Locke's Leap of Faith

November arrived with its entourage of cold nights, windy days, falling leaves, and predictive early snow flurries. The firearms deer season would open in mid November and the members of the Chukar Harbor Ancient Order of Sportsmen (CHAOS) made last minute plans for their hunts. Flint Locke, the Sheriff of Chukar County, had stumbled upon a sizable herd of deer in the marshy islands of the Mashkigwan River earlier in the year. He went back in late October to mark some trails and now he was trying to persuade C.F. Icair to accompany him on a hunt of the islands.

"The reason that herd is so large is that the islands are in the middle of the river, Sheriff Locke said. " No predators and plenty of food".

"Yeah, but any hunting would require a boat, not to mention that those islands are crisscrossed with swampy streams and marshlands." Icair reminded him. A boat wasn't the problem. They both owned boats adequate to the task of carrying two men with gear, a deer. Icair’s concern was tracking a deer through the area if they didn’t make a clean kill. The deep, cold rivulets and the black, silty marshes could make a blood trail disappear and travel risky.

Nonetheless, in keeping with the ‘nothing comes easy’ spirit of CHAOS, the two companions found themselves at the river’s edge on opening day. Sheriff Locke launched his 14-foot flat-bottom boat and the two hunters headed for a mid-size piece of high ground on one of the forested islands. It was 2:00 P.M. by the time they had arrived at Old Gooseberry Isle and were settled into their blinds.

About an hour before sunset, around 4:00 P.M., C.F. Icair heard Sheriff Locke fire his rifle. One shot. Clean kill. Good. Since they needed to be in the boat on their way back to the boat launch by sunset, Icair gathered his gear and started walking the 150 yards or so to Sheriff Locke’s blind. About 25 yards out from Locke’s blind, Icair ran into the Sheriff who was searching the ground.

"Problem?" Icair queried.

"Nice 6-point". Sheriff Locke said. "He ran this way. Looks like he entered the brush here." Knowing the light would be failing soon, the two hunters followed the blood trail to the edge of one of the black water streams that crisscrossed the island. It was about 10 feet wide; too wide for men to leap across.

However, a dying buck can leap it. Sheriff Locke’s 6-pointer was lying on the other side, in full view, about 30 feet from the stream. The stream appeared to be one of those deep, slow moving tributaries with water as black as coal from centuries of silt from the Mashkigwan River.

"What now?" Icair asked. The light was already dimming and they were in the 50 yards deep into the swamp. Before long, they would have to load the deer into the boat and return to the launch area. It would definitely be dark by the time they reached the launch area.

"See that tree over there?" Flint pointed to a freshly fallen cedar stretched across the stream about 30 feet away. Tuck the deer harness under your coat. I’ll take the rope. We’ll use that tree to cross the stream." They unloaded their weapons and leaned them against a tree.

The two men soon found themselves winding their way across the stream on the cedar blow-down. Suspended over the menacing water, Locke and Icair soon discovered that the traits they possessed as young men, agility and bravado, had deserted them. The upright branches of the cedar were still limber and several times had them leaning over the water until they could regain their balance with the other’s help. One step at a time, they weaved precariously through the tangled branches until they both managed to cross the stream.

They slowly lowered themselves through the branches and extricated themselves from the tangled wood, bruised and scratched, but generally in good shape. It only took a few minutes to harness the deer and drag it to the edge of the stream.

"Now what?" Icair mumbled. There was no way out of the predicament. One of them was going to get wet. That was assuming the other would try to return via the cedar tree. Icair was thinking that getting wet was preferable to challenging the cedar tree alone.

"We’re pretty close to the boat." The Sheriff said. "I’ll swim across with a rope tied to the harness. You can come over on the cedar."

"I’m not sure I could climb up through those branches, even if I wanted to, Flint." Icair said. "We should cross one at a time in case one needs to pull the other out." Sheriff Locke agreed. The light was dimming now. The sun had dropped behind the horizon. Sheriff Locke tied the rope around his waist and wondered if he was about to jump into muck or quicksand. He removed his waders and as much clothing as he could.

"Well, here goes." Locke said.

Locke backed up a few steps and ran forward as he took a deep breath. He planted his right foot at the edge of the stream and leaped almost half way across the cold, black water. The Sheriff brought his feet together in the air to protect himself against any submerged objects. His boots hit the black water and he was instantly submerged in about four inches of water.

The hard, sandy bottom was a shock to the Sheriff. Since he had planned for a much greater depth, his feet tended to stay in place while his torso, prepared to swim, continued forward. He fell forward, trying to get his feet to take another running step, his arms flailing helplessly to stop his fall, but it was too late. He fell face down into four inches of cold, silty water only a foot or two away from the other bank.

C.F. Icair picked up the Sheriff’s parka and waders. He crossed the stream in four or five easy strides, passing Sheriff Locke as he got to his feet and untied the rope from his waist.

"Need any help?" Icair asked. He couldn’t quite hear Locke’s reply, but was pretty sure it included some expletives.

Royal Dun

Chasing Snow Trout

During the mid-winter ice and snow, N. Vince Sybil and I were smitten by the urge to do some winter trout fishing. While most people turn to outdoor activities like snowmobiling, skiing, snowshoeing, or ice fishing, winter fly-fishing is a sport enjoyed by tens of hardy, if not peculiar, outdoorsmen.

The forecast called for a cold but sunny day so we assumed we would have a heavily overcast sky and mild temperatures. That would be perfect for fly-fishing. It turned out that the weather forecasters chose that particular day to give their one accurate forecast for the year. The day was the first clear day all winter. With no clouds overnight all heat had escaped the planet and the temperature was about -12 degrees. We prepared for the cold by dressing in layers, including fleece pants, stocking caps, parkas, and a flask of single malt scotch.

Sybil and I reached the Wabimakadi River after negotiating some snow-laden roads. We got out of the car and slipped our parkas on. I tucked a pair of fingerless wool gloves into the left pocket of my parka along with a chemical hand warmer. We slipped on our waders and vests, grabbed our rods and cautiously worked our way down the first few feet of the sloping path that led to the river.

Sybil figured out how to make a wide, easily negotiated path in the virgin snow by placing his butt quickly and firmly against the ground, leaning back, and screaming his way to the bottom of the path with his neoprene-covered legs in the air. I, on the other hand, recovered Sybil’s rod and took the more traditional approach, stepping down the slope using the path so adequately cleared by my partner.

Shelf ice had formed along the edge of the river wherever a back eddy had slowed the current enough for the water to freeze. The entire forest was iced and quite winsome as Sybil broke some of the shelf ice to enter the water. He said he could have sworn that hole was three feet to the left. Although he was standing in four feet of water, surrounded by ice, he was able to extricate himself in spite of my feeble assistance and raucous laughter.

Trout, being cold-blooded animals, are less active in cold water and are best fished along the bottom with egg patterns and sculpins. We rigged up with weighted slip droppers and egg patterns, similar to a spinning rig used for steelhead fishing in the Midwest. I cast the rig to the head of a run on the outside of a bend and almost immediately felt the slight hesitation of a pickup. I raised my rod tip and felt the surge of a heavy trout on the other end.

"This is a nice fish!" I called out to Sybil who was gingerly probing the river’s edge to enter the water downstream. I felt the combined surge of the current and a heavy fish. But as I gently worked the fish toward me, I saw an eight-inch Brown Trout using a discarded foam cup with a hole in the bottom to protect itself from the cold. That so young a fish understood the insulating qualities of plastic foam impressed me as to their intelligence.

After a few more casts and the associated tip-ice removal, I noticed a sizeable dark area in the stream that seemed to undulate around a light patch in its center. Being of greater curiosity than sense, I quietly approached the scene, as the cold water swept against my waders.

The dark area turned out to be about a hundred fish in various sizes and tightly concentrated near the head of the school, body against body. This crowding created a huge air bubble behind them and, in the center of the air bubble, a small fire burned. The school slowly rotated clockwise around the fire until they reached its downstream side. After a few minutes of being warmed by the fire, these fish became more active and began migrating clockwise, toward the head of the school. As one fish joined the tightly packed group, another would drop backward taking its turn to warm itself by the fire.

I called Sybil over to witness this activity. Earlier, on our way to the river, we wondered if the stocked strains of the Wabimakadi were as hardy as wild fish, but we never considered they might be so resourceful. Instinctively, we realized these fish might perish if we attempted to break up the school, or cast to them, so we carefully moved around them and continued upstream keeping our eyes peeled for foam cups lurking behind the rocks.

In all my years of fishing, I have never observed such behavior. I considered returning to the car to get my camera so I could fully document this phenomenon but Vince’s cooler mind prevailed.

"Don’t bother," He said. "Scientists already know that heat flows downstream."

Royal Dun