Blue Backs

 

This is a good time of year to catch some blue-backs. What is a blue-back? It’s not an easy question to answer. Most salmon have a blue back and a white belly when they come out of the ocean. There could be a reason. To a predator looking from above the blue back of the fish blends in with the deep blue sea. A predator looking at the same fish from below will have a hard time seeing the white belly against the light of the sky. This blue and white color scheme works equally well for predators trying to attack prey either from above or below. As the fish enter the river they endure an amazing transformation from salt to fresh water. Their salt water scales fall off. Fish change color to match the rocks in the river so they can be well camouflaged while they spawn. A fish that has a blue back generally means it just came out of the saltwater so it is in the best eating condition.

Some people call the sea-run cutthroat a blue-back and that is our right as decent Americans. Others call these fish the “Harvest Trout” because they run in late summer but they are wrong. Cutthroat will always be blue-backs to me. Like all anandromous fish Cutthroat come up the river to spawn but they do not die after spawning like the salmon. They feed on the eggs of the spawning fall salmon. The presence of the sea-run Cutthroat is an indication of the health of the salmon runs.

The Lake Ozette sockeye were also once called blue-backs but now they are called “endangered species.” The most famous trout on the Olympic Peninsula, the Beardsley of Lake Crescent was also called a blue-back. The Beardsley was named after Admiral Beardsley who brought the U.S. Navy's Pacific Squadron to Port Angeles for summer maneuvers in 1895. Admiral Beardsley was said to have spent so much time fishing at Lake Crescent they named the trout after him. The legend has been passed down that the Admiral caught three hundred and fifty trout on his very first visit to Lake Crescent. It is not my place to question the integrity of someone who was with Commodore Perry's landing at Kurihama, Japan in 1853, was on the monitor Nantucket during the ironclad attack on Charleston Harbor in 1863, carried the first U.S flag through the Suez Canal in 1871 and re-opened the Chilkoot Pass in 1880, no Admiral Beardsley's service record speaks for itself.  Still 350 trout is just a little bit too round and tidy a number and besides, reeling in a Beardsley trout is not as easy as it sounds...

E.B. Webster, founder of the Port Angeles Evening News which became the current Peninsula Daily News, wrote about the Beardsley trout in his epic book, “Fishing the Olympics.”

Webster estimated the Beardsley could hit speeds of twenty-five miles an hour when it struck and peel a hundred feet of line before jumping six or seven feet in the air. A Tacoma angler was said to have spent three hours and forty five minutes reeling in an eleven pounder. Beardsley trout were known to reach twenty pounds. Imagine catching three hundred and fifty of those blue-backs. There's not enough hours in the day.  Even if Admiral Beardsley was fishing two rods he'd be lucky to catch half that number in a day. This would confirm my theory of translating fish stories into English where you simply divide or multiply each number by a factor of two depending on who you are talking to.

Owl Season

 

 

It's never too early to get ready for hunting season. This year should provide many new bang-up opportunities for hunters to enjoy the bounty of the great outdoors. I'm not talking about deer hunting. Our deer populations are still depressed by the devastating hair loss syndrome which the authorities are at a loss to explain. You might as well forget about elk hunting while we are on the subject. Even now the pathetic remains of our once great herds are being shot up by poachers leaving calves with no mothers and frantic nursing mothers out searching for their calves. The legal hunt for these animals starts in September and runs through December. Combine the long hunting seasons, poachers and the burgeoning populations of bears and cougars and who could blame the elk and deer for moving into town. The woods are simply too dangerous for animals anymore.

As hunters we are indeed fortunate that a hard-working group of federal biologists have stepped up to the plate to provide us with an awesome alternative to big-game hunting, shooting barred owls. In a 505-page environmental impact statement The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service described this new hunting opportunity as “limited experimental removal using lethal means.”

The bios' have proposed shooting over 3,600 of these magnificent trophy birds in an effort to save the endangered northern spotted owl. 

The barred owls are thought to originate in Canada, which would make them illegal aliens. For years we were assured that the Canadian owls only ate mice and flying squirrels that American spotted owls no longer wanted. We were supposed to believe the barred owl would only live in nests too dilapidated for an American owl to consider. Then we heard horror stories of breeding pairs of spotted owls being overwhelmed by barred owls in a manner too shocking for a family newspaper.

Are we going to wait until the mystical “hoot” of American owls in our Nations' wild places is replaced by the  “eh” of the Canadian owls before we decide to do something about this new threat to our endangered species. I think not. Maybe you remember the last time a critter threatened our spotted owls. It was a timber beast called the hickory-shirted logger. The biologists chose not to shoot the loggers because if you do and the logger finds out about it they can become agitated. Instead the loggers were trans-located to Alaska.

It's just too bad there’s no room in Alaska for 3,600 barred owls so we have no choice but to shoot them. People have asked me how you could shoot such a beautiful, trusting creature that just sits on a limb and stares at you with those big round eyes. It's easy, you don't have to lead them so far. Even in the air the barred owl is a slow flier so it should be no problem to get your limit. Of course once you have bagged your trophy it's time to see how the barred owl stacks up as table fare. Rumor has it that the barred owl tastes a lot like the marbled murrelet only less greasy.

Right now I am scrambling to come up with an owl recipe book that will include, Stuffed Owl with maple syrup infused back-bacon to honor their Canadian heritage and Pressed Owl in case you run one over with your truck. It will include a chapter on how to pluck an owl. Those who do not want to be an owl plucker may prefer to skin them. There is more than one way.

 

Summer Bird Watching

                                                 Great Blue Heron Tracks

                                                       Summer Bird Watching.

      It was daylight on the water in a quiet back eddy far from the fast current of the main river.  I was bird watching which in the fisherman's dialect of the West End means you're fishing but not catching anything so you may as well watch birds. This is probably the best time of year to fish since it never snows here in the summer. It's probably the worst time of year to bird watch if you have a weak stomach or sensitive nature. That's because this is the time for young birds to try their wings and leave the nest before they are eaten by one of many predators that have their own babies to feed.      Witnessing the attack of two bald eagles on a great blue heron nest must be one of the queasiest sights in nature. The great blue heron must be one of the worst nest builders in the entire bird kingdom. I've seen them nesting in a spindly hemlock that didn't look like it could support one heron never mind a mating pair and half dozen hatchings in a nest made of sticks the size of the bed of a pickup truck. The parents feed their young with revolting regularity on a diet of half-digested fish that is regurgitated into the bottomless craws of the nestlings whose constant squawking seems to advertize the position of the nest to any predators in the neighborhood.

In the air the Great blue herons glide in a slow lumbering flight that seems to take forever to get them anywhere. With their necks majestically folded and their legs hanging back like a rudder they appear easy prey for an eagle.  The only thing the herons have going for them is their exceptional wariness and a long sharp beak that looks like it could poke through a sheet of plywood.  Eagles dive with the speed of well, an eagle with long sharp talons and a beak that can rip through about anything. You wouldn't think a great blue heron would have a chance against an eagle so maybe that's why there is usually a pair of herons on a nest.

All I saw for sure was two eagles chasing one of the herons.  It might have been acting like a decoy to lure them away from the nest. I've watched eagles catch geese, ducks and even a pelican so you'd think a slow flying heron wouldn't stand a chance. Not that I care. Herons are fish eating devils that can spear a foot long trout and choke it down whole in one gulp. If you've ever had trout pond you'd be amazed how little time it takes for the herons to clean out every fish. I figured those eagles would be making the world a better place by eating a heron or two. The lone heron appeared doomed with two eagles closing in fast. There was nowhere for the heron to hide in the wide open sky and I had a ringside seat. Then the heron started spiraling up higher in tight little circles. The eagles were denied their main weapon, where they hit their target with a surprise attack from above. They flapped their wings for all that they were worth but could not catch the heron in its ungainly, ridiculous looking vertical take-off. In the space of a minute the birds were just little specks in the sky. The eagles gave up and glided off in different directions. I sat on a stump stunned by the realization that not even the bird watching was going my way this morning.

 

Moon Campers

This could be the year to plan for a truly unique camping experience the whole family can enjoy. Forget about the disgust and hassle of setting up a leaky tent, or the gas-guzzling expense and danger of piloting a bloated RV through a maze of crumbling highways and collapsing bridges that endanger the traveling public of this great nation. It's way past time to shed these outdated notions of outdoor recreation and embrace a whole new opportunity for adventure that's so far out of the box, it's out of this world! Thanks to the tireless efforts of two of our nation's lawmakers we may have a new opportunity to expand our horizons beyond our wildest imagination. Democratic Reps. Donna Edwards of Maryland and Eddie Bernice Johnson of Texas have filed legislation that would establish a U.S. national park on the moon- “The Apollo Lunar Landing Sites National Historical Park.”

“As commercial enterprises and foreign nations acquire the ability to land on the Moon it is necessary to protect the Apollo Lunar landing sites for posterity,” reads H.R. 2617, otherwise known as the “Apollo Lunar landing Legacy Act.” They are proposing that NASA work with the Department of Interior and the National Park Service to manage access to, provide interpretation of, and help historically preserve all areas where astronauts and instrument connected with the 1969-72 Apollo space program touched the lunar surface. Edwards, a ranking member of the House Space Subcommittee, is concerned that artifacts left at six Apollo landing sites could be pirated away in the not-too-distant future.

We put a man on the moon so why not establish a National Park on the Moon? Just because we signed the United Nations 1967 “Outer Space Treaty” where we agreed not to subject outer space to use or occupation,” no big deal. That was then. We’re thinking about the future.

Our national parks are a uniquely American invention that protects endangered species, preserves historic sites and allows us to experience the outdoors. Unfortunately our National Parks are losing their relevance on Earth.  Younger generations of Americans who've grown up playing video games and watching horror movies have no patience for any distractions from the electronic world they inhabit. Children these days associate sitting around a campfire in the woods at night with a scene in a horror movie with a zombie in a hockey mask.

Populations of Endangered Species in our National Parks continue to dwindle despite the best available science. The historic sites in our National Parks are being destroyed by the jack-booted heel of rampant development and a bureaucratically engineered system of benign neglect.

A National Park on the Moon would contain no endangered species to restore, mission accomplished. Young people might be convinced to visit the Moon thinking it was a video game. The historic site of the Apollo Landings on the Moon could be preserved as a gift shop where Moon campers could buy plastic reproductions of space travel artifacts and obtain the required passes, permits and licenses to pay for the administration of our newest National Treasure.

Future generations of Moon campers will thank us for this.   

 

 

 

Elwha River Water, So thick you’ll want to drink it with a fork but you may need a shovel.

 

I feel kind of bad about missing the birthday party of an old family friend. Some of my earliest memories were of all the fun we had hanging out at her place. She was a grand old dame who defined the term, “land poor', that is she had a lot of land but not a lot of money. It didn't matter because she had a lot of things that money couldn't buy like the absolute quiet of a forest of world record sized trees, a star filled sky with no streetlights and crystal pure water that you could drink right out of the stream.  She had herds of almost tame elk that didn't seem to be bothered much by humans and runs of salmon that were so thick you could almost walk across the river on their backs.  We used to swim in her ice-cold lakes and fish in her crystal clear rivers. You could hike for days along her hidden trails and stay in a series of rustic shelters that had been built by the pioneers. Or you could hike off the trails and discover places you could figure no human had ever been. Her place was a little slice of heaven that formed some of my earliest childhood memories. It was good, too good to last.

You know how some people tend to get a little cranky as they get older.  Life is change after all but the day she started charging money to get on her land I knew our relationship was in danger. Of course she needed the money to keep the campgrounds open. We're talking about Olympic National Park here. Parks have always been a low priority in this country where it seems like our politicians would rather give money to foreign countries that hate us, than spend it here at home. Unfortunately it seemed like the more money we gave the park the crazier she got with spending it. She seemed to forget the park was for the people who paid with their tax dollars to support her and started treating it as a private domain where scientists could conduct experiments of questionable value.

The scientists started forest fires just to study them. They electro-shocked the bull trout just to study them. They took the dams out of the Elwha so they could study that too.

It was an experiment we were told, to see if taking the dams out would bring fish back to the river. This ignored the sad fact that the fish were endangered in rivers with no dams. Nobody seemed to care much about the fish. All that mattered was the 325 million dollars in Federal funds coming to our community.   Of this 150 million was spent on a new water system for Port Angeles. Unfortunately this has turned into another National Park Experiment.

The exact amount of sediment coming down the Elwha after the dam removal was an unknown variable. No one could predict just how fast the sediment could clog up the new water filtration plant. No one knows if the current well that the city depends on for its' water supply will be affected by the close proximity of the silt-choked Elwha.

No one knows who is at fault for the silt clogging the water system but there should be plenty of blame to go around. The Solicitors Office, which is the legal branch of the U.S. Department of Interior, is “anticipating legal action”. This should be another great experiment to see if lawyers can make pure drinking water out of a monstrous pile of court documents.

 

Angling for Elk

Thar' She Blows!

 

Angling for elk could be the hottest new sport since alligator wrestling!  Hook up with one of these trophies and get ready for the fight of your life. Scientifically designed zircon encrusted Kevlar coated Velcro lures attach to the elk with an 8,000 lb test Spectra mainline. You’re strapped to the detachable skid-mounted fighting seat so that when you snag one of these beauties you’ll be on a scenic high speed chase through the only temperate rainforest wilderness in America.  Once or if the elk tires you simply throw out the grappling hook to slow down enough to where the real adventure begins, unhooking the elk.  This is a 100% catch and release fair chase fishery, I mean hunting opportunity.

You’ll need

Crash Helmet, body armor, first aid kit. 

Special group rates available

Dairy Farm Threatens Endangered Bull Trout.

 

 

 

 

                                                    
                                                    Bull Trout Giganticus

It was a good week to be a bull trout. Clallam County Commissioners approved the removal of an historic dairy farm along the Dungeness River. Farm removal is a key element in the multi-million dollar plan to restore the bull trout in the Dungeness River by removing the flood control dike. Built in 1963, the dike has prevented the river from wandering freely across the historic flood plain.  The best available science believes the dike “constricted” the river.  With the dike removed it is hoped the bull trout will thrive and prosper. Previous efforts to restore the bull trout have included building log jams, buying property, (from willing sellers) then razing the structures and planting native vegetation. In addition the Dungeness River is closed to fishing for most of the year.  Despite these efforts and the millions of dollars spent, the Dungeness bull trout is more threatened and/or endangered than ever.

Removing the dike to save the bull trout is an experiment that could eventually endanger some homes and farms.

Any non-compliant, obstructionist or reactionary elements whose bourgeois sensibilities foster an unhealthy attachment to their homes will become willing sellers once they are flooded out. Small farms can become willing sellers once their water is shut off.  As my Uncle Joe used to say,

“Losing an acre of farmland is a tragedy. Losing a hundred acres is a statistic”.

                                             Dairy Farm Threatens Endangered Bull Trout

The family farm is an anachronism that has no place in our modern age. A visit to a dairy farm is a good case in point.  Typically, the dairy cows graze aimlessly across an open pasture.  Factory farms with cows in cages produce more milk at less cost. Milk is not just something you dunk your cookies in anymore. With the miracle of genetic engineering and the can-do attitude of today’s corporate farmer, milk has become a commodity that can compete with sports drinks for the market share. Modern milk has enough vitamins and additives in it to help children grow up strong like former Soviet Union athletes. We don't need farms for vegetables anymore either. Modern farm produce can be produced cheaper in third world countries where labor rates and chemical restrictions are more in line with the global economy.

It is a small price to pay to save the bull trout.