Grapefruit Trees and Rebar...The Odd Pair!

  The oddities found on the Bayou never fail to intrigue me.  By oddities, I am referring to things found where they do not belong.  Sure, I find the occasional trowel on a tree stump or perhaps part of my lawnmower in the bushes (different story but still interesting) but those are nothing compared to say a filet knife found on the rooftop!  I have yet to figure out how that got there and whether I have some unknown enemy out there threatening my wellbeing with a filet knife! Still, these things are interesting, to say the least.

  Today's find?  Well...a piece of rebar.  While that, in itself, is not the most unusual find, the whereabouts of said rebar is.  What in the world was a piece of rebar doing up in the top of the grapefruit tree???  That...my friends...is the question of the day!

  Mark finally took the notion to cut out the dead parts of the citrus trees.  Termites had taken up residence in the roots of the trees and pretty much killed the grapefruit trees.  (Who says that citrus oil helps prevents an infestation??  Yeah, I read that somewhere.  Definitely not true.)  Anyway, as he cut the thirty foot tall trees down, a piece of rebar came tumbling to the ground.  Thankfully, it did not hit anyone or anything as it plummeted to the ground.  

  The rebar is bent into a lovely hook-shape making me ponder if someone had tried to use it to shake down fruit at some point.  It is approximately twenty-one inches long so is quite large.  I asked Son, since he has always picked the fruit from these huge trees for us, but he says that he always just climbed the trees.  Yep, that is something that I can vouch for as I am the one to "catch" those hefty fruits as he tosses them from the treetops.  Mark said he did not attempt such a dangerous game of tossing a rebar thirty feet into the air and I know I could never heave that thing up there.  This leaves me one conclusion...perhaps the rebar was hung on a low limb when the tree was small and then hoisted as the tree grew?  Who knows???  Surely, it was not the same culprit that left the knife on the rooftop....you think?  

  All is well that ends well, however.  The grapefruit trees are thinned of dead wood and the danger of the rebar hook has now passed.  Still...lingering questions....always lingering questions!

"The Greedy Fish"

  "Its mine!  Its mine!  Its mine!  All of them are mine!", thought the catfish that lived in the Bay.  "Its mine!  I want this minnow and this minnow and this minnow.   I can eat them all and grow up to be as big as my daddy.  Its mine!  One more! Oooh!  There is another.  I shall eat it, too."  The greedy fish ate and ate and ate.  Then, the unthinkable happened.  The greedy catfish's gluttony got the best of him.  Two...yes, two of the minnows that he ate contained hooks.  These two minnows were fishing baits and the greedy catfish gulped them down along with the other minnows.  Now, he was in trouble.  The catfish was pulled this way and that.  Two fishermen (or one fisherwoman, in this case!  Me!) thought they had hooked two different fish.  They reeled and reeled almost competing with each other.  At first, the fishermen thought that their lines had become tangled but the realization that they were catching the same fish soon became apparent.

  Yep, we did.  Mark and I set out fishing early this morning.  Before I got to the pier, he had already landed a nice trout and a beautiful redfish. We were excited about perhaps catching enough fish to share with our elderly friends so we kept tossing out the baits.  Then, both lines went out at the same time.  We both fought our fish only to soon realize that we were landing the same fish.  The catfish obviously bit Mark's bait first then went on to pick up mine.  This was a first for us!  Never before have we had this happen!  The fish had been double hooked. 

  Lucky for the fish, after a few photographs, Mark carefully removed the hooks and tossed the fish back into the water.  I can only imagine the stories that fellow is telling to his friends deep down under the water.  Perhaps he learned his lesson and will not be quite so greedy in the future! Strange things happen on the Bayou.

Well, That Was Awkward!

  Mark and I made a late afternoon hike about the hillside.  Of course, we wound up on the pier and, well, decided that work for the rest of the day was out of the question.  Fishing was calling.  He caught a few menhaden for bait and we tossed the lines.  It did not take long before both lines were zinging out from the reels!  It was beginning to look like a great idea to be fishing....until we landed the fish.  Both were huge catfish.  These were of the hardhead type and not worth keeping as food. We tried again....and again...and again.  Each bait brought up another large catfish.  Since we do not keep these fish to eat, they were gently removed from the hook and tossed back into the water.  Most of the time, the used minnow went over with the fish.  This "baiting" of the waters gathered a rather large number of gulls and terns to the area. Each waited for another free meal.

  It did not take long before we were out of bait.  Mark "fished out" the last bait and, once again, hooked a large catfish.  This time, however, the hook had snagged the fish instead of the fish taking the bait.  The poor thing was hooked in the belly!  Well, that was awkward! Mark removed the hook as gently and painlessly as possible and released this fish as well. Catfish are tough fish and this one will heal soon.  The fish will be feeding again by morning and will hopefully have learned its lesson to stay away from hooks. 

  With the last bait used, our attention turned to the gulls and terns.  One last menhaden was floating near the pier and a few birds were circling overhead.  Hoping to catch the "perfect shot", I got into position and held the camera steady.  Ready, Aim, Shoot!  The first dive of a tern went amiss and the bird flew away with no supper.  Then right behind that one, a tern made a quick dive, snagged the minnow and flew away with all of the other gulls and terns chasing behind.  They all wanted that menhaden!  With millions of the little minnows swimming in the water, it tickled us that the one dead fish was so coveted.  Our show was over as the birds flew southward chasing that single tern.

  When I looked at the photographs that I had taken, the one of the diving bird reminded me of how graceful these birds are while hunting.  Since the minnow was picked up mid-flight and next to the pier, the bird had little room for error.  The little tern handled the situation admirably and never missed a beat as it took off with its prize. Well, that was definitely NOT awkward!  I only hope that after that impressive dive, the tern ate its supper in peace without being harassed by the other seabirds.

Stranger things

  I should have been doing chores about the Little Bayou House.  I should have been watering the plants in the greenhouse.  I should have been putting the final touches on the Christmas decorations.  I should have been doing a lot of things....instead, I went fishing.  It was a gorgeous, sunshiny day and the weather forecasters are calling for storms for the next three days so it was only natural for me to head to the pier before the rains set in for the duration.  I needed to get in that last bit of fishing.  I figure the rainy days can be spent doing all the inside chores that need doing.  There was no use in letting a pretty day go to waste.  Make hay will the sun shines and all that good stuff.  In other words, I grabbed ahold of any reason just to get to the pier.  It seemed to me that it was my turn to catch a big fish.

  I did catch a nice redfish which will make supper tomorrow night.  I am sure that I probably could have caught more but it seemed selfish to take more than needed.  This one twenty-eight inch fish would more than suffice as a meal..or two.   The only problem was that with Hubby out of town, I had to fillet that fish.  He usually fillets the larger fish but, here again, I guess it was just my turn.  For anyone who has never cleaned a large redfish, it is no easy task.  Those scales are  rather tough and slicing through them requires a super sharp filleting knife.  It did not help matters much that I had just smashed my finger trying to repair the washing machine!  The wounded finger did not want to cooperate making the job doubly difficult.  

  Once I removed the nice slabs of meat, curiosity got the best of me.  It seemed that the stomach of this fish was unusually "packed".  Since I had to retrieve my hook (I had cut the line instead of digging around hunting for my hook.), I slit open the stomach. That redfish was a bit of a glutton!  Inside I found, three menhaden, one goby and one small catfish!  (I cannot believe the fish ate a horned catfish!)  But that was not all.  As I wiggled out my hook, I found another smaller hook.  This fish had already been caught once and had gotten free only to snatch my bait.  Here, he was not so lucky.  I caught him!  I picked out the other hook only to find that it was not the line that was broken but the hook itself.  The eye of the hook was missing!  A lot of folks make fun of me with my large hooks but I guess this just proves it pays to think big if you want to catch huge fish!  

  Finding the second hook inside the redfish made me think of an old that old saying "Even a fish would stay out of trouble if it would learn to keep its mouth shut!"  This one just did not learn its lesson well the first time.