Spring Woods Walk
One wrong step and ice water is now beginning to run down the edge of my boot, and I can feel the frigid tingle begin to penetrate my sock. It’s not like falling into a trout stream right after ice-out where the shock steals your breath for a second before you realize you’re not going to drown. This liquid ice is more like upland water torture: slow, steady, painful.
I’m at a marsh about a mile from the house in northeast Connecticut in what has become a favorite spot. I took the winter shortcut across the back end of the marsh to a stream to fish and made a poor decision. In fact, I probably shouldn’t have been disturbing it anyway. I discovered the marsh last fall while hunting woodcock along the tiny stream that feeds the 10-acre marsh. Shallow in most spots and packed with snow and ice just two weeks ago when it was easy to walk across with snowshoes, now this 10-acre mix of downed cattails and dead water lilies in the deeper spots and large tussocks of thick grasses in the shallow end is just a few weeks away from greening out. Hopping from tussock to tussock, I think I’ll make it to drier, higher ground, but my boot slips off a large hummock and in I go. I struggle to release my foot from the ooze from which it is embedded and off comes my knee-high rubber boot. Using the rod tube for balance, I’m back in the boot and safely detached from the pungent, primordial quicksand. And this was supposed to be an easy day; I wasn’t even going to wade into the raging stream runoff.
Denne historien er fra Spring 2023-utgaven av The Upland Almanac.
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Denne historien er fra Spring 2023-utgaven av The Upland Almanac.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Tail feathers - STANDARDS AND PRACTICES
\"An armed society is a polite society,\" the NRA says in one of its dicta, cribbed from Robert A. Heinlein, a 20th-century American science fiction writer.
Day's End - IN PRAISE OF FENCEROWS
Driving north along the Hudson River, I gazed at a pastoral autumn scene: sere fields of faded yellow harvested corn, stubbly and broken amongst the clods of black earth, almost smooth from my vantage point. Spiky brown veins of wild growth marked barriers between plots. Occasionally, the gray bones of a mature oak rose among the brown shrubs to stand over the yellow fields. A sentry, keeping silent watch as white frost crystals slowly melted into invisibility.
That Time of Year Again
Without doubt. The most idyllic form of hunting in Ohio is seeking the woodcock. - Merrill Gilfallan, Moods of the Ohio Moons: An Outdoorsman's Almanac (1991)
I Don't Wanna'!
I'm an old hand at being retired, though - have been practicing for 25 years.
Hunting the Huns: Alberta's Big Sky Country
The prairies of southern Alberta are vast, beautiful and full of prime bird habitat. Crop fields are interspersed with abandoned farms, rolling hills are intersected by coulees and creek beds, and Hungarian partridge and sharptailed grouse occupy some of the best and most picturesque habitat on the continent.
Side Dish - End of Season
Sporting trips are not only about sport, as many other experiences are discovered alongside. And my trip to Lakewood Camps in Maine was certainly just that.
AN EXTENDED STAY
There is no reason to leave Michigan in the fall unless the opportunity of a cast and blast adventure at a historic sporting lodge in Maine comes calling.
KEEP IT HANDY
If you think shooting a ruffed grouse on the wing with a shotgun is tough, try shooting one in flight with a still camera.
A Longtime Love Affair
It's possible to hunt your favorite birds in a lot of different places, I suppose, but I don't do that.
Profile of an Artist: Harley Bartlett
Harley Bartlett was born in 1959 near Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. However, having lived in Rhode Island for most of his life he considers himself a Rhode Islander.
