Florida's Urbanized Sandhill Cranes

In my 62 plus years I have lived in seven states (Wisconsin, North Dakota, Georgia, Nebraska, California, Virginia and Florida), two other countries (the Bahamas Islands, and the Turks and Caicos Islands) and had 28 different addresses for whatever felt like home at the time.  I have visited six of the seven inhabited continents (plus felt the frigid winds of Antarctica from Ushuaia, Argentina, and from Hobart, Tasmania), been in 111 countries (and counting) and crossed over the boundary of each of the 3,076 counties or parishes in the United States.  Without doubt my most favorite country is Thailand and it’s followed very closely by Argentina, Australia, and South Africa.

Of the states I’ve called home, I miss Wisconsin, Virginia (Washington DC) and Nebraska the most.  My yearnings for Wisconsin are simple – that’s who I am.  Once my ancestors all decided to move to North America from Norway, Germany and the Czech Republic, they converged on the great Cheesehead state and all sorts of genetic mixing followed.  I have not physically lived there since Saturday, January 20, 1979, but I will always be a Packer fan and a Badger fan and a Cheesehead to the core. 

I miss living in northern Virginia and Washington DC because of the history, culture, the politics and the really cheap airfare.  Almost everyone living in NOVA (even some of the drug dealers on the corner of 17^th and K Streets NW in the District) eventually develops a keen interest in the rich history of the area.  If you don’t have an interest in the Civil War (that would be the “war of northern aggression” or simply the “nothen wah” in Georgia) before you move there, I promise you will by the time you leave.  With venues like the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and Ford’s Theater and the National Theater and the Wolf Trap Farm Park for the Performing Arts all just a few metro stops away from wherever you are, many people develop an interest in the arts and some like me even begin to sound like they know what they are talking about when it comes to plays and various actors.  Politics, the number one industry in northern Virginia, are self-evident there.  Where else can you go where those talking heads you see on television are dashing in and out of Metro stops with you just like regular people (which they quickly forget that they are).  And cheap airfare - $58 roundtrips from Washington National airport (never EVER call it Reagan Airport) to Louisville, or $238 to Glasgow Scotland for a long weekend, or $520 roundtrip to Dubai in the United Emirates for a few days on the Arabian Peninsula? 

Although it lacks the social and cultural amenities of northern Virginia there are so many things to miss about Nebraska.  Most importantly I miss the people.  The only place other than my natal Wisconsin where I regularly met people who would literally give you the shirt off your back even if you didn’t need it at the time was Nebraska.  Then there is the incomparable Platte River.  Even though thanks to excessive water withdrawal to irrigate surplus corn that results in more set aside programs and more Congressionally-mandated payments to store what’s over produced, there are very few places in North America as majestic and as crucial as is the Platte River.  The river’s importance involves many species of wildlife on top of drinking water for hundreds of thousands of people however without the river the continued existence of nearly 80 percent of the world’s population of sandhill cranes would be threatened.  And it’s all of those sandhill cranes that show up on the Platte River for 8 weeks every spring that I miss the most about Nebraska.

From about Valentine’s Day until about the 10^th of April upwards of 500,000 sandhill cranes converge on the Platte River to prepare themselves for the continuation of their migration to nesting areas in Arctic Canada, western Alaska and eastern Siberia.  It’s along the Platte River where established pairs of sandhill cranes re-strengthen their bond with their mate (unlike humans, sandhill cranes remain mated for life) and should a sandhill crane be looking for a replacement after their mate died, or if you are a young sandhill crane trying to find a mate, the Platte River is the place to make that happen.  I once described the Platte as a sinuous pick up bar for birds and I still cannot think of a better way to explain it.

When I moved from Nebraska to suburban Los Angeles just before the start of crane migration season in 1993 I was afraid that a huge part of who I had become – a fanatic lover of sandhill cranes – would be buried my other more seemingly important things.  In California I worked on many issues like California condor recovery and desert tortoise conservation and trying to figure out ways to keep commercial sea urchin fishermen from killing the endangered California sea otter.  The office I supervised in southern California was responsible for the conservation of 118 species of plants and animals that had been added to the Federal endangered species list or the threatened species list and that left little time to think about sandhill cranes.

From California I moved to northern Virginia where for 14 years I was a regular patron of the Metro subway and bus system.  Although I had a car at times I wondered why I did.  In October 2007 I put exactly four (4) miles on my car the entire month.  With almost everything I needed just a Metro bus or subway ride away there was little need to put miles on my car and that month I barely did.  In Virginia seeing sandhill cranes was a major event.  Unlike Nebraska where you had to shovel them out of the roadway, and even in California where you could see several hundred at a time on the Carrizo Plain in northern Santa Barbara county, in Virginia sandhill cranes qualified for the rare bird alerts. When one or more, no doubt off course headed to or from Florida and the Great Lakes states, showed up near DC they were instantly added to the top of the rare bird alert and I would regularly drop whatever I was doing to dash out to see one.

My last day in my office and the last day I worked for the US Fish and Wildlife Service was February 25, 2008.  On that day I left my office three hours early (what were they going to do – fire me?) and walked to the Ballston Metro station. There I removed any clothing that resembled working in Washington plus my wrist watch.  I bundled everything up and threw it in the garbage.  I put on a pair of flip flops and wore them as I rode the subway home one last time.  The following day I put myself and my car on AMTRAK’s Auto Train in suburban DC and headed for Florida.  I was wearing shorts, a Jimmy Buffett t shirt and jesus sandals (and no wrist watch) as the train carried me south.

Exiting the train the next day in Sanford Florida, I noticed as I drove out of the train station that a pair of sandhill cranes stood like sentinels along the roadway as they watched cars pass by.  A little later on the Beltway around Orlando I noticed other pairs of sandhill cranes and in the lawn of a hotel near the intersection of the Beltway and Interstate 4, not far from the entrance to the Ratworld complex, a flock of 12 sandhill cranes foraged vigorously in the recently mowed lawn of the hotel.

In a little over six years living in Florida I have seen sandhill cranes in 34 of the state’s 67 counties and in every county south of Interstate 4. I am lucky where I live in having a rather fecund pair that has produced colts every year I have been here.  Without fail every morning at dawn they fly over my home trumpeting their message to all of cranedom that this landscape is theirs and woe be to any other crane foolish enough to think they could take it over.  Many times at sunset I hear them calling as they settle in on a wetland on the University Park development where they spend every night. 

Unlike Nebraska where if you sneeze loudly you’re likely to cause a flock of 1,000 sandhill cranes to take wing and fly away, in heavily urbanized Florida (there’s hardly any “rural” left in this part of the state) they have come to tolerate humans and our often noisy intrusions.  Several years ago while on my bicycle I witnessed a crane-human interaction on a golf course that still makes me chuckle.  A golfer, totally oblivious to the presence of a pair of cranes and their colt on the fairway, swung his club and hit the ball and sent it on a trajectory for the cranes.  They saw the human and watched as the golf ball sailed closer and closer to them.  As it did the male (I assume it was the male) of the pair began trumpeting his utter contempt for this human-induced indignity.  The golf ball hit the ground and rolled to within inches of the family group of cranes.  The human, now aware of the birds, strolled up to the irate (and vigorously bugling) sandhill crane expecting it to move. But it didn’t.  Instead the sandhill cranes held their ground refusing to budge.  The golfer tried flushing the birds so he could get to his golf ball but the cranes fought back.  The dominant male in the group began pursuing the golfer every time he approached the family.  The bird was not to be intimidated and for a full 30 minutes would not allow the golfer to get to his ball.  I stood along the fairway and watched as the now indignant crane family made their final move.  The male walked up to the golf ball, took it in his mouth, and with a loud trumpeting call that I think would be translated from sandhill craneze as “fuck you,” took wing with his family in pursuit and flew off to some distant wetland.  The score was now - sandhill cranes 1, golfer 0.

This morning while driving on Cattlemen Road near the new rowing/sculling venue I came onto a group of 16 sandhill cranes strutting around in the roadway.  Looking at the coloration on the crowns of the birds it was easy to tell that four of them were this year’s colts and the rest were adults.  They were in no rush to go anywhere and through their slow and deliberate actions held up human traffic on southbound Cattlemen Road.  Eventually tiring of their newfound power, the birds called to each other, took wing, and flew south over the wetland and toward the Meadows. 

I listened to them talk to each other as they flew away and the scene reminded me of the Platte River only in miniature.  Seeing 16 cranes along the Platte River in early March isn’t even a good start, but in Sarasota County Florida that is a pretty nice way to greet the dawn.  As I watched and listened to the flock disappear it dawned on me that my love of Nebraska comes from being with cranes for 8 weeks in the spring and if I was lucky for 4 weeks in the fall.  In Florida, although I can’t see them in numbers anywhere near like what you see in Nebraska, I can see them and hear them and be in touch with sandhill cranes 52 weeks of the year.  They are here any day I need to be around them and that’s even better than Nebraska.

A Deer-Bobcat Interaction in an Urban Landscape

Living where I do among nearly 300,000 humans in the Sarasota- Bradenton area I remain amazed by the relative abundance of wildlife that survives in this increasingly concrete-choked landscape especially in areas west of Interstate highway 75.  Since moving here in early 2009 I’ve found river otters quite regularly (including too many road kills), nesting swallow-tailed kites (the most beautiful raptor on earth), eastern diamondback rattlesnakes, several cottonmouth’s (including one on my front step during a torrential downpour), opossums, white-tailed deer and no shortage of armadillos.   The latter, almost all the time, are road-kills.

Probably the wildlife species most closely associated with “wilderness” has been the bobcat.  Before moving to Florida I had seen only two bobcats in my lifetime.  The first was crossing the road not far from Clint Eastwood’s home (and his empty chair) near Carmel, California in October 1980. The second was seen stalking a flock of Gambel’s quail along the San Pedro River in southeast Arizona in May 1998.  Since moving to Florida however I have seen probably 20 more in the wild including one not far from my house in a heavily urbanized area on January 24, 2013.

Location of the white-tailed deer and bobcat interaction this morning (left pin). The site lies just 0.78 miles from heavily traveled Interstate 75 (right pin) and two city blocks north of a major highway intersection.  Click on the image to make it larger.

My most recent sighting of this magnificent mammal occurred this morning while I was on my bicycle.  As I pedaled down Honore Avenue and approached the unnamed road that turns into the shopping mall where Staples is located, I noticed a fawn white-tailed deer, perhaps no more than a month old, dash across Honore (without looking for oncoming traffic) and disappear into the thick woody vegetation behind the shopping mall. About 2 steps behind the fawn was a second one (no doubt its twin) that was traveling at the same high rate of speed.  Perhaps two seconds behind the second fawn was an adult female white-tailed deer and what seemed like a nanosecond behind the adult deer was an adult bobcat running full out in pursuit of a late morning breakfast.

Once they passed I pedaled to the place where they were seen entering the thick woody vegetation.  There I saw white-tailed deer tracks and bobcat tracks but nothing more.  I waited a minute to listen for the sounds of a kill but heard none.  All I heard was a persistent male northern parula and some northern mockingbirds mimicking everything they had ever heard.

Defenders of Wildlife information about bobcats states that they primarily eat lagomorphs but also take birds, rodents and adult deer.   

  

Early June is the time of year when juvenile bobcats are still with the mother and are still fed by her.   My guess is that this animal was in pursuit of the fawns not the adult because of the size of the fawns and because of their vulnerability.  Despite the reason (and it doesn’t really matter anyway) it was exciting to see this interaction.  I only wish I could have seen through the thick vegetation to determine if the bobcat was successful.  Perhaps I’ll have a hunch if I see the female deer again but next time she has with her only one fawn.  Several recent studies have shown that white-tailed deer fawn mortality rate (rate of deaths from birth until their first birthday) ranged from 53 percent to 77 percent.  Thus it’s likely that only one of those fawns I saw this morning was going to live to blow out its birthday cake candle 10 months from now.

Regardless of the speculation about something I could never prove it was exciting to once again see an animal I usually associate with wilderness roaming around near two major street intersections, a heavily-traveled interstate highway and the homes of nearly 300,000 people.  Given that paving the countryside is the fate for most of Florida’s landscape in a few short years, I hope these urban bobcats continue to survive.  Even if the deer are extirpated, there is no shortage of house cats here.  Maybe Morris the Cat will become the principal food item of these bobcats.  At least then there would be one positive outcome of urbanization.

Who Does Your Newborn Resemble?

Meet Garrett Parker

Birth of a baby causes all manner of excitement.  Even though you have had 9 months to prepare for the big event, when the day finally arrives all of those plans seem to go up in smoke.  They follow that course because when a baby arrives everything that once was important suddenly becomes less important.  Your baby is what it’s all about now.

The birth of a newborn also sets in motion an enormous amount of speculation and most of it revolves around who the baby resembles.  Who among us has not been a part of the discussion about “Doesn’t he look like Jill?”  or “I think she has Ed’s eyes” or “Don’t you think she has Ellen’s forehead?”  Although I have never heard it discussed I’m sure that someone somewhere has speculated about “Don’t you think he has my great grandfather’s ear lobes?” 

Garrett Parker made his grand entrance into the world in a hospital in Alaska on March 21, 2014.  He was normal weight and normal length and he had a head full of thick dark hair.  When I asked his mother about him she told me that when he was first born she and her husband “thought he looked like an alien.”  Mom’s response reminded me of a similar conversation that occurred the morning after mom was born.

Garrett’s mom is my daughter Jennifer.  She made her grand entrance shortly after 10:00 p.m. one Friday night in early September in 1977.  It took Jennifer 16 hours to make that first appearance and when she did I looked at her with all that chalky looking goo covering her tiny little body and immediately checked her face, her fingers and her toes to make sure nothing was missing.  About the time I finished checking out my baby, the doctor announced that we had a girl.  As the nurses wrapped her in a blanket I looked even more closely at her.  She was all pink and wrinkled but to me she looked just like Jennifer.

At the time of Jennifer’s birth we were living in a very small and very drafty downstairs apartment of a house on South Main Street in River Falls, Wisconsin.  About two blocks from our home, at a major three way intersection across the street from the University of Wisconsin – River Falls, stood Swede’s Standard station.  Through seven years of undergraduate and graduate school I always stopped at Swede’s for gasoline and for car repairs.  After all those years it seemed that Swede was more like family than the owner of a gas station and I wanted to make sure he knew about Jennifer’s arrival.

At mid-morning the day after Jennifer’s birth I stopped at Swede’s to tell him the big news.  As I entered the station I saw that an old English literature professor of mine, Zane Chaffee, was also there.  He was drinking coffee with Swede and discussing (but not solving) all of the issues in the world.

Excitedly I interrupted their conversation and made the announcement that my baby daughter had arrived just 12 hours earlier.  As a huge smile crossed Swede’s face he began grilling me about Jennifer: “Does she have Ruth’s red hair?”  “Does she have your nose?”  “Who in your family does she look like the most?”

Taking in all of his questions I searched for an answer and finally came up with one.  All I said was “Swede, she is just this little pink wrinkled thing.”   I then added, “If she looks like anyone she looks like herself.”

Zane Chaffee, whom I more than once said was a reincarnation of Mark Twain, blew coffee out of his nostrils and with a hearty laugh said “You know, Craig, you’re the first father of a newborn baby I’ve ever heard tell the truth about his child.” 

I haven’t met Garrett yet but I hope to next summer.  When I meet him I will check him out and with luck maybe take him fishing.  I helped his mom catch her first fish, an Arctic grayling, from a river on the tundra of Canada when she was 3 years old.  Maybe I’ll be able to help Garrett catch his first fish from an Alaskan river when he is a little over one.  I’ll tell him stories about his mom when she was a little girl like the one about Harvey the Hog-nosed Snake that his mom insisted had to sleep in her bed with her when she was four. I might even tell him the story of that morning in Swede’s gas station when Zane Chaffee recognized the truth about newborns.

There will be many things to show him and many things to tell him but the most important thing to tell him is that Garrett looks just like Garrett and nobody can tell him any different.

Welcome to the world.

Wisconsin and the World War II Memorial

The World War II Memorial in Washington DC will be a busy place today, the 70th anniversary of the D-Day invasion. I first visited the memorial about a week after it opened. It consists of a series of "mini" memorials to every state and every trust territory that fought in the war. On that first visit I instinctively sought out the Wisconsin mini memorial but quickly discovered that the states were not arranged alphabetically. In fact there seemed to be no pattern to them at all.

Frustrated I saw an old guy who was probably in his late 80s attached to a canister of oxygen and walking with the aid of a walker. He was wearing a University of Wisconsin t shirt and a Green Bay Packers cap (pretty solid evidence that he was a native born Cheesehead). Stopping him I said I was from Wisconsin and couldn't find our memorial. Not missing a beat he pointed over his shoulder and with a scowl on his face said "It’s over there - next to those fuckers from Minnesota."

Turns out the mini memorials are arranged according to when states were admitted to the Union. Wisconsin was admitted in 1848. Iowa admitted in 1846 was on one side of the Wisconsin memorial and Minnesota admitted in 1858 was on the other side of us. Oregon was admitted a year after Minnesota. I wish it had been two years earlier.

Happy 41st Birthday Chester the Chesapeake Bay Retriever

Chester the Chesapeake Bay Retriever entered the world on June 4, 1973.  His mom, a brood mother for a Chesapeake Bay Retriever breeder from near Shakopee, Minnesota, gave birth to Chester and his 7 siblings early in the morning that day.  The dog breeder, a well-known and highly respected person in those days, focused on Chesapeake’s because in his mind they were the finest hunting dogs on the face of the earth.

The fall before while hunting ducks in an area of lowland forest and wetland along the Mississippi River near Diamond Bluff, Wisconsin, I trudged out to my favorite pond breaking through ice as I walked.  On arrival at that pond I found another hunter had arrived earlier and set up his decoys in the exact spot where I liked to set out my spread.  He sat on a collapsible chair hidden by some cattails and next to him, in a hole created in the thin ice, sat his Chesapeake Bay Retriever.  Despite the cold temperatures and ice everywhere, his dog sat shivering in the frigid water scanning the sky and waiting.  A male wood duck flew by us as the owner and I talked.  He stood up and shot.  As the duck plummeted to the ice his Chesapeake sat motionless waiting for the command to retrieve.  With the duck lying dead on the ice the dog’s owner said, softly, “retrieve.”  The Chesapeake bounded from his icy seat, broke ice with every lunge, grabbed the duck in his mouth, and turned around to return to his owner.  Safely back by the hunter the Chesapeake dropped the wood duck at his owner’s collapsible seat, walked over several feet and shook himself off. Then, with no commands, returned to his icy seat in the open water, plunked himself down and began scanning the sky for more ducks.  I knew instantly that if I ever had a duck hunting dog it would be a Chesapeake Bay Retriever.

Dennis Maus, a local barber in Rice Lake Wisconsin was an avid duck hunter and proud member of Ducks Unlimited.  Denny hunted with a Chesapeake Bay Retriever and once, while clipping my hair, bragged to me that he and his son had shot 115 ring-necked ducks one afternoon the fall before from a blind on Red Cedar Lake.  The bag limit for 2 hunters then would have been 10 ducks between them.  When I asked Denny why he shot so many he said “They kept coming and we kept shooting until we ran out of shells.” 

Our conversation occurred in early June 1973 just after I received my bachelor’s degree from the University of Wisconsin at River Falls and just before I began graduate school at the same university.  I told Denny of my interest in a Chesapeake Bay Retriever and he told me about the breeder in Minnesota from which he purchased his Chessie several years earlier.  After finishing with my hair cut, Maus called the man to find out the status of any puppy broods that may have been born recently.  As luck would have it one of his brood mothers had given birth to 8 puppies just a few days earlier.  He promised not to sell any of them until Denny and I had a chance to check them out personally.

Most dog authorities tell you that the earliest you should separate a puppy from its mother is at 7 weeks or 49 days of age.  For whatever reason, Denny Maus and I traveled to Shakopee Minnesota on Chester’s 5 week birthday – just 35 days.  We looked at the litter and I picked out the largest and most active puppy in the bunch.  He was a chocolate brown with the hairs on his back already curly.  His skin was oily (an adaptation to help them endure frigid water) and already the webs between his toes (an adaptation to help them swim) were growing and obvious.  I paid the breeder $150 for this magnificent dog and we began the trek back to Rice Lake.  By the time we returned home I had named my dog “Chester.” It had a bit of a Disney-esque ring to it but the name fit the puppy perfectly.

That first evening at just five weeks old, I drove Chester down to the boat landing at the east edge of Montains Lake (long before all of the uplands there were infested with houses) and summarily threw him in the water.  He splashed down, submerged briefly, and then instinctively paddled back to shore.  Unafraid of the water he shook himself off, turned himself around and pointed at the lake’s surface.  Taking the hint I picked him up and threw him back in.  That continued for an hour when I was tired of the exercise.  Five-week-old Chester still wanted to swim.

Duck hunting season 1973 opened on October 1 and on opening day a rapidly growing Chester sat in the front of my 13 foot canoe as we paddled around on Spring Creek looking for ducks. Not long after the 12:00 noon opening bell a flock of mallards erupted from the water’s surface and after three shots rang out three male mallards lay on the water their orange legs kicking.  Without saying a word, Chester was over the gunwale and paddling out to the first duck.  With it safely in his mouth he returned to the canoe, spit the duck out into my hand and turned around to retrieve the second duck.  He repeated the process again and retrieved the third duck.  Just a few days short of being 4 months old Chester had the concept of retrieving down perfectly.

He and I and my former wife enjoyed many days hunting in western Wisconsin.  It seemed that if an animal flew Chester would retrieve it.  Once while tromping around in the woods of an area known as the Mikana Swamp, Chester tried his hand at retrieving a porcupine.  The porcupine won and we wound up at the veterinarian’s office where the painful quills were removed from his mouth. Not one to quickly learn from such experiences a week later Chester tried his hand at retrieving another porcupine in the same forest.  This time the concept of “quills = pain” sunk in and he never tried for another one.

Our first daughter was born on September 2, 1977, and Chester immediately proclaimed himself the main protector of Jennifer.  Despite having known my parents for more than 4 years when they drove to River Falls to see Jennifer when she was just a couple weeks old they walked in the door and found Chester curled up at the base of Jenny’s crib.  My mom took one step toward Jennifer and Chester was on his feet, teeth bared, hair on his back standing on end, and a deep guttural growl flowing from his throat. Jennifer was his baby now and in Chester’s mind only he would determine who could get near her. 

Several years later in North Dakota, my youngest daughter Dana was playing with some neighbor kids.  At probably 2 years old Dana let out a squeal of happiness typical of a child that age.  Chester however heard the squeal differently and assumed that Dana was in danger.  His response was to walk up to the child who caused Dana to squeal, clamp his mouth on the offender’s forearm, and stand there doing nothing more.  The message however was clear “don’t you dare harm my baby!”  The neighbor boy who made her squeal never did that again.

Chester was in heaven when we lived in North Dakota.  I distinctly remember one morning on Sibley Lake in Kidder County.  He and I drove out there and set up our decoys in anticipation of the opening hour of 7:00 a.m.  Right on cue a pair of male American wigeon flew in and I shot them both.  Chester swam out and retrieved them both in his mouth at the same time.  Placing them at my feet he sat down and waited and soon two male mallards flew in and met a similar fate.  Chester retrieved both in his mouth at the same time and lay them at my feet.  With one more duck to go to have my limit we waited until a male redhead flew in and was taken.  With the redhead safely in our bag I looked at my wrist watch – it was 7:12 a.m.  We had a limit of ducks in 12 minutes.  Soon a flock of snow geese flew in and I shot four of them and Chester retrieved them with no instructions.  One goose was injured and swam ½ mile across the lake.  Chester was in hot pursuit and in the middle of the lake as the goose dove to escape Chester dove after him.  Returning to the surface he had a snow goose in his mouth that he returned to me.  Returning to Jamestown we picked up a limit of 3 sharp-tailed grouse and 10 gray partridge and Chester retrieved them all. That evening I went mourning dove hunting with some friends and took Chester along.  Between us we could shoot 50 mourning doves that evening and only because we ran out of shells we took 49. Despite his huge sloppy mouth Chester retrieved each mourning dove for us and never ruffled a feather.

I didn’t know it at the time but Chester’s last hunt was on November 8, 1982.  Friends from Jamestown and I went hunting and of course took Chester along.  Luck was with us as we shot a bounty of snow geese, several mallards and some lesser scaup.  With one duck remaining to fill our bag limit for the day we stopped at a wetland near Cleveland in Stutsman County and set out our decoys.  With a light snow falling and wind whipping a male redhead flew into the decoy spread and I shot it.  Chester picked it up and we all went home.  It was the last duck he ever touched.

A separation and subsequent divorce the following spring resulted in me living separately from my family and my dog.  For various reasons my almost-former-wife was unable to take care of Chester like he should have been, and the one-bedroom apartment I lived in was too small for a dog even if the apartment complex rules would allow.  With no other option I returned him home to my parents farm on his birthday, June 4, 1983. There as I was leaving I scratched his ears and told him I would see him soon but I never did.  My last sight of him was the dog chasing me down the road trying to catch me thinking we would go hunting again.   Despite having been a hunter since 1960 when I was 8 years old I have not picked up a gun or hunted another animal since the day I last saw Chester.  Without him my passion for hunting burned out and has never been relit.

About 2 years later in 1985, Chester bounded out of his dog house to greet the milk hauler who had arrived at my parents farm to pick up cans of milk from the previous day’s milking.  As he drove into the yard the truck driver didn’t see Chester and Chester wasn’t paying attention and soon Chester was underneath the left front tire of the truck.  He died instantly and was buried in the pasture at the southeast corner of our farm.  Twelve years later we spread the ashes of both of our parents on the same patch of that pasture where my dog was buried.  Most of my family seems to reside on that patch of ground now.

There has been only one other dog in my life since the loss of Chester.  Rauxi, a 105 pound Rottweiler who thought she was a human being was owned by a woman I lived with in Washington DC.  Despite the supposed ferocity that everyone associates with a Rotti, Rauxi was a cream puff.  I trained her to bare her teeth and growl when I said the word “Republican” and then trained her that squirrels were Republicans and whenever one showed up in the yard I’d send Rauxi on a frenzied chase across the back yard cleansing it of Republicans.

Despite having Rauxi in my life for 4 years she never could and never would replace Chester.  In fact 41 years after his birth (that is 287 dog years) and 31 years after I last saw him there is not a single day that goes by in which I don’t think about him or mention his name.  I still have dreams about hunting with him on North Dakota’s prairie and I still feel sad that my divorce put him in a situation where what he loved the most – hunting and protecting his family – were no longer a part of who he was.  

The Colfax Tornado of June 4, 1958

Wednesday June 4, 1958, dawned sunny, hot, and muggy in Menomonie, Wisconsin.  I was in the first grade at Coddington Elementary School where I had a serious case of pre-pubescent lust for my teacher whose name I have now forgotten.  As usual I walked the few blocks (maybe 10?) from our home to school in the morning and gave nothing else much thought.

My father, an artificial inseminator (a “bull cheater” in the parlance of rural Wisconsin in those days) made his usual rounds inseminating cows in the barns of his many customers in northern Dunn County.  One of his stops that morning was at the farm of George House, a generally prosperous farmer whose land lay next to State Highway 25 about 3 miles north of Menomonie.  My dad was at the House farm about 11:00 a.m. where he bred a cow, his last of the morning, and then returned home for lunch.  His afternoon rounds took him on his typically circuitous route and he completed those calls about 4:00 p.m.  I arrived home from school about the time he returned home and just as he did a farmer between the villages of Elk Mound and Colfax called saying he had forgotten to get in touch earlier.  He had a cow that was ready for inseminating and asked my dad to make a special trip out to service the bovine.

As we left Menomonie on US Highway 29 headed east about 4:15 pm it was rapidly becoming obvious that the sunny and muggy morning we had experienced was being replaced by large, dark and very ominous storm clouds off to the west.  In those days there was no such thing as advanced Doppler radar, or storm chasers, or even severe thunderstorm or tornado watches and warnings.  Then we relied more on instinct than some talking head from the three television stations in Minneapolis/St. Paul or WEAU-TV in Eau Claire to tell us what was brewing in Mother Nature’s kitchen.

My dad parked our Volkswagen Beatle (the “bug”) on the east side of the customer’s barn and entered it to breed a cow.  Meanwhile my mother and I remained in the VW bug fantasizing about trips that would never be taken and places she would never see.   As we waited the sky grew even more ominous and threatening.  Its color had turned an indescribable green, the bottoms of clouds were hanging from the base of the thunderhead, and all of the sky was rotating like a clock in reverse.  Suddenly in the distance the occasional thunder we had heard turned into a nearly deafening roar.  Not knowing what was happening yet, we assumed that the roar was just a continual chorus of thunder because the sky was lit up with lightning in every direction and nickel-sized hail was pelting down.

However the roar was not from thunder.  As everyone who has ever experienced a tornado will attest, the sound we heard was the “it sounded like a freight train” of a tornado.  The funnel emerged from behind the barn and twisted and churned its way across the landscape sucking up soil and everything else in its way.  Along with it was a second, smaller funnel that (at least at that time) hung from the base of the rotating wall cloud and did not touch the ground. We sat in petrified awe as this massive storm passed less than ¼ mile (1,320 feet or about 4 football fields) from us).  I still remember seeing soil and branches and almost everything else imaginable being flung into the air by the passing tempest.

The tornado eventually passed by us on its east - northeast trajectory and unknown to us at the time, slammed into the tiny village of Colfax, Wisconsin, from which its name “The Colfax Tornado” was born.  Later estimates of the damage caused by the storm caused most authorities to say that the Colfax Tornado was an EF-4 – the second most destructive storm on the Enhanced Fujita scale.  More recently I have seen some who claim the Colfax Tornado was an EF-5 (the most destructive of all tornadoes) for at least part of its dance across the landscape.  One report received about the Colfax Tornado claims that not one but two funnels slammed into the village.  A local meteorological expert (in Wisconsin that is anyone in a bar who has just looked at a cloud) claimed that the funnel hit a nearby hill and that caused it to split into two separate funnels that slammed into Colfax.  Later research has shown that multiple vortices are fairly common in large rotating wall clouds and the second funnel was most likely just that – maybe the funnel my mom and I saw dangling from the cloud before it touched down a few miles away near Colfax.

Returning to Menomonie after the storm passed we like many other foolish people that day drove out to the Dunn County countryside to see what had been destroyed in the tornado’s path.  At first we drove north of Menomonie on State Highway 25 and just before Tainter Lake, at a small bend in the highway we crested a hill and saw the George House farm where my dad bred a cow at 11:00 that morning. Now, at about 6:00 p.m. there was no barn remaining in which a cow could be stanchioned.  In fact there was virtually nothing remaining on or of the George House farm. The barn or at least the part that remained on the House farm was a pile of splintered timber.  All of the outbuildings were gone as was the house.  In fact the only structure that remained on the entire farmstead was George House’s bath tub.  It was still anchored to the foundation of what used to be a house that surrounded it.  There was no sign of anything alive on the House farm at 6:00 p.m. and later reports indicate that Mr. House had died in the chaos an hour earlier.

From the House farm we drove west on some country roads and saw destruction and devastation everywhere.  One thing that we saw that remains indelibly etched in my mind was at the remains of a farmstead near the village of Knapp. There standing next to a decapitated barn was a Holstein cow, still on her legs, with a 2x4 of timber protruding from a hole in her stomach just forward of her hip.  I still remember today, 56 years later, watching a man walk up to her, put a pistol to her forehead, and pull the trigger putting her out of what must have been immense pain.

The Colfax Tornado first set down in Ramsey County, Minnesota just north of the Twin Cities.  From its initial touchdown it roared east crossing the wide expanse of the St. Croix River and then churned its way across St. Croix, Dunn, Chippewa and Clark counties. Later estimates revealed that the funnel (or one of its offspring) was on the ground for nearly 130 miles.  It remains one of the longest track tornadoes ever recorded in Wisconsin.  Twenty-nine people died that afternoon in the path of destruction and many lives were changed forever.  The village of Colfax was essentially wiped from the face of the earth. 

The day following the tornado about the only topic of discussion in our second grade classroom was the tornado.  At recess that morning I still remember classmate Doug Clemmons sitting on the sidewalk trying to describe the destruction.  To illustrate what happened Doug pulled up a loose brick from the sidewalk and threw it to the side explaining that was how everything looked where the tornado had been.  Our teacher was quite helpful in assisting us in talking about what we experienced.  I remember (because I still have it in a frame) drawing a picture for her of what I saw from 1,320 feet away.  It was a water color on construction paper but the greens and the yellows and the blacks I saw that day all stand out.  So too does the rotation of the giant wedge funnel, and adjacent to it is a smaller funnel dangling from the cloud.  Could that have been the second funnel that slammed into Colfax? Nobody knows or will we ever but now 56 years later it’s fun to speculate.

You can read more about the Colfax tornado and see a collage of pictures of its destruction here, here, here and here.  Frustratingly there are no known photos of the Colfax Tornado but plenty of photos of its aftermath. 

The Colfax Tornado had a profound effect that remains with me to this day.  I vividly remember another storm in 1963 when we were living in Barron County (one county north of Dunn).  The sky was black and a wall cloud was hanging from it and as I watched it in horror I began chewing on the collar of my t-shirt.  By the time the storm passed I no longer had a collar on my shirt – only the dangling strings of what used to be one. 

For whatever reason, since that first tornado, I have seen more tornadoes on June 4 than any other day of the year.  For example:

June 4, 1978 – one tornado on the ground 10 miles south of Great Falls Montana while I was conducting a census of nesting songbirds on a patch of native prairie.

June 3, 1980 (a day early) – the night of the tornado outbreak in Grand Island Nebraska in which at least 7 separate tornadoes rampaged through the city.

June 4, 1981.  While giving our nearly one-year old daughter Dana a bath in the kitchen sink (don’t ask why we chose to bathe her there – I do not remember), we saw a tornado drop from the sky just west of our home in Jamestown, North Dakota and briefly dance across the prairie before dissipating.

June 4, 1991 – My daughters and I sat on a hilltop north of Grand Island, Nebraska and watched three funnels form to the southwest.  One touched down briefly but caused no damage other than churning up some corn.

June 4, 2010 – A funnel formed and touched down briefly at Blackwater River State Park in Santa Rosa County, Florida.  I was driving west on US 98, saw the rotating wall cloud, and pulled over to the roadside and watched.

June 4, 2012 – A funnel formed over the intersection of University Parkway and Interstate Highway 75 in Sarasota Florida.  I was riding my bicycle home and saw the funnel overhead one mile away.  Luckily it didn’t touch down.

Today there is an abundance of information about tornadoes, how they are formed and where they have been that is available on the internet.  One particularly useful site is The Tornado Project from St. Johnsbury, Vermont.  People working on this project are assembling a chronological list of known tornadoes by state and by county in each state for as far back in history as possible.  There are a few missing storms in the database which is to be expected.  However they have compiled a huge amount of information about these fascinating and destructive winds.

The Colfax Tornado and its aftermath were important in developing a deep sense of wonder about tornadoes and at the same time an incurable fear of them.  It was later that same year when my parents let me watch "The Wizard of Oz" for the first time.  Having just seen a real tornado a couple months earlier the fake one in the movie was too much to bear.  On top of that the damned flying monkeys scared me as much as the tornado that took Dorothy and Toto on their magical mystery tour.  

To this day, 56 years later, anytime the sky turns black and takes on tints of green and maybe starts to rotate a bit my survival instincts kick in and I start to panic a bit thinking that I’ll be experiencing another Colfax Tornado sometime soon.  Whomever says that people quickly forget negative things that happen to them as a child should have been sitting with my mom and me that day in 1958 when my outlook on weather was changed forever.

How The Rick Scott Administration Can Address the Issue of Urinal Ball Theft on State Lands

This sign on the wall of the men’s room in the visitor’s center at the Homosassa Springs State Wildlife Park in Homosassa Springs Florida on May 26, 2014, was my first inkling that the theft of ammonia balls from urinals was such an issue in Florida that the Scott Administration had to take special steps to curtail the thievery.  After calling the Governor’s office and leaving five voice mails requesting information on the issue, and then being hung up on by a receptionist after I called a sixth time I decided to write to the Governor directly to get his learned input on the issue and to offer some suggestions on who the culprits might be and how to catch them.  That letter follows

May 31, 2014

Governor Rick Scott
The Capitol
400 S. Monroe St.
Tallahassee, Florida 32399-0001

Re:  Theft of urinal balls from State lands

Dear Rick

On Monday May 26, 2014 I stopped in at the Homosassa Springs State Park in Homosassa Springs and while in the visitor center I had occasion to use the men’s room.  While relieving myself at the one urinal in the men’s room I casually glanced up and looked at the wall.  As you know, being male and having used men’s rooms on occasion, the walls in men’s rooms are usually blank and uninspiring affairs.  However the wall in the men’s room at Homosassa Springs State Park was not.  On that wall, in plain sight (I guess that was the point) was a sign printed out from a State computer admonishing all males of any height and age to be certain that they did not steal urinal balls from the urinal.  I took a picture of the sign and have attached it for your edification.

It was not until last Monday that I had any inkling that urinal ball theft was such a problem that it would have to be pointed out to the pissing public.  Still, I’m elated to see that the Scott Administration finds this issue of such import that you have taken the bold step of warning wayward pissers that they should not be ripping off state-purchased urinal balls.  I have visited each of the state parks in Florida a minimum of six times now but apparently only Homosassa Springs State Park has been struck by urinal ball bandits.

Further research into this issue reveals that urinal ball theft is becoming a nationwide problem.  In fact just three days ago there was an incident in Alabama where the police arrested two perpetrators for grand theft urinal balls near Birmingham.  In that instance the perpetrators struck at five area restaurants and were so brazen that they also stole components of the actual toilets in addition to the urinal balls themselves.  The story from the Decatur (AL) News tells the story here:  

Apparently theft of urinal balls has now reached near epidemic proportions as far north as New York City.  The following tells the sad story there:  

 On April 1st [2013] the Parks Department discovered that thieves had stolen plumbing from the comfort station in Franz Siegel Park in the Bronx. The bathrooms have been out-of-service since. Last Saturday hundreds of ballplayers as well as friends and families were forced to find other places to relieve themselves. ”We have to go in the bushes,” said a member of the Canabacoa ball club playing on the poorly maintained fields. “We’re used to it.” According to the Parks Department, 4 flush valves (approximate value $500 each) were stolen. The agency replaced the valves this week and they should be open today.

There are other incidents of grand theft urinal ball from as far west as Houston where locals have described the incidents as being of “epidemic” proportions.  The reason for all of these thefts is to recover metal contained in the balls for sale as scrap metal – something I had no idea existed until I began researching this issue.

Immediately after leaving the men’s room at Homosassa Springs I phoned your office to find out what, aside from putting signs on a men’s room wall, the Scott Administration was doing to address this growing issue, however being Memorial Day your office was closed.  Throughout the day last Monday I called and left 5 voice mail messages asking for someone to call back so I could learn how the Florida public could help the Scott Administration to wipe out urinal ball theft on public lands.  Nobody ever returned my calls and when I called your office again on Wednesday this week and explained my concerns, the smarmy receptionist who took my call hung up on me.

Urinal balls cost about $4.35 a ball.  You can buy them in packets of 24 on Amazon.com for $105.  Given the apparent seriousness of this issue I think I might know where you could start looking for find the perpetrators and I wanted to pass on that information to you and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (and maybe the Florida Park Service police).  Given that you and the legislature have seen fit to not provide underpaid Florida state employees with a raise in salary for a minimum of 8 years now, my guess is that the urinal ball thieves are not casual visitors like me but in fact cash-strapped State employees trying simply to make ends meet. 

If I was you I would set up a surveillance camera in the men’s room and watch to see who might be pilfering those little aromatic balls of scrap metal. That or you could post one of your underpaid state employees by the door of the men’s room in the visitor center and have that person sniff the hands of every potential culprit who leaves the rest room.  I’d especially focus on people who hide their hands in their pockets and look down at the floor as they leave.

As a concerned Florida citizen I wanted to bring this issue to the attention of the top decision maker in the state.  In the end, I think this issue exists because state employees would prefer to piss on you personally, but lacking that ability they decided to pilfer your smelly balls instead.

Attachment

It's Wine O'Clock Somewhere

This South African Airways Airbus A340 sitting on the tarmac at the Cape Town airport took me to Johannesburg where I very reluctantly left one of the nicest nation’s on the planet.

If you ever get the chance to travel to South Africa don’t think about it, just do it.  I have now traveled to 111 countries on the six continents and one of my three most favorite is South Africa.  When that opportunity to travel presents itself there is only one airline to fly on to get there.  South African Airways, the flagship carrier for this wonderful nation will make you feel like you are already on a Durban beach or hiking the Drakensberg Mountains even before you leave the United States.  After you touch down in South Africa and stretch your legs for a few minutes, you simply must spend some time in the wonderful wine country east of Cape Town.  If you’ve didn't like wine before traveling to South Africa I can almost guarantee you will when you return home.  

This morning South African Airways posted a message on their Twitter feed that began with the words “It’s Wine O’Clock Somewhere.”  The message contained an advertisement for the Cape wine country and as I read the Twitter message and the story about the Cape wine district, and as my mind wandered back to the opening line “It’s Wine O’Clock Somewhere” I remembered a Friday afternoon at 5 O’Clock cover band I listened to in a bar in Lambert’s Bay near the end of my 5 week trip to South Africa.  It was a trip that resulted in the writing and publication of my book Sojourn to South Africa and in that book there is a story about that 5 O’Clock encounter with a cover band.  That story is recounted and remembered here:

Lambert’s Bay Hotel sits across the street from a giant fish processing plant that, understandably, reeks of fish.  Likewise the air in Lambert’s Bay reeks of fish.  I had guaranteed a reservation for a sea view room at the Lambert’s Bay Hotel and that is exactly what I received when I checked in.  If I stood on my bed and looked west over the roof of the belching fish processing plant I could view the sea in the distance.

The hotel bar was one of the town’s hotspots.  If you were a local and wanted to pick up a tourist from Cape Town or Johannesburg, then this was the place to be and be seen.  There in the Anchor Bar at precisely 5:00 p.m. on Friday afternoon, a local cover band took the stage.  Their first song was not some South African melody.  Instead it was a song about time and Jamaican vacations and the fact that no matter where you are on the planet it’s always 5 o’clock somewhere.  And it was in Lambert’s Bay and that is how the cover band got its start.  Next they sang “Changes in Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes” which was most appropriate when you are headed south toward increasingly smaller latitudes.  Then, as the sun was crossing a fictional yard arm on its descent to the South Atlantic, they played “Margaritaville” the national anthem of the Parrothead Nation.

How cool is that?  Here I was 9,000 miles from home in the southern hemisphere in a bar next to the ocean, surrounded by palm trees and the first music I heard was a threesome of Jimmy Buffett tunes.  Anyone who is not aware of Jimmy Buffett's worldwide impact and influence should have been sitting next to me in the Anchor Bar curled up with an ice cold bottle of Windhoek beer listening to this band near the south end of South Africa singing songs about time and latitudes and lost shakers of salt.

I Met The Person For Whom "You Can't Fix Stupid" Was Coined

This morning at my local Hess gasoline station I think I met the person for whom the phrase “You can’t fix stupid” was coined.  She was in her mid-late 20’s driving a small white car like mine and was wearing both a pink top and white shorts that appeared to be painted on her nearly perfect ass.  She pulled up at the pump next to mine and on exiting her car started the pump and on inserting the nozzle in her gas tank set the pump on automatic and returned to her car.  There she began a frenzied session of texting with someone.

She continued texting the entire time that her pump was pumping gas.  When I finished filling my 10 gallon tank I put away my nozzle and washed off my windows.  Meanwhile Ms Hardbody was burning up her fingers in her still-frenzied texting session.  

When I finished washing my windows I heard the distinctive sound of gasoline spilling out of a gas tank and onto the ground.  Obviously the automatic shut off had failed to work and the sound coming from the escaping gasoline sounded like a miniature Niagara Falls.  Concerned about her safety not to mention the wasted gasoline I knocked on her window to get her attention telling her that her gas tank was overflowing.  As I did she was still texting like crazy.  Thanking me for bringing it to her attention she ended the conversation saying “I’ll get it as soon as I finish this text.”

I looked at the gas pump.  It read $70 and some change and was still climbing as I walked back to my car.  The pump was still pumping and the woman was still texting as I drove out of the Hess gas station.  My guess is the gas pump was approaching $100 by now.  

I certainly hope the text message was worth it.

Black-eyed Peas and Corn Bread for Lunch

Thirty years ago today, in a truck stop along Interstate 20 near Cuba, Alabama, I had my first encounter with black-eyed peas and corn bread.  Happily it wasn’t the last time I tried them. 

Black-eyed Peas and Corn Bread for Lunch

Sumter County, Alabama

Spend the first 25 winters of your life in northern Wisconsin and you quickly acquire a fantasy-filled lust for anywhere south of the frost line.  Add that six more winters in North Dakota and soon despite being an atheist you begin to believe that if there is a heaven its somewhere along the Gulf Coast of the United States.  Sitting in a bare-walled one bedroom post-divorce apartment in Jamestown North Dakota one December night I watched the latest in a seemingly endless parade of blizzards blow through town on what local meteorologists called an “Alberta Clipper.” A clipper is just that – a fast moving system of fast moving wind and fast moving snow and quickly plummeting frigid temperatures that were probably in Alberta just an hour earlier. As the night dragged on and the snow blew sideways I watched a news story about the United States invading the tiny island of Grenada in the southern Caribbean.  All the video showed was palm trees and tropical beaches and tropical heat and most especially not one scintilla of a smidgen of snow. I looked out my living room window and saw barren aspen trees and Arctic wind and snow drifts and I knew that something had to change and it had to change before another Alberta Clipper glued me to my apartment for another excruciating storm. 

That change came several months later when I was selected for a position in Athens Georgia on the campus of the venerable University of Georgia.  I had several misgivings about living in Georgia and many of them centered on the fact that people there are still upset that former U.S. Army General William Tecumseh Sherman turned Atlanta into a bonfire as he rode through town on his way to Savannah.  Still, despite its shortcomings, Georgia was much warmer than Jamestown, North Dakota and I hurriedly and excitedly accepted the position. 

The research I was expected to conduct would begin in Michigan in June and I arrived in Athens in early May and for a month I had little to do but open my pores and let in the warmth.  My supervisor, a man named Don who grew up in North Louisiana, and who said that squirrel brain was his most favorite meal as a child, was conducting research at Yazoo National Wildlife Refuge in Mississippi and he asked me to join him for a trip to the Delta.  Having never seen Alabama (through which we would have to travel) or Mississippi I quickly accepted Don’s offer.

Don had received his PhD from the University of Arkansas and was as fervent a fan of the Razorbacks as I am of the Wisconsin Badgers.  I first noticed this as we drove into Greenville, Mississippi on the banks of the Mississippi River and Don saw a sign for the bridge to Arkansas.  When he saw the word “Arkansas” he broke into a perfect University of Arkansas “Woooooo-Pig-Sooooooie” chant.  Personally I prefer the more civilized “Fuck ‘em Bucky” chant of the University of Wisconsin but that is just me.  Don and I spent two days at Yazoo National Wildlife Refuge collecting bird eggs for pesticide analysis, and then began the long trek back to Athens.

On our return we traversed the center of Mississippi and intersected Interstate 20 near Jackson.  We then followed it east and crossed the border into Alabama at about noon just in time for lunch at Billy Bob’s Bar-b-Que and Bait Shop near Cuba, Alabama.  That is not the name of the place but it should be.  Don was attracted to Billy Bob’s because a freeway billboard announced a “down-home southern buffet lunch” every day but Sunday.  Don, in his perfect southernese accent pronounced “buffet” as “buff-aaay.”  It was imperative that we stop for lunch because as the billboard said in a small reminder at its bottom it was closed on Sunday, the day that “the Lord wants us to rest and he wants y’all to rest too.” 

Billy Bob’s had a huge spread of food laid out and being a truck stop the restaurant lacked any semblance of ambiance.  Its walls were bare of any art work except pictures of Peterbilt trucks (one sign said “Old truckers never die. They just get a new Peterbilt”), the stench of diesel fumes was everywhere and Willie Nelson crooned loudly and hoarsely through speakers placed at intervals along every wall.   This certainly was not the restaurant in the Plaza Hotel in New York City. In fact it wasn’t even the Country Kitchen in Grand Island, Nebraska.  It was Billy Bob’s and there was no denying that fact.

Before this trip my total experience with eating southern food had been restricted to two incidents each of which was indelibly etched in my brain.  The first was my only-ever meal of biscuits and gravy consumed in a truck stop restaurant near Paducah, Kentucky.  I had to try it because the name on the menu sounded inviting and almost everyone anywhere south of Indianapolis eats biscuits like they are popcorn.  What the waitress placed in front of me when my meal arrived reminded me more of what my dog had thrown up than it did any culinary delight of southern travel.   Reluctantly but bravely I ate the biscuits and gravy and just like after your first time having sex when the meal was over I wondered what all the excitement was about.  The meal stuck with me literally and figuratively and now nearly 40 years later I can still taste it.  My other southern culinary delight was grits (or “greeutz” in perfectly spoken southernese) that crossed my palate in a restaurant at Oden’s Dock on the Outer Banks of North Carolina a year after my first and only bout of dog biscuits and gravy.  At least with enough butter and pepper, grits were bearable and they didn’t look like dog vomit.

The lunch buffet at Billy Bob’s contained no biscuits and gravy because, mercifully, we were there after breakfast but there was a huge crock pot full of grits.  Along with them was every southern food imaginable.  One container held boiled okra and another held collard greens. Next to it was turnip greens and there was a huge vat of green beans complete with the little hunks of ham that make it southern.  There was also cauliflower and mustard greens and poke (not polk!) salad.  There was country ham (someday I want someone to explain the difference between country ham and city ham because it all looks the same) and hush puppies and succotash and boiled potatoes (“balled ‘taters” in perfect southernese) and sweet taters and pimento cheese and a strange kind of bean with a black spot on it.  Over on the meat table was more ham and more chicken and pulled pork and beef steak and shrimp and oysters and something that was passed off as jambalaya and almost everything was fried.  None of it was simply fried.  It was all southern fried.

Don returned to the table and his plate was filled with a sampling of almost everything that Billy Bob offered.  His plate also contained those curious beans with the black thing on them that I had never seen before so I asked Don, “What are those funny looking beans you’re eating?”

“These,” Don began, “are black-eyed peas.  Haven’t you ever eaten black-eyed peas before?”

When I admitted that I had never seen let alone eaten black-eyed peas Don motioned for the waitress to approach our table. When he did each of the 50 other patrons seated at the buff-aaaay lunch at Billy Bob’s turned to listen.  “Ma’am,” Don began in his finest southernese, “This god-damned Yankee sitting here has never had black-eyed peas. Can you believe that, ma’am?”

The waitress Bonnie, complete with a bouffant hair do, had a shocked look on her face as she turned to me and drawled “is that right?” (Only in Bonnie-speak it sounded like she said a long drawn-out “riot”).  Admitting my transgression, Bonnie looked at me with the same level of shock and disgust as the 50 other people in Billy Bob’s, each of whom now knew that a black-eyed pea virgin Yankee was in their midst.

Don turned to the still-shocked Bonnie and drawled, “Ma’am would y’all fix him a mess of those mighty fine black-eyed peas, please?”

Bonnie turned to me and asked “Do y’all want corn bread with your black-eyed peas?”

Not knowing the proper etiquette of black-eyed pea consumption, I replied, sheepishly, “Are you supposed to eat corn bread with black-eyed peas?”

Bonnie, now on the verge of cardiac arrest, bellowed “of COURSE you eat corn bread with black-eyed peas!”  I could tell she wanted to add “you ignorant god-damned Yankee,” however her proper southern upbringing would not allow it.

I timidly dug into the black-eyed peas and washed them down with fresh corn bread as Bonnie stood over me, right hand on her right hip shaking her head in disbelief that anyone more than one year old had never had black-eyed peas.   The other patrons kept shoveling in fried everything as I found myself wanting nothing but black-eyed peas and corn bread.  In fact the meal was so good I had seconds, and black-eyed peas and corn bread was all I had for lunch.  

More Than Just Fish Stories Are Told on Great Abaco Island

Great Abaco Island in the northeast corner of the Bahamas is a must-visit place for anyone interested in bone fishing, chilling out, and seeing cool West Indian birds.  It also seems to be a place where self-proclaimed Jimmy Buffett "experts" find out that they really aren't.

One thing I have learned since moving to Florida is that everyone south of Indianapolis claims to have met Jimmy Buffett at least twice and everyone south of Chattanooga has had Jimmy out on their boat seemingly every time its keel hits the water.  

Great Abaco Island in the Bahamas is most definitely a Jimmy Buffett sort of place to be.  Boating and sailing are two of the biggest attractions and bonefishing on the "Marls" west of the island are a close third in importance.  The sun bakes here and tourists waste away here and usually the most strenuous thing you can do on Great Abaco is hold yourself up at the bar after two too many Kalik beers.

The Conch Inn Hotel and Marina with its famous Conch Crawl Restaurant and Conch Out bar was right across the street from the Lofty Fig where I stayed for a week my last time on Great Abaco.  Jimmy Buffett admonishes all of his disciples to eat seafood “only when you can see the ocean” and at the Conch Crawl Restaurant that is easily accomplished because most of the place is built on stilts out over the water. You’d have to be blind to miss the ocean here.  Their menu included blackened grouper and the Conch Out Bar had lots of ice-cold Kalik Beer so I was a happy camper.

The Conch Inn and Marina in Marsh Harbour is one of the best places on the island to do absolutely nothing.

As I ate my dinner and absorbed a bottle of Kalik, I couldn’t help but hear an obnoxious 30-something American sitting at the bar trying to impress three stunning 20- something South Florida beach blondes (can’t blame a guy for trying).  His line of bullshit was all about Jimmy Buffett so I listened intently.  Much of what he said was wrong.

“When I met Jimmy the last week of April, 1992, he was sailing from the West Palm Beach to St. Maarten. He sailed right into this dock, got out and bought us all a beer.”

I knew this was a bald faced lie because I met Jimmy backstage at his concert in Fort Lauderdale during the last week of April 1992. He had just come back from bone fishing in the Ragged Islands.  He was no where near Abaco or a sailboat that week. I listened more closely.  The blowhard continued to lay it on.

He professed to be an authority on Buffett and was laying the bullshit on thick to these three absolute babes who were obviously Parrotheads.  He sealed his fate, however, when he pronounced to his covey that “Margaritaville was Jimmy’s first top 10 hit.” I knew then I had to take action. 

Finishing my meal I paid the tab and then slowly walked back past the blowhard.  When I was even with him I stopped.

“Sounds like you really know your Jimmy Buffett music,” I started.  “Do you sing his songs when you play your guitar?”

He said that he did.

I then said, “Do you know where Jimmy was standing when he heard that he first made the top 10, and what was that song?”

“Oh, that’s easy,” he boasted. “He was in Key West and the song was Margaritaville. I just told these girls that before you showed up.”

“Well, partner,” I said, “you’re dead wrong.  Jimmy was in a music store in London, England, when he first heard that Come Monday was his first song to hit the top 10.”

“Oh.”

I then asked “What language is Jimmy singing in when he does the chorus in “One Particular Harbour?”

“Oh, that’s easy. He’s singing in Spanish.”

“Wrong. He’s singing in Tahitian.”

“Oh.”

“Jimmy owns a ranch in south Georgia that he uses for what purpose?”

“He goes there fishing.”

“No. He owns it for quail hunting.”

By now he’s starting to sweat a little because he can tell the beach blondes realize he’s full of Cheney.  I then put him out of his misery.

“Okay,” I said. “Here’s your last question. – What is the name of the dolphin in the song “Jolly Mon Sing”? 

He said “That’s easy. I sing that song all the time. The dolphin’s name is…” He stammered and stuttered a bit and finally said “I don’t know.”  The first truthful thing he’d said all night.

“The dolphin’s name is Albion.  You would only know that if you were actually a Parrothead.  We know the answers to the questions I just asked you.  I personally think you’re full of shit and so do these three women.”

I expected to get hit in the mouth but instead when he realized that he’d lost all face, he stood up from his chair and bolted for the exit. As I did one of the three hot south Florida blondes he was trying to impress chimed in saying "That guy Alex is such a pompous ass.  We were getting so sick of him, and then you came along and put him in his place. It was perfect timing.”

What would have actually been perfect timing would have been meeting those three about 30 years earlier.