9/19/11 WE SO OFTEN FAIL TO COUNT OUR BLESSINGS

DAWN ON OPENING DAY

TURKEYS EVERYWHERE

DECOYS

BILL AND ZODIAC

ART AND ZODY

Monday, 8:30 AM.  55 degrees, wind SSW, calm.  The sky is cloudless and the humidity 45%. We got almost a half inch of rain while we were gone, and the barometer predicts more; perhaps tonight.  We did not see too many signs of fall color on our trip except for sumac turning, and a few red maples.
    The goose hunting trip was a success on all counts.  Good visit with old friends Bill and Allene and their children and grandchildren, and three successful morning hunts; three geese on opening day and one each of the two following days.  We had a few more opportunities that were missed (Bill seldom does, I often do).  The mornings were cloudy and damp but with little actual rain.  We would have lost two  of the geese as cripples except for Bill’s dog Zodiac, a Chesapeake bitch with a great nose.  The geese we shot were all migratory geese, weighing between 6.5 and 9 pounds.  The local geese, much larger and called “giants,” were evidently not flying.  The migratory geese, not yet educated, decoyed nicely. 
    We saw many flocks of turkeys, particularly on Hwy. 70 between Fifefield and Minocqua, a forty mile stretch where we saw probably a hundred birds picking gravel along the roadside.  We also saw eagles and deer, and there were hundreds of sandhill cranes constantly moving about while we goose hunted. They are protected but still very wary and I couldn’t get a decent photo of them.
    We sometimes forget that our conservation efforts have paid off in many, many major ways over the years and are too quick to be critical of everything.  A half century ago we would have been overjoyed to shoot a couple of geese, and we would never have seen a turkey or a sandhill crane or an eagle, let alone a wolf.  In fifty years turkeys have established nesting populations throughout the state, and bald eagles have become almost common.  Back then geese were the accepted symbols of wildness (remember the old song, “Wild Goose, Brother Goose?).  Now we shoo them from the golf courses with dogs. We so often fail to count our blessings.