Fish, Fur and Fun
It was glorious to see the larger Edgar community assembled on lawn chairs up and down Third Ave. on Sunday for the Edgar Fire Department’s annual Homecoming parade. The parade is always an early summer highlight, but especially so after a year of COVID-19 isolation. Normal proceeded as normal. People set up their chairs in exactly the same spots as in years past. People were friendly, happy to say hello. I had a number of pleasant exchanges with folks. This is one of those good news stories. The bonds of community persisted against the ravages of the coronavirus.
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Our backyard owls have departed. Other animals have returned.
I now regularly see snakes, frogs and rabbits doing their thing. The rabbits have been especially plentiful and, as they are so inclined, have ventured into our backyard vegetable patch.
The damage to date has been negligible, but that hasn’t kept either my wife, Susan, or I from charging after the bunnies with the full indignant fury of Farmer MacGregor.
The rabbits go spinning in frightened circles around the fenced in garden until, in desperation, they zip out of a spot where the soil is low and they can fit through.
A rabbit I chased zinged through a hole in our worse-forwear wooden garden fence. The rabbit escape tells us where to fortify our fencing system to prevent further hare incursions.
The war between people and rabbits is an endless game. I think it must amuse the rabbits to no end.
My strategy is to try and eat all of the garden’s leafy greens before the rabbits do. We’ve been dining on tender lettuce and tossing baby bok choy in our stir fries. Take that you wassacly wabbit.
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We are creatures of habit, no doubt.
On Saturday, I caught a nine-inch brook trout on the Prairie River with a No. 14 Light Hendrickson. And then I caught another one. And another one.
After I caught about a dozen nine-inch fish in the space of an hour I started to conclude that this section of river was populated only with this one size of fish.
That was the evidence presented. I, of course, threw all of the fish back.
And that’s when things went crazy.
An enormous fish, I assume a gargantuan brown trout, caused a massive, loud fish swirl three feet behind me. I was actually frightened. It sounded like someone heaved a bowling ball into the river.
That fish was probably the largest trout in Prairie River history and I waded right past it. Now I wonder what my fishing adventure had been like if I ignored the evidence and guessed that a fish like that was actually hanging out in the watery depths.
E VERYWHERE I GO I FIND A PAL
PETER WEINSCHENK
EDITOR
