

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