ESTESBOG

by Peter Walker

One thousand acre Wassookeag Lake lies just outside the little mill town of Dexter, Maine. From 1975 through 1977, Wassookeag was the most northerly of the more than 600 lakes on my watch as an Assistant Regional Fishery Biologist in Maine’s Fishery Region B, the south central coastal plain.

            Lying next to a minor population center in otherwise rural central Maine, Wassookeag received heavier ice fishing pressure than most lakes. The lake at that time possessed small populations of landlocked Atlantic salmon and lake trout (“Mackinaw”). There were never enough to go around, yet I could always find an assortment of several dozen “townies” trying their luck on Wassookeag.

Wassookeag was well inland and high enough in latitude to lie in a much colder climate than lakes along the coast. By late winter the ice might approach four feet in thickness. This was enough to support any vehicle safely. Read more…

 Photo by Joe Lewendowski courtesy of Colorado Division of Wildlife

by Peter G. Walker

In order to put today’s tale in perspective, and to be fair to all concerned, I need to give you quite a bit of background. First of all, those of you who have never visited the little known region of eastern Colorado, you need to appreciate just how rural it is. Discounting Greeley, which is really an eastward extension of the Colorado Front Range, in an area the size of the entire state of Maine, there are only four “cities” that approach 10,000 people in size. The entire region has a phone book about the size of the one we used 30 years ago for the greater Augusta area in Maine. It’s about as rural as it gets. Mayberry RFD with cattle trucks and wheat fields.

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by Peter Walker

Did you ever hear of a hound making a career change?

Years ago my friend Dave Schnoor, manager back then of the state fish hatchery out in Wray, had a little rabbit hound named Luke. Luke was “beagle-ish,” but by no means a purebred. He was tri-colored like a typical beagle and small in stature. But Luke was heavier set and his head, ears and feet suggested a basset somewhere in his recent ancestry.

At any rate, Luke’s true love, aside from being a Schnoor family member and all the duties that entailed, was hunting rabbits. With his super nose and full voice, he was very good at it.

When Luke was around 7 years old, the unthinkable happened. His humans, for reasons he couldn’t fathom, brought home a pair of Brittany puppies. Suddenly he was overwhelmed with competition. Life was cruel. Life was unfair. And it was about to turn more so. Read more…

 by Peter Walker

His name was Tiny. He belonged to the Tedfords who lived up the hill from my grandparents in rural southwestern Maine.

He was quite possibly the oddest little dog I’ll ever see. Physically he looked like a critter made of leftover parts and pieces. His head was pretty much golden retriever both in size and appearance. But his body was more or less basset hound. So his head was way too big for his body.

His legs were extremely short and his tail stood straight up. His hair was long and frilly – a mixture of yellows and whites. The upper half of his tail had long white hair trailing off like the big flag on a sailboat’s mast. Read more…

by Peter Walker

USFWS photo by Peter Johnson, 2008

Oh, why does man pursue the smelt?
It has no valuable pelt,
It boasts of no escutcheon royal,
It yields no ivory or oil,
Its life is dull, its death is tame,
a fish as humble as its name.
Yet – take this salmon somewhere else;
And bring me half a dozen smelts!

Ogden Nash, 1902-1971

            I can’t explain it either. But ever since I was a little kid I’ve had a fascination with the smelt. And lots of other Mainers do, too.

            Middle Range Pond, the natural lake at the foot of the hill where I grew up in Poland Spring, Maine had a thriving population of tiny, sardine-sized smelts. They lived in the lake’s depths and were only seen in the early spring around ice-out when they ran up the little tributary brooks late at night to spawn. Men used to stay out all night to go smelting. They would catch the tiny fish with fine mesh dip nets. The limit was 4 quarts per fisherman per night. But, as I soon came to realize, smelts for most Maine outdoorsmen, are simply an excuse to stay out all night and howl at the moon and drink themselves into oblivion.

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Drawing by Wayne Lewis courtesy of Colorado Division of Wildlife.

by Peter Walker

            Three years ago my then 7-year-old grandson, Jason, introduced me to the recent hit animated movie “Over the Hedge.” One of the funniest scenes takes place in a tract home when the invading small animals are confronted by the woman of the house, armed with a broom.

            In the confusion the skunk turns to one of her compatriots and says, “I’m sorry you have to see this.”

Then she yells out, “FIRE IN THE HOLE!”

The view pans back away from the house as, “POOM!” a green cloud blows out simultaneously from the windows and doors. Read more…

(Photograph courtesy of Colorado Division of Wildlife)

by Peter Walker

            I don’t know whether curiosity actually kills cats, but I do know what sort of trouble curiosity once brought to a red fox.

            A Maine Game Warden buddy of mine named Smally Chandler told me about the incident. Smally worked the Camden-Searsport district on the Maine coast during the early 1970s. In those days there was a great deal of night time deer poaching west of the Penobscot estuary and it kept the district wardens in that region very busy. Read more…

By Peter Walker

The human brain is a complex organ. There is still so much about this natural computer with its enormous capacity for data storage and retrieval that is a mystery to science. Obliquely, my story today is about a little-used function of the human brain stem.

Evolutionists believe the human brain stem represents the original brain possessed by our reptile-like ancestors millions of years ago. As such, it was not capable of very much thought, but it served to keep body functions like breathing and heart rate steady. It was also capable of conducting certain instinctual reactions to external stimuli – reactions like fright response.

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BY PETER WALKER

Let’s face it. Chickens are not smart. Inside that small, silly-looking head is a brain about the size of a garbanzo bean. That’s not much to work with. 

Still, insofar as a hen can cluck while at the same time walking from Point A to Point B, chickens are capable of rudimentary multitasking.

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This little wildlife drama was photographed and described to me by fellow photographer Mandy Colburn of Fort Morgan. Mandy’s 11-year-old stepson, Ouray Ocanas, is an exceptionally observant nature nut who seldom misses an interesting snake or bug or mammal in his wanderings.

            One day last summer Ouray noticed the family pack of weiner dogs were excited about something on the back lawn. Going to investigate, he spotted a gray and black object in the grass and it was moving. It was a baby bat. Assuming it had lost its mother, and knowing enough about bats to realize he probably shouldn’t handle it directly, the boy put on some heavy work gloves to capture the little bat and put him in a terrarium. He figured that the baby bat’s mother could access the baby through the open top and the little animal might be at least somewhat protected from cats and other small terrestrial predators.

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