Traplines

"Vegetarian: an old Indian word for 'can't hunt'."

There's an enormous amount of truth in that outside the word "vegetarian". Thanks to some input from my friend and faithful reader Craig Taylor of Pennsylvania, I'm going to take a jab at all you guys who spend hundreds on the after-market choke tubes.

Many hunters aren't the sharpest tack in the pack and a lot of them who are, simply ignore the basic laws of physics when it comes to shooting guns.  Here's two: "For every action, there's and equal and opposite reaction", and "Pressure and velocity vary inversely." No matter what you do, those two laws are going to play a part in the end result.

Suddenly the 3.5 inch magnum 12 gauge shotgun is the only one out there. Few people who are big and fat like me can take the kinds of recoil generated by these cannons, and many who force themselves to for manly purposes soon find they don't shoot nearly as well as they used to. Just anticipating the recoil makes them get the yips and flinching while pulling the trigger means your shot column isn't where you hoped it would be.

Next is that "velocity" thingy.  When you place a "super full" or "turkey choke" on your gun, you do it to increase the velocity of your shot downrange. It works lke the nozzle on a waterhose. But to increase that velocity, there has to be a pressure let off and that takes place right at the muzzle of your gun. That pressure doesn't disintegrate, it increases the recoil and puts stress on your firearm as well as your shoulder. Though American firearms are the most dependable around and manufacturers will tell you that adding those after-market chokes do them no harm, that's bull. I've seen 2 guns in the last 2 years with split barrels and both had after-market chokes.

Couple all this with a turkey head about the size of a tennis ball.  Sure, your pattern will be 12 inches wide at 60 yards, but what happens with a turkey at 10 and you with the yips? Many times the turkey gets an education and an ear ache and you start lamenting that it was "impossible" for someone of your skills to have missed a bird that close. Next time you're out, check your pattern at that range and it will probably be one or two inches at most.

If you want to "hunt" use a gun and shells that you're comfortable with and take shots at ranges that a "hunter" would be proud of. You can always lie to your buddies and say it was at 75 yards.

I'd always like Keith Warren and thought that he spoke as "one of us". I have to say, however, that impression is gone forever.

Recently on one of his shows, he speaks of his long ambition to shoot an elk with a handgun. Not just any handgun, mind you, as there are plenty lethal and effective handgun calibers out there to do an ethical job, but he wants to use his Glock chambered in a special handload .45 round.

I don't care how good a shot you are, how domesticated the elk happens to be inside his penned impoundment, this is simply an ego driven unethical way to portray what we as hunters have strived to protect.

Understand, Warren is a big proponent of shooting animals inside high fences, and he selected an area where he could get within steps of an elk.  These elk have been raised by hand and many of them are so human tolerant as to be hand fed. If you watch the video, this particular elk twitched several times as if to bolt, but remained in place until Warren was within feet of it. Warren did make a good shot that took the animal down, but it doesn't change the sorry commentary anyone professing to be a hunter would have to use in order to justify his ego.

The .45 is a venerable round and it is, without question, one of the best "man stoppers" on the market.  It is a very short cartridge, however, and cannot possibly hold enough powder and lead within those confines to be considered an effective choice for anything larger than a small deer  standing within arms length. To film such a stunt is bad enough, but to air it nationally is simply reprehensible.

As hunters, we should hold ourselves to higher standards that just being workers in a slaughterhouse. Our ethics and our respect for the game should take precedence over everything else and I found the complete segment disgusting.

Today's hunters have been brainwashed in the capabilities of firearms. All it takes is a few Marine snipers using .50 caliber BMG's or Dirty Harry with his .44 Mag to tell a Nimrod that he needs a bigger gun.

John Buol, Jr., in his article that appears on FirearmUserNetwork.com drops the sad truth of American shooting prowess like a bad habit. It's enthralling reading under the title: "Shooting Skills for Huntes: The .30-30 Drill".

The gist of the article is that most hunters have difficulty seeing a target at distances over 250 yards, little if any practice at hitting them, and no concept of the lethality of the smaller calibers out there that give you as much bang for the buck as you can stand.

The .30-30 shooting a 10 grain bullet at approximately 2200 fps can do the work on most of the most popular North American game out there.  When zeroed at 150 yards, it will be 2 inches high at 100 and 5 inches low at 200.

I have some friends who're exceptional shots and I know that they can and have made shots at 300 plus yards.  None of them took the shot to show off and it was certainly the only shot they had, but they have great discipline and posture to make those shots.  I've heard of guys bragging about hitting an animal at 800 yards and I have no doubt that the gun is capable of doing that, but why?  Why would anyone shoot at anything over a half a mile away. Just think how much easier the shot would be if you walked 600 yards closer.

Energy is another big fairytale. Why would anyone need a .300 Win Mag or bigger gun to shoot a black bear or a pronghorn antelope? Instead, think of owning a firearm that you can shoot comfortably that won't jar the fillings in your teeth and won't cause you to flinch when you pull the trigger. Shot placement beats a magnum round all day long. Learn to hit what you aim at before you start playing Quigly Down Under.

I know it's May but it's also the time of year when nights are cool and comfortable and day time temperatures and humidity don't suck the breath from you. It's a perfect time to be in your deer woods.

Now's the time to clean up your trails.  New growth green briars are  vulnerable to good herbacides. Winter blow downs can be cleaned off the trails and you can get a head start on those shooting lanes you'll end up working during August.

I like taking a 50 gallon electric sprayer out in my RTV and spraying down the roses, grean briars and bunch grasses that may be starting up on my old trails. It's wise to include a chain saw for the winter blowdowns, and a machete is always nice from pruning back new limbs and tall briars that have managed to intrude on your trails.

It's also an excellent time to be putting down mineral licks and blocks. Deer desperately need this during the time that the antlers are beginning to grow and does are about ready to start dropping fawns. Delaware soil is missing many of the bone growth minerals deer seek and if you have a mineral lick or a salt block hanging out, this is the time of year to insure it's fresh.

And sure, some of the foilage will come back before deer season, but if you get a head start on it, the job won't be so tough when you do have to go back in the late summer. Whatever you do, don't forget the permethrin. Ticks and chiggers are also in their glory this time of year and those are things you can do well without.

If you travel South State Street Extended near the Linkside Shopping Center, you've no doubt, seen the majestic trees with the pale lavendar flowers hanging like grapes.  This is a strange immigrant to the Delmarva and many southern states have actually listed it as an "invasive species." It it the polonia  or the Paulownia tree.

Native to Asia the tree barks and leaves of the tree were originally used to package China dishes on their long trek to America. Myth has it that such usage ultimately led to the sprouting and growing here, though that's questioned by many. I was imported here because of the showy spring flowers and used as a garden shrub.

Resembling the native catalpa tree in foliage, the polonia is an extremely fast growing, decidious tree. Though compared to the oak, this tree is amazingly unique. Growing up to 20 feet in one year, the wood is extremely straight grained and is, when compared to oak, almost fireproof. (The oak burns and about 500 degrees F while the polonia is nearly 800 degrees.) Because of it's rapid growth, the Global Warming groups are touting it as the answer to deforestation in the Amazon. For the same reasons, indigenous foresters class it invasive as it quickly dominates a planting area. Conversely, the lumber industry loves the possibility of quickly producing strong, straight grained lumber in a fraction of the time necessary for the oak and poplar to mature.

I grew up being a sort of wordsmith. I love this language and it's descriptive adjectives, metaphors, and simply the flexibility of its lexicon. Never would I have suspected that such a trait could lead me down the path of misery at times.

In 1994, Don Flood hired me as a freelance writer of an outdoors column for the newspaper. My style of writing even caused a few conflicts with him at times and after about the third or fourth call to me questioning my choices of words, I think he gave up. In contrast, however, I drew the attention of other wordsmiths whose sole joy seemed to come from finding me using an improper term or spelling. Originally I submitted a typewritten sheet that got transcribed and I often got blamed for those errors in transposing as well.

This all brings us to yesterdays Post and when it hit the street.

The story was about a Canada goose nesting in a tree and I sent several photos to validate the report. As I usually do in this cyber world today, I simply attached the photos to the email with a note on them. Because of space, some photos can't be used so I don't spend much time writing explanations. The editors do a great job of that and I'm just pleased to see some of them published.

In yesterdays paper, however, the editor noted that it was a picture of a "Canadian goose" on the nest. My first call came at 9 a.m.

Here's the deal.  I and the wordsmiths know that there is no such bird.  The proper term for the goose is the CANADA goose. Those geese don't have green cards and a large majority of the ones we see here today never left the state of Delaware.  Neither did most of their ancestors.

The Canada goose gets its name from the scientific name Branta canadensis. It is a member of the brant family of birds. Still, coloquialisms and usage end up getting words into dictionaries, and today's dictionary might very well contain "Canadian goose", but that doesn't mean it's proper nor accepted by purists or wordsmiths. We're just fortunate the names these geese get called on golf courses, city parks, and lawns is listed as "profanity" in the same dictionary.

Let's get one thing straight: rabies is incurable and fatal.  Once contracted, the infected person dies.  Simple enough.

For years I've harped on the dangers of rabies here in our Small Wonder. It seems to have fallen on deaf ears as just last week, a case of an unvaccinated pitbull having contracted rabies was reported by the state health department.  OH, and by the way, there was a second case also reported at the same time.

Rabies is vectored by and to any warm blooded animal.  Though rodents and opossums tend to avoid the disease because of their metabolism, they are still capable of carrying or contracting the disease. Though the bat is the first culprit most think of (about 7% of all bats do carry the disease and that is a troubling number), it is actually not the one usually responsible. Here in Delaware, the raccoon, the skunk and the fox are the prime carriers. Still, both the state and the local SPCA continue to stick their heads in the sand concerning feral animals and most especially feral cats. Tragically, I forsee that it's going to take some child dying from a rabid cat scratch before the legislators finally wise up to completely ignoring the cat problem in Delaware.

Oh, I know I risk the wrath of cat owners. I've lived with that burden quite well. Yet the first thing I want to know is how many of you cat owners allow your pets out of the house to roam the neighborhoods?  Did it ever occur to you that your sweet Fluffy might encounter a rabid coon, skunk or fox?  You already know cats aren't required to be vaccinated. Is yours?  And what happens, unbeknownst to you, if your cat becomes infected and then attacks you or a family member? Worse yet, what if the cat develops the "dumb" strain of the disease and simply dies quietly? If you touch the dead cat and have an open cut, you could contract the disease. Chances are you'd only know after it's too late to do anything about it.

Cats should not receive preferential treatment in Delaware and should be held to the exact same standards as dogs do. If it doesn't bother you that they aren't, it certainly should.

Politicians love to "grip and grin", but when approached with things of importance to us outdoors lovers, they tend to scurry back to their little legislative cubicles  and pretend they never heard us.

A recent report presented by the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership should be a wake up call to these posterior challenged Solons. It seems that on the Delmarva peninsula alone, nearly 4 billion dollars of revenue is directly attributable to the outdoor sports.

Not to confuse the issue of impact, we need to understand this includes portions of Virginia and Maryland, but if Delaware isn't getting its piece of the pie, then there's hardly anyone to blame other than ourselves.

Sadly, most of the commercial public fishing ventures (read "headboats") that once choked most of the Delaware  Bay ports of the 70's have gone with the weakfish. Still, there's a resource that could be helped if our governor spent time seeing how we could make money instead of chasing windmills. There's a big community of bird watchers that are virtually untapped here. Many "nature lovers" are exempt from contributing while the huntes and fishermen still have to buy licenses, permits and stamps. Why do the other two states sharing our peninsula allow Sunday hunting to some degree yet it is taboo to these legislators?

Four billion dollars isn't something anyone can dismiss. With the economy in turmoil and every agency looking to just stay afloat, it's time we told the people we elect to represent us to start doing what they're paid to do. Grip and grin may be fine for newspapers and kissing babies may make the parents share a Kodak moment, but it sure doesn't pay the rent.

Mr. John Thompson, a faithful and dedicated shooter, outdoorsman, and hunter has retired from his position as the chair of the Delaware Shooter Sportsman's Association (DSSA) due to health issues. John has served us and the state in protecting our gun rights for over 30 years.  He was  instrumental in getting the current changes in the concealed deadly weapons permits and the instituting of a handgun season in the state.

At the recent Friends of the NRA banquet at the Modern Maturity Center in Dover, former NRA President and retired Dover police captain, John Sigler presented Mr. Thompson with an NRA achievement award for his dedicated and faithful service.  John has been a mainstay at the DSSA for as long as I can remember and he will surely be missed.

Thank you for your service Mr. John Thompson. All of us wish you the very best.

Over the years, many of us have used the services of McMillan Fiberglass Stocks and the McMillan Firearms Manufacturing company for our gun works. Know by outdoorsmen for their quality work and smooth fit, McMillan stocks have become a staple of many target shooters over the years.  Thanks to that, they have expanded their services to include other ancillary products for shooters and shooting sports.

Writing on Facebook last Thursday,Kelly McMillan, Operations Director for the company, described a meeting that was held when he was called to the office of Ray Fox, a business banking Senior Vice President for Bank of America (BOA).  Arriving for what he had been led to believe was an "account analysis", Fox quickly turned it into a diatribe chastising McMillian for his growth in the firearms industry.

Tiring quickly of being dressed down, McMillan asked pointedly if Fox was implying that he should take his business banking elsewhere. According to McMillan, Fox replied, "That is correct."

McMillan is in the process of finding a bank more respectful of the Second Amendment.

Fox later commented that Bank of America had to "do what we had to do" and to "assess the risk of doing business with a firearms related industry." I think we, as hunters, shooters, and outdoorsmen should now return that sentiment and assess our need to use BOA. McMillan supports the first statement and plans to do what it must do as well. Their first consideration is to refuse purchases using BOA credit cards.

The persistent drought on the Delmarva has dried up many of the usual watering holes and brought in a virtual infestation of no-see-ums.

No-see-ums are tiny midges that cover a plethora of species. Most are bothersome and innocuous, but the hemophlagic member of the family is just plain trouble. Being no larger than a grain of fine black pepper,  these biting pest burrow into your skin and suck your blood. Their color is a transparent gray and oftentimes the pinch of their bite will take a second or third look in order to smush the little varmint. Thus comes the name "no-see-um".

The problem they cause to deer hunters is because of the drought.  Traditional watering holes are drying up and the midges swarm to existing pools in search for more warm blooded animals.

This is the time of the year where the whitetail is beginning to be stressed and these little flies will bite velvet antlers, mucous membranes around the eye and any other exposed skin areas such as the nostrils and anus.  The problem comes , not from the loss of blood, but from the bloodborne diseases they carry.  The most devastating one is epizootic hemmorhagic disease (EHD)  or what's called "blue tongue" by many.

EHD causes a high fever in the animals who then congregate at the watering holes trying to cool their insides. The animal's tongue turns blue and few animals infected are able to survive more than a couple days.

Miraculously, those does that do survive, then pass an immunity to EHD on to their offspring. That is the only bright side as EHD often reaches epidemic stages within the herd with massive die-offs (The fabled Milk River area in Montana had the majority of their whitetails die from the epidemic.)

Still, the whitetail is a resilient animal and will eventually make a comeback in those areas.  The areas hardest hit will be slower to recover, obviously. So pray for rain and hope for a mild summer season if you plan to get the "big one" this fall.

Don't forget the Friends of the NRA Banquet being held at the Modern Maturity Center this Friday night.  The doors will open at 5:30 pm and dinner will be served at 7:15. Tickets are $50 and you'll need reservations.  You can contact Sharon Donovan at (302) 672-8129.  More information can be found about the event at www.friendsofnra.org.

This event is held each year to raise funds for local NRA sponsored events and for simply "getting the word out". Every gun owner in America should be a member of this organization. There are other fractured groups supporting our Second Amendment rights, but none puts their money where their mouth is like the NRA .  Backed by it's over 3 million members, the threat of legislative clout is enough for many politicians to wither under it's gaze.  Increasingly however, that's not enough to offset the dedicated gun control fanatics that buy their way into local positions and who can make their points clandestinely. The NRA is constantly sending out alerts to its members on these local politicians and legislation they're trying to push through the back door.

Considering what you have to lose down the road, the cost of membership is a bargain you can't afford to pass up.  Join today.

Here in the Small Wonder, the invasion of noxious weeds and vermin seem to have a pattern of attraction. With spring busting out all over, I notice several of our most common vines are coming into bloom. This early, probably the most obvious is the wisteria.

The wisteria is a common decorative vine used in arbors to decorate yards and gardens. The beauty of it is the showy pale lavender flowers that hang like grapes from it's tangling vines. The horror of it is that it will take over if not aggressively pruned and cut. Unfortunately, old homesites were swallowed up and top soil moved by developers had the seeds that ended up in the woodlots.Once unbridled they can make an impenetrable mess.

Next comes the trumpet creeper. Colloquially referred to as "cow itch vine" the trumpet creeper loves fence and ditch lines.  It's showy large trumpet shaped flowers from which it gets its name are a lovely reddish orange with yellow throats.  Seemingly harmless, the vine can cause severe skin irritation if broken or crushed.  (Thus the name "cow itch".) Though certainly not as woody stemmed as the wisteria, the vines can produce a mess if not controlled.

And last is my favorite; the poison ivy. "Leaves of three, beware of thee." Here poison ivy grows in most woodlots and fence rows. Last year my neighbor got a terrible reaction while cleaning "some vines" out of the chain link fence between us.  Those vines were poison ivy.  The plant will spread by reach out rhizomes. In old growth timer, the main vine can reach 3 inches across and while entwined around a tree, is often mistake as "just a vine". A few years back I came across two ladies on our land. When I inquired what they were doing, I was informed they were getting vines to make Christmas wreaths. Both of them had their arms filled with coils of poison ivy. I don't even like thinking how that tuned out.

It was supposed, without any intense investigating, that the use of DDT led to the almost extinction of many species and especially to the bald eagle.  DDT was and is wantom and indescriminate killer. When the use of it was banned, even though dreaded diseases like malaria, West Nile virus, and the tick maladies had a complete resurgence, so did the bald eagle and the osprey. What was once a rare sighting in the inland areas of Delmarva has now become  a common occurrence.  There are various nest sights throughout the state and I'm fortunate to have a pair of eagles that frequent the Cypress Branch area.

To often, the Walt Disney era of wildlife has either distorted the truth or avoided mentioning the facts that the bald eagle, though a raptor and an efficient predator, is first and foremost a scavenger. Conversely, the osprey which sometimes becomes the prey of the bald eagle is the consumate fish eagle. This raptor can hover high above a fishery, spot its prey and then dive headfirst into the water to grasp it. It then resurfaces and uses its exceptionally long wings to pull itself up out of the water and fly with its catch back to its nest.

The tale that unfolded in front of me on Saturday was one that even if I'd had a video, would never have shown the battle for life that goes on in nature every day.

Riding south on US113 south of Dover AFB, a bird suddenly came rocketing from behind that small woodlot on the St. Jones. At first, the speed and distance fooled me and I thought it might be a crow when a larger bird appeared behind it.  I presumed it to be a hawk after a crow who'd stolen some food along the way. As I drew closer to their crossing path, I realised that the bird up front was an osprey and the huge bird behind it was a mature bald eagle that was closing ground quickly.  The osprey tried to climb but the eagle still gained ground as they reached several hundred feet above the marsh.  The osprey chandelled toward Kitt's Hummock but was still losing ground as the eagle was within feet of it.  Suddenly I saw the silvery reflection of a white perch in the talons of the osprey that I'd missed.  The osprey, in mortal fear dropped the fish.

As soon as the fish dropped, the eagle folded its wings and tipped its head down in a dive. Scant feet from the marsh grass, it grasped the fish and then flared strongly as it glided back across the marsh before regaining altitude. I guess the eagle hatchlings fed well that night and the osprey had to resume its fishing to insure its young got fed.

I've about had it with the "hunting video" crews.  Aside from the fact that most of these "celebrity" hosts are on hunts in areas either you and I can't afford, or are hunting animals that have been "saved" especially for them by outfitters needing free advertising, most of them are nothing but side shows hawking snake oil.

I'm tired of the background music.  I have nothing against country western music. If you like it, that's OK with me, but when we get to a segment of the show and they launch into "pickin' and grinnin'" , it sends a subliminal message to those who don't understand what we do. Even in the this politically correct world, the banjo will have a few eons before the images of "Deliverance" fade away.

Next comes the whispering. WHY? With all the bells and whistles of today, certainly some post-narration could eliminate Jay Gregory from trying to explain how he couldn't get a shot at an animal 5 feet away because he'd perched in the top of a tree in an apple orchard. Actually watching the mug of Stan Potts in HD splattered across my 30 inch flatscreen makes me a bit ill to begin with.

Please explain to me why a guy making a bazillion dollars automatically becomes a star on a hunting program? Why would a NASCAR driver be of interest to me. Craig Morgan can't sing and his overinflated ego make me turn to the Game Show Network for reruns. The WWF and MMA seems to be a growing prerequisite. And none of that chafes me like taking up half the show with some wannabe caterwalling by the campfire as it's it's Amateur Hour.

And I won't even address the fishing shows and I feel so much better having vented like this. Have a Happy Easter, a blessed Passover, or a delightful Spring Break.

Back in the early 20th Century, affluent Texans hunting abroad became aware that certain species they went  to hunt were quickly perishing from their native environs. At their own expense, pairs of the animals were live trapped and transported back to  huge tracts of high fenced land in Texas. The ranchers protected them and insured they got all they needed to flourish. Herds of these exotic species began to thrive and expand on the the Texas plain and go to the point where the ranchers needed to control their populations. Not surprisingly, hunters were willing to pay huge sums to come and take an animal that, by this time had been virtually eliminated from it's native homelands.

Today, the addax is found in only small pockets of the Sahara. The semitar oryx, once native from the Great Steppes in Eurasia to the Sahara was now extinct . The Dama gazelle, also of the Sahara, is extremely rare with no huntable populations. As a concern for the value of wildlife and for the protection of them, an international group formed the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). In turn, CITES came up with an endangered species listing that their Utopian thinking was sure would protect animals once listed there. Americans, always eager to be the beacon came up with the Endangers Species Act of 1973(ESA) signed by Richard Nixon.

The ESA has always been a panacea of special interests as much as it has been about conservation of animals. Animal rights activists have used it with abandon. Their actions can be credited with the reintroduction of the wolf in the West, the suspected introduction of coyotes on the Delmarva, and now to the cessation of hunting those captive reared animals in Texas.

Before you pooh pooh the tragedy, remember that the species was actually saved from extinction by hunters, not bunny huggers. They were saved simply because the animals have value (as much as $10,000 per trophy quality animal), and that the ranches that had brought them back from the brink had a financial incentive to insure their existence was protected.

Now thanks to the bunny huggers, these ranchers must pay an exorbitant permit fee to the USFWS to shoot an animal they bought, paid for, and insured their very existence. In true Texas style, they refuse to pay what they consider blackmail for an animal they consider their private property.

So when you hear the bunny huggers crowing about stopping the hunting of these exotics, just ask them who  is going to pay for their continued maintenance and existence. Just don't expect them to have an answer. They're not giving any of their money for something so unimportant as the continuation of a species.

Serious anglers spend more money pursuing their hobby than hunters do. Remember, the fisherman needs a boat, a motor, a trailer, and a vehicle strong enough to tow it. Add to that the electronics packages, the rods, the reels, the tackle, special PFD's and the associated garb and hunters pale with their expenditures.

The next thing with serious anglers is the growing tradition of catch and release. That phenomenon is relative new to the fresh water fisherman. Saltwater anglers learned years ago that they could catch a fish, release it, and then have a reproduction made.(I'd like to say the saltwater guys did that out of conservation ideology, but it was a bit more pragmatic than that.  Saltwater fish are very oily and traditional taxidermy doesn't hold up well.)

The first reproductions were crude sand cast models that were made of wood, burlap and plaster of Paris. They didn't fare much better than skin mounted fish. Then came the fiberglass models that started picking up the finer details. Still the fish reproduction had to have very thick fins to keep them from snapping off.

We've come a long way since then and today's injection moulded and polyethylene castings have thin, flexible, and transparent fins. Some of them are so good they're difficult to tell from the real thing.

So if you want a memory of your best fish and don't want to kill it, have your taxidermist order you a reproduction. Some supplier will carry a fish that's almost a duplicate of what you caught. (Don't worry. If he can't find one your size, he'll order a slightly larger one. I've yet to see a fisherman admit that a larger replica wasn't more close to what he'd really caught.)

Be prepared,however. Most taxidermists charge "by the inch" and a fish the size of the new Delaware state record largemouth would run you between $350 and $400.

In case you're one of only a handful of Delaware fishermen who don't know it, there's a new record for largemouth bass in the state. It's 10 lbs. 10 oz., it was 26 inches long and it was 18.75 inches in girth. It was caught in Georgetown by James Hitchens who transported it to Seaford to be officially weighed and records, then transported back to Georgetown where it was released back where it was caught. Past that point, it's pure speculation about anything as Mr. Hitches ain't talking. (I fully support that.)

Still, the talk in the fishing community is how to find the spot. State biologist Cathy Martin tried to imply it was "our" fish and now could be pass along its genes and be caught again by other sportsmen. Personally, I think that's a lot of bull.

I say that because of several factors. The fish's coloration doesn't project "mill pond" to me. Our mill ponds are seldom over 7-8 feet deep and winter growth is inhibited because of that. Very few of our ponds don't have heavy fishing pressure so a fish this large surviving to reach that size is very questionable.

Personally, I suspect the fish was taken from a private irrigation pond or borrow pit that had been privately stocked. I know of several places like that here in the state. My first citation fish here was caught in just such a place in 1990 and though I could have thrown a rock across the largest width, it was a 22 feet deep irrigation pond.

I'd be more interested in seeing if the fish survived the process.  From the picture (http://www.gameandfishmag.com/2012/03/26/delaware-record-largemouth-caught-and-released/) you can see by the redness of the pelvic fin. That coloration is an indication that the fish has been stressed and stress is not a good thing in a fish that size.

A common misconception is that released fish survive it you don't find them floating on the surface. When stressed, fish often die and sink to the bottom. Neither the air bladder nor the bacterial bloating is enough to lift the fish and scavengers clean up the evidence. We simply don't see it and really don't want to know about it.

Still, hope springs eternal and all of us outdoorsmen understand the one day, the big one will bite, the big ducks from "up north" will make it down, and "Mr. Wonderful" will one day step in front of our gun.

The expansion of the United States can be attributed to one industry and one only: the fur trade. Trappers led the way west following the beaver, the otter, the mink and the muskrat. A trade seldom given the credit it deserves is alive and well in the US today but thanks to misguided bunny huggers, it's true importance is not being recognized.

I often talk about urban blight, but the suburban blight has enveloped the eastern and western seaboards. The land changed but the creatures that lived here before we came are still here and the havoc they wreak on the little natural environment we have left is seldom discussed.

A recent event, hosted by our Amish neighbor William Ray Byler of Byler's Raw Furs brought that to light. He invited speakers from the USFWS and the Maryland Fur Trappers Association to give seminars on how to deal with the Mud Mill invasion of another non-native pest, the nutria. About 90 people attended the event.

My thanks go out to Bob Dunn, a reader of my column. He admitted that trappers tend to be a quiet lot and certainly the Amish don't go around with billboards advertising such events.  Bob did tell me, however, that the Maryland Trappers Association is hosting their annual banquet and funds raiser at Bowles Farm in Faulkner, Maryland on March 31. If you'd like to learn more about trapping along with stuffing yourself with great Eastern Shore tablefare, this is the place for you. Cost is $45 per person. That includes an open bar,and a dinner of steamship round, chicken, crab balls, fried oysters, and side dishes. There will be both a live and a silent auction. You can make reservations by calling Bill or Linda Rice at (301)259-2736 or by email at ricefarms3@gmail.com.

What I call the "Pennsylvania Fad" effects many people who decide to put a scope on their gun.  That "fad" involves thinking that you can see better without a scope during twilight and such thinking brought about the dreaded "see through rings". When I see a pump or lever action rifle with see-through rings, I immediately think of Pennsylvania.

A scope is designed to give you one focal plane to compensate for your bullet's trajectory (versus having to align a rear and front sight.) The scope with its telescopic qualities has light gathering qualities that our older eyes don't. The see-through rings also trash good shooting posture.

We've always been told to keep your cheek on the buttstock. The see-through rings lift the head off the stock and thereby create a much greater chance of paralax (the difference between your natural line of sight and the actual trajectory of the bullet you fire.) You will never find anything like those rings on the firearms of good shooters.

Next is field of view (FOV.) Many believe the higher the number of the objective lens means a larger FOV. Actually it's the reverse. A 3x9x40 has a FOV equal to or better than a 3x9x50. What the larger objective does have, however, is better light gathering qualities.

And last is "The Lifetime Warranty".  When you're standing in Idaho's Bitterroot Wilderness and your scope suddenly has the crosshairs turn to "X's", that warranty is totally useless. Scopes seldom break on the range. You don't have your gunsling slip off your shoulder and the scope hit boulders on the range. Quality glass costs extra and quality scopes have quality glass that will take those "whoops" moments in stride. You get what you pay for. Think wisely before you invest and if you can't afford a good scope for your gun, use the open sights until you can. Too often having a "cheap" scope is worse than having none at all.