What is fishing? Ch. 6: Wildlife

Chapter 6  Wildlife

Fishing takes a person into the world of nature. It's up to the fisherman how
intent that experience will be. Personally, what I find every time I go fishing is a host of creatures. 

Imagine this: A couple has been fishing across the bayou from me for the last three afternoons. They come with all their gear, including a boom box. And they keep it turned on, though not loud. My question is: Why? 

I like to listen to all the surrounding sounds: all kinds of birds from robins to woodpeckers to erratically chatty little wrens. The loudest is the blue heron, yes, a blue heron, a gigantic bird. Every time I disturb him(her?), he flies off, squawking, no, bellowing his displeasure, that I had interrupted his feeding time. However, this afternoon, we scared each other. I took my rod, loaded up worm, got in my favorite spot, then glanced six feet over, and wow! That blue heron was standing there when he suddenly saw me and gasped and flew away. Mutual admiration, maybe.

Daily, along the bayou's edge, close to the point that water meets land, I find some kind of animal tracks. Could be a cat's because I've seen a cat wander the banks, but the paw prints are too large for Boo (neighbor's cat, Boo short for Beauregard). Could be beaver tracks, or maybe possum, or raccoon, --I've seen all these animals at one time or another.

A squirrel currently has a nest in the majestic cypress and enjoys throwing down the cypress balls that grow in the tree. Same is true for the huge pecan tree which half hangs over my property. Ha! 

Did I mention snakes and turtles and mosquitos? I guess all beautiful things have their drawbacks. I've watched a snake slither just under water's surface. One even surfaced his freaky little face and eyeballed me. I guess snakes are curious, too.  

The most marvelous yet perilous things I've seen on this bayou happened twice this week. Right in front of my eyes, three feet from me, a large-mouth bass, a large one, leaped right up out of that water intending to catch his breakfast then and there. However, breaking to the right was a tiny silver fish. I froze in disbelief. Then again the next day further down the bank, another? the same? bass did the same leap.

It's just awesome ("awe"--def. extremely impressive or daunting; inspiring great admiration, apprehension, or fear) to see such things, and to know that someone created all this beauty in its magnificence and fear.)