Wilson Post Blogs

By JOHN L. SLOAN
Cool with no breeze. A light jacket is perfect and so is my cast. The devil horse, my old friend, the green and yellow one, nestles in tight against the grass. I let it sit until the ripples die down, then start it back toward the boat. Twitch-twitch-jerk stop. KaBloom! Fish on.

I guess the Higher Power decided to give me a break. For once, the fish measured-exactly 14-inches. In the box and back to work. Big Bird and I had the combination. For 90 minutes, we piddled and paddled around the weed beds on Old Hickory and were present for the Miracle of Misty Cove. Even the resident beaver approved. She came out of the big house on the ridge just long enough to slap the water and scare the bejeepers out of us. Someday I am going to blow that house up.

Ten of the 11 bass we caught on topwater lures were between 14 and 15 inches; all legal keepers and they were kept. Usually on Old Chickory, the bass are 13-inches and not legal. That is why it was a miracle. Talk about good eating size fish. It can only get slightly better.

And it did.

When the bass action stopped, we had some options. One option was to dig out the spoons and head for the top-secret hidey-hole that usually will produce a walleye or a sauger. That is what is slightly better eating than a bass of 14-inches.

Big Bird got the boat just right and I started fumbling around looking for a spoon. I knew I did not have a spoon but I figured if I fumbled enough, the Bird would offer me one.

Instead, he started catching fish. The first one in was a perfect walleye, just great eating size.

Then he put a sauger of the same size in the boat. That is when I spoke to him rather sharply about the silver spoon or lack thereof. Understanding as he is, he finally gave me one.

At 10 minutes past time for me to leave, we had exactly 10 bass, three walleye and three sauger in the box. The Bird allowed as how he did not want any of them. I did not try to change his mind. He had already given me a quart of his fantastic squash relish and I had visions of supper dancing in my head.

There is a trick to filleting walleye and sauger and it is hard to explain. Their rib cages contain a tremendous amount of meat and if you are careful, you can fillet out the rib cage and have meat in the amount of another fillet.

In mid-afternoon, after the fish had been on ice long enough to make the easy to fillet, I proceeded to put the knife to all the fish. What a small mountain of fillets. I set six aside for my supps.

You batter that delicate white meat differently. At least I do. I like a thin batter so I cut my cornmeal with flour about 60-40 in the cornmeal’s favor.

I dip the fillet in ice water and two beaten eggs and then shake it in the batter. Cooking oil in the fryer is at 375 and just a minute or two is all you want. Just get the batter golden brown and the fish starting to float.

Your tomatoes are sliced as is your onion and your French fries were salted while still hot and have drained on the paper towels.

Now all that is required is a big glass of tea and good helping of the squash relish. Talk about good eating!

Hard to beat fish and fixins if you know how to do the fixin.

And the fishin.

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By JOHN L. SLOAN
The fog lays close and thick. It is dawn but we can barely see. The forecast is for a high temperature of close to 100 degrees. I don’t care where you are, we call that hot. But I shiver slightly and button another button on my long sleeve shirt.

Seldom do I start an article or column about trout fishing on the Caney Fork that I don’t recall that opening paragraph or something similar. I wrote that somewhere around 1984, for Tennessee Sportsman magazine. I believe that article was the start of the influx of trout anglers on the river. I also recall July 4, 1974, when Harold Dotson and I floated from the dam down to Dick Samson’s store. We had 17 fish, a mixed bag of rainbow trout, walleye, spotted bass and a smallmouth. We did not see another angler either in a boat or on the bank.

I cannot say that about the blistering hot morning, July 28 of this year when Mark, “Big Bird” Campbell and I hit the river. It was, as I said blistering hot but again I wore long sleeves and they felt good until close to 10 AM. At daylight, it is cold on the Caney Fork regardless of what the temperature is back in the world.

There was no generation and the water was crystal clear and bone aching cold. We caught some fish, enough I guess, a mixture browns and brooks. One rainbow-the lone silver bullet. I don’t know what has happened to the rainbows. Maybe the rockfish ate them all. Maybe it is something in the dam repair work or maybe we just caught them all.

It was a good morning. The sun, as always, was slow to top the ridges and not a drop of sweat dripped until the sun was well up and coloring everything copper. The slow current moved us along and turkeys called in answer to my squeaky reel handle. No, I am not making that up. When it finally warmed enough for me to shed down to short sleeves, the fog still lay close on the water. I caught a fish that jumped and I could not see it in the fog.

It was a different river for me. This was the first time I had been down the Caney in three years. I just had not been physically able. However, I made this trip just fine, very little pain and as usual, I caught the most. But it was a different river for sure. The heavy rains and floods of the past two years have changed the gravel bars and the float pattern. New trees down, old ones gone.

There has been another change, a great one. It has been coming for some time and the movie, A River Runs Through It, broke it wide open. Fly fishing has proliferated to the point that time after time, Orvis clad figures, male and female and one unidentified, suddenly appeared in the fog. Standing waist or chest deep in the cold water, their upper bodies waving wraith-like in the fog, they presented yet another obstacle to avoid. All were obliging and friendly as we quietly slid past in the small float boat. Susan and her husband Bob, friends of Mark, even obliged by catching one from their top of the line kayak so I could get a picture.

One motor powered canoe, complete with well-tattooed fly anglers also smiled for a picture. Lots of people on the river even though it was a weekday.

It was not the non-stop action we have seen in the past and we did not boat any bragging fish. Bird did catch a bass, one of his best this year and strangely enough, we did not lose a single lure. We needed a little generation. The fish go on a feeding frenzy as the fresh water first water comes down. At Happy Hollow, our takeout point, we ran into a high-ranking TWRA employee who shall remain nameless just in case he should have been working. He emailed me later and told me just after we left; he caught a dandy brown trout of over 20-inches. That is what you said, isn’t it, Steve?

Are you hot? There are still some hot days left this year and time before we finish our last minute scouting, pick up the bows, and climb the trees.

The Caney, early in the morning, offers a sure fire escape from the heat. Trout and rockfish offer plenty of action. Maybe the rainbows will return and I can write another story about the Silver Bullets of the Caney Fork.

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By JOHN L. SLOAN
I think I was 11-could have been 12. It was hot, so hot the road was sweating. We pulled the old red truck into the dusty lane and shut the engine down. The gate and the cornfield, picked four days ago, stretched in front of us. I got my Winchester 20-gauge and three boxes of shells from the back. Of course, they were Peters High-Velocity. The good ones. The gun was one of the now valuable, red W ones. Wish I still had it.

Sweating like pigs, Uncle Lloyd and I headed for the small pond where we would setup. It was September 1 and in 15-minutes, dove season would open and I would probably shoot my three boxes of shells. Hopefully I would kill a few doves. They make a great jambalaya and just the breasts, wrapped in bacon and grilled aren’t bad either.

How many years and how many shells have I spent since then? From that hot, dusty kid and through the miles of fields and acres of food spreads, years sprinkled with backyard shoots and massive, catered hunts.

Dove season marks the start of hunting season even though squirrel season opens earlier here in Tennessee. The great many of us only hunt a few days at the start of the season. The addicted wing shooters hunt all through the season. It opens here tomorrow and I suggest you consult your hunting guide for exact dates since I am no longer smart enough to figure it all out. What I know for sure is, it starts at noon tomorrow and the limit is 15.

On that first afternoon, if memory serves, I killed five birds out of my three boxes of number 7-1/2 lead shot. Those shells were paper. This was before plastic took over and stopped the problem of swelling from moisture. I had a brand new shell vest with a lined game bag and the pockets of the vest were loaded with shells. A carefully wrapped sandwich-baloney and cheese on white, loaf bread-and a bottle of water bumped shoulders with a couple candy bars

Naturally, the candy bars would melt and the sandwich never was eaten because as we opened the gate, the air was filled with doves.

Uncle Lloyd and the rest of the group, Lester, Jesse, Rip, Frank, Alphus and some I’m sure I can’t remember started the war. That is what it sounded like. Most got their limits. As I said, I got five. Pretty good for the first time, I thought.

I recall an opening day near Portales, NM when I killed almost as many rattlesnakes as I did doves. I was hunting with Winston Ford, the athletic director at Eastern New Mexico University. He was nailed as he reached down to pick up a dove. I rushed him to what pretended to be a hospital. Thankfully, it was not a bad bite, not much venom injected and they handled it.

There was a shoot down in Mississippi hosted by their fish and game department. Birds everywhere and I needed only 18 shots to get my limit. It is possible that field may have been baited but I wouldn’t swear to it. Some folks just plant wheat that way.

There were the great hunts at wade Bourne’s house near Clarksville, complete with fantastic food, some of which I cooked, and enough birds to suit everyone. I usually shot my Remington 870, 20-gauge on those hunts. Good shooting, good food, good companions.

Funny how the action always picks up just as the sun starts to go down and when you go to pick up a bird, another one flies over you.

There was the day it rained. We were in central Louisiana on the Cane River. The big field was behind the restored plantation house and there must have been 50 hunters. At five minutes until noon, the skies opened. It rained as only it can in Louisiana. We were all soaked but still the birds flew.

There was the hunt near Paris when I shared a shooting stake with Hank Williams Jr. He outshot me even with only one eye. However, not by much.  I still run into him from time to time, usually in airports as we go various places. Last time we were going hunting, he for elk, and me for deer. Pretty good wingshot, ole Junior.

In addition, there have been some good shoots here on the Old Hickory WMA. That was years ago. I do not go much anymore. Just lost interest, I guess. I don’t know if I’ll go tomorrow or not. Either way, dove season opens tomorrow at noon and the limit and possession limit for that day is 15.

Hunt safely, wear sunscreen and shoot well.

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By JOHN L. SLOAN
Bob was barking almost like a man hollering. Then I woke up. Uncle Lloyd was banging on my bedroom window. I had overslept for a squirrel hunt on Alligator Bayou. I may have been 13. I expect it was 1957, and we were going to enjoy one of the state sports of Louisiana- a hunt for tree rats. We were taking Bob, an Arkansas, natural bob-tailed fiest and a squirrel-treeing marvel.

Squirrel hunting is almost a state sport in Louisiana. It ranks right up there with alligator hunting, fishing, pig roasts and crawfish boils. In proper circles, football is not even mentioned. With Bob, on a good day, in the right place, with good scenting weather, you could tree 50-75 tree rats.

Hunting with a squirrel dog is a lot different from still-hunting where you slip quietly through the woods, moving slowly and stopping often to listen for the sound of falling acorn or hickory husks or a shaking tree branch. “With a dog you drag your feet. Still hunting you barely set them down,” opined Uncle Alphus, the senior member of our crew.

I grew up and learned woodcraft and how to hunt and a variety of things squirrel hunting the swamps of Louisiana. The season opened in mid-October and there was no school that day, should it happen to fall on a weekday. It wouldn’t matter if it had, nobody would have gone.

There were few if any deer and the ducks weren’t “down” yet, still hiding up North. Therefore, we hunted tree rats. Since squirrels are a part of the rodent family, the name is not improper.

By JOHN L. SLOAN
Man, it is hot! Sweat is rolling down my cheeks and the heat from my face is blurring the scope. I sight the TenPoint carefully and get the green dot in the center of the crosshairs to rest on the white spot 30-yards away. I push the second safety and slowly begin to squeeze the trigger. Whop! The arrow quivers dead center in the circle.

I am ready.

Each year, no matter how well your crossbow shot last year, you need to sight it in and make sure it is on. Then, shoot a few practice shots. My TenPoint, Phantom is ready. The string has been inspected and well waxed. All the cables are perfect and there is a new battery in the scope.

y JOHN L. SLOAN
The sun was going down. It seemed to hover just above the trees. I was sweating bullets just from reeling. I felt the boat rock and knew the first fish of the night was battling my partner in the back of the boat. It turned out to be the largest fish of the night, close to five pounds. That was a year or so ago but I thought of it on this night.

Then it got dark.

Just because it was dark did not mean it was cool. There was not a tendril of moving air. I could hear the blue/black jig hit the water but I could not see it. It was past the scant light from the black light. At the third crank of the reel, I felt that flutter that signifies a fish has picked up the jig. Then the line tightened and I set the hook. It was a smallmouth of a pound. Even the little ones fight-smallmouth.

We worked our way through the dark, the rear boat light and the black light providing just enough light to work by. Now, a breeze hit our faces now and then and not only did it cool us, it kept the bugs away. The insects were not bad, just enough to make you aware of their presence. A jet went over low, preparing to land at the airport. A siren blared somewhere in Nashville.

Big Bird caught another bass of about the same size. I was afraid that was the pattern for the night-small fish and nothing of any size. About then I caught another one-pound smallmouth. The color of the evening was the blue/black combination that I have come to favor at night. I was using a crawfish imitator from Stanley Jigs. They make a good product and in the weight I like. Most jigs today come in weights of over ¼-ounce. That are too heavy for the type of fishing I do. I wish I could still find the black or dark brown ones in bear hair or fox hair. The smallmouth seem to prefer them.

I drag and hop a jig across the bottom. I do very little, make that, I do no flipping and vertical jigging. Therefore I want a jig light enough for me to handle easily on the 6# line. My choice is 1/8-ounce and if it is deep water or windy, I’ll go to ¼-ounce.  I do not want a heavy jig that stays on the bottom and usually hangs up on something. I want one that hops up and floats down.

You do not lose many fish on these jigs. Not only are the hooks good, most of the time, when a fish hits a jig and you set the hook properly, they get hooked in the top lip. It is a tough part of the lip and they don’t throw many lures when they jump as smallmouth do. Of course, bass aren’t all you catch at night. Stripers and Hybrids are not uncommon in lakes where they abound. Catfish are a regular night time catch. An experienced fisherman can just about tell what he has by the way he fights.

I enjoy night fishing. I always have. I like the dark, even on land. I don’t night fish at much as I once did. For a while, starting in late May, I used to fish four or five nights a week. Mostly I fished Center Hill. I like fishing the hill because the high ridges make for good landmarks you can see silhouetted against the sky. Makes for good running in the dark. You are required to have boat lights-a white light on the back and a red/green one on the bow. Now and then you might use a spotlight to check your location or spot a landmark on the bank. Now I mostly fish Percy Priest and there is usually enough ambient light from the area businesses to allow you to run. I try to go on nights when it is not loaded with boats. On this night it is almost deserted.

I make a long cast across the point of the island. I start bouncing and hopping the jig slowly across the point Halfway back, the tap comes. I set the hook hard, the rod bows and the drag clicks. All signs of a good fish. I can’t move him. He runs sideways toward the back of the boat, not acting like a bass. Then the line goes limp. Lost him. I think probably catfish. Then Mark and I both catch the same piece of discarded line. I save my lure, he does not.

It is now close to one a.m. Five hours is long enough. We have caught a respectable number of small fish. Even though night is when you are supposed to catch the big ones, on this night, Big Bird and I did not, just the drillers, the bank runners. However, it was an enjoyable night.

A hot night. A hot night for fishing.

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By JOHN L. SLOAN Sometimes there is healing power in just a drop or two of water. Add fish, good company, warm sunshine and expand that drop to a three-acre pond and you may have a healing pond.

By JOHN L. SLOAN
They did not turn the generators on until 11 a.m. As hot as it was, a mere 94 degrees, I have no idea why they waited that long. Finally, they did and the fun began.

We had been catching catfish in the shade of the big Chickamauga Dam since seven. We caught and released 25-30 cats in the 5-15 pound range and now it was time to try something else, drifting in the tailwaters for whatever hit.

By JOHN L. SLOAN
The shadgraph began to throb. The vibration in the rod tip showed a vibrato you could throw a bluegill through. Then it hit the dips-a left dip, a right dip, a double deep dip. I reeled the rod tip underwater about three inches and performed a perfect elbows up. The elbows up are a maneuver designed to sink the hook deep in the tough upper jaw of a Rockfish.

By JOHN L. SLOAN

Many years ago in Wyoming, I spent my birthday fishing on the Powder River in the land of Butch and Sundance. I remember it as being a great birthday. That memory spawned this story. JLS

It had been a pleasant night. He had actually slept well, something he did not often do anymore. Usually he would be up every 90 minutes for one reason or another. Last night he had only gotten up once. Maybe he should try sleeping in a tent and on a foam pad at home.

The woods had been noisy last night. A variety of animals, especially the peepers, had carried on a conversation the whole time. Maybe that white noise had allowed him to sleep so well. It was slowly coming daylight now. He could feel it seeping in. He stretched making both his back and his hip pop. He shook his left arm and got the feeling going in it. Eventually he would have to have something done about the pinched nerve.

By JOHN L. SLOAN
“Hard to find a better eating fish than a walter.” Said Harold Dotson. “They aren’t much to look at and they don’t put up much of a fight but they sure plate up right nice.” Made me look again at the five fish cooling on the bag of ice in the Coleman cooler. I was starting to get hungry.

A walter is a slang name for a walleye. They are a member of the pike family and have all the attendant teeth that go with that group. They also have weird eyes. They are often called “marble eyes”. In daylight, they appear to be blind.

Senor Dotson and I were putting along on the carp arc, a small pontoon boat with a 25-hp kicker and a pump that pumped water right out of the lake and allowed a hot fisherman to cool off. We had four rods in holders-two with night crawler rigs and two with weighted, long-lipped crankbaits. The crawler rigs were winning 4-1.

By JOHN L. SLOAN, June 15, 2011
The use of bait for hunting deer is controversial and involves a complex set of biological, social, and ethical issues. Biologically, population influences related to baiting can be important in the dissemination and maintenance of disease and can affect the natural movement, distribution, and behavior of deer. Baiting can also influence survival and reproduction of deer, particularly when it moves towards supplemental feeding.

Finally, concentrations of deer at bait sites may lead to effects on other species, habitats, and ecosystems.

Just fish in the DAM SHADE
By JOHN L. SLOAN, June 8, 2011
It is a cool, 97 degrees. Even the trees are sweating. Not Judge Dave Durham, fishing guide Richard Simms and I. We are cool and comfortable bobbing gently in the shade of Chickamauga Dam. The dam rears high above us, providing plenty of cool shade. We are fishing for bluegill.

However, that is just temporary. The ‘gills are just for bait. We are cat fishing on a day that will approach record heat. Probably we will use chicken breasts, cut in strips. The ‘gills are just for insurance.

By JOHN L. SLOAN
I got plum hot the other day and that made me think of this. We were on the Tres Sombreros Ranch in the southeast corner of New Mexico and it was around the first of September. I reckon it was about 110 for an average midday temperature. We were shooting a hunting video and it was hot enough to drive me and the one of the camera girls crazy. We got so crazy we jumped into a windmill fed water tank not realizing it was 12 feet deep.

Good thing we could swim. See, we were living in teepees. Not air-conditioned wikiups, teepees. They were comfortable but at night, when it cooled off to about 95, they did tend to still be hot. I think that may be the first time I ever saw a cholla just get up and leave. See, plants, they aint supposed to walk. But thisun just walked away looking for some shade, I reckon.

By JOHN L. SLOAN,
The Wilson Post
It was just about as perfect as you could ask for. The nights were cooling, on their way to frosty and the days warmed up to high sixties and maybe a seventy thrown in for good measure. My doe was skinned, quartered and on ice. Well mostly she was. The tenderloins and a piece of back strap had gone the way all good deer meat should go -- supper.

BY JOHN L. SLOAN
One of my favorite outdoor writers is Gene Hill. One of my favorite archers is Howard Hill. One of my favorite smallmouth lakes is Center Hill. What is it about Hills that attracts me? I guess some of it may be mystery. You never know what a particular Hill may hit you with. It may be a trick shot, a surprise phrase or a fish that you did not expect. Some too, may well be sheer beauty. An arrow etched just perfectly against a blue sky or a “set” of words that become a picture or fog, low on the water that suddenly becomes a rock bluff.

By JOHN L. SLOAN
It was cold this morning, 20 at the house at 6. I dressed accordingly. The gray light had just started to show on the fringes at the top of the trees as I eased the Arctic Cat into the briar patch and shut it off. It looked as though there might not be much of a sunrise, just a spreading of the gray. I made a last check of my pockets, cocked the crossbow and began to ease into the cedars and push my way, using elbows only, into the middle.

By JOHN L. SLOAN
There was a huge gap between the smell of azaleas in Lower Alabama and the crisp, cool air of the rising thermals as the sun warmed the mountains. Six years. A six years filled with heat, sand, cold, and wind…always the wind. And often, excessively often, the sound of gunfire and mortars and choppers and bombs.

And screams.

By JOHN L. SLOAN
That is a question before Tennessee state legislators. Introduced by Rep. Frank Niceley (R) Knoxville, HB 1112 would make it legal to raise and import whitetail deer into Tennessee for commercial purposes.

Let me make it simple for you. What this bill would do is allow Tennessee residents to enclose deer in pens and raise them as they would cattle and then sell the live animals, the body parts for food consumption, allow the killing of them by individuals and sell the various by products.

Since turkey season opens Saturday, April 2, I thought this week and next, I would tell you a couple true turkey hunting stories to get your wattle and snood all aworking. I may even join Big Daddy for a hunt myself. JLS
By JOHN L. SLOAN
It could be raining. The dew is dripping from the trees so heavily it could be rain. I am getting wet and glad it isn’t cold. Again, the coyote sings and again the gobbler answers. He is across the swamp and we will have to hurry if we are to try for him. We have walked some distance from the where we parked the truck. It is almost time for the sky to change clothes from funeral black to church gray.

Eddie starts out at a fast walk. Eddie Salter knows this swamp better than I know my office floor. That is why I am so surprised when he steps into the creek. Fortunately, it is only three feet deep and the drop was less than a yard.