Find The River

Largemouth bass="Ditch Pickles"

I like it.

Was looking over my bills yesterday, including my phone bill, which is one of the few I still get in paper form. I've been meaning to change that situation but always manage to get around to something else first. Apparently, I'm not the only person who dawdles about this: the envelope I opened yesterday promised me that should I "go paperless" I would not only spare trees in the future, but would have a tree planted in my name.


This is a well-established form of persuasion. Taken at face value it sounds unimpeachable, but I do wonder exactly where and in what circumstances the trees are planted. If they established along a crumbling riverbank to halt erosion, great. If they are added to the ranks of lumber plantation, not so good. Too, forests are not the only habitat in need of restoration. What about grasslands, which face the double threat of development and, if not maintained by cutting or fire, forestation. Where should the creatures that depend on that habitat go?

Perhaps companies or nonprofits that sponsor "plant a tree incentives" ought to offer a choice to have a tree cut on behalf of the customer or donor. They could not only cut trees to preserve grasslands, but offer to cut exotic, invasive tree or shrub species. They could cut overgrown forests that have animal populations in decline (which ought to appeal to hunters) or cut sterile pine plantations and sell the wood at a loss (for which of course they could claim a charitable deduction). To simplify the process, they might just present "native prairie restoration" as the feelgood bonus for accepting the offer at hand.

But reforestation is the embodiment of conservation in the public mind, the most iconic form of greening the land. This is not a bad thing, but there are deeper shades of green. Is there room for those within our routine household transactions? With only a little imagination, the answer could be, yes.

With summer coming nigh, fishing is on my brain. How much of it I get to do is in doubt.

Lots of projects on my plate--teaching two courses, revising courses for next fall, helping design a curriculum for a new minor in sustainability studies, and a new writing project whose nature remains vague. I want to write about literature of Ohio's Maumee valley (wherein I happen to teach). There is precious little of it, but I think it deserves some notice. That there is any would come as a shock to many people.

There is much work on the house to be done too. We're considering a move to the Toledo area next year, so we need to get this ready to sale. Given the market, we need to make this dwell nothing short of swoon-worthy.

All the same I will be scrounging out some water time. I plan a few days the week after next somewhere or other. I'll let the spirit move me in a suitable direction when the time comes. I plan to head north at least a couple times a month. And with a relatively dry spring (until now) the Huron should be fishable early this summer.

What this means is blog fodder. Daily writing is unlikely, but I will be on at least once a week. This is not of great consequence to many people but I'm feeling the need more now--this site has become a nagging itch. I hope I am inspired to continue writing, if only because writing inspires me in whatever I write about.

So I'm back after what felt like a very long winter. Coming out from blog hibernation.

Since I was here last, things have been pretty routine. No excuse for not posting except laziness. This is of interest to few people, I know, but I still regret not keeping up with the blog. I've been more acutely aware lately of needing a creative outlet.

I did get out fishing on April 1st, at Stockerfest. My best venture there yet, landing 7 trout in a couple hours. Thought about going back today but not in the mood to head out there before dawn to beat the crowds. I slept till 7 as in investment in well being. Maybe next Friday.

Beautiful if cool weather this weekend. Sadly, I'll be mowing the lawn for the first time this year--fallout from those two weeks of summerlike weather we enjoyed for a couple weeks prior to Easter.

Happy spring, everyone. Come back often.

Friday catblogging is SO 2004...but since we've gotten a new kitty, I think it's fitting today.

Meet Sully:






We got him before new years. Some friends of one of our nieces had seen him wandering her neighborhood and took him in, but couldn't keep him. We had planned to take a longer break from pets after losing Pavlov, but with this guy on the verge of being sent to Animal Control, we couldn't resist. He spent most of his first week hiding in the basement and has warmed to us slowly. Given that now he has no problem jumping into our bed at 3 am and begging for food (sorry dude, no dice), I'd say he's settled in.

He's not a cuddly cat like Pavlov, but he is very playful. It'll be fun having him.

An article from the Michigan Messenger today examines plans for biomass power generation plants afoot in northwestern Michigan. In spite of the economic development that might come along with these plants, residents of the affected areas aren't altogether keen on this venture into sustainable power:

Mancelona is facing severe economic stress. The auto parts manufacturer that was the town’s major employer closed last year. Yet, despite the community’s pressing need for jobs, at a public hearing on the company’s air permit application last month, locals focused on potential environmental problems associated with the plant.

The town is also the site of an immense plume of groundwater contamination, and locals raised concerns that plant operations could spread groundwater contamination into the air and that emissions and truck traffic associated with the proposed plant could further degrade the area.

“I’ve seen too many lies in here,” area resident Stuart A. Rogers Sr. said during the hearing, “ … these plants don’t produce 30 jobs.”

In Traverse City, officials have suspended the proposed biomass plant to evaluate other energy options.

It's a complicated issue, touching on air pollution, deforestation, broader patterns of land use and, of course, economic recovery.

My suggestion: Open the plant in southern Michigan and fuel it with exotics like buckthorn, honeysuckle, and multiflora. Cut down some of the overgrown forests in so-called game areas and improve hunting opportunities.

This unlikely and probably unrealistic. But it would address an ecological problem. People are worried that there isn't enough forest to sustain the proposed plants up north. Down here, we may not have as much forest, but we have too much of the wrong kinds of forest. At least in this hunter's view.

I have wanted to begin writing here again. But at the same time I've been studiously avoiding it. There are various excuses, though the root cause is that I simply am not up to the introspection that usually comes with writing, even in its mundane forms. (Why this is I'm not clear on myself.) That explains partly why my posts last summer and fall tended toward tightly factual accounts of fishing or hunting trips.

Keeping up on the surface of things has been an effective short term survival strategy. But I am more and more conscious feeling hobbled, spiritually and mentally, and I fear too I could acquire a permanent internal limp.

Relax. That's as far as I'll take the navel gazing today. I don't know if I'll venture into any of these matters here later, though writing about anything, if I'm at my best, often forces some attention on my inner life, even if I never address it directly.

To update you on the really important matters...

I did have a nice grouse hunt over break, seeing two and shooting one. Didn't end up with any ducks in my bag after three more trips, but found some promising spots for next season and have plans for lots of scouting between now and then. Stockerfest on the Huron river is less than three months away now, and the trout opener less than four.

I probably find more grounds for optimism in the outdoor life than in anything else. Many people claim to have been saved from despair by nature. I wonder if this is simply because it holds out so many possibilities for what do do next?