Hunting, fishing bring to mind keen memory

My lifestyle has greatly changed in the last five weeks. I had spinal surgery on the last day of March. Lots of pain. Recovery is slow. No fishing, no turkey hunting, no bike riding, no long hikes. No nothing! Just a prisoner IN my house, simply chained to my chair. My wife Beth has been a great nurse helping me. But she is the Gestapo when it comes to me doing too much too soon!

But my mind is not chained to the house. I have myriads of great hunting and fishing memories. So I just let them flood in like I am in the boat or field. Some of the memories are old, some more recent.

One of my recent memories came out of our month-long trip to the Florida Keys in February. We only had a couple of days remaining before starting the long haul back to Texas. Beth and I launched my 16-foot ski and we ran to one of the many bridges connecting the Keys. The tide was just beginning to move when I spotted some minnows around a large light pole near the bridge. A tarpon was busting into the minnows. I cast a long silver bass jerk-bait into the minnows and had an immediate hard strike. I was sure it was the tarpon. Wrong! The fish went deep and fought hard. I knew a tarpon would already be in the air. Finally, Beth netted a nice 10-pound Jack Crevalle.

At the next light pole I saw more baitfish and cast the jerk bait beside the pole. I saw the tarpon flash on the bait. I set the hook as best as I could on my light rod and 10-pound test mono line. The tarpon made a long, hot run then catapulted into the blue Florida morning sunlight. The lure came flying back to the boat.

Someone said hooking a tarpon is like dropping your lure into a glass milk bottle. Trying to get a hook to stick is not likely. But sitting in my chair in the house, the whole scene changed to a beautiful bay with a wild tarpon leaping into the sky. Memories are great.

My surgery caused me to miss the whole Rio Grande spring turkey season. I have called in many gobblers but I remember one of the last ones I shot. I had set up a flimsy temporary camp blind in a pecan bottom on Cibolo Creek. It was a beautiful morning with very low winds. I heard a gobbler sound off far down the creek in some heavy brush and timber. I made a few yelps on my call and he heard it and answered. The next time he gobbled he was closer. He was hot after the “hen.” I was sitting near a couple of pecan trees. The pecan bottom had been moved with a tractor. It was wide open. He gobbled once more and I shut up. He knew where I was. He came to a barbed wire fence separating the brush from my open field. He disked right under and headed straight for me. I wish I had brought my little .410 gauge auto because I could have brought that turkey into my lap. The .410 gauge would have been plenty a gun. At about 30 yards he paused and I pulled the trigger on my 12 gauge Browning auto. He joined the group of birds in turkey heaven. The memories of that hunt set me free from my pain and infirmary prison!

Many years ago my friend Eddie Hinote, my two sons, Tim and Terry, and I were hunting ducks in Big Lagoon near Pensacola Pass. My duck hunting years in Pensacola were not the best. Pensacola was not on a major waterfowl flyway. We caught only the edge. Most of the ducks we killed were divers. Very few nice pintails, mallards, gadwalls and teal. But when you love to hunt ducks you take what you can.

We saw a large group of divers in the distance. I called and they turned our way. They crossed the decoys at about 20 yards high.

“Tak’em,” I shouted.

All four of us shot into the tight formation of bluebills. When our shot patterns blew through the formation, it looked like we cut a doughnut hole out of the group. Ducks fell out in wads. They were all over the water. My dog, Lodie, really went to work. The hunt was over. We had our limit of bluebill divers. My boys still talk about blowing that doughnut hole in those ducks.

Right before my surgery, my good friend and neighbor, Tom Ray, and I took our kayaks to Lake LBJ right below Inks Dam. Even with my bad back I knew I could do it because Tom helps me so much. He launched the two kayaks and before he could climb into his boat I had a white bass on.

White bass run up the Colorado River to the dam each spring. I lived four miles below the dam on the Buckner Boys Ranch 55 years ago. I caught white bass then and its still the same. The fish were thick. I tried to fish two rods but the bite was too fast. At 8:15 we had 46 white bass, loaded the kayaks and turned south toward home.

That's not a bad memory to go into surgery with a few days later. Thank God for outdoor memories.