Close-to-home fun

As an outdoors writer for the past 39 years, I’ve become accustomed to “gallavanting” around the country fishing, hunting and collecting material for my articles. Lately though, I’ve been sticking pretty close to home.

Kenneth Shephard with a good “eater size” gar. Photo by Luke ClaytonMy wife had shoulder surgery a couple weeks ago and I’ve been serving as chief cook, bottle washer and caregiver to her and her cats (she’s no problem but the cats have been a challenge). Thanks to some great friends very close to home that allow me to hunt and fish on their land, I have managed to get out for a bit just about every day and head to my happy place back in the woods or on one of the ponds to wet a hook.

Gar have moved into the shallows to spawn and turkeys are doing what turkeys do this time of year, the gobblers are gobbling their heads, strutting and showing off for the hens that are moving out of their winter haunts in search of that perfect nesting spot. Bowfishing for gar with a good friend and a little pre-season turkey calling and photography has provided the fodder for this week’s column.

Gar first

One of my close-to-home friend’s gravel pit has an abundance of gar, mostly alligator and spotted gar with an occasional needle nose. Kenneth is an expert shot with anything that launches an arrow or bullet, and when he called the other day and informed me that gar had moved into the shallow flooded areas of his pond and inquired if I might wish to come over and do some bowfishing, I was all in.

The wheels began to turn. This would make a great segment for the TV show that I do with Larry Weishuhn and Jeff Rice. “A Sportsman’s Life” airs weekly on Carbon TV and YouTube as well as several other places. I calculated that I could make the mile drive to Kenneth’s, film him shooting an ‘eater’ gar in an hour or so and build a segment of our show around the event complete with a ‘wrap up’ cooking gar nuggets on an open fire the next day.

We arrived at the gravel pit which was elongated with a dogleg in the middle. Recent rainfall had caused the water to flood some adjacent lowland and this is where the majority of gar were spawning. The afternoon was sunny and the temperature in the mid-70s, gar had moved into the really skinny warmer water close to the bank.

Gar can be spooky when in very shallow water and one’s shadow will send them scurrying to deeper water. We had the sun at our back and Kenneth was careful to stay far enough from the water’s edge to avoid spooking the fish, using shoreline brush for cover when making the shot.

Kenneth invited me to shoot but I declined. I needed to get back home in an hour or so and opted to serve as cameraman, besides my buddy was more practiced with his bowfishing rig and I figured his aim would be better. Our goal was for one ‘eater’ size gar around two to three feet in length.

As we rounded a tree lined bend in the pond, a couple of nesting greater Canada geese spooked and began paddling across the shallows to the far bank where they probably had a nest. Kenneth says the pair nest here every spring, raise their young and then fly away until the next year.

Observing wildlife is a big part of any outdoor outing to me and I couldn’t help but wonder where this mated pair spent the remainder of their year. With my video camera rolling, I locked in on Kenneth slowly approaching a long, dark spot in the water about five feet from shore. It was a 30-inch gar, perfect for my plans with the cast iron skillet, cornmeal and hot cooking oil. His shot was perfect, and I was soon on my way back home where I made short work of removing the two snow white backstraps from the gar.

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I trimmed the meat well, cubed it into nuggets and applied a liberal amount of seasoning and into the fridge it went to marinate for a few hours.

Fried to a crispy golden brown over a wood fire at my little cabin behind the house, the gar was very tasty. Gar is a bit chewier than catfish, but the flavor is very good when eaten fresh.

Next time, I plan to make gar balls by first boiling the meat and mixing chopped peppers, onion, garlic along with salt and pepper, forming the mixture into balls a bit smaller than golf balls and dusting with corn meal before frying. I’ve had this dish before and found it to be very tasty and easy to prepare but never made it myself. We are already planning round two with the gar and another cooking session.

On to the turkey

A few years ago, Rio Grande wild turkey were stocked close to my home, and it appears each year the population is growing. Although hunting season is still probably years away, I have a lot of fun each spring filming the birds during the breeding season with still and video cameras.

This past week, I packed my old hen decoy, some camo netting, my box call and cameras back to the corner of a fence that proved to be a perfect spot to construct a quick blind. A few subtle hen yelps and I heard a gobbler answer back in the brush.

Each time I called, his answer gobble rattled the leaves on the trees. He was hot and as they say, coming to me as though on a string. With each call, his answer was closer. He was coming and I turned the camera in the direction of his approach and waited.

This was textbook turkey hunting, even though I was using cameras instead of shotgun or bow. A big gobbler in full strut reminds me of the American flag with all the bright colors contrasting an otherwise pale green early spring landscape.

My gobbler stayed long enough to become the star of this week’s show and his still image will hopefully grace the pages of an outdoor magazine or two in upcoming months. Another close to home adventure and within the hour I was back home checking on the wife and downloading the images.

Where there is a will there is a way.